Writing these regular posts on HH has begun to stir up the sludge at the very bottom of my brain, and some interesting things are coming to the top, like this one;

The prairies of South Dakota, and I believe North Dakota and Montana housed America’s Knockout Punch during the Cold War, in the form of missile silos housing nuclear arms aimed directly at specific places in the USSR.  While these silos seemed modest from the road, they in fact went at least thirty feet underground, where two men sat in a shock-proof capsule round the clock waiting for the President of the United States to call on a Big Red Telephone.

Nowadays the National Park Service has purchased one of these and turned it into a surprisingly popular park where they showcase this rather obscure facet of Cold War history.  But back then it was really serious stuff, when we thought about it.  I guess we didn’t think about it too much or we all would have drank a lot more.  I sometimes think we should have been offended that all of that firepower was placed in our backyards, because more than likely several Comrades were sitting by a Big Red Telephone in the USSR waiting for the word to obliterate our summer pastures.  I can almost imagine the conversation at the Pentagon before the silos were installed out here.

“So, what would be our losses if the USSR struck the heartland with a nuclear weapon?”

“Well based on our reconaissance, it would be forty hicks and a cow, tops.  Certainly sustainable, if somewhat unfortunate.”

Back to the story, with apologies for that digression.  The silos were manned by teams of airmen from Ellsworth AFB near Rapid City.  The psychological strain of spending large portions of your week in a cow pasture in the backwater waiting for the President to call was probably greater than any of us could appreciate.  These airmen spent something around three days at a time in a missile silo, and then returned to Base.  Their blue pickups and suburbans on the main roads became a fixture in western South Dakota, and most of them got used to waving back at us when they drove by.

One road that they used to get to the silos went by the Elm Springs School.  We would often see them driving by while we were on recess, and we would wave and they would wave back.

Elm Springs is fifteen miles north of nowhere.  While we have had our share of small-time miscreants and dustups, we have had no serious threats to our security ever.  The Elm Springs School has about the same level of danger on a daily basis as Sherriff Roscoe P. Coltrane ever had.

So we were very surprised one day during the middle of school to find four airmen at the door.  Our teacher answered the door and there were two airmen at the top of the stairs and two at the bottom, sort of flanking the formation, ready for trouble.  One of the men at the door addressed the teacher while the other one peered intently through the windows like he was looking for Mikhail Gorbachev.

“Good day, ma’am,” said the one doing the talking.  “What can we do for you?”  Our teacher responded in words and facial expressions that we really didn’t have any pressing need of four jumpy airmen, and then proceeded to ask them what caused all the ruckus.

“Well, ma’am,” the talker said somewhat sheepishly, “your ah, flag, is upside down, so we thought we needed to respond.”

And it was.  Two of us kids ran the Stars & Stripes up in the front yard every morning, and whoever had done it that day wasn’t paying attention and hung it upside down, which is a sign of distress.  We hurried up and turned it around.

Boy, we learned a lot that day!

I would like to thank the airmen and women who spent parts of their lives out here manning the missile silos in our defense.  And stopping to rescue the Elm Springs School.