“Cold War Oklahoma” presentation by Landry Brewer

The Museum of the Western Prairie in Altus is pleased to host a presentation by Landry Brewer, author of Cold War Oklahoma, on Thursday, November 21 at 7 p.m.

Oklahoma might seem like an unexpected place for Cold War tensions to boil over, but the state played a key role in a conflict that threatened global annihilation. Altus Air Force Base served as a hub for twelve intercontinental ballistic missile launch sites. Cold War Oklahoma, explores the deep ties that emerged between the citizens of the Sooner State and what President Eisenhower famously called the military-industrial complex. Landry Brewer delves carefully into the Atlas F missile program and describes the eleven sites constructed within 45 minutes of Altus Air Force Base in the 1960s. From his descriptions of the military installations, the careers of Carl Albert and Thomas Stafford, and the threat of a nuclear holocaust, Landry’s presentation will engage listeners with “a masterful overview of ordinary Oklahomans in no ordinary time.”

Landry Brewer is Bernhardt Scholar and instructor of history for Southwestern Oklahoma State University and teaches at the Sayre campus.

The program is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be served. The presentation is hosted by the Western Trail Historical Society. For more information please call 580-482-1044.