View of the Cartwheel bunker in September, 1961. JFK Presidential LIbrary photo
Cold War tensions escalated on August 12th, 1961 as Communist soldiers sealed off West Berlin with barbed wire barricades. In Washington, construction of a different sort was also underway that day, as the White House Signal Agency moved forward with a top secret communications facility in Tenleytown.
When it was completed this unassuming brick tower concealed a radar dish that linked Washington via microwave relay with the Midatlantic “federal relocation arc”. In the event of a missile exchange, the tower -codenamed Cartwheel- would function as the central spoke connecting whatever remained of the continuity of government system.
Construction viewed from nearby water tower. JFK Presidential Library photo
It’s located in Fort Reno, a public park in a quiet suburban neighborhood, so the spot may seem odd for a classified military project. It was selected because of Reno’s elevation - the highest in the city - and because the 100 foot tall tower could blend in amongst the two preexisting water towers.
Elevation is key because the microwave relay employed line of sight technology; the radar dishes at each relay literally had to be able to “see” one another. A network of similar towers were spaced out roughly 50 miles apart and allowed the signals to jump from Washington all the way to facilities in Pennsylvania.
Shielding goes up on the radar dish level in November, 1961. JFK Presidential Library photo
The facade of the top section of the Fort Reno tower is painted Plexiglas that conceals the Cartwheel radar dish. A crew lived and worked in the tower 24 hours a day. A two story bunker underneath housed the electrical generators and food stocks that would supposedly see the crew through World War III.
Of course the whole thing was kind of ridiculous. Early civil defense concepts were based on outdated World War II era notions of air power, where an attack might constitute a single (relatively low yield) atomic bomb. By 1960, both the Soviet Union and the United States had developed intercontinental missiles that could carry vastly more powerful thermonuclear weapons. In the event of war several of these weapons may have been fired at Washington.
In the 1970’s Cartwheel was deemed obsolete and transferred to the Federal Aviation Administration, who found a civilian use for the communications tower. It is still in use.