Historic photo's of the "Pop Bottle" at the Warren Grove Bombing Range

Teegate

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I was recently contacted by a man named Jeffery Brethauer who passed along photo's taken by his father during WW2 at the Warren Grove Bombing Range. He believes his father may have been there for a short time where he worked on the special "pop bottle" project depicted in the below photo's. I assume his father called it "pop bottle" because it looks like a soda bottle. In the photo's you can see at least two of the buildings that were there at the time.



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While his father was there he was involved in fighting a large forest fire and he makes note of where the mention of that is in the article.



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Jeffrey is uncertain if the "pop bottle" is related to the next photo's but there is a possibility. Here is a portion of the text from Jeffrey Brethauer about his father.

I was looking at my dad’s service records, and in July 1945 he was transferred to Washington, D.C. for a special 90-day assignment at the Bureau of Ordinance. The description of the project was “Experimental Unit, Bureau of Standards, in connection with the assemblies of AA Radar Glider target MK 16”. Whether this was in reference to what he did at Warren Grove, I have no idea. My dad was trained as an aviation radio technician in the Navy, so that kind of fits.


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I will post much larger photo's of the first four as soon as I can get a chance.


Guy
 

ecampbell

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Jan 2, 2003
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That looks like an airplane engine and prop in the bottle. A wind tunnel? The taper would amplify the prop wash.
 

Gibby

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Apr 4, 2011
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Trenton
The motion picture camera attached to the wing of the Corsair is very cool! The gun ports in the wing are taped over too.
 

Teegate

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The motion picture camera attached to the wing of the Corsair is very cool! The gun ports in the wing are taped over too.


I was wounding what that was. Imagine finding that film somewhere! That would be nice.
 

Teegate

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I spent quite a bit of time on these photo's and came up with the location where I felt this "pop" bottle was built. This morning Jessica and I spent a few minutes there checking to see if I was correct. And I am happy to report I believe I am. I will be heading back soon to photograph the location some more.


I was not able to take a good photo from the most perfect spot because of tree cover but this is pretty close. The depression where the pop bottle was is to my right.


pop1.jpg



This shows the building.


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This photo pretty much proves this is the correct location. The photo's are taken from opposite directions and I had to do that because I did not get one from the proper direction. I will do that soon. The arrows point to the steel bracket and bolts located in the proper spots on the concrete slab.


pop3.jpg



The photo showing the larger building nearby also fits perfectly with what I saw today.

Guy
 
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