Abandoned North Truro Military Base Is a Peek into 1950s Cape Cod

Take a look inside what was a hub of air defense during the Cold War era.

The North Truro Air Force Base on Cape Cod started operating as a radar station in 1951, where radars worked to detect potential threats to American air space.

"Anyone who remembers schoolyard 'duck and cover' drills also remembers the pervasive fear that the Soviets would send an atomic bomb our way," the National Parks Service shared on its website. "One nation’s reaction to this fear was the establishment of bases like North Truro, whose mission was to 'detect, identify, intercept and destroy' hostile aircraft."

But the base was so much more than its radars. Families lived on base, in neighborhoods of houses that looked identical. Children of military men and women that worked on the base played on the playground equipment and used the base's basketball courts and baseball fields. Military members probably even used the base's bowling lanes to decompress and destress after a hard week of work.

Although an Atlas Obscura update in June of 2021 noted that the base had been closed to the public with fences and locks, it had been open to the public for decades after closing in 1994. Luckily, the YouTube channel @Exploring With Josh traveled out to the Cape in 2015 and explored the property, taking video of their journey and the beautiful ocean views not far from the former North Truro Air Force Base.