The Kansas CW | This Missile Base Home
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THEN: The Pedens' Missile Base in the 1960's.
NOW: Satellite Image of the Pedens' Missile Base (courtesy: Google Maps)
THEN: An Atlas E being backed into position. (courtesy: SiloWorld.com)
THEN: An Atlas E Missile ready for launch.
THEN: A test flight of an Atlas missile (without warhead)By Chris Durden & Photojournalist John Olson (WABAUNSEE COUNTY, Kan.)
Thanksgiving is a time for family, for going home. Some fly to get there, others drive. For a Wabaunsee County couple, going home means something a little different.
Meet Ed and Dianna Ricke-Peden. Their home is a converted missile base near Topeka. Built during the height of The Cold War, it has a new life as a home, a business and even a tourist attraction.
The story of this Atlas E missile base, known as Subterra Castle, begins in 1961. It is one of 27 Atlas E bases built by the United States. This one cost $25 million dollars.
The base housed one missile and a 4 megaton thermonuclear warhead. The warhead was 200 times more powerful than the bombs dropped on Japan during World War II.
By the mid-1960's, sites like these were obsolete. The Air Force removed the missiles and the most sensitive and dangerous equipment. The properties were turned over to salvage companies, school districts or abandoned altogether.
Ed Peden bought this site for just under $50,000 in 1982. He made his decision during a time of increased tensions with the Soviet Union. Ed says the fact he had two young daughters, made the idea of having a safe and secure home all the more appealing.
The original plan was to build a house on top of the missile base and restore part of the facility. "This property had been abandoned for so many years, that if you had seen it when I first saw it, I had no interest in this structure at all," says Dianna. But like most home plans, theirs changed.
The Pedens, along with family and friends, spent next decade converting the one-time weapon of war into a home complete with wood floors and ceiling fans.
"The fact that we have 15 feet of wall space from ceiling to floor we decided to make use of that by lofting it and build on a second area, a second floor. That opened up all kinds of creative options for design," says Dianna.
She says her favorite room is the kitchen. "I spend a lot of time there. It's cozy. It's warm. It's where all the social events seem to gather around. It just has the warm, cozy, I'm in grandma's home feeling to me."
Behind the Scenes: Dianna Shows Us Her Home
The control room is now the living room. The generator room is now a large multi-purpose room. "It's a very large room. We play music there, we have various gatherings there, we have drum circles, parties there."
Out the front door and down a underground tunnel is the missile room. Ed uses it for a garage and work area.
As we talk in, Ed describes the first time he saw the property. "There was three feet of water through the entire facility. We would get in the canoe and paddle around with flashlights checking it out before we purchased and drained it."
Ed's work area is the same place where nearly 50 years ago, Air Force personnel would keep the missile and the base humming. Next door, is the missile room.
"This room's 100 feet long and 20 feet wide. It expands out even wider in the back. This is where the Atlas rocket lay. The rocket was about 90 feet long so it took up most of the room." Beneath the room is a flame pit. It's now covered to keep people from falling in.
Behind the Scenes: Ed Takes Us Inside the Missile Area
Behind the Scenes: Ed Takes Us Inside the Missile Area Pt. 2
"The really large door is the one up here," Ed says pointing to the ceiling. "One-hundred feet long, 40 feet wide and weighing 400 tons. This door would have to open to allow the missile to erect for firing."
Ed is a former school teacher and self-described "peace-nik." He and Dianna host tours of their home on a regular basis. Sometimes their visitors are students. Other times curious tourists stop by. The pair has appeared on Oprah, in People magazine and in newspapers around the world.
Part of the worldwide fascination has to do with Ed's business. He started selling missile sites more than a decade ago. In the past 15 years, he's sold sold nearly 50 properties around the country.
"The weapon of mass destruction that was located here had a range of 6,000 miles and could strike most anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere. So many, many countries were interested in this because of its international nature from its inception."
The theme of recycling and turning something built for war into a symbol of peace is common here. The living room contains symbols of religions all over the world. The multi-purpose room is used for concerts, family gathers and parties.
The kitchen's hardwood floor comes from an old military barracks in Medicine Lodge. A pair of stained glass windows in the living room are from Dianna's hometown church in Hazelton. "The point of this was to make it feel like home, not like an old missile base."
More About the Pedens
