Traveler's Aid - Visiting the Cold War: A Weapon of Mass Destruction Becomes a Tourist Destination (10/4/02)

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Remember the Cold War? Remember fallout shelters, Sputnik, and the missile gap? Remember duck-and-cover drills, the Iron Curtain and first-strike capability?

Some say the Cold War is over; some say it lingers on, albeit in less obvious ways. One thing's for sure: The history of the Cold War is scattered all over the country in the form of inactive missile sites -- one of which will soon become a National Park Service historic site. It's located on the edge of Badlands National Park in South Dakota, and was officially transferred from the Air Force to the Park Service last week.

The silo once held a Minuteman II missile that could send a nuclear weapon to the Soviet Union in 30 minutes. Now, tourists from all over the world will take vacation snapshots here. What will a holiday outing at a missile site be like? And more importantly, what story will the site tell about our history -- a story that will be absorbed by millions of tourists?

To answer these questions, Sue Lamie joins us. She's a Park Service historian and one of the key players in getting the site ready for the visiting throngs.

Savvy Resources: For more information about The Minuteman Missile National Historic Site, go to: http://www.nps.gov/mimi/

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