Mound Cold War Discovery Center

  Being a ham, I was invited to attend a tour of the Mound Cold War Discovery Center with members of the Germantown Amateur Radio Society. While my friend Mike Kilroy was unable to attend, he suggested the tour would be something both Tom and I would enjoy.

 I have been an inactive amateur radio operator (WB8VQD) for many years. I think I was licensed in about 1976 and got an Advanced license at that time. I've always renewed it. Back in 1987, a month after we moved to P:inehaven, the place was burglarized and all my ham equipment was stolen. I replaced some of it for a while. But my main interest was 2 meter autopatch and that was, in my mind, superseded by cell phone.

 So all these years later, I'm still a ham but only in name.

 We got to the MCWDC before 10 AM, just as others were gathering in the parking lot.

 It's right across the road from the Miamisburg Mound. That makes it impossible to miss.

 The place has fluorescent "black lights" (UV-A) on the ceiling throughout the tour  area. It makes some of the displays a bit hard to read (though my vision isn't great) and it makes the unusual carpet literally glow like a starfield. It doesn't show well in this photo but my socks glowed an otherworldly blue.

 When I sat for a rest at one point, I tried to determine if the pattern repeats (it does).

 "Uranium ware" used uranium for coloration and the resultant glassware literally glows when the lights are turned off. This case shows a number of items with a radioactive history.

 I lived in Miamisburg from 1949 - 1980 and the Mound was always a focal point high on a ridge to the south. I wondered then what all the buildings held and what went on there. Now I know. The Mound played a major role in the development of the United States nuclear arsenal. Afterwards it developed technology for NASA.

 This is a model of an RTG (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator) that generated many hundreds of watts through radioactive decay and the resultant heat. Similar units were used on various interplanetary craft.

 This brochure offers details on the location of the Discovery Center, hours of operation, phone number and online link.