Cold War Detroit Information

[M CD M]

On a recent trip to DFD HQ, I was given a bunch of civil defense binders.
All of them are mostly from the late 1980's. But one of the binders was one of the "Holy Grails" i've been after. It the master list of Fallout Shelters for Detroit and Wayne county.
I have been mapping these locations on a google map.
I'm on page 6 out of 24 pages in plotting these locations.
Majority of the black and yellow signs are gone. But I'd thought I'd share
with the forum.

Here's the link to the Detroit ones i've done so far, The rest of wayne county will be on a different map.

CLICK HERE FOR THE MAP

[dodgemain]

Nice work. I'm sure some of our history mavens will be chimeing in.

[Ray1936]

Fun project, McdM! I know the sign is still out front at 1300 Beaubien, the DPD HQ.

For what it's worth, here's a sign in my garage that is the EXACT OPPOSITE of a fallout shelter sign! It came from the Nevada Test Site, about 60 miles up the road from here.

[Retroit]

I'm amazed that there were so many.

• How many were there altogether?
• Are the occupant capacities listed, and would all of them together have been able to accommodate the entire population?
• How many of them would have offered any real protection in the event of a nuclear bombing? Is there any categorization/classification for level of protection?

Thanks for sharing!

[lpg]

I noticed that the sign is still in front of my old elementary school. Hoover Elementary in Lincoln Park.

[M CD M]

I'm amazed that there were so many.

• How many were there altogether?
• Are the occupant capacities listed, and would all of them together have been able to accommodate the entire population?
• How many of them would have offered any real protection in the event of a nuclear bombing? Is there any categorization/classification for level of protection?

Thanks for sharing!

The map is just for the address's I have.
The other part of the binder is in two parts.
One part is for RAC [[Reception and care facility)
The other is for NFS [[National Facility Survey),
Both list capacity's.
RAC is for the injured, so how many people can fit in a space to be properly cared for.
NFS is listed as PF CAT [[protection factor - category) for spaces and RBP SPACES [[relative blast protection).

But here's the kicker.

Midland School in Highland Park has signs on the inside[[and outside) that show a capacity of 90 [[inside sign only shows numbers).
But my list shows a capacity of 327. So I assume that it means that above staff and students, they can have 90 more people inside.


The PF cat list as 0 [[no protection) 1 [[low protection) 2-3 [[good protection) and 4+ [[nest protection), midland is in the 2-3 cat. And a 0 for RBP.


I've been thru Lincoln park and only found the Police Dept and the old Post office to have signs. I must of missed that school.
Hoover school in LP has 777 PF 0 spaces, 1065 PF 1 spaces, total Basement 1065, But it also has 1278 RBP spaces.

[Lowell]

Great idea M CD M. Thanks. I always wonder if a few of them still have old rusting buckets of emergency provisions, blankets and such in some forgotten room.

[cman710]

I noticed a few weekends ago that the old Highland Park Police Headquarters off Woodward still has a fallout shelter sign near its front entrance. I would not be surprised if the old City Hall and Fire Department Headquarters also contained shelters, but I did not notice any remaining signs.

[Khartoum]

Great work M CD M

[M CD M]

Highland Park Court building had a sign, I have a photo of it. But someone took it down. The FD building was a EOC [[Emergency Operations Center) and was only for personal [[ no basement, and only has a PF of 1, So probably no signs). The Police Dept, Fire station 3 and City Hall are on the list as well. I never saw a sign on City hall, But I did on Mcgregor Library .

[Danny]

The Cold War is over, but the terrorist war begins. Those Bomb Shelters will be useful in case of a nuclear attack from Al-Qaida and other Jihadist terrorist network.

[Retroit]

What shelters had the highest PF or RBP?

[[Just to keep my options open should Ahmadinejad get trigger-happy.)

[ferntruth]

The Cold War is over, but the terrorist war begins. Those Bomb Shelters will be useful in case of a nuclear attack from Al-Qaida and other Jihadist terrorist network.

Yeah, duck and cover Danny! Duck and cover!

[M CD M]

What shelters had the highest PF or RBP?

[[Just to keep my options open should Ahmadinejad get trigger-happy.)

CLICK HERE FOR SHELTER LIST WITH TOTALS FOR SPACES

[Retroit]

Wow, thanks!

So, 2430 facilities with total capacity of 6,581,424 people.

I'm still dubious on the levels of protection. I think the only place that would offer any protection would be a "mine, cavern, or cave", all listed as "0". I guess they were assuming that the bomb would fall far away from the city and that "fallout" would be the primary concern? I really doubt that any of these facilities would provide "blast protection".

[M CD M]

Update 5-3-10 12 pages of locations now on the google map.
I've been getting 2 pages done every few days.

And strange that the totals for mines/caves is 0 when they list the Salt mine over by the marathon refinery as a shelter location in the list at the front of the binder. But it's not listed on my NFS list at the back of the binder

[Retroit]

Now THAT is dedication!

I was wondering about the salt mines also. I figured that the list was for Detroit only and that the mines didn't extend under Detroit or have access from Detroit.

Also, what about the "0" for military facilities? How about the Light Guard Armory on 8 Mile Road or the fort, Fort Wayne.

[jackie5275]

Here's a link showing a map of suspected target areas in the US. http://www.nikemissile.org/nuclear_t...p_of_the.shtml
This thread got me thinking about the Nike missile base at Union Lake [[Commerce Twp) near where I grew up. I didnt' realize there were a bunch more in metro Detroit. http://ed-thelen.org/loc-m.html#Michigan This is a link to the sites around here. This link lists the locations with small informational websites & photos from each location. Please be advised however that not every photo is accessible due to what seems to be outdated links.

[M CD M]

Also, what about the "0" for military facilities? How about the Light Guard Armory on 8 Mile Road or the fort, Fort Wayne.

It's on the list as a shelter[[a few more pages ahead) so it's like they skipped some things.

[Stinger4me]

We had some cousins who lived near St. Jude Church. As I recall there was some type of radar installation on E. Seven Mile Rd. west of the church property and east of Hayes. It may have been located where Morang intersects with E. Seven Mile Rd.. I can't recall the exact years. Maybe someone out there remembers this as well.

[Brock7]

We had some cousins who lived near St. Jude Church. As I recall there was some type of radar installation on E. Seven Mile Rd. west of the church property and east of Hayes. It may have been located where Morang intersects with E. Seven Mile Rd.. I can't recall the exact years. Maybe someone out there remembers this as well.

What would that have looked like?

[Stinger4me]

There were some buildings which had antennas and if I recall correctly there were small barrack buildings as well. Some of the same type of buildings which were located at the missile base on Belle Isle at the east end of the island behind the refreshment stand. The area was fenced off and very close to Seven Mile Rd.

[Brock7]

There was an anti-aircraft artillery gun site occupying the south end of Heilman Field from 1952-57 just opposite Morang and 7, if that's fits your time-frame.

Here's an aerial view of it from April '56. St. Jude is at the lower right corner. Burbank Elentary, where there was also a shelter and an air-raid siren, is at the northeast corner of Heilman Feild.The street to the west of the gun site is Brock which is west of Morang. The street to the east of the site is Crusade. The AAA gun site is named Park Grove in the list of Detroit sites below.

Attachment 5988

http://www.northamericanforts.com/East/mi.html
Cold War AAA Defenses of Detroit
[[1952 - 1959), Detroit area
Several permanent sites were established for the Army's Anti-Aircraft Artillery [[AAA) Gun Site Program, the precursor to the NIKE missile defense program. Four 90mm AA guns were positioned at each site, with troop barracks and other support buildings. Known sites include:
Algonac [[1952 - 1958): undetermined.
Warren [[1952 - 1958): at Ryan and 10 Mile Roads [[?).
Hazel Park [[1952 - 1956): undetermined.
Ferndale [[1954 - 1956): undetermined.
Detroit [[1952 - 1955): at Mark Twain and Belton.
Detroit [[1953 - 1955): at 6301 West Jefferson Ave..
Fort Wayne [[1955): on post.
Park Grove [[1952 - 1957): at Crusade and Novara Road.
Algonquin [[1955): undetermined.
Dearborn [[1953 - 1955): at Greenfield Road and Dearborn Street.
Newport [[1955): undetermined.

NIKE missile defense sites are at this time beyond the scope of this website.

The photo is reduced by half from this file[[16mb):
http://www.clas.wayne.edu/photos/par...56/ga-1-38.pdf

[MikeM]

The Algonac site for the Nike missiles was a few miles north of Algonac along Short Cut Rd, either side of McKinney. I don't think they had guns there.
The Warren gun site was at Hoover and Hupp, southwest corner.
The Hazel Park gun site was at Ryan and 10 Mile Roads, southwest corner.
The Ferndale gunsite was in Harding Park, south of 10 Mile, west of Hilton.
The Detroit site listed as 6301 West Jefferson is the same thing as Ft Wayne, and there were no guns sited there.
The Algonquin gun site was at the northwest corner of Southfield and Ford Roads [[se corner Faust & Kirkwood).
The Newport site was at the southwest corner of Telegraph and Newport Roads, although this was just a Nike site and not a gun site.

There were also gun sites in: Grosse Pointe Farms at the current location of Brownell Middle School; in Grosse Pointe Park at the foot of Three Mile Drive; in northwest Detroit, in Van Antwerp Park, northwest corner of Wyoming and St Martins; and in Ecorse at the southeast corner of Jefferson and Westfield.

[REL]

Great thread, thank you.

I volunteer to check the American Coney Island one!