Into the sky in this picture once flew the rockets of Operation Bumblebee. Early rocketry in the 1940s dominated this piece of beach I look out on today. The thought was there was a need to protect the coast at the time. Some things never change. To enhance the protection of the coast, rockets were tested that were to eventually act as long range missiles. Where I sit typing this was government property and very secretive was the activity here. A great deal was learned from this time of testing the ramjet propulsion that needed a little boost to get where it needed to go. Sound familiar?
Dotted along this coast are still what we call “Towers” that served as observatories in measuring and studying the nuances of the rockets that did well and…well…the ones that did not do so well. One of them, Tower 5, was converted in to a house that now serves as rental property. Carrie, my dear wife, and I stayed there in the summer of 2011. It was very cool.
What is not cool is that I had to get to the place they did this work to find out about it. Sure, it was a secret at the time. This secret has been too well kept for too long. Thankfully there is museum at the south of the island in the little strip called Topsail Beach. Missiles and More houses a plethora of history and artifacts about this special place in time. There is, as the name suggests, more there too. Too much for me to mention because someone would be left out and you don’t want to make the WASPs of the day mad now. That isn’t White Anglo Saxon Protestant either.
You can look it up.
While you look that up, I will continue to look up to the open skies around here now and again.
I might see something like this…a CH 43. It is very large.
Today alone I have seen Osprey, Hueys, CH 43s, C-130s, and something else I was not sure of.
Less than thirty miles to the north of us is Camp Lejeune. This is a LARGE Marine Corps Base. This is where our air show originates. Know that Carrie and I have a soft heart for these aviators. Our son, Jarrett, served on a Blackhawk in the Army himself. Helicopters are our friends.
All this talk of rockets and aircraft reminds me of the guy I am reading the biography of this week.
The authorized biography of Neil Armstrong.
What a guy.
Not that this is indicative of Neil, but I must say I am so glad we had no twitter or facebook accounts when we were sending guys to into space in the early going. Some nutball out there would have surely put together a campaign or two based on half-truths or no-truth that would have probably derailed one of these guys from making the history they made for all of us.
Never mind me. I am going to go look at the open skies and dream about a better place.
Speaking the rights.
Danny Johnson