Raven Rock Mountain Complex

The Raven Rock Mountain Complex (RRMC), also known as Site R and simply The Rock, is a U.S. military installation with an underground nuclear bunker near Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania. Raven Rock Mountain has been called an "underground Pentagon". The bunker has emergency operations centers for the United States Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. Along with Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center in Virginia and the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado, it formed the core bunker complexes for the US continuity of government plan during the Cold War to survive a nuclear attack.

The installation's largest tenant unit is the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, and RRMC communications are the responsibility of the 114th Signal Battalion. The facility has 38 communications systems, and the Defense Information Systems Agency provides computer services at the complex.

Raven Rock Mountain is adjacent to Jacks Mountain on the north, while Miney Branch flows west-to-east between them in the Potomac River Watershed. The 1820 Waynesboro-Emmitsburg Turnpike with toll station for the 1787 crossroad was constructed between the mountains, where the Fight at Monterey Gap was conducted after the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg (Stuart's artillery at Raven Rock Gap shelled Federal troops.) In 1870, copper ore was discovered to the north, and the nearby Fountain Dale Springs House was established in 1874. The scenic area's mountain recreation facilities to the west included the 1877 Pen Mar Park, the 1878 High Rock Tower, the 1885 Monterey Country Club, and several resorts (e.g., Blue Mountain House, Buena Vista Springs Hotels, & Washington Cliff House). The 1889 Jacks Mountain Tunnel on the Western Extension (Baltimore and Harrisburg Railway) was completed near Raven Rock Mountain, and nearby stations were at Blue Ridge Summit and Charmian. The Army's 1942 Camp Ritchie was built southwest of the resorts, and a local road was built^[when?] eastward from Blue Ridge Summit and intersected the north-south Fountaindale-Sabillasville Road (the intersection now provides access to the RRMC main gate.)

Planning for a protected Cold War facility near Washington, D.C. began in 1948 for relocation of military National Command Authorities and the Joint Communications Service.^{[citation needed]}

In 1953 the Army's Raven Rock unit^[specify] was part of Joint Support Command, then in 1971 was redesignated as the Directorate of Telecommunications and placed under the garrison commander of Fort Ritchie, where Strategic Communications Command moved. The Directorate was redesignated USACC Site R Telecommunications Center in 1976,^{[citation needed]} then simply USACC Site R in October 1981 (both under 7th Signal Command). Col. Humphrey L. Peterson was the 1983 commander of USACC Site R, which was redesignated in May 1984 as United States Army Information Systems Command - Site R. Operation of the center^[who?] was removed from the mission when the unit was redesignated the 1111th U.S. Army Signal Battalion under the 1101st U.S. Army Signal Brigade in October 1988 (under the 1108th U.S. Army Signal Brigade in October 1993), and the battalion remained responsible for maintenance, upkeep and communications.^{[citation needed]} The unit became the 114th Signal Battalion under the 21st Signal Brigade after the 1995 Base Realignment and Closure Commission.

The planned deep underground communications center was identified in the original 1950 federal petition to seize the Beard Lot, a 1,500-foot-high (460 m), 1-mile-long (1.6 km) hill located at Fountaindale and extending east and south along the Waynesboro-Emmitsburg road, The "Declaration of Taking" for United States of America v. 1,100 Acres of Land was filed at the Adams County courthouse on 23 January 1951, and made the government the official owner of the 280-acre (110 ha)-acre tract seized from four properties (17 total properties had been requested by 15 February—some only for temporary use). South of and above the Carson service station on the Sunshine trail, bulldozers began work on 19 January 1951; by 3 February a roadway to the site had been leveled behind a farmhouse; and by 24 February underground work had commenced (40 men working "normally" on that date were only performing above-ground construction). By 26 May the Army had named the landform Raven Rock Mountain ("Raven Rock" is a pillar landform to the north along the mountain range) and listed its elevation as 1,527 feet (465 m).

By 20 October 1951, there had been two deaths: one, Roland P. Kelly, of PenMar, MD, due to premature dynamite detonation in the Beard Lot tunnel, and a power shovel operator from Phillipsburg named Leroy Fleagle who suffered crushing injuries. The S. A. Healy Company was working on the alternate Pentagon in November 1951, when the government announced a defense appropriations cutback that would affect the project. On 16 January 1952, the government indicated that when completed, the bunker would have a standby group of approximately 100 personnel. Because of construction damage to the Sunshine Trail, the US said it would rebuild the trail in any fashion the state desired.

By 29 March 1952, more than 100 workers were striking from building additional Raven Rock housing at Camp Ritchie, which was to be a supplemental installation for the underground Pentagon at Fountaindale. No work was going on in the Raven Rock (Beard Lot) tunnel then. Local travelers having to bypass on the serpentine on the slope between Monterey and Fountaindale grew frustrated during the delay (the incomplete tunnel was derogatorily dubbed "Harry's Hole," for President Truman.) By 7 April 1952, United Telephone Company rights of way had been secured for four tracts, including one in Cumberland Township. Easements for three additional private tracts were filed by the government in December 1953 (a 1954 lawsuit against the U.S. by Alfred Holt was seeking $2,000 per 1-acre (4,000 m²) for his 140-acre (57 ha) woodlot atop the Beard Lot [after] turning down an offer of $2,800 from the government.)