page_title: Naval Facility Nantucket
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Naval Facility Nantucket / History
context_page_description: Naval Facility Nantucket Island or simply Naval Facility Nantucket was a shore terminal of the Sound Surveillance System active from 1955 to 1976. The true function of the system and the shore terminals was classified and the term "Naval Facility" was intentionally vague. Its function was described as oceanographic research.
  The facility was built about twelve miles from the town of Nantucket on a part of a site that had been used in World War II as an ordinance site and practice bombing range. Locally the facility was sometimes known as the Tom Nevers Naval Facility for the area of Nantucket island where it stood.
  In 1980 the property was sold to the Town of Nantucket and is now a park managed by the Parks and Recreation Commission.
context_section_description: Naval Facility (NAVFAC) Nantucket was among the first Atlantic systems ordered and installed with the shore facility commissioned 1 August 1955. The facility, along with the entire Atlantic system at the time, was experimental though it quickly became operational. The visible shore installations and obvious cable work done in connection with their construction required a cover story explaining them as oceanographic research facilities and that data gathered by oceanographic and acoustic surveys with ships could at times be collected "more expeditiously and more economically by means of shore stations. These are the U. S. Naval Facilities." The "oceanographic" cover included the entire span of the facility's existence and decommissioning on 30 June 1976 with the SOSUS mission being declassified in 1991.
  The site, about twelve miles from the town of Nantucket on Tom Never’s Head at the southernmost tip of the island, had been part of the Nantucket Ordance Site. During World War II the land had been leased by the government from September 1943 through 30 June 1946 for use as the Nantucket Ordnance Site (also known as  Tom Nevers Rocket Projectile Target) used for as a aerial rocket range by pilots from the Quonset Naval Air Station. 
  In 1958 the facility was still in Quonset huts housing both the sensitive electronic equipment and eight officers and eighty-nine enlisted men. Within five years the temporary buildings had deteriorated putting the terminal building electronics at risk. The complement had grown to ten officers and ninety-four enlisted men and new combination administration building and barracks was requested along with a mess hall and recreation facilities. It was evident that the classified details of the system and its shore terminal was not clear even to some high ranking Senators as the same request for replacement buildings was met by questions in the Senate Committee as to why it could not be moved to another location, including the Boston Navy Yard, and why its "oceanographic work" could not be done at Woods Hole. The Navy again requested funds in 1964 to upgrade facilities to permanent buildings. Fourteen units of family housing were authorized in 1967.
  The surveillance system shore processing facilities underwent backfits during the late 1960s at the stations replacing original equipment with more modern equipment including moving from electromechanical spectrum analysis to digital.
  A bomb shelter for President John F. Kennedy, to be used in the event of a nuclear attack while President Kennedy was in Hyannisport, was located under a mound built on the facility. 
  The first decommissioning of SOSUS shore stations came in 1976 when the first to be commissioned, Naval Facility Punta Borinquen (commissioned 18 September 1954 as NAVFAC Ramey), Puerto Rico, was closed on 30 April followed by Naval Facility Nantucket on 30 June.
caption: Lofargram writers on watch floor.