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(Yahoo) Spiffy Decades later, a Cold War secret is revealed in Danbury, CT   (news.yahoo.com) divider line 146
More: Spiffy, Cold War, Danbury, Eastman Kodak, declassification, Big Bird, slide rules, advanced degree, Cold War secret  
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30541 clicks; posted to Main » on 25 Dec 2011 at 3:33 PM   |  Favorite    |   share:  Share on Twitter share via Email Share on Facebook   more»   |    Get this fabulous T-Shirt and impress the methane out of your friends! shirt it!



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ZAZ [TotalFark]
2011-12-25 11:07:02 AM
I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.
 
2011-12-25 11:18:18 AM
Good find.
 
2011-12-25 12:07:23 PM
ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

This is a good way to weed out foreign spies I bet. Buzz words and jargon are really really hard to learn as a non native speaker. My father in law has lived in the US for 20 years and still can't understand sports reports.
 
2011-12-25 12:30:11 PM
Wow. That was really interesting.
 
2011-12-25 12:43:48 PM
More stories from the NRO 50th anniversary in September, where they showed off the Hexagon at the Udvar-Hazy Center (new window)

It was pretty cool (new window)
 
2011-12-25 01:20:30 PM
FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust
 
2011-12-25 01:55:59 PM
My God the thing was massive.
 
2011-12-25 02:03:14 PM
Okay, this just cracked me up, and every time I think of it, I smile again!

"This was light years before Google Earth," Prusak said.

Thanks, subby, this is an ubercool link. Brings back lots of memories :-)
 
2011-12-25 02:09:56 PM
jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

who?
how did his leak affect the security of the country?

I seem to remember that it made out country safer by exposing the lies and the cover ups.
Do you REALLY think that lies and cover ups make us SAFER?

/security theater for the win
 
2011-12-25 03:38:30 PM
Oh great, now the Soviets know about it. We are definitely screwed.
 
2011-12-25 03:40:23 PM
Very cool. I live in Fairfield County, and not only am I getting a kick out of this story, but there are pictures of my doing so.
 
2011-12-25 03:40:54 PM
Mock26: Oh great, now the Soviets know about it. We are definitely screwed.

Gotta find some Soviets first to do the screwing...
 
2011-12-25 03:50:34 PM
Really freakin' cool. I remember seeing something on TV about a grappling-hook retrieval system, but I can't remember if it were another program, speculation, or this had already been declassified. It's amazing the sacrifice that can tear family and relationships apart.

I look forward to reading more cool stories like this as they get opened up and - hopefully - being able to thank at least a couple living participants.
 
2011-12-25 03:51:23 PM
Sounds like another money wasting, bureaucratically excessive government program to me.
 
2011-12-25 03:52:43 PM
namatad: jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

who?
how did his leak affect the security of the country?

I seem to remember that it made out country safer by exposing the lies and the cover ups.
Do you REALLY think that lies and cover ups make us SAFER?

/security theater for the win


No, they don't, but that's not the point. The point is... he betrayed our trust, and for that he should do MUCH time behind bars.
 
2011-12-25 03:54:27 PM
BarbadoSlim: Sounds like another money wasting, bureaucratically excessive government program to me.

Sure, but if you're gonna have a money wasting, bureaucratically excessive government program you might as well have a really cool one.
 
2011-12-25 03:56:38 PM
My God the thing was massive.

That's what she said!
 
2011-12-25 03:57:21 PM
Isn't this the same company that farked up Hubble's primary mirror?
 
2011-12-25 03:58:38 PM
ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

We call that "weaselspeak."
 
2011-12-25 03:59:33 PM
BarbadoSlim: Sounds like another money wasting, bureaucratically excessive government program to me.

It's why we have GPSs in our cars and phones now.
 
2011-12-25 04:00:01 PM
My brother sat in a Blackbird. He called and told us the day the clearance expired.

/he was quite the expert on radar
 
2011-12-25 04:00:14 PM
Arklop: ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

We call that "weaselspeak."


What? He wrote "executive".
 
2011-12-25 04:00:46 PM
ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

Sounds like the interview I had with Booz Allen a few years back. I was kinda relieved that I ended up getting another offer elsewhere.
 
2011-12-25 04:01:57 PM
jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

Too bad our government and military are no longer worth that trust. Why you ask? Billions and Trillions of Dollars have been and are routinely flushed down the "contractor" hole when our own (former) military services and experts should have been doing the same jobs for less money. How much do you think one or more of our current aerospace corporations would charge for half-assing the same job described in TFA? Include "no-bid contracts" and "cost-overruns" in your estimate.

/Employ the unemployed: lift the service number ceiling and make the armed forces go back to peeling their own potatoes.
//Burn in Hell well-connected, incompetent contractors. You've profited doing next to nothing at the expense of our teachers, fire-fighters, and our social safety net.
 
2011-12-25 04:02:02 PM
These are the kinds of stories I show my kids to try to get them to understand the wealth of info at their fingertips. The security of the world depended on getting accurate info from satellite and our people were scooping it up out of the friggin ocean. My kid punches up Google Maps and can locate just about any location in the world in seconds.
 
2011-12-25 04:02:50 PM
Spy satellites that used film cameras ... then dropped the film which was caught by airplanes.

Wow.
 
2011-12-25 04:03:40 PM
Arklop: ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

We call that "weaselspeak."


what do you have against weasels?
 
2011-12-25 04:04:26 PM
The Southern Dandy: namatad: jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

who?
how did his leak affect the security of the country?

I seem to remember that it made out country safer by exposing the lies and the cover ups.
Do you REALLY think that lies and cover ups make us SAFER?

/security theater for the win

No, they don't, but that's not the point. The point is... he betrayed our trust, and for that he should do MUCH time behind bars.



One could argue that he betrayed their trust...after they betrayed our trust with said lies and cover ups.

/just sayin'
 
2011-12-25 04:06:02 PM
Charles Ives > satellite
 
2011-12-25 04:06:27 PM
Hawkeye Kodak as well as the Lincoln facility might had some input.



No, I was not involved. Just a history interest here.
 
2011-12-25 04:07:32 PM
Shazam999: It's why we have GPSs in our cars and phones now.

So private companies and police agencies can spy on our every move.
 
2011-12-25 04:07:52 PM
My Dad worked on Corona in the 60s as well as Bio satellite which was really developed as a platform to test the film jettison and retrieval systems. He said that even back in those days, resolution was so good that if someone was looking up in a photo, you could recognize the face. Just imagine what they can do now.
 
2011-12-25 04:09:29 PM
Harry_Seldon: Shazam999: It's why we have GPSs in our cars and phones now.

So private companies and police agencies can spy on our every move.


Yeah, but now they know that I try to piss into the toilet, despite what the janitor keeps saying.
 
2011-12-25 04:09:40 PM
Bucky Katt: Arklop: ZAZ: I remember going to Perkin Elmer looking for a summer job and meeting some guy in a suit who spoke the most stereotypical buzzword laden executive talk I had ever heard up to that point in my young life.

We call that "weaselspeak."

what do you have against weasels?



Nothing, provided they sound like Michael Dorn.
 
2011-12-25 04:20:56 PM
Never happened.
 
2011-12-25 04:22:08 PM
4.bp.blogspot.com
It puts the spy film in the return bucket.......
 
2011-12-25 04:27:23 PM
If you're ever out & about in Arizona, look for these mysterious markings out in the desert:
mw2.google.com

They're relics from the Cold War. They were used as "Imaging Calibration Targets" for the Corona satellites as they flew over, to help determine how well-focused the orbital cameras were as they headed out over Soviet or Chinese territory to snap photos of military spots of interest.

1.bp.blogspot.com
 
2011-12-25 04:28:34 PM
The Southern Dandy: namatad: jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

who?
how did his leak affect the security of the country?

I seem to remember that it made out country safer by exposing the lies and the cover ups.
Do you REALLY think that lies and cover ups make us SAFER?

/security theater for the win

No, they don't, but that's not the point. The point is... he betrayed our trust, and for that he should do MUCH time behind bars.


So you want to lock up every politician to ever hold elected office? Sounds like a good start to me.
 
2011-12-25 04:28:48 PM
Despite their best efforts, not even an uber-cool top secret spy satellite program could make Connecticut a cool place.
 
2011-12-25 04:29:23 PM
/Waves to the spook types that post on this site that don't dare to endanger CNWDI or "lifestyle" situations to comment here.
 
2011-12-25 04:34:19 PM
Video footage of the Hexagon (new window) campus.
 
2011-12-25 04:42:07 PM
TV's Vinnie: If you're ever out & about in Arizona, look for these mysterious markings out in the desert:
[mw2.google.com image 500x375]

They're relics from the Cold War. They were used as "Imaging Calibration Targets" for the Corona satellites as they flew over, to help determine how well-focused the orbital cameras were as they headed out over Soviet or Chinese territory to snap photos of military spots of interest.

[1.bp.blogspot.com image 271x320]


They could have used this.
 
2011-12-25 04:43:17 PM
Great find subby...


Mock26: Oh great, now the Soviets know about it. We are definitely screwed.


On the case...
cf1.imgobject.com
 
2011-12-25 04:43:24 PM
Lol.. what lies did manning expose? That massive info dump did nothing but make generic headlines, maybe some extra ad revenue for the bloggers
 
2011-12-25 04:54:38 PM
Bob16: Charles Ives > satellite

So what does Charles Ives have to do with the Cold war?

/I know about his connection with CT.
 
2011-12-25 05:00:01 PM
KyanWan: Despite their best efforts, not even an uber-cool top secret spy satellite program could make Connecticut a cool place.

Apart from the Electric Boat Company, the Voynich Manuscript, Igor Sikorsky and Project Wombat, you mean?
 
2011-12-25 05:02:20 PM
Anyone recall having nuke drills while growing up during the Cold War? They were like tornado drills, but infinitely more creepy in retrospect. The ones I recall were in the early eighties when I was a wee lad.

By the time the Soviets fell, I was 14 or so. But growing up with a very defined threat (as opposed to the often nebulous fright theater of terrorism) was pretty unnerving for a little boy. Each day I half-expected the sky to turn blood red. I shouldn't complain though, as it's not like we grew up in WWll era London.
 
2011-12-25 05:07:28 PM
YodaBlues: The Southern Dandy: namatad: jim32rr: FTA: "It was more than a sworn oath. We had been entrusted with the security of the country. What greater trust is there?" Too bad Pfc.Manning could not honor that trust

who?
how did his leak affect the security of the country?

I seem to remember that it made out country safer by exposing the lies and the cover ups.
Do you REALLY think that lies and cover ups make us SAFER?

/security theater for the win

No, they don't, but that's not the point. The point is... he betrayed our trust, and for that he should do MUCH time behind bars.

So you want to lock up every politician to ever hold elected office? Sounds like a good start to me.


Politicians don't swear to keep secrets. Office holders do, and if they betray those secrets they need to serve time too.
 
2011-12-25 05:08:22 PM
The truth is that, due to the classifications of most intelligence programs, the public never really learns about the ones which work well. When things get FUBARed (like Gary Powers and the U2) everybody and their cousin end up learning about it with most people demanding to know why the government wastes their money on such weird projects.
 
2011-12-25 05:12:37 PM
cherryl taggart: These are the kinds of stories I show my kids to try to get them to understand the wealth of info at their fingertips. The security of the world depended on getting accurate info from satellite and our people were scooping it up out of the friggin ocean. My kid punches up Google Maps and can locate just about any location in the world in seconds.
Link (new window)

www.nasm.si.edu
 
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