According the his stepson, Jeff Horstman, the late Arthur Houghton was not a doomsdayer per say, but it could be said he was a man of his times. When the former president of Corning Glass laid out his plans for the Wye River Plantation in Queen Anne’s County for his beloved Black Angus cattle and the Wye Institute, (later to be incorporated into the Aspen Institute) in the early 1960s, it was not inconceivable that the DC region might be the target of a nuclear attack. With the Cuban Missile Crisis fresh in the minds of many Americans, some of the country’s wealthiest began building fallout shelters as a reasonable precaution to remain alive if such an event took place.
But unlike other shelters that were built to house only a handful of people, the Houghton fortress was a massive underground complex of dorm rooms, a dining area, a social space, kitchen, and endless space for food storage. At its core were twin Kohler generators, fed by massive oil tanks, ready to keep up to 40 people supplied with air exchangers with radiation filters. Rows of bunk beds, each once sealed with fresh sheets in protective wrapping, lined the bedrooms. And Houghton maintained a survival list of those who would be admitted on short notice.
Horstman, who serves on the board of the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp, who owns the property, was taking this spy around the property to tour the organization’s new facilities to host children with extremely serious illnesses and their families a special getaway throughout the year. That will be the subject of another Spy story in September but we did take a side trip that day to explore this one-of-a-kind facility.
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