No shelter for latest fallout
Monday, March 31st, 2008
By Staff
At a time when Homeland Security dominates so much of the national consciousness, a little-known fact:
Half a century ago, the nation was similarly focused on civil defense and the possibility of nuclear attack by our Cold War enemies. While schoolchildren were learning to duck and cover, Gov. Luther Hodges did something more concrete.
Literally.
Hodges had a fallout shelter constructed somewhere inside the governor's mansion.
Interesting, no?
But what came next was even more remarkable. Forty-seven years ago this week, Gov. Terry Sanford announced a contest that would be inconceivable today:
"One lucky married couple" would get to spend three days in the governor's fallout shelter, after which they would be treated to an all-expense-paid night in the old Sir Walter Raleigh Hotel.
The chosen couple was from Charlotte — and the wife was a reporter for The Charlotte Observer, which came in handy as dispatches from inside the shelter were issued daily. Afterward, the reporter wrote about her experience.
It would be a bit like Vice President Dick Cheney inviting a reporter into his famed Homeland Security bunker to write feature stories about its amenities.
He might never have let her out. (more…)
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