National Fallout Shelter Program Public Shelters Virtual Tours
LaGrange College Library, LaGrange, Georgia. May 2004
In May of 2004 James Blackwood e-mailed me about some shelter supplies he found on the campus of LaGrange College where he works as the Information Technology Director. James went out of his way to take these photos and e-mail them to me for a virtual shelter tour. The text captions on this page are his comments. All the photos were taken by him. I have added a few comments in italics. Thank you James for taking the time to document these remaining supplies!
Mr Green,
I found your website while I was looking for information on a stash of CD
supplies I found on our campus. When I first came to LaGrange College eight
years ago, I remember seeing a fallout shelter sign on one of the buildings.
We're located about 60 miles south of Atlanta, GA and the school has been
in its current location since the late 1800's. I was curious about what
I could find out and it didn't take long to realize that nobody knew anything.
A couple of years later the sign disappeared. Some time later while exploring
some rooms in the library, I found several CD water barrels and two Sanitation
Kit IV's.
I'll get back down there and take some more pictures soon. It's rainy today so it may be Friday or Monday. I'll follow your lead with showing outside, entry, location, etc. so they'll be close to what's already on your site. These photos are put in order of how you would enter the basement fallout shelter area.
Inside Basement Door
This is the first thing you see when entering the basement area from the "tunnel." The door with the glass window enters the basement stacks area.
Air Conditioning Room Door
The AC room is in the basement of the library. The building is on an uneven grade so the main entry is the second floor. The entire basement is finished, and always has been.
In this photo it is hard too see anything. One of the water barrels with shipping label, and the box with the liners is visible. You could probably use the other pictures I sent for this room. I just wanted the transition from the finished basement to the AC room to be seen. You can just see the barrel shipping label between the a/c unit and the brick wall.
Supplies In Corner of A/C Room.
I'm working on one of the servers in the library today so I explored the items a little more closely. They are located in what is now an HVAC room stuck in a pocket back behind an air conditioner. There is a light assembly in there with a metal cage around it that looks exactly like the one on your Dallas EOC Air Filtering System page. It is not the primary fixture in the room and I can't figure out how to turn it on. This room may have been a shelter itself, but I doubt it because of its size and the fact that it has a window to the outside. That may have been added later though. One of the SKIV's has been opened and basically torn apart. The other one was still closed but showed some signs of water damage on the outside. I opened it and found its contents mostly intact except for the hand cleaner, and the can opener. There is no sign of food or medical/sensing equipment. Mr. Blackwood's photos here show a prime example of why shelter supplies stay in place so long. They are usually tucked away in areas just like this. It wouldn't take much work to get these out of here but most of the time supplies are in such inaccessible places they usually aren't removed until they absolutely have to be removed.
I didn't touch all of the barrels, but the ones I did push are empty. The tops are crimped on though so I don't know if they leaked or were emptied. Many water barrels were stocked in shelters and never filled. The intent was to fill them if there was an "increase in international tensions" which would have resulted in increased Civil Defense activity.
Box of Barrel Liners
I found something else in there that I didn't see mentioned on your site. I'm sure you've seen it and just didn't find it significant enough to include. It's a rectangular cardboard box that contains additional plastic bags for refilling of the water barrels. There is also an instruction manual about the proper procedure for refilling. It's dated October 1962. Actually, I still don't have a box of barrel liners in my collection.
Here are some various photos James included of the water barrels.
All of the barrels have shipping labels that show they were shipped from Atlanta to the CD Administrator of our county then finally to one of our dorms. How they took up residence in the library I don't know.
Classic white label U.S. Steel manufactured water barrel. The first bunch of barrels I ever found in a shelter were U.S. Steel barrels. I still have them. Thanks again James for a well documented shelter find!