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Conspiracy file · 1942–1981 · the legend since 1992

Project Montauk

The claim that a Cold War radar base at the tip of Long Island hid secret government experiments in mind control, psychic warfare and time travel. The base is real and its radar tower still stands. The experiments have never been documented.

Also known as The Montauk Project · Camp Hero · Montauk Air Force Station

On the recordTimelineFrom the comicsIn Paranoid American comicsSources & further reading

Project Montauk, a panel from a Paranoid American comic
From Time Samplers #4

The story

Camp Hero opened in 1942 at Montauk, on the eastern tip of Long Island: a coastal defense post disguised as a fishing village, with 16-inch guns guarding the sea approach to New York. After the war the Air Force turned it into a radar station. Montauk Air Force Station joined the SAGE air-defense network in 1958, and its huge AN/FPS-35 radar went live in December 1960.

The station shut down in 1981, and in 2002 the land opened to the public as Camp Hero State Park. The radar tower was left standing.

The legend began circulating in the early 1980s and took off in 1992 with Preston Nichols and Peter Moon's book The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time. Drawing on what they called recovered memories, they described experiments in mind control, psychic programming, teleportation and time travel, picking up where the 1943 Philadelphia Experiment supposedly left off. The authors themselves called much of it "soft facts". The story went on to inspire Stranger Things, which was once titled Montauk.

Memorandum for the recordSubject: Project Montauk

On the record

  1. The U.S. Army commissioned Camp Hero in 1942, named after Maj. Gen. Andrew Hero Jr., the Army's coastal artillery chief.
  2. It was built to look like a fishing village from the air, with batteries of 16-inch and 6-inch guns.
  3. Montauk Air Force Station joined the SAGE air-defense network in 1958.
  4. The AN/FPS-35 radar went operational in December 1960. In 1961 it was switched off for a while because it interfered with local TV and radio.
  5. The station closed on January 31, 1981.
  6. Camp Hero State Park opened on September 18, 2002. The radar tower was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places the same year.

The theory

  • After the radar went quiet, secret underground levels kept running experiments for a government program.
  • The "Montauk Chair" amplified a psychic's thoughts and could make them appear in the real world.
  • The experiments developed psychological warfare and mind-control techniques.
  • Researchers opened tunnels through time, connected to the 1943 Philadelphia Experiment aboard the USS Eldridge.
  • Some versions add teleportation, contact with extraterrestrials and faked Apollo Moon landings.

Timeline

  1. 1942The U.S. Army commissions Camp Hero as a coastal defense station
  2. 1943The alleged Philadelphia Experiment, later woven into the Montauk story
  3. 1948The first Air Force radar is set up at the site
  4. 1958Montauk Air Force Station joins the SAGE air-defense network
  5. 1960The AN/FPS-35 radar goes operational
  6. 1981The station closes (January 31)
  7. 1992The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time is published
  8. 2002Camp Hero State Park opens (September 18)
  9. 2015The documentary Montauk Chronicles is released
  10. 2016Stranger Things premieres; its working title was Montauk

From the comics

Panels straight from the page. Click one to read it full size.

From Time Samplers #4: Blowing Out the Candle · Pages 4-5

Welcome to Camp Hero

The Montauk Chair is the heart of the legend. In Preston Nichols' telling it was a chair ringed with magnetic pickup coils: a psychic sat in it, and the base's transmitter turned his thoughts into real things. The story goes that in 1983 the psychic, Duncan Cameron, pictured a monster, it appeared, and the project was shut down for good. None of it is on the record. All of it is in Time Samplers #4.

Welcome to Camp Hero, 1 of 11 Welcome to Camp Hero, 4 of 11
Welcome to Camp Hero, 6 of 11 Welcome to Camp Hero, 7 of 11
  1. Delta-T antenna: in Nichols' books, an octahedral antenna under Camp Hero said to "shift time zones" and open a door between years. Some retellings credit the design to Nikola Tesla.
  2. 6037 AD: Montauk lore says children were sent by time machine to the year 6037 to inspect a golden horse statue standing in a ruined city, then report back. The story comes from the Montauk book series and the timelines fans compiled from it; there is no evidence for any of it.

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