Camp Hero/Montauk Air Force Station

It’s an old photo, but with a squint this looks like a fishing village from the mid-20th century. And that’s exactly what Camp Hero was designed to fool the viewer into thinking it was. But in fact, this settlement of quaint-looking wooden clapboard buildings was a secret military base known as Montauk Air Force Station, and for forty years it operated as such. The area has been a focus point for numerous conspiracy theories, including claims of government-sponsored human experimentation with mind-altering drugs. Indeed, the television show “Stranger Things” is based in part on these rumors.

Camp Hero was situated on the far eastern tip of Long Island, and was run by the US government between 1942-1984. What started out as a surveillance and defense base against possible Nazi attacks turned into an anti-Soviet base. But regardless of the potential enemy, Camp Hero’s exact mission and military power was classified and sealed off from the general public.

You can see a fake wooden building on the second slide — its interior walls were concrete. There are still remains of a fake New England-style church, and unknown tunnels under the observable top structures. Today it’s now a New York State Park that tourists can visit. (!).

The third slide shows a radio tower, one built to detect and give warning about nuclear strikes. Apparently it would occasionally emit a signal at 425 MHz, which was strong enough to mess up local televisions and radios.

All of this fed into the vast conspiracy theories about government human experimentation. And sadly, there is documented evidence that the federal government did engage in such practices (for instance, MKUltra, which I have posted about elsewhere). There was also a 1992 book written by Nichols and Peter Moon called _The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time_ — the Moons’ book is considered science fiction, but those who love occult government plots have thought it to be a real account.

I’ll stick to the writers of “Stranger Things” for my fiction in this area, but I would love to tour around Montauk State Park! 👽👹🦠