Seeing as that was two years before I came to be, needless to say, I wasn't around to witness the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Most of you know the story–Fidel Castro was the Western Hemisphere's leading Communist dictator, tensions were high between the US and USSR, and the minds in charge in the Politburo decided to send ballistic missiles to Cuba. By the middle of October of 1962, President Kennedy was notified that several launch sites were under construction–photographs courtesy of the U. S. Air Force's U-2's and the U. S. Navy's RF-8 Crusaders. Some tense moments, indeed, as the world was ratcheted that much closer to all out nuclear confrontation…
I'm told by friends who were around at the time in Florida that it got, well, interesting for a while. McCoy Air Force Base (now Orlando International Airport) hosted various units–U-2's, fighter interceptors, and bombers. Homestead Air Force base was said to have been loaded with various fighter and fighter-bomber squadrons. They also were putting up more than a few U. S. Army units and their equipment–just in case we had to invade, the Department of Defense sent them to South Florida.
One of the more interesting facets of the whole event–to me, at least–were the various missile units that were established at various points of the South Florida map. These missiles were a mix, usually Hawk Surface-to-Air and various members of the Nike family (usually Nike-Hercules) Surface-to-air missiles. These missiles were placed to shoot down aerial invaders from the South–and at the time, the hopes were high that the systems actually worked! There were at least nine Nike bases and at least that many Hawk batteries. Even after the Crisis had passed, these missile sites were improved and consolidated.
So, what has become of the old sites? Well, most of them stayed manned until the late 1970's, the last of them closing in 1979. The Hawk batteries in the Florida Keys were mostly left ot be reclaimed by the wilderness, such as it is. Here's one example from Key Largo–the Nike missile site there was closed and the equipment removed, and now has been largely eaten by the native flora. A better known example would be the site known as HM-69–it is located in an area in the Everglades known as "The Hole in the Doughnut", and was recently opened to tours. And yet another location (HM-95) was deactivated as a missile site and the launch facility was adapted to be an Immigrations detention center–South Floridians know it well as the Krome Avenue Detention Center.
As for the numerous Hawk batteries, they, too, were shut down in the late 1970's, and those sites were also left to blend back into the scenery. There was one in Key West that is documented, and then there is this one, just East of the Homestead-Miami Motor Speedway. It is currently–apparently–being used as a daycare center for the nearby Turkey Point Nuclear Power plant. Now, I don't know if that truly qualifies as irony, but it must come damn close to it.
So, being the history nerd, model builder guy, and South Floridian at heart that I am, I was geeked when Revell reissued their Nike-Hercules and Hawk Missile kits that date back to the Stone Age of styrene. Of course, I just *had* to have them–and I'll tell you what, I might buy more as I see them. While I might not build a 1/40th-ish diorama of HM-69, the possibility *is* there…
Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.