(09/28/11) Australian architectural designer Alexander Michael opens an exhibit of his sculptures this Saturday at his part time Adirondack hidden home that once housed an anti-ballistic missile (ABM). Michael will also give tours of his former Atlas Missile Silo in Lewis, in the Champlain Valley.
Twelve ABM sites were built near the Plattsburgh Air Force base in the early 1960's, hidden in the mountains. Each deep underground silo held a missile, and quarters where the crews lived and worked. Many of these silos were taken off alert and fully decommissioned within a few years.
Following their closure, most of them were sold off to local towns, salvage companies or left to decay. But Michael's Lewis Missile Base, also known as Boquet 556-5, is one of the more impressively restored missile silos.
He lives there for about eight weeks each year, and for more than ten years, he's pumped out water, hauled out or recycled scrap metal, restored the former Launch Control Center into an underground retreat. Todd Moe stopped by for a tour.
