Highlands Air Force Station was a

military installation A military base is a facility directly owned and operated by or for the military or one of its branches that shelters military equipment and personnel, and facilitates training and Military operation, operations. A military base always provides ...

in Middletown Township near the borough of

Highlands, New Jersey :''See also New York–New Jersey Highlands for the northwestern part of New Jersey.'' Highlands is a Borough (New Jersey), borough in northern Monmouth County, New Jersey, Monmouth County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. A historic waterfront ...

. The station provided

ground-controlled interception Ground-controlled interception (GCI) is an air defence tactic whereby one or more radar stations or other observational stations are linked to a command communications centre which guides interceptor aircraft to an airborne target. This tactic wa ...

radar coverage as part of the

Lashup Radar Network The Lashup Radar Network was a United States Cold War radar netting system for air defense surveillance which followed the post-World War II "five-station radar net" and preceded the "high Priority Permanent System". ROTOR was a similar expedient ...

and the

Semi-Automatic Ground Environment The Semi-Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) was a system of mainframe computer, large computers and associated computer network, networking equipment that coordinated data from many radar sites and processed it to produce a single unified image ...

network, as well as providing radar coverage for the

Highlands Army Air Defense Site The Highlands Army Air Defense Site (HAADS) was a United States Army air defence site in Middletown Township, New Jersey. The Army Air Defense Command Post (AADCP) at Highlands directed the Nike fire units in the New York Defense Area, replacing ...

. The site's is now the Rocky Point section in Hartshorne Woods Park of the Monmouth County Parks System. The Navesink Military Reservation (also called the Highlands Military Reservation) was added as a historic district to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

on 13 October 2015. Highlands AFS - 1960

atop the Highlands-Middletown hill overlooking the

Navesink river The Navesink River is an estuary in the eastern United States in Monmouth County, New Jersey. Approximately in length, it is surrounded by the communities of Middletown (including the namesake Navesink CDP), Red Bank, Fair Haven, and ...

" (published 7 August 1958).

History

Early installations

The Navesink Highlands had a sea navigation beacon in 1746, and the first

Navesink Twin Lights The Navesink Twin Lights is a non-operational lighthouse and museum located in Highlands, Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States, overlooking Sandy Hook Bay, the entrance to New York Harbor, and the Atlantic Ocean. The Twin Lights, as the na ...

lighthouse was built in 1828. The current

lighthouse was built in 1862. The Navesink Highlands were used for antebellum flag signaling experiments that communicated with Fort Tompkins on

Staten Island Staten Island ( ) is the southernmost of the boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County and situated at the southernmost point of New York (state), New York. The borough is separated from the ad ...

in 1859. In 1899

Guglielmo Marconi Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquess of Marconi ( ; ; 25 April 1874 – 20 July 1937) was an Italian electrical engineer, inventor, and politician known for his creation of a practical radio wave-based Wireless telegraphy, wireless tel ...

built a radio station on the hill next to the north tower of the

to report on the

America's Cup The America's Cup is a sailing competition and the oldest international competition still operating in any sport. America's Cup match races are held between two sailing yachts: one from the yacht club that currently holds the trophy (known ...

races off of Sandy Hook.

Seacoast defense and 1930s radar testing

In 1917 during World War I, four

12-inch coast defense mortar The 12-inch coast defense mortar was a weapon of caliber emplaced during the 1890s and early 20th century to defend US harbors from seaborne attack. In 1886, when the Endicott Board set forth its initial plan for upgrading the coast defenses o ...

s were placed on the Navesink Highlands for seacoast defense, transferred from the mortar batteries at

Fort Hancock, New Jersey Fort Hancock is a former United States Army fort at Sandy Hook, New Jersey, Sandy Hook in Middletown Township, New Jersey, Middletown Township, New Jersey. The coastal artillery base defended the East Coast of the United States, Atlantic coast a ...

Sandy Hook Sandy Hook is a barrier spit in Middletown Township, Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States. The barrier spit, approximately in length and varying from wide, is located at the north end of the Jersey Shore. It encloses the southern en ...

. These were called Battery Hartshorne.Berhow, p. 210 The battery was named for

Richard Hartshorne Richard Hartshorne (; December 12, 1899 – November 5, 1992) was a prominent American geographer, and professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who specialized in economic and political geography and the philosophy of geography. He is ...

, a settler who acquired the land in the 1670s. This battery was disarmed in 1920. By 1933,

Harold A. Zahl Harold Adelbert Zahl (August 24, 1904 – March 11, 1973) was an American physicist who had a 35-year career with the Signal Corps Laboratories, U.S. Army Signal Corps Laboratories, where he served as the director of research at Fort Monmouth and ...

's radio range experiments had begun from the

Twin Lights lighthouse The Navesink Twin Lights is a non-operational lighthouse and museum located in Highlands, Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States, overlooking Sandy Hook Bay, the entrance to New York Harbor, and the Atlantic Ocean. The Twin Lights, as the na ...

, and an August 1935

US Army Signal Corps The United States Army Signal Corps (USASC) is a branch of the United States Army responsible for creating and managing communications and information systems for the command and control of combined arms forces. It was established in 1860 by ...

radar test at the lighthouse allowed a searchlight beam to track an aircraft. An

SCR-268 radar The SCR-268 (for ''Signal Corps Radio no. 268'') was the United States Army's first radar system. Introduced in 1940, it was developed to provide accurate aiming information for antiaircraft artillery and was also used for gun laying systems and ...

assembled in August 1938 was demonstrated at the Twin Lights lighthouse in 1939. In 1942-44 the Navesink (or Highlands) Military Reservation was built, which included Battery Isaac N. Lewis (also called Battery 116), a

casemate A casemate is a fortified gun emplacement or armoured structure from which guns are fired, in a fortification, warship, or armoured fighting vehicle.Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary When referring to antiquity, the term "casemate wall" ...

d coastal defense battery of two

16"/50 caliber Mark 2 gun The 16"/50 caliber Mark 2 gun and the near-identical Mark 3 were guns originally designed and built for the United States Navy as the main armament for the South Dakota-class battleship (1920), ''South Dakota''-class battleships and s. The succe ...

s, along with Battery 219, a coastal defense battery of two 6-inch M1903 guns on the hill to the south of the Twin Lights Lighthouse. The batteries were garrisoned by the

United States Army Coast Artillery Corps The U.S. Army Coast Artillery Corps (CAC) was an administrative corps responsible for coastal, harbor, and anti-aircraft defense of the United States and its possessions between 1901 and 1950. The CAC also operated heavy and railway artiller ...

as part of the

Harbor Defenses of New York The Harbor Defenses of New York was a United States Army Coast Artillery Corps harbor defense command. It coordinated the coast defenses of New York City from 1895 to 1950, beginning with the Endicott program, some of which were located in New J ...

. Battery Lewis was one of the primary batteries guarding Greater New York in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, along with another 16-inch battery at

Fort Tilden Fort Tilden, also known as Fort Tilden Historic District, is a former United States Army installation on the coast in the New York City borough of Queens. Fort Tilden now forms part of the Gateway National Recreation Area, and is administered ...

in Queens and two 12-inch long-range batteries at Fort Hancock on Sandy Hook. These rendered all previous heavy guns in the area obsolete, and these were gradually scrapped during the war. After World War II it was determined that gun defenses were obsolete, and the guns at Navesink were scrapped in 1948.

Twin Lights station

The Twin Lights

Aircraft Warning Corps The Aircraft Warning Corps (AWC) was a World War II United States Army Air Force organization for Continental United States air defense. The corps' information centers networked an area's "Army Radar Stations" which communicated radar tracks b ...

Site 8A was an Army radar site that reported radar data to an Information Filter and Control Center in the

New York Telephone Verizon New York, Inc., formerly The New York Telephone Company (NYTel), was organized in 1896, taking over the New York City operations of the American Bell Telephone Company. Predecessor companies The Telephone Company of New York was formed ...

building (now the

Verizon Building Verizon Communications Inc. ( ), is an American telecommunications company headquartered in New York City. It is the world's second-largest telecommunications company by revenue and its mobile network is the largest wireless carrier in the ...

) in New York City during World War II. The station was used for a November 1939 demonstration for the

Secretary of War The secretary of war was a member of the U.S. president's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War", had been appointed to serve the Congress of the ...

in which radar data was networked from the local

SCR-270 radar The SCR-270 was one of the first operational early-warning radars. It was the U.S. Army's primary long-distance radar throughout World War II and was deployed around the world. It is also known as the Pearl Harbor Radar, since it was an SCR-270 ...

and, via telephone, from one in Connecticut that both tracked a

Mitchel Field Mitchell may refer to: People and fictional characters *Mitchell (surname), including lists of both people and fictional characters *Mitchell (given name), lists of people and fictional characters Places Australia * Mitchell, Australian Ca ...

B-17 bomber The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is an American four-engined heavy bomber aircraft developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). A fast and high-flying bomber, the B-17 dropped more bombs than any other aircraft during ...

formation. From 1942 to 1945, the site had a

Westinghouse SCR-271 radar for early warning. The site was operated by the 608th Signal Aircraft Warning Battalion. Between 1946 and June 1948 the site was operated as a research field station by the Lt. Colonel Paul E. Watson Laboratories in Red Bank, New Jersey. Watson Laboratories set up an experimental model of an AN/CPS-6 Radar which was developed at the end of World War II by M.I.T. After the 1948

Berlin Blockade The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, roa ...

in Germany, the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

was on and with the appearance of the Soviet

Tupolev Tu-4 The Tupolev Tu-4 (; NATO reporting name: Bull) is a piston-engined Soviet Union, Soviet strategic bomber that served the Soviet Air Force from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s. The aircraft was a copy of the American Boeing B-29 Superfortress, ha ...

intercontinental bomber in 1947, a major concern of the United States was a possible attack by Soviet long-range bombers. In 1948, the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...

(USAF) directed its

Air Defense Command Aerospace Defense Command was a major command (military formation), command of the United States Air Force, responsible for air defense of the continental United States. It was activated in 1968 and disbanded in 1980. Its predecessor, Air De ...

(ADC) to take radar sets out of storage for operation in the Northeastern United States. In June 1948,

activated the 646th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron at the Twin Light Lashup Site L-12 with the Watson Laboratories General Electric AN/CPS-6 Radar and an AN/TPS-1B radar providing radar data to the Manual Control Center at

Roslyn Air Warning Station Roslyn Air National Guard Station (ADC ID: P-3) is a closed United States Air Force station. It was located in East Hills, New York, on Long Island. It was originally part of Clarence MacKay's Harbor Hill estate. It was closed in 2000. Histo ...

, New York as part of the

. In December 1950, 646th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron moved from the Twin Lights Lashup site to the Navesink Military Reservation with a new General Electric AN/CPS-6 Radar. In July 1951 the

accepted the new radar and designated the site P-9 as the 9th new Permanent radar site in the nation as part of the

Permanent radar network. In December 1953 the Navesink Military Reservation was renamed to the Highlands Air Force Station. In 1955 a General Electric AN/FPS-8 Radar for medium range surveillance was installed to augment the radar data of the General Electric AN/CPS-6 Radar and was (later converted to a General Electric AN/GPS-3 Radar that remained until 1960.) Nine units of officers housing were built in 1955 near Battery 219. In March 1957 the Highlands Air Force Station began operating the first Bendix AN/FPS-14 Radar in the nation at the radar Gap Filler site P-9A in

Gibbsboro, New Jersey Gibbsboro is a Borough (New Jersey), borough in Camden County, New Jersey, Camden County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 2,189, a decrease of 85 (−3.7%) from the 2010 United S ...

until 1960. In 1958, four

General Electric AN/FPS-6 Radar The AN/FPS-6 Radar was a long-range height finding radar used by the United States Air Force's Air Defense Command. The AN/FPS-6 radar was introduced into service in the late 1950s and served as the principal height-finder radar for the United S ...

were added to the site along with a General Electric AN/FPS-7 Radar.

SAGE site

In 1958, Highlands Air Force Station began providing data to

Semi Automatic Ground Environment The Semi-Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) was a system of mainframe computer, large computers and associated computer network, networking equipment that coordinated data from many radar sites and processed it to produce a single unified image ...

(SAGE) Direction Center DC-01 at

McGuire AFB McGuire AFB/McGuire, the common name of the McGuire unit of Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, is a United States Air Force base in Burlington County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, approximately south-southeast of Trenton. McGuire is unde ...

which had

interceptor aircraft An interceptor aircraft, or simply interceptor, is a type of fighter aircraft designed specifically for the defensive interception role against an attacking enemy aircraft, particularly bombers and reconnaissance aircraft. Aircraft that are c ...

and

CIM-10 Bomarc The Boeing CIM-10 Bomarc ("Boeing Michigan Aeronautical Research Center") (IM-99 Weapon System prior to September 1962) was a supersonic ramjet powered long-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) used during the Cold War for the air defense of No ...

surface-to-air missiles. In September 1959, the Highlands Air Force Station was the first site in the nation with a General Electric AN/FPS-7 Radar used for long range surveillance for the

Martin AN/FSG-1 Antiaircraft Defense System The Martin AN/FSG-1 Antiaircraft Defense System, better known as Missile Master, was an electronic fire distribution center for United States Army surface-to-air missiles. It aimed to computerize Cold War air defense (AD) command posts from manua ...

and the Air Force. (The 1262nd U.S. Army Signal Missile Master Support Detachment provided site maintenance to the

from 1960 to 1966.) The Missile Master at the Highlands Air Force Station was the Army's command post for the New York-Philadelphia Defense Area and was designated as Nike Site NY-55DC and was a

NORAD Control Center NORAD Control Centers (NCCs) were Cold War "joint direction centers" for command, control, and coordination of ground-controlled interception by both USAF Air Defense Command (ADC) and Army Air Defense Command (ARADCOM). The Joint Manual Stee ...

. It was operated by the 52nd Artillery Brigade (Air Defense).

Texas Tower 4 Texas Tower 4 (ADC ID: TT-4) was a United States Air Force Texas Tower General Surveillance Radar station, located south-southeast off the coast of Long Island, New York in of water. Hurricane Donna struck the tower in September 1960, serio ...

(call sign "Dora") was an offshore radar annex of Highlands Air Force Station operated by a 646th Radar Squadron (SAGE) from 1958 until it collapsed into the Atlantic Ocean on 15 January 1961, killing 28 people. The Highlands Air Force Station had an AN/FRC-56

Tropospheric scatter Tropospheric scatter, also known as troposcatter, is a method of communicating with microwave radio signals over considerable distances – often up to and further depending on frequency of operation, equipment type, terrain, and climate fact ...

Communications shore station which communicated with the

. In 1960 the Air Force installed an

AN/FPS-6 The AN/FPS-6 Radar was a long-range height finding radar used by the United States Air Force's Air Defense Command. The AN/FPS-6 radar was introduced into service in the late 1950s and served as the principal height-finder radar for the United S ...

B height-finder radar at Highlands which, along with the AN/FPS-6, had been replaced by 1963 with

AN/FPS-26 The Avco AN/FPS-26 Radar was an Air Defense Command height finder radar developed in the Frequency Diversity Program with a tunable 3-cavity power klystron for electronic counter-countermeasures (e.g. to counter jamming). Accepted by the Rome Ai ...

A and AN/FPS-90 sets. On 31 July 1963 the site was redesignated as NORAD ID Z-9. The

United States Secretary of Defense The United States secretary of defense (acronym: SecDef) is the head of the United States Department of Defense (DoD), the United States federal executive departments, executive department of the United States Armed Forces, U.S. Armed Forces, a ...

announced on 20 November 1964, that the Air Force operations would be closed. The

(HAADS) was established in 1966 with the first

Hughes AN/TSQ-51 Air Defense Command and Coordination System The AN/TSQ-51 Air Defense Command and Coordination System developed by Hughes was a transportable electronic fire distribution center for automated command and control of remote Nike missile launch batteries. The radar netting system replace th ...

in the nation. This replaced the

in the

Missile Master Missile Master was a US Army surface-to-air missile control complex/facility. It controlled Project Nike missiles. Virtually all Missile Masters had a bunker housing the Martin AN/FSG-1 Antiaircraft Defense System, as well as additional stru ...

nuclear-hardened bunker, which used radar data to guide

Nike missile Project Nike (Greek: Νίκη, "Victory") was a U.S. Army project proposed in May 1945 by Bell Laboratories, to develop a line-of-sight anti-aircraft missile system. The project delivered the United States' first operational anti-aircraft mi ...

s. HAADS assumed control of the USAF station after the DoD announced its closure for July 1966. The 646th Radar Squadron (SAGE) was inactivated on 1 July 1966. The Army's use of the site ended in 1974 under

Project Concise Project Concise was a United States Army program to close military installations after the Vietnam War. The closures included Nike missile launch sites and command posts including Highlands Army Air Defense Site, Fort Lawton, Fort MacArthur, Fort ...

when the Nike missile program ended. Most of the buildings were demolished in the mid-1980s and mid 1990s, and a few building foundations remain in a small clearing within the site's overgrowth of vegetation. However, the concrete remains of Battery Lewis, Battery 219, and the Plotting and Switchboard Bunker still stand.

Present

The area is now

Hartshorne Woods Park Hartshorne Woods Park (pronounced: hurt-shern) is a county park located in Northern Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States, in New Jersey's Raritan Bayshore, Bayshore Region. The park has of trails, several old military bunkers and a small b ...

. In January 2017 a retired US Navy

16"/50 caliber Mark 7 gun The 16"/50 caliber Mark 7 – United States Naval Gun is the main armament of the ''Iowa''-class battleships and was the planned main armament of the canceled . Description Due to a lack of communication during design in 1938, the Bureau of ...

, formerly a spare for the s, was placed on display in one of the gun positions of Battery Lewis.

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

List of all US coastal forts and batteries
at the Coast Defense Study Group, Inc. website
FortWiki, lists most CONUS and Canadian forts
{{NRHP in Monmouth County, New Jersey Installations of the United States Air Force in New Jersey Radar stations of the United States Air Force Forts in New Jersey Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in New Jersey National Register of Historic Places in Monmouth County, New Jersey New Jersey Register of Historic Places Middletown Township, New Jersey Radar pioneers Wikipedia articles incorporating text from the United States Army Center of Military History World War II sites in the United States 1966 disestablishments in New Jersey