Kagnew Station
Tract F

Tract F was occupied by the navy in 1961. If I was on a quiz show and had to take a wild guess at the month, I'd say April. The operations building ran roughly east to west with a central corridor of the same orientation. Entrance to the site, and the building, was from the east. On the right side of the center corridor was first a small lounge, then the navy relay (RBQA?), then Special Communications (supersecret, those within forbidden to talk about what they did -- but from one clue and another we figured out that it was comms with the Polaris-missile submarines), and finally circuit control. I think the COMSEC Custodian's vault could be entered only through circuit control. On the left side of the corridor were a couple of rooms devoted to electronics and teletype repair, a head, an office housing the operations officer, operations chief, and operations yeoman, and last the message center (largest space in the building) -- tape cutting, message reproduction and distribution, ship-shore comms, fleet broadcast, and the desks of communications watch officer, traffic officer, and traffic chief. At the end of the corridor double doors opened out to our nearby incinerator.

The next-largest building, on the right (north) side of the compound, was completed a few months later. I remember movies being shown there in late 1961 but the navy admin offices had not yet moved from tract A, I assume that move was made soon after, in 1962. It contained offices of the captain, exec, admin officer, a mailroom, large admin/personnel office where the yeomen and personnelmen worked, education & training office, small auditorium/theater, offices and spaces for supply and for public works.

There was a row of smaller buildings along the south side of the compound but I don't remember anything about their uses.

Before moving to tract F the navy occupied a small corner of tract C; as you entered the compound it was at the right rear of the building. The same functions mentioned in the message center of tract F were there except that the relay (and everything else) was unclassified only -- there was an adjoining crypto center but it had no circuits (? - my memory could be at fault here) and was mostly handled by junior officers. We also had a small quonset hut off that right rear corner, partitioned in two. Half of it belonged to the electronic technicians, the other housed ship-shore CW and a couple day workers.

Consider the foregoing to be "as best as I can remember". There are probably a few inaccuracies/mistakes somewhere in it.