National Security

This is another in the Sunday Story series. No political implications here, just some stories about National Security from a Son of a Spy.

Son of a Spy

I didn’t know it until I was fourteen – but I was a son of a — spy.  Mom was a part of Special Operations Executive (SOE) in World War II.  They were Churchill’s personal spy group, specifically trained to sabotage and disrupt Nazi controlled Europe.  Their goal was to keep hope alive, distract Nazi troops, and prepare for the eventual Allied invasion.  Many of the SOE agents were killed in the war, but Mom was a survivor.  I’ve written several stories about her missions, and she told many stories as well (Dahlman Papers).

But she was also under the restriction of the British Official Secrets Act.   It prevented her from discussing her activities for twenty-five years.  The War ended in 1945, so it was 1970, the summer I turned fourteen, that she began to open up about her past.  It’s one of those times that I remember – exactly.  We were driving in our 1964 Ford station wagon, a “Country Squire” with the fake wood paneling on the side, down the Dixie Highway just South of our home in Dayton, Ohio.  Mom may have been a spy, but she didn’t drive (another secret, and one I don’t think I really got to the bottom of, something about a horrific wreck in 1942).  So my sister Terry was driving, and I was in the back seat.

About Mom

Mom started to reveal her past.  It was kind of, to use a 60’s expression, “mind blowing” experience.  This little lady with the English accent (I was already five inches taller) was talking about jumping out of burning airplanes, learning secret codes, and blowing up troop trains. And later, Dad verified (of course we asked) what he knew, though he learned some of  Mom’s “secrets” for the first time as well.  And I do think there are stories Mom took to the grave, so difficult that she didn’t want to remember them anymore. 

Spying, and secrets, and national security was in my “blood”.  I’ve already told a lot of Mom’s stories.  So, here are some stories about my “brushes” with National Security over the years, beyond the amazing stories Mom told us.

Out for a Ride

Like a lot of teenaged boys before they get driver’s licenses, my bicycle represented my freedom.  By the time I was twelve I had a serious “touring” bike, a ten-speed Raleigh.  And I had no fear about riding that bike everywhere.  At one point, when we’d moved to Cincinnati, I went out for a Saturday ride, and ended up back in Dayton.  When I called home from the Dayton Mall to let them know where I was, my parents were confident enough to tell me to have a safe ride home.  That was the first time I rode 100 miles in a day.

But we were still living in Dayton when I went out for a ride “in the country”.  I was headed out  towards Oxford, home of Miami University where my sister Terry was enrolled.  I tried to avoid the major highways (there’s another story about getting blown off the road by a passing semi), and in that age before “Siri” directions, I often had a county map tucked in my belt. 

Mutual Assured Destruction

So on some back road in Preble County, I was cruising along between corn and soybean fields, when I saw something coming out of the ground.  I braked to a halt, as the tip of a missile came up from in a concrete lined hole, and slowly rose to ground level.  It was not a “toy”, it was a full sized Minuteman missile like the ones I saw at the Air Force Museum back in Dayton.  Steam rose from the engine, but it didn’t look like it was going to launch. 

Maybe it was a drill, or they were giving the missile a bath, or maybe just airing out the silo.  But there, in the middle of a field in western Ohio, was a part of the United States’ nuclear deterrent, a missile poised to launch at whatever enemy dared to threaten the US. And back then there was only one nuclear threat, the Soviet Union.

I realized this probably wasn’t a “spectator event”.  Whatever was happening, a fourteen year old kid on a bike probably wasn’t in the “security protocol”.  So I stood on the pedals and got out of there, waiting for the launch behind me, or the military MP’s in Jeeps to track me down.  And for the rest of the ride there was one additional worry.  Missiles were up, was our way of life and world as we know it about to change?  The dark joke was, “Moscow in flames, bombs on the way, film at eleven.” Would I even make it to Oxford before the end?

Driving from Cleveland

In 1974 I was still in high school, driving my “original” car, a 1969 Plymouth Fury III.  The Plymouth was a great first car, a “boat” with bench seats for six, or eight, or even more in a crunch.  I was as senior, driving by myself from my sister’s in Cleveland back home to Cincinnati on a Sunday morning after breakfast.  My only listening choice was AM Radio.  I did have an FM radio in the Fury, but at that time FM signals didn’t travel very far.  On the long stretches of I-71 through the Ohio countryside, the only entertainment was WLW radio, the “clear channel” station from Cincinnati.

There wasn’t a Bengals game that day, they were playing the Dolphins the next night on Monday Night Football.  So I was just listening to whatever music WLW offered.  And back then, there was news on the half hour, every half hour. 

So I was about at the Lodi exit on I-71 around noon, when the first news break hit.  A TWA flight bound from Columbus, Ohio to Washington DC, had disappeared off of the radar.  Back to music as I cruised towards Mansfield.  Then the next 12:30 “on the half hour” news break.  Trans World Airline (TWA) flight 514, with 92 on board, had crashed on approach to Dulles Airport.  It was down in the mountains of Virginia (Wikipedia).  

Even as a senior in high school I was very aware of politics.  And a Sunday flight to Washington, DC from Columbus might well have Representatives on board.  So I got concerned about that.  And while plane crashes happened more in those days, it was still a big deal when a regular domestic aircraft went down.  So, between the listening to “Kung Fu Fighting” by Carl Douglas and “Cats in the Cradle” by Harry Chapin, I was driving and wondering what happened, and who was lost.

Security Breach

I was just passing Sunbury when the 1:00 news hit.  TWA Flight 514 crashed into Mt. Weather, a National Security facility in Virginia.  The news explained that Mt. Weather was the evacuation point for Congress and the President if Washington was threatened by a nuclear attack.  And as I approached Columbus, I thought, “I really don’t think that the government would want the whole world to know about that; ‘if you’re going to blow up Washington, they’ll all be at a mountain in Virginia, aim there next.’”

Getting through Columbus those days was a bit of a trick.  The freeway bypassing the town, I-270, wasn’t even completed.  Even what today is I-71 through town wasn’t done (and if you live in Columbus, you know it still isn’t!).  What was then I-71 is what today is called SR 315.  So as a young driver I had to make sure I kept my directions straight to get through town.  I wasn’t paying much attention to the radio until I cleared the small town of Grove City, and was on the last long stretch of I-71 to home.

Clean Up

It wasn’t until the 2:00 pm news that I was paying attention again.  And this time, it was very different.  Someone had made a phone call, or as I imagined it, the FBI had stormed into the studio, tearing up scripts and threatening long imprisonments.  The news reporter spoke of TWA Flight 514, down in the “heavily forested land” west of Dulles Airport.  No mention of Mt. Weather, or nuclear war, or any national security protocols.  And for years, the exact purpose of the location was kept quiet.  But I was in on the secret, along with whoever else was listening to WLW at 1:00 pm on Sunday December 1st.  In the event of nuclear war, our government will be on Mt. Weather.

Dinner at the Dahlman’s

My parents were well known for their Saturday dinners.  There was always amazing amounts of food, and plenty of wine to go with it.  But what really made their dinners special were the people around the table.  Dad, at the head of the table, was changing the television business with his success with the Phil Donahue Show.  Mom, at the other end, was a former SOE agent and represented “England” to the world.  And the guests might include Federal Judges, Proctor and Gamble Engineers, exiles from the Soviet Union, and even a woman who communicated with ghosts.  

After the roast beef or the Cornish hens, there would always be a special desert.  And we would sit around the table, working through bottles of wine, and talking for hours about the events of the day, or the latest trip overseas, or politics (but never religion or the Queen – Mom’s rules). 

Pole Vault Poles

One night in the mid-1980’s, a former Navy Commander and material engineer, and I were talking about my pole vault coaching.  He was interested in the construction of poles, how the fiberglass stored energy, and what the athlete did to enhance the effect of the “slingshot” up over the bar.  He began describing a different material than fiberglass, one that was lighter but had greater energy “storage” capacity.  As a coach, I was fascinated.  We were going to change the whole sport, right there over a bottle of Pinot Grigio and the remains of a chocolate cake.

Abruptly he changed the subject, leaving me “hanging” on the new material.  I think he realized he’d stepped beyond the “security” boundaries of his corporation, and was too close to giving away “trade secrets”.  I was, frankly, annoyed.  He got me that far – it was clear we weren’t having a “theoretical” discussion – but stopped.  No amount of cajoling got us back on topic.  To this day, now thirty-some years later, whatever that material was hasn’t been revealed. 

Secrets Revealed

But beside him was another engineer, this one an aircraft engine specialist who worked for General Electric.  He’d been particularly interested in the conversation, and also in a bottle or two of  a California red.  So when he noticed my annoyance, he brought up some different materials that he worked with.

He began to describe an aircraft that couldn’t be seen on radar. It was made of  material designed to absorb radar waves instead of bouncing them back, and the work he did to fit the engines into the small profile body.  He went onto describe material that wasn’t metal, but a composite of materials, that made the plane, as he put it “stealthy”.  He’d spent months away from home in California.

The room got quiet.  Everyone realized that we were hearing about something that we didn’t know about,  for a reason.  I got that creeping feeling that the FBI would soon burst through the front door, and we would be in for a long interrogation.  But, though national security was definitely breeched that night in Cincinnati, it was a secret safe with us. No one was going to find their Soviet “handler” and pass on the information from “loose lips” about what we know now as the B-2 Stealth Bomber, manufactured in Palmdale, California with General Electric engines.

Secrets Safe

The B-2 “Batwing Bomber” was first publicly announced a few years later in 1988.  

Thirty-five years have passed since that dinner party, sharing secrets around the table in Mom and Dad’s dining room.  The “Officials Secrets Act” didn’t apply, but the time is passed.  And so has everyone sitting around that table, except for me. I don’t think the FBI will be visiting Pataskala anytime soon. At least I hope not.

The Sunday Story Series

Author: Marty Dahlman

I'm Marty Dahlman. After forty years of teaching and coaching track and cross country, I've finally retired!!! I've also spent a lot of time in politics, working campaigns from local school elections to Presidential campaigns.

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