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REPORT ON GROOM LAKE
ABC World News Tonight
April 19, 1994

Peter Jennings:  Finally from us this evening, the road to 
Dreamland.  And there really is such a place, though you are not 
supposed to know about it, and the U.S. Air Force is unhappy with 
us because we're going to tell you about it.  The Dreamland we are 
talking about is actually an Air Force base in Nevada.  The 
Russians know about it, so why not you?  ABC's Jimmy Walker has 
the results of an ABC News investigation....

Jimmy Walker:  We are one hundred miles from Las Vegas driving 
across the Nevada desert on public land.  There is more here than 
meets the eye.  A few feet off the dirt road, an electronic sensor 
is hidden in the sagebrush.
Glenn Campbell:  [Radio static in background.]  The base control 
has relayed to the patrols that someone has crossed one of their 
sensors.  That's us.

Walker:  So they now know...

Campbell:  They know we're here.  They'll be here in about ten 
minutes.

Walker:  Sure enough, minutes later, a white Jeep goes by.  
Someone is very interested in who visits this particular piece of 
scrub.  That someone is the U.S. Air Force.  A helicopter flies 
out to investigate us.  It comes from Groom Lake, one of the most 
closely guarded military facilities in the country.

The secret air base which some people call Dreamland or others 
Watertown or still others Area 51 is located about twelve miles 
over in that direction.  It's clearly visible but the government 
won't acknowledge that it even exists.  And to photograph it would 
violate the Espionage Act.  
Military historians say the U-2 spy plane was tested at Groom 
Lake.  More recently, the Stealth fighter.  But the base does not 
appear on any map, and for the record, the Pentagon will only say 
that Groom Lake is part of the vast Nellis Range complex.

Enter Glenn Campbell and Peter Merlin, members of a group that 
believes the Air Force has too many secrets and not enough 
accountability.  Armed with lawn chairs and binoculars, they set 
up shop on public land overlooking the air base.  And they're 
driving the Air Force crazy.

Peter Merlin:  There's some large hangers.  One is quite enormous.  
And a control tower....

Walker:  As a result of the prying eyes, the Air Force is trying 
to expropriate this hilltop and an adjoining one to add to the 
4700 square miles it already controls, saying it's needed for 
safety reasons.

Campbell:  There was the suggestion that people sitting on this 
-
ridge like we are doing might be hit by aircraft.

Walker:  The pending land grab has turned the hilltops into a 
tourist attraction, drawing even more attention to the base.  Last 
month at a federal hearing in Las Vegas, officials got an earful.

Angry Citizen at Hearing:  The place is big enough already.  How 
much expansion do they need?  That place is safe.  It's stupid.

Another Citizen at Hearing:  There have already been allegations 
that environmental crimes have been committed there.  Now you're 
asking for 4000 more acres to hide behind.

Walker:  What's more, buy this model plane kit [Testor's "Thunder 
Dart"] and you get with it [on the] directions this 1988 
photograph of the base taken by a Soviet satellite.  The pentagon 
says it's okay to show you this picture.

Campbell:  The only people this base is being kept secret from are 
the American people, the people who pay for it.

-
Walker:  Our story took an unexpected turn as we prepared to 
leave.  We spotted a Sheriff's car heading our way.

Deputy (at driver's window):  We're investigating the possibility 
of a criminal offense.

Walker:  And what would that criminal offense be?

Deputy:  Sir, may I see your driver's license, please.

Walker:  They believed we were photographing the facility.  They 
were wrong.  We were detained, questioned and searched.  Our 
camera, audio equipment and some video tapes were confiscated.  
The Air Force held the gear for five days before returning it.  No 
charges were filed against us.

And every work day, a fleet of privately owned unmarked airliners 
shuttle more than 1500 workers from Las Vegas to the base that 
doesn't exist.

Campbell (looking through binoculars):  Yup, secret base out 
there.  Sure enough.  Same secret base as yesterday.

Walker:  J
ames Walker, ABC News, Lincoln County, Nevada.

#####

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----- THROW THE BUMS OUT -----

Speeches by Nevada "home-rule" activists greatly enlivened the 
Jan. 31 hearing.  Seeing this land fight as a test case for their 
-
new ideas, several speakers drove hundreds of miles from other 
parts of Nevada to be in attendance.  When a leader of the 
movement, Dick Carver, finally had his chance to speak, he 
announced that five minutes were not enough, and that he would go 
on as long as necessary.  When the five-minute tone was sounded, 
the BLM moderator tried to interrupt but was rebuked by the 
audience, who unanimously demanded that Carver be allowed to 
continue.  Carver thus walked away with about 15 minutes of air 
time and gave everyone in the audience the warm satisfaction of 
having beaten BLM into submission at least on that issue.

Readers who live outside the western U.S. may have never even 
heard of BLM, never mind grasping the boundless animosity it 
often enjoys among locals.  The vast majority of land in Lincoln 
County is "public," that is, owned equally by all U.S. citizens, 
and is currently managed as a public trust by the federal 
government.  A significant portion of the economic activities in 
the county have to go through the BLM.  It leases grazing and 
mineral rights and enforces many despised environmental 
regulations, thus placing it in the role of evil landlord who 
everyone loves to hate.  Local sentiments are elegantly expressed 
-
by one resident's well-trained dog who stays, sits and lies down 
on command.  The dog will also "kill" on command, but only on 
special key word.  Give him a old shoe, say "BLM," and it's 
rendered to shreds instantly.

The position of the revolutionaries is that the federal 
government has no right to manage public lands within the state 

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and that it does so only by default.  The activists cite statutes 
dating back to Nevada's founding which they contend give the 
state the sole authority to manage public lands.  BLM, they say, 
has no real delegated authority to do anything, and they are 
trying to prove this by a series of Freedom of Information 
requests.  Whenever an interesting legal case comes up in which 
BLM is the enforcer, they demand that BLM turn over documents to 
prove that they indeed have that authority.  According to the 
activists, BLM is inherently unable to supply those documents and 
thus can be forced to back down from whatever action they were 
attempting.

We are pleased that the rebels have adopted the Groom land grab 
as a cause celebre.  Without them, there might have been only 
half as many people at the Caliente hearing.  At the same time, 
we are a little confused on what the end result of this rebellion 
is supposed to be, and we are mildly skeptical about whether it 
can succeed.

The current anti-BLM movement reminds us of a number of radical 
females we have known who would just as soon eliminate the male 
gender altogether.  On the surface, we can understand the 
sentiments.  Males must account for 85% of the violent acts in 
this country and easily 99% of the female grief and pain.  
They're aggressive, suppressive, insensitive and demand too much.  
Give them an inch and they'll take a mile.  WHO NEEDS THEM 
ANYWAY?  "Just say No," is the best solution.  If you excise them 
definitively from your life then all your problems will be 
solved.

Okay, so maybe that's a bad example.  The point is, although such 
dramatic plans to "Throw the Bums Out" may seem solid in theory, 
they usually get tripped up somewhere in the implementation.  We 
march into the battle with high idealistic hopes but a few years 
later usually find ourselves living with the bums anyway.  Given 
this typical outcome, one wonders if it would be more productive 
to take a less combative approach that might be more likely to 
succeed in the long term.  Instead of expending all our resources 
in an attempt to totally annihilate the enemy, we could take the 
time to understand him, learn his fears and vulnerabilities and 
the kind of leverage we have over him, then take him by the balls 
and turn him into our slave.

No, wait, never mind.  BAD example.

----- LAS VEGAS HEARING DATE SET -----

The Las Vegas hearing on the Groom land grab has been officially 
set for Weds., March 2, 1994 from 5-7 pm at the Cashman Field 
-
House, rooms 203-204.   (Cashman Field House is a stadium complex 
on Las Vegas Blvd. just north of Downtown.)

This is the BIG ONE.  (Caliente was only 4.0.)  Everyone's 
invited!  More info will be provided in Desert Rat #3, which will 
be issued at least a couple of weeks before then.

----- TRESPASSERS' TRIAL DELAYED -----

In Desert Rat #1, we reported the case of the seven Las Vegans 
who stumbled across the military border while visiting the 
Tikaboo Valley.  Due to their lawyer's schedule conflicts, their 
trial, originally scheduled for Mar. 2, has been delayed to a 
later date.  (We'll publish the date when we know it.)  The 
location will be Alamo Justice Court in the County Annex Building 
in Alamo, 90 miles north of Las Vegas.  Come one, come all!

The change of date is providential because it means that the 
trial will not compete with the Las Vegas hearing.

----- AN AMBASSADORIAL VISIT -----
-
On Jan. 28 at our psychospy headquarters in Rachel, we were 
pleased to receive a surprise visit from the Ambassador Merlyn 
Merlin II from the planet Draconis.  He had taken human form, 
resembling to us a bearded Abe Lincoln or Amish farmer, and was 
driving a 10-year-old brown Monte Carlo.  When he first appeared 
at our door, he was holding a small black book in front of him in 
both hands.  In an impulsive attempt at humor, we blurted out, 
"Oh, a Bible salesman!"  He smiled at that and showed us that it 
was only a notebook.  The bible, it seems, was out in the car.  
Later, he went to fetch it and read to us some lengthy passages.

Three aviation watchers from the Bay Area happened to be visiting 
our headquarters at the time, and we were all quite fascinated 
with the Ambassador.  He was a "Being of Light," he said, 
although we touched him and found him to be quite solid.  He was 
on a mission to promote the coming "Golden Age," when the aliens 
would be integrated into our society and we humans would evolve 
into a higher form.  This transformation, he said, would take 
place within the next five years.

-
The Ambassador did not always know that he was a Draconian.  He 
had thought he was an ordinary human for most of his time on 
earth until he began to experience some revelations in 1986.  
Even now, he has no direct memories of Draconis, although he is 


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certain that that is his origin.  He said that another part of 
him was on Draconis even as he was speaking to us.  He suspected 
that he was also simultaneously a Venusian and that part of his 
being was currently at home on Venus.

He was proud of his role as Ambassador to Earth and was 
especially pleased to be officially recognized in that capacity 
by the State of Nevada.  He gave us a xeroxed letter to prove his 
status.  It was on official state letterhead from the Secretary 
of State in Carson City.  The letter was dated March 31, 1993, 
and was signed by the secretary herself.  It read:

   Ambassador Merlyn Merlin II
   The Embassy of Christ

   Dear Mr. Ambassador:

   Thank you for your invitation; however, I will not be able
   to be in California.  Thank you for your consideration.

   Sincerely,
   Cheryl A. Lau

We wish the Ambassador the best of luck in his mission and urge 
the Federal government to accord him similar recognition.

----- RECENT ARTICLES -----

Following are recent articles on Groom Lake in the major media.  
Each article is available from psycho
spy for 25c each (to cover 
copying and postage).
-P
5/93:  On-Site Inspection Agency:  Fact Sheet on Open Skies 
Treaty [which allows foreign overflights of Groom Lake].
9/93: Intl. Defense Review: "Groom Lake's secret revealed?" 
[Mothership theories, by Sweetman.]
10/19/93:  L.V. Review-Journal: "State to examine Stealth base 
for toxic fumes."  [Hazardous waste dump at Groom base.]
10/17/93:  Salt Lake Tribune: "No peeking from peak:  Air force 
wants to seize mountain to protect secret base."
10/18/93:  Federal Register  "Notice of proposed withdrawal and 
opportunity for public meeting."
10/21/93, Aerospace Daily: "Air Force tries to plug 37-year-old 
leak with Groom Lake Land Grab."
10/23/93, L.V. Review-Journal: "Air Force promises openness" [in 
open-pit burning case].
10/23/93, Scripps Howard Service: "Mountain 'spying' upsets AF at 
secret Nevada base."
10/25/93, Defense Week: "Air Force land grab eclipses view of 
'UFOs'."
10/29/93, Inside the Air Force: "USAF seeks to keep unwanted eyes 
from watching secret Nevada base."
-Pause
11/1/83, Newsweek: "The Mystery at Groom Lake."
11/1/93, Testor Corp.: Announcement to dealers of June 94 release 
of Lazar saucer model.
11/1/93, Aviation Week: "No more peeks." [one paragraph]
11/5/93, CBS affiliates: Report on Testors Aurora & Mothership 
models. [transcript]
12/93, Intercepts Newsletter: "Dispatches from the front." [Road 
sensors found on public land]
11/6/93, L.V. Review-Journal: "State seeks evidence of burn pits" 
[at Groom base].
12/5/93, L.V. Review-Journal: "'Spy' turns focus on buffer area." 
[Campbell]
12/5/93, L.V. Review-Journal: "Budget for hypersonic spy plane 
rivals Nevada Test Site."
12/7/93: L.V. Review-Journal: Editorial cartoon.  [Prospector 
chased by security goons.]
12/27/93, High Country News: "How military secrecy zones out 
Nevada." [Oct. camp-out]
11/11/93, CBS Evening News: Report on Testors Aurora model and 
Groom Lake. [transcript]
12/28/93, Wall Street Journal: "'Earthlings Welcome' in tiny NV 
town where mysterious aircraft often fly overhead."
1/2/94, Washington Post: "The Pentagon's Secret Garden."  [by 
Sweetman]
1/3/94, Aviation Week: Letter by John Andrews protesting land 
grab.
1/5/94, L.V. Review-Journal: "Seven people arrested in Groom Lake 
incident." [Trespassers]
1/29/94, L.V. Review-Journal: Editorial re: Lazar and Knapp 
[dismissive].
1/30/94, L.V. Review-Journal: "Air Force buffer zone for Groom 
Lake base to be discussed."  [Hearings]
2/94:  Wired Magazine: "A Visit to Dreamland." [2-page photo of 
Groom base]

----- "PARANOID NEWS" LAUNCHED -----

Pleased with the instant success of The Groom Lake Desert Rat, 
psychospy has launched yet another free on-line newsletter--this 
one on an unrelated subject.  THE PARANOID NEWS will explore 
psychospy's favorite mental disorder, paranoia, and show how it 
effects the thoughts and behavior of all of us.
----- "PARANOID NEWS" LAUNCHED -----

Pleased with the instant success of The Groom Lake Desert Rat, 
psychospy has launched yet another free on-line newsletter--this 
one on an unrelated subject.  THE PARANOID NEWS will explore 
psychospy's favorite mental disorder, paranoia, and show how it 
effects the thoughts and behavior of all of us.
-Pause- [C]ontinue, [N]onStop, [S]top? [  

Paranoia is a fascinating mechanism by which a person tends to 
bring about the very thing he most fears.  If he is terrified 
enough of failure, then he will often create it for himself by 
his own hand.  Paranoia is more pervasive than we might suppose, 
and there is not one of us who isn't touched.  Paranoia effects 
our every decision, especially our most important ones, so don't 
read this newsletter unless you are prepared to question your 
past choices or the wisdom of your current circumstances.  This 
is not a pretty newsletter.  There are a lot of icky things 
inside our minds, and THE PARANOID NEWS will delight in exposing 
them.

Issue #1 will be available within the next few days.  Email 
subscriptions are free of charge to internet users.  Send your 
request to psychospy@aol.com.  Hard copy subscriptions are 
available for $1.50 per issue, mailed anywhere in the world.

----- SUBSCRIPTION AND COPYWRITE INFO -----

(c) Glenn Campbell, 1994.  (psychospy@aol.com)

The entire contents of this on-line newsletter are copyrighted 

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From: psychospy@aol.com




and may not be reproduced in any form without permission, EXCEPT 
FOR THE FOLLOWING:  For six months following the date of 
publication, you may photocopy this text or send this document 
electronically to anyone who you think might be interested, 
provided you do it without charge.  You may only copy or send 
this document in unaltered form and in its entirety, not as 
partial excerpts.  After six months, no further reproduction of 
this document is allowed without permission.

This newsletter is published on an irregular basis whenever 
conditions warrant.  Email subscriptions are currently available 
free of charge to any internet user.  To subscribe (or 
-P
unsubscribe) to current and future editions of THE GROOM LAKE 
DESERT RAT, send a message to psychospy@aol.com.  We will 
acknowledge your request within a few days; if you receive no 
reply it may indicate an addressing problem.  In that case, call 
the human at 702-729-2648.  Hard copy subscriptions to this 


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newsletter are available for $1.50 per issue, ordered from the 
address below.  (e.g. $15 for the next 10 issues, mailed anywhere 
in the world.)

For a free catalog of documents and products relating to Groom 
Lake and government secrecy, send us your US mail address.  An 
email version of the catalog is also available (no pictures, size 
13K).  Among the documents available is the "Area 51 Viewer's 
Guide," the definitive 110-page visitors  and reference guide to 
the border and its lore.  (Available for $15 plus $3.50 postage.)  
Also available is the popular Groom Lake cloth patch.  ($8, plus 
$1 postage if ordered separately.)

The US mail address for psychospy, Glenn Campbell, Secrecy 
Oversight Council, Area 51 Research Center, Groom Lake Desert Rat 

and countless other ephemeral entities is:
     HCR Box 38
     Rachel, NV 89001 USA

#####

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[Supplement to the Groom Lake Desert Rat]

Title:  GROOM LAKE TOXIC BURNING ALLEGED
Subtitle:  A former worker at the secret Air Force base says 
poisonous substances were routinely ignited.

Las Vegas Review-Journal, Mar. 20, 1994, Page 1B.

Illustration:  Photo of "The B-2 Stealth bomber, one of the planes 
tested at the Groom Lake base."  Map of buildings at the Groom 
Lake base, titled "Groomed for secrecy," with the following 
labeled:  "Lockheed hangers," "burn pits," "Scoot-N-Hide shed," 
"Red Hat hangers," "Satellite dishes" and "Sam's Place bar and 
recreational complex."

By Keith Rogers, Review-Journal

Trucks hauling poisonous waste from California routinely arrived 
at the Air Force's secret Groom Lake base on Mondays and 
Wednesdays, said a former base worker who was employed there 
during the 1980s.

There were always two Kenworth rigs, he said.  They towed trailers 
with sealed cargo bays sometimes filled with 55-gallon drums of 
resins, solvents and hardening compounds--stuff he said Lockheed 
Corp. used to coat its radar-evading Stealth aircraft.

At the base, 35 miles west of Alamo in Lincoln County, the trucks 
would roll past the dormitory complex where as many as 2,000 full-
time residents lived, then down a road that parallels a taxiway 
that leads to Lockheed's hangers at the south end of the base.

There, just west of the road and at the foot of Papoose Mountain, 
the trucks would back up to one of the 300-foot-long trenches.  
Workers would then roll the barrels into these pits where the 
drums and their classified contents would be doused with jet fuel 
and ignited.

Like every activity at the base, the Air Force and the phantom 
trucking company, known only a NDB, operated with great latitude 
under the veil of secrecy, often in defiance of state and 
environmental laws at the time.
-Pa

The waste shipments were never accompanied with manifests, which 
are required by law in Nevada and California.  And the trail of 
paperwork to the base, once known as Area 51, was covered by code 
words.

Any reference to the base during the Stealth project was 
nonexistent in government correspondences, other than the name 
"Score Event," said the source who spoke on the condition of 
anonymity, but who provided a base manual, map and aerial 
photograph of the base that was taken in the mid-1980s by a 
government contractor.

"They could have hauled in untold amounts of things," he said.  
"They would bring the stuff up from California at first twice a 
week, then once a week," he said.

His story about waste disposal practices at the Groom Lake base 
confirms what other workers and former workers have said about the 
burn pits and the acrid fumes that wafted over the hangers and 
dormitories where people lived and worked.

Nevada environmental officials are probing whether the burning was 
proper and George Washington University law professor Jonathan 
Turley is preparing legal action against the Air Force, accusing 
it of environmental crimes.  Turley has said his growing list of 
clients includes people who were injured by the Air Force's 
actions.

Nevada's only environmental official with a clearance to enter the 
base, Air Quality Bureau Chief Thomas Fronapfel, has visited the 
base twice since allegations about open-pit burning were made last 
year.  He said he has "looked at most of the information" about 
waste burning practices at the base and has found that classified 
materials were burned, but they were mostly papers.

Fronapfel and his boss, Environmental Protection Division 
Administrator Lew Dodgion are still trying to determine how they 
will report their findings and what action, if any, they will 
take.  Dodgion has said, though, that the amount of information 
that state has compiled about waste disposal practices at the base 
is small compared to what his staff has not reviewed.

Neither the Air Force, Lockheed nor NDB are licensed waste haulers 
in Nevada, according to the state's Motor Carrier Division in 
Carson City.  NDB is not listed as a trucking firm in Nevada, 
California or in the National Directory of Addresses and Telephone 
Numbers.

Allen Hirash, a spokesman for the California Department of Toxic 
Substance Control, said, however, that Lockheed Aeronautical 
Systems Co., in Burbank, Calif., was a registered hazardous waste 
hauler from 1982 to 1991.  Likewise, several Air Force bases in 
California once were registered to haul hazardous waste but the 
registrations have expired, the latest being the one for Beale Air 
Force Base.  Its registration expired Jan. 31.

When asked about its waste hauling practices from Lockheed's 
Advanced Development Co. in Palmdale, Calif., the so-called Skunk 
Works division that developed Stealth aircraft, company spokesman 
Jim Ragsdale issued a statement that he said "is all my management 
is willing to say on this topic."

"Lockheed on occasions in the past has had requirements for 
removal of materials from our factory that our customer, the US 
Air Force, deemed to be classified materials.  In those instances, 
Lockheed followed instructions from its customer as to how the 
materials were to be transported away from the factory location," 
the statement says.

"When the materials were trucked away, the destination of the 
trucks and the eventual disposition of the classified materials 
were determined by the Air Force," Ragsdale's statement says.

Air Force officials in Las Vegas and at the Pentagon did not 
respond last week to questions about Lockheed's statement.

But in a telephone interview Thursday, Rep. Jim Bilbray, D-Nev., a 
member of the House Armed Services and Intelligence committees, 
said he has asked the Air Force to give him a "full, detailed 
briefing on any burning activities in its Nellis Range Complex, 
which maps show include the Groom Lake base.

"They may not be willing to come forward and admit to violations 
that they don't think took place," Bilbray said, noting that while 
he can't acknowledge the base's existence he said he has "deep 
reaching ability to peer in."



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"What was done out there a few years ago, the institutional memory 
might not be there.  Records might not exist," he said.

Regardless of the secret nature of the Groom Lake base, Bilbray 
said if any environmental crimes took place, the people who 
suffered from them should be compensated.

Bilbray confirmed that he has heard of the words, Score Event, in 
connection with the Nellis Air Force Range complex, but "I 
shouldn't get into it," he said.

"When you cannot acknowledge that a facility exists, it makes it 
very difficult to talk about what goes on there," he said.

What did go on at the Groom Lake base from 1980 through 1990 
didn't come cheap, said the source who worked there during those 
years.

The source said he saw charts that listed the base's budget at 
between $93 million and $115 million per month.  That figure fits 
with the $1 billion to $1.5 billion annual budget that private 
military analysts have estimated based on projects at the base and 
daily flights to shuttle workers there.

"I was staggered by the numbers," the source said.

High-powered, telemetry satellite dishes at the base's north end 
serve a dual role for communicating and fogging film of any would-
be photographers who were detected on nearby ridges, he said.

A Scoot-N-Hide shed on one runway was used to keep secret advanced 
aircraft out of sight while foreign satellites orbited in view of 
the base.

While the F-117A Stealth fighter jets and a prototype B-2 bomber 
were housed at one end of the base, the government's Red Hat 
teams--the foreign Technology Assessment Group from Edwards Air 
Force Base in California--kept its collection of advances Soviet 
MiG jets in hangers at the other end, the source said.

In the time he worked there, the source said base personnel were 
involved in seven plane crashes that involved three F-117s, one A-
7 Navy chase plane and three Soviet MiGs, including one that 
landed in a woman's back yard in Rachel.

At least five unmanned F-86s were shot down for any Army 
battlefield air defense system project.  The crashes and missile 
exercises sometimes caused range fires that could have been 
avoided, he said.

Sidebar:  EXTRAVAGANT LIVING ON A SECRET BASE

Just because the 2,000 or so civilian and military personnel 
working at Groom Lake were fighting the Cold War didn't mean they 
couldn't enjoy a cold one.

A favorite watering hole was Building 170, the hanger-size 
centerpiece of the base's recreational complex.  It is listed in 
one base directory as Sam's Place, a bar named after a Central 
Intelligence Agency official who once ran the base, said a source 
involved in base operations during the 1980s.

Sam's Place was a dark, fully carpeted nightclub with large padded 
chairs and a bar ringed with stools that rivaled the largest ones 
in Las Vegas, the source said.  The bar and many of the facilities 
probably still exist, he said.

The club had four pool tables, dart boards and a big screen where 
pornographic movies were shown "until a few ladies on the base 
complained," he said.

The recreational complex was complete with an eight-lane bowling 
alley, a heated indoor pool, four racquetball courts, a basketball 
gymnasium with a wooden floor, tennis courts, saunas and a snack 
bar.  At one time, a golf course and lighted softball field 
existed.

Supplies for the base were flown in from Hill Air Force Base in 
Utah aboard C-130s.

"Sometimes people would chip in and buy big ice boxes of shrimp 
that were flown in specially to the base from Florida in 20 to 30 
big Styrofoam coolers," he said.  The planes stopped at the base 
only long enough to offload the shrimp, he said.

Some colonels, he said, "had very extravagant tastes," including 
one who had grapefruit flown in from Israel at $25 a piece and 

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requested deliveries of canned tuna from South America that he 
-
estimates cost the government $26 per can.

In the dining hall, prime rib was offered every Wednesday 
afternoon and New York steaks were often on the lunch menu.  "They 
used to serve frog legs, king crab and filet mignon at no charge," 
he said.

"They drank bottled water to the tune of $50,000 a month," he 
said, comparing the lifestyles of some base inhabitants to high 
rollers in Las Vegas at the government's expense."

#####

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