In a December 8, 1953, speech to the United Nations, President Dwight D. Eisenhower announced a new "Atoms for Peace Policy", and the United States Congress enacted his program into law the following year." Atoms for Peace "made funding accessible to anyone who tried to harness the atom's power for peaceful purposes. Under the new program, an airplane manufacturer sought a large isolated area in central Pennsylvania "for the development of nuclear-powered jet engines and to conduct research in nucleonics, metallurgy, ultrasonics, electronics, chemicals and plastics". The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania sold the company 8,597 acres for $181,250 and gave them a 99-year lease on the remaining 42,596 acres at $30,000 a year.
The state constructed $1.6 million of roads to the area; the Quehanna Highway was built. Three facilities were built on the land. The first was a nuclear research center with a nuclear reactor and six shielded radiation containment chambers for handling radioactive isotopes at the end of Reactor Road. The second was for jet engine trials and had two test cells with bunkers just north of Quehanna Highway. The third installation was an industrial complex where they manufactured a foam for furniture and household products and used beryllium oxide to make high-temperature ceramics for application in the nuclear industry.
By 1960 the Air Force had decided not to pursue nuclear-powered aircraft and the Federal Government cancelled testing contracts with them. By June 1960 the reactor was on standby and by July 1963, Pennsylvania Governor William Scranton announced the termination of their lease. In 1965 the State legislature passed an act declaring the former leased area a wilderness area and Maurice K. Goddard, secretary of the Department of Forests and Waters, named it the Quehanna Wilderness Area, the largest of the 16 wild areas in the state.
AFTER THE AIRPLANE MANUFACTURER LOST THEIR LEASE ON LAND IN CENTRAL PENNSYLVANIA, WHAT WAS THE AREA CALLED ???????
THE QUEHANNA WILDERNESS AREA = N 40 49.765 W 078 55.735
SINNEMAHONING STATE PARK = N 40 49.011 W 078 56.178
CONGRATULATIONS TO theslipperyweasels..schmuck&puttz..and TheBOZ FOR A SHARED FTF