The Lockport Air Force Station, off Shawnee Road in the Town of Cambria once was a key defense factor for the Niagara Frontier. This station was buzzing with radar images and radio signals as Airmen on duty watched the skies over the Niagara Frontier, and indeed over the Northeast USA. It was the cold war, and this air station had a population of several hundred, most of whom were housed within the barbed wire fences of the high security installation.
In the above "crossroads in time," still abandoned base housing is seen in the middle of the picture while other housing has now been converted to a new apartment complex on the extreme right. The Air Station was a "little village" back in the 50's, 60's, and early 70's. Self-sufficient over the short term allowing men here to stay by their stations "for the duration." The Unicorn Apartment complex below is an example of how part of this former air station has been slowly converted to civilian uses over the past near ten-plus years.
Another part of the former base is Niagara County headquarters for the Senior Nutrition Program where hot meals are cooked for County Seniors in a government subsidized food delivery program. The headquarters building is seen below, a nice conversion of a former military building.
Much of the Air Station, however, is pretty much how the military left it...except time has taken its measure since the men in blue moved out at the end of the 1970's. These buildings were top-rate, mil-spec, before they were deserted and left to deteriorate and be vandalized. The buildings seen below are two such examples.
A few of the wire antenna supports is about all that is left showing from the outside indicating this was the radio and radar "nerve center" of Lockport Air Station. Mighty long-range HF transmitters and powerful radars were controlled from here in an era before satellite communications.
High
frequency radio links were active here around the clock linking Lockport Air with Air
Force North American Air Defense Command.
When the Air Force pulled out they didn't bother to remove much more than the transmitting and control equipment and code books. Much of the once-secret Air Force correspondence still litters a remaining desk inside the radio complex as seen on the left. The last communications found was dated late in 1979.
Ah, don't tell any enemy agents that this correspondence is now laid out here available for inspection. No "Freedom of Information" application form needed!
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