You're looking for a geocache along the North Lighthouse Ravine Trail in Milwaukee's Lake Park. The cache commemorates the Nike Missile defense system utilized by the United States during the height of the Cold War in the 1950s and 60s. Street parking is 366 feet west of the cache.
During the early cold war, Milwaukee was considered a major industrial center that required defense from the Soviet Union. A ring of eight NIKE surface-to-air missile (SAM) defensive installations were constructed to intercept and shoot down long-range Russian bombers carrying nuclear weapons to destroy Milwaukee and its industry. Each NIKE facility had two parts which were spread apart: there was a COMMAND CONTROL center with radar, and there was a MISSILE LAUNCH area.
The M-20 Launch was in what is now known as the Summerfest gounds, and the M-20 command radar installation was on the top the bluff, here in Lake Park. It was north of the lighthouse and just 400 feet northeast of this cache, along what is now the Oak Leaf Trail. Only one building remains from the former Control Center; if you care to see it, it is the brown cinderblock building at N 43° 03.999 W 087° 52.207. The building is now utilized for maintenance of Lake Park Golf, only 200 feet away. The park maintenance workers still call it the Nike Building (although many didn't know why).
Shown above is the defensive ring around Milwaukee of Nike missile installations.
Introduced in 1954, all eight sites initially were equipped with Nike Ajax missiles, which were designed to intercept conventional bomber aircraft flying at high subsonic speeds. Their range was approximately 30 miles and each carried three high explosive warheads. However, in 1958, three of the sites - Milwaukee, Waukesha, and River Hills - were fitted with the next generation of missiles: Nike Hercules. Designed to intercept both high altitude bombers as well as ballistic missiles, they had a range of approximately 75 miles and could be equipped with nuclear warheads. Since the Hercules was a much faster and more powerful system, the army did not need as many sites to protect the area. So in the early 1960s most of the sites were closed, leaving just the three sites with nuclear warheads.
By the early 1970s, every Nike missile site in the Milwaukee area was closed. There were a few reasons why. First, they were expensive to maintain and man, and second, they became somewhat irrelevant as the focus switched to intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Most of these sites faded into obscurity, and as they did much of their history has been forgotten.
Thankfully, the greatest fears of the Cold War were never realized, but remnants of the missile sites remain - a legacy to the looming threat of nuclear war and the people who ensured it would never happen.
Shown above is an aerial image is of the M-20 Radar site which is currently part of Lake Park, on the bluff overlooking the lake. There is one original structure left, which is a brown cinderblock building 200 feet southeast of Lake Park Golf, along the Oak Leaf Trail.
Pictured above: Two images of what was formerly called Maitland Field, but is now known as the Milwaukee Summerfest grounds - it was the launch site for Nike missiles. The missiles were not housed in silos.
These are some great links to learn more:
- https://ericapp.weebly.com/milwaukee-area-nike-missile-history.html
- https://www.jsonline.com/story/communities/waukesha/2017/08/23/nuclear-missiles-were-once-ready-launch-milwaukees-suburbs/574221001/
- http://www.notpurfect.com/travel/nuke/nike.html
The Nike Challenge!
This Nike cache series has caches hidden at all eight Nike sites. There is also a Challenge Cache GC3E3PY Nike Missile Challenge for anyone who has visited all eight sites and found at least one cache at each site. See the bookmark list of all the possible caches on the Nike cache pages. You can sign the log of the challenge cache in Lake Park in Milwaukee early, but you can not claim a find on it until you have visited all eight sites.
Placed by members of the
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The Milwaukee County Parks Department approved this cache with permit #796.