Saturday, June 16, 2012

Uknown History you can find in the woods of Charlotte, NC


A Tube Station in London during the Blitz.
 London, England. The 7th of September, 1940
This day began the longest bombing raid ever done by man. "The Blitz" as it was called, was started by Hitler's notorious Luftwaffe which continually bombed England until May of 1941. It left from what we can only estimate to be anywhere from 40,000 to 43,000 casualties.

The attack was designed to strike fear into the hearts of the people of England, and for many years to come, the bomb became the source of worldwide fear. This led to the panicked building of bomb shelters and tube stations till the end of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Now this happened way before my time and I do not intend to make you feel like you're back in school. Believe me! I just graduated, and I don't want to feel that way either! I will not bore you with all the details, but there are places here in Charlotte, NC that can take you back in time.  One such place I am about to show you is a shelter built somewhere around the sixties by General Payne (along with several other neighbors who were all WWII veterans in the National Guard).

Originally they planned to build an Olympic sized swimming pool, but later decided that a bomb shelter was a better use of the money. This was especially true since at the time, we were in close range of the USSR's Nuclear weapons during the Cuban Missile Crisis (AKA "The Invasion of the Bay of Pigs").  Looking at the shelter from the street, it looks as if you are looking at a pre-WWII drill pad (only notice the vents in the background).


Air vents.
Around the back you have the usual heavy Iron Door. Now to be honest, normally I do not have the guts to go in to stuff like this. But this time, I could not help myself!
I could tell that the entryway has been previously flooded a few times and the door has been cracked open for quite some time. (And we found evidence of trespassers) I know, I know... You are probably thinking about asking, what is it like in there? A lot of times people had their shelters set up like an everyday living room. Many were furnished with couches, and chairs, and sometimes even beds to keep things comfortable. This shelter had a bathroom with a shower, and a pantry with plenty of food and water to survive for several days. Unfortunately the owners cleared it out, but I will leave what this particular shelter probably looked like, to your imagination.

I believe this could have been where the pantry was.

The leftovers from trespassers!

50x100 Sq. Feet.
 
Shower, water, toilet, and sink.

Thanks for reading! :D

A big thanks to the owners for giving us the grand tour!

4 comments:

  1. What a great experience! Thanks for inviting us, Eric. The kids and I really enjoyed the tour as well.

    Keep up the blog. I look forward eagerly to the next post!

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  2. It was great that you all could come along! :D

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  3. Eric - I'm a reporter at News 14 Carolina. Could you email me (adam.rhew@news14.com) with some more information about where this shelter is? I'd love to contact the owners to use it in a future story. Thanks - great post!

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    1. Hello Andrew! So sorry for not responding for such a long time. Still getting used to the Blogger UI and had no idea that I had a new comment till now! That sounds great! Would you happen to be able to send me a message on Facebook? https://www.facebook.com/#!/middleton.eric I would gladly send you their contact info on there.

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