White Sands Missile Garden

While on vacation in late 1997, I stopped by the White Sands Missile Range. It has changed from my last visit (1985, I think...). The Missile Garden and museum had moved from the inner part of the main base to just inside of the guard post. The hours had also changed from what I remembered: the museum is now only open on weekdays. It used to only be open on weekends, so of course, that's when I visited... the museum was closed, but I could still wander among the missile garden. (The museum is now also open on weekends, but it wasn't in 1997 when I visited.) The missiles are in rather poor shape: they look as if white latex paint had been crudely applied with a large brush. But at least they have the proper shapes. I was also surprised at the size of some of them... The most interesting of the exhibits to me is the "flying saucer" testbed for the Mars landing program. I seem to recall that they used to have a V-2, but it's not in the garden now. (As I have since found out, the V-2 is still in the 'old' missile garden, about 200 yards down the road from the museum. You can visit the museum's web site at http://www.wsmr-history.org/)

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SE corner view Pershing Aerobee-Hi Lark
WAC Corporal Nike Ajax Talos Loki
Honest John Corporal Loon Loon
Nike Hercules Crossbow XM-21 Little John
Sargeant XQ-4 Redstone Pogo-Hi
Aeroshell flying saucer Aeroshell interior Aerobee 170 Athena
Terrier VC-6A NE corner pan SW corner pan



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Sven Knudson, IPMS#32490
sknudson@austin.rr.com