Re: Could the president visit Area 51?


Message posted by Peter Merlin on March 15, 2010 at 21:08:35 PST:

On 29 September 1995, President Bill Clinton signed Presidential Determination No. 95-45, which acknowledged the existence of “the United States Air Force’s operating location near Groom Lake."

It had been acknowledged four decades earlier through an announcement distributed to 18 media outlets in Nevada and Utah including a dozen newspapers, four radio stations, and two television stations. On 18 May 1955, the Atomic Energy Commission's Las Vegas Field Office announced construction of "a small, satellite Nevada Test Site installation” a few miles northeast of Yucca Flat and within the Las Vegas Bombing and Gunnery Range.

In May 1957, the AEC issued an information booklet called “Background Information on Nevada Nuclear Tests” to news media covering the Operation Plumbbob atomic test series. It noted that during 1955, “construction of a small facility at Watertown, in the Groom Lake area at the northeast corner of the Test Site, was announced.

In November 1959, an AEC spokesman announced: “Sheet metal workers needed at the Groom Lake Project 51 in the Nevada Test Site are constructing a butler-type building.” The spokesman said that the building would be used to “house data reduction equipment for use by Edgerton, Germeshausen, and Grier in an Air Force program.” The announcement was made because of publicity generated by a labor dispute.

On 15 January 1960, the "N.T.S. Bulletin," an unclassified newsletter for Test Site workers published new Area 51 telephone numbers on the front page. The announcement included contact numbers for the Base Commander’s Office, Security Office, and REECo.


In Reply to: Re: Could the president visit Area 51? posted by Hank on March 15, 2010 at 15:06:54 PST:

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