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92-505: Its headwaters rise mostly in southern Berks County and northeastern Lancaster County , in an area known as "Bortz's Swamp" or "Penngall Field" (a small area rises in Chester County ). The East Branch and West Branch of the Conestoga join to form the main river just north of Morgantown , and the stream flows from northeast to southwest for more than 60 miles (97 km), passing close to

184-597: A deterrence weapon that could hit Soviet cities with a second strike and countervalue counterattack if the U.S. was attacked. However, the development of the United States Navy (USN) UGM-27 Polaris , which addressed the same role, allowed the Air Force to modify the Minuteman, boosting its accuracy enough to attack hardened military targets, including Soviet missile silos. The Minuteman II entered service in 1965 with

276-568: A watershed area of approximately 217 square miles (560 km) if the main stream is alone considered, rising to 491 square miles (1,270 km) when the Cocalico, Mill, and Little Conestoga Creek watersheds are also included. The stream was named after the Iroquoian -speaking Susquehannock people. In the eighteenth century, British colonists in Pennsylvania called them the Conestoga, referring to

368-475: A " stogie " throughout the United States. In the early 19th century, it was possible to travel by boat to Lancaster, Pennsylvania , from Chesapeake Bay through a system of locks. Though the Conestoga is smaller than most streams generally designated a river, local boosterism in the late 19th century insisted that any stream holding scheduled commercial transport should be called a river. Steamboat service to

460-428: A D-17 disk revolution was 10 ms. The D-17 also used a number of short loops for faster access to intermediate results storage. The D-17 computational minor cycle was three disk revolutions or 30 ms. During that time all recurring computations were performed. For ground operations, the inertial platform was aligned and gyro correction rates updated. During a flight, filtered command outputs were sent by each minor cycle to

552-541: A Democrat carried Berks in a Presidential election occurred in 2008, with Barack Obama receiving 53.9% of the vote to John McCain 's 44.7%. The other three statewide winners ( Rob McCord for treasurer, Jack Wagner for auditor general, and Tom Corbett for attorney general) also carried it. While Republicans have controlled the commissioner majority most of the time and continue to control most county row offices, Democrats have become more competitive in Berks in recent years. In

644-530: A ball which could rotate in two directions. Conventional solutions used a shaft with ball bearings at either end that allowed it to rotate around a single axis only. Autonetics' design meant that only two gyros would be needed for the inertial platform, instead of the typical three. The last major advance was to use a general-purpose digital computer in place of the analog or custom designed digital computers. Previous missile designs normally used two single-purpose and very simple electromechanical computers; one ran

736-480: A continuous low rate cycle. Systems in a missile would detect failures, at which point it would be removed and recycled, while a newly built missile would take its place. The missile design was based purely on lowest possible cost, reducing its size and complexity because "the basis of the weapon's merit was its low cost per completed mission; all other factors – accuracy, vulnerability, and reliability – were secondary." Hall's plan did not go unopposed, especially by

828-472: A female householder with no husband present, and 31.0% were non-families. 24.5% of all households were made up of individuals, and 10.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.59 and the average family size was 3.08. In the county, the population was spread out, with 23.9% under the age of 18, 9.9% from 18 to 24, 24.4% from 25 to 44, 27.3% from 45 to 64, and 14.5% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age

920-514: A host of upgrades to improve its accuracy and survivability in the face of an anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system the Soviets were known to be developing. In 1970, the Minuteman III became the first deployed ICBM with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV): three smaller warheads that improved the missile's ability to strike targets defended by ABMs. They were initially armed with

1012-517: A knoll above the Conestoga River and was occupied from c.  1625 to c.  1645 . For several decades Conestoga Town was important fur trading center, and a meeting place for negotiations between Pennsylvania and various Indigenous groups. Its importance, however, waned as the focus of the fur trade moved westwards. The population declined due to out-migration, and the remaining Conestoga became increasing impoverished and dependent on

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1104-498: A length of 55 ft 11 in (17.04 m). The Minuteman I weighed roughly 65,000 lb (29,000 kg), had an operational range of 5,500 nmi (6,300 mi; 10,200 km) with an accuracy of about 1.5 mi (2.4 km). The Minuteman I Autonetics D-17 flight computer used a rotating air bearing magnetic disk holding 2,560 "cold-stored" words in 20 tracks (write heads disabled after program fill) of 24 bits each and one alterable track of 128 words. The time for

1196-653: A local amusement park barely qualified, but the designation caught on. The name "Conestoga" has also been applied to the Conestoga Rocket, a rocket produced from LGM-30 Minuteman parts and launched from Matagorda Island , the freighter Conestoga , which is a popular diving wreck in the Thousand Islands , the C-93 Conestoga cargo aircraft, and, in Star Trek: Enterprise , the name of the starship used in

1288-489: A pastoral landscape farmed extensively by Pennsylvania German farmers and along the eastern and southern outskirts of the city of Lancaster. Many covered bridges span its banks. Northeast of Lancaster city are many Old Order Amish and Old Order Mennonite farms; horse and carriage traffic frequents local roads. Many small dams impound its waters, most of them built long ago to power mills or generate electricity. Most dams are in disrepair and have been abandoned, though there

1380-427: A program to improve transistor and component reliability 100 times, leading to the "Minuteman high-rel parts" specifications. The techniques developed during this program were equally useful for improving all transistor construction, and greatly reduced the failure rate of transistor production lines in general. This improved yield, which had the effect of greatly lowering production costs, had enormous spin-off effects in

1472-471: A single Soviet missile. In any conceivable scenario where both sides had similar numbers of ICBMs, the US forces would survive a sneak attack in sufficient numbers to ensure the destruction of all major Soviet cities in return. The Soviets would not risk an attack under these conditions. Considering this countervalue attack concept, strategic planners calculated that an attack of "400 equivalent megatons" aimed at

1564-570: A single target, whose precise trajectory information was hard-coded directly in the system's logic. In 1957, a series of intelligence reports suggested the Soviet Union was far ahead in the missile race and would be able to overwhelm the US by the early 1960s. If the Soviets were building missiles in the numbers being predicted by the CIA and others within the defense establishment, by as early as 1961 they would have enough to attack all SAC and ICBM bases in

1656-531: A sneak attack. This had initially been proposed as a way to defend the SAC bomber fleet. The Army argued that upgraded Soviet missiles might be able to attack US missiles in their silos, and Zeus would be able to blunt such an attack. Zeus was expensive and the Air Force said it was more cost-effective to build another Minuteman missile. Given the large size and complexity of the Soviet liquid-fueled missiles, an ICBM building race

1748-548: A way to improve launch times or survivability, but part of a radical plan to greatly reduce the cost of ICBMs so that thousands could be built. He envisioned a future where ICBMs were the primary weapon of the US, not in the supporting role of "last ditch backup" as the Air Force saw them at the time. This would require huge deployments, which would not be possible with existing weapons due to their high cost and operational manpower requirements. A solid fuel design would be simpler to build, and easier to maintain. Hall's ultimate plan

1840-611: A wider range of targets. Some missiles also carried penetration aids, allowing the higher probability of kill against Moscow's anti-ballistic missile system . The payload consisted of a single Mk-11C reentry vehicle containing a W56 nuclear warhead with a yield of 1.2 megatons of TNT (5 PJ ). The Minuteman II had a length of 57 ft 7 in (17.55 m), weighed roughly 73,000 lb (33,000 kg), had an operational range of 6,300 mi (10,200 km) with an accuracy of about 1 mi (1.6 km). The major new features provided by Minuteman II were: System modernization

1932-609: Is an American land-based intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in service with the Air Force Global Strike Command . As of 2024 , the LGM-30G (Version 3) is the only land-based ICBM in service in the United States and represents the land leg of the U.S. nuclear triad , along with the Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) and nuclear weapons carried by long-range strategic bombers . Development of

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2024-467: Is an active movement to remove as many as possible. Seven were removed between 1996 and 1999. 39°55′30″N 76°23′03″W  /  39.92500°N 76.38417°W  / 39.92500; -76.38417 Berks County, Pennsylvania Berks County ( Pennsylvania Dutch : Barricks Kaundi ) is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania . As of the 2020 census , the county's population

2116-811: Is composed of four historic structures: White Horse Inn, George Douglass Mansion, Bridge keeper's House, and the Mouns Jones House, constructed in 1716, which is the oldest recorded building in the county. West Reading in home to the annual Art on the Avenue, which reached its 25th year in 2019. Berks County is home to several media outlets, including: Under Pennsylvania law, there are four types of incorporated municipalities: cities , boroughs , townships , and towns . The following cities, boroughs and townships are located in Berks County: Census-designated places are geographical areas designated by

2208-478: Is often abbreviated to Berks. Berks County began much larger than it is today. The northwestern parts of the county went to the founding of Northumberland County in 1772 and Schuylkill County in 1811, when it reached its current size. In 2005, Berks County was added to the Delaware Valley Planning Area due to a fast-growing population and close proximity to the other communities. According to

2300-658: Is still competitive, with the last Republican to carry the county by more than 10% being George H.W. Bush in 1988. As of 2023, the Republican Party maintained a total registration edge over Democrats in Berks County. At the top of the Pennsylvania ticket in November 2022, Berks County split its votes, supporting Democrat Josh Shapiro for governor and Republican Mehmet Oz for U.S. Senate . The first time since 1964 that

2392-498: The 2010 U.S. census the metropolitan area is the 10th-most populous in Pennsylvania and the 128th-most populous in the U.S. with a population of 413,491. Berks County is part of the larger Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD Combined Statistical Area (CSA) , the largest in Pennsylvania and eighth-most populous in the nation with a population of 7,067,807. As of September 21, 2023, there were 253,186 registered voters in Berks County. Berks County leans Republican, but

2484-679: The Oley Valley . The Old Order Mennonites in the area belong to the Groffdale Conference Mennonite Church and use the horse and buggy as transportation. There are several farms in the area belonging to the Old Order Mennonite community and meetinghouses are located near Kutztown and Fleetwood. The Office of Management and Budget has designated Berks County as the Reading, PA Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) . As of

2576-703: The Strategic Air Command 's arsenal in 1962. After the first batch of Minuteman I's were fully developed and ready for stationing, the United States Air Force (USAF) had originally decided to put the missiles at Vandenberg AFB in California, but before the missiles were set to officially be moved there it was discovered that this first set of Minuteman missiles had defective boosters which limited their range from their initial 6,300 miles (10,100 km) to 4,300 miles (6,900 km). This defect would cause

2668-512: The Swatara Creek in the northwest and the Conestoga River , which starts in Berks County between Morgantown and Elverson in the county's extreme south. It has a humid continental climate ( Dfa except for some Dfb on Blue Mountain at the northern boundary.) The hardiness zone is mostly 7a with 6b in some higher northern and eastern areas. [1] As of the 2010 census , the county

2760-582: The U.S. Census Bureau for the purposes of compiling demographic data. They are not actual jurisdictions under Pennsylvania law. Other unincorporated communities, such as villages, may be listed here as well. The population ranking of the following table is based on the 2010 census of Berks County. † county seat CDP = census designated population 40°25′N 75°56′W  /  40.42°N 75.93°W  / 40.42; -75.93 LGM-30 Minuteman Minuteman II: 6,300 nmi (7,200 mi; 11,700 km) The LGM-30 Minuteman

2852-641: The U.S. Census Bureau , the county has a total area of 866 square miles (2,240 km ), 857 square miles (2,220 km ) of which is land and 9.2 square miles (24 km ) (1.1%) of which is water. Most of the county is drained by the Schuylkill River , but an area in the northeast is drained by the Lehigh River via the Little Lehigh Creek and areas are drained by the Susquehanna River via

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2944-596: The W62 warhead with a yield of 170 kilotons . By the 1970s, 1,000 Minuteman missiles were deployed. This force has shrunk to 400 Minuteman III missiles as of September 2017 , deployed in missile silos around Malmstrom AFB , Montana ; Minot AFB , North Dakota ; and Francis E. Warren AFB , Wyoming . The Minuteman III will be progressively replaced by the new LGM-35 Sentinel ICBM, to be built by Northrop Grumman , beginning in 2030. Minuteman owes its existence largely to Air Force Colonel Edward N. Hall , who in 1956

3036-414: The autopilot that kept the missile flying along a programmed course, and the second compared the information from the inertial platform to the target coordinates and sent any needed corrections to the autopilot. To reduce the total number of parts used in Minuteman, a single faster computer was used, running separate subroutines for these functions. Since the guidance program would not be running while

3128-456: The 1740s when inhabitants of northern Lancaster County sent several petitions requesting that a separate county be established. With the help of German immigrant Conrad Weiser , the county was formed on March 11, 1752, from parts of Chester County , Lancaster County , and Philadelphia County . It was named after the English county in which William Penn 's family home lay, Berkshire , which

3220-510: The 1960s, became increasingly vulnerable to surface-to-air missiles . The B-1 of the early 1970s eventually emerged with a price tag around $ 200 million (equivalent to $ 600 million in 2023) while the Minuteman IIIs built during the 1970s cost only $ 7 million ($ 30 million in 2023). The Air Force countered that having a variety of platforms complicated the defense; if the Soviets built an effective anti-ballistic missile system of some sort,

3312-604: The 1990s. It's not clear exactly why the W59 was replaced by the W56 after deployment but issues with "... one-point safety" and "performance under aged conditions" were cited in a 1987 congressional report regarding the warhead. Chuck Hansen alleged that all weapons sharing the "Tsetse" nuclear primary design including the W59 suffered from a critical one-point safety issue and suffered premature tritium aging issues that needed to be corrected after entry into service. The LGM-30F Minuteman II

3404-511: The 2012 Presidential election, Mitt Romney carried the county by approximately a one-percent margin, 49.6% to 48.6%, however, in 2016, Donald Trump carried Berks by a much larger margin of 52.9% to 42.7%. Chart of Voter Registration School districts include: Reading Public Museum in Reading is an art, science, and history museum. The Reading Buccaneers Drum and Bugle Corps are an all-age drum corps based in Berks County. Founded in 1957,

3496-449: The Atlas and Titan at 120 inches (3.0 m), which meant smaller and cheaper silos. Hall's goal of dramatic cost reduction was a success, although many of the other concepts of his missile farm were abandoned. Previous long-range missiles used liquid fuels that could be loaded only just prior to firing. The loading process took from 30 to 60 minutes in typical designs. Although lengthy, this

3588-459: The ICBM and SLBM fleet might be rendered useless, while the bombers would remain. This became the nuclear triad concept, which survives into the present. Although this argument was successful, the number of manned bombers has been repeatedly cut and the deterrent role increasingly passed to missiles. The LGM-30A Minuteman I was first test-fired on 1 February 1961 at Cape Canaveral , entering into

3680-455: The Minuteman II had a CEP of 0.26 nautical miles (0.48 km; 0.30 mi). Additionally, the computers were upgraded with more memory, allowing them to store information for eight targets, which the missile crews could select among almost instantly, greatly increasing their flexibility. From that point, Minuteman became the US's primary deterrent weapon, until its performance was matched by

3772-523: The Minuteman began in the mid-1950s when basic research indicated that a solid-fuel rocket motor could stand ready to launch for long periods of time, in contrast to liquid-fueled rockets that required fueling before launch and so might be destroyed in a surprise attack. The missile was named for the colonial minutemen of the American Revolutionary War , who could be ready to fight on short notice. The Minuteman entered service in 1962 as

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3864-501: The Minuteman project, sending him to the UK to oversee deployment of the Thor IRBM . On his return to the US in 1959, Hall retired from the Air Force. He received his second Legion of Merit in 1960 for his work on solid fuels. Although he was removed from the Minuteman project, Hall's work on cost reduction had already produced a new design of 71 inches (1.8 m) diameter, much smaller than

3956-516: The Navy's Trident missile of the 1980s. Questions about the need for the manned bomber were quickly raised. The Air Force began to offer a number of reasons why the bomber offered value, in spite of costing more money to buy and being much more expensive to operate and maintain. Newer bombers with better survivability, like the B-70 , cost many times more than the Minuteman, and, in spite of great efforts through

4048-597: The Pennsylvania government, who occasionally provided clothing and provisions. By 1763, only seven men, five women and eight children lived in Conestoga Town. In December of that year, the Paxton Boys , in response to raids by the Lenape and Shawnee , attacked Conestoga Town in the mistaken belief that the inhabitants were aiding and abetting the attacks. The Paxton Boys slaughtered the six Conestoga they found there, and burned

4140-478: The Soviet Union, and thus impossible to attack by either ICBM, because they were moving, or long-range interceptor aircraft , because they were too far away. In the shorter term, looking to rapidly increase the number of missiles in its force, Minuteman was given crash development status starting in September 1958. Advanced surveying of the potential silo sites had already begun in late 1957. Adding to their concerns

4232-489: The US in a single first strike . It was later demonstrated that this " missile gap " was just as fictional as the " bomber gap " of a few years earlier, but through the late 1950s, it was a serious concern. The Air Force responded by beginning research into survivable strategic missiles, starting the WS-199 program. Initially, this focused on air-launched ballistic missiles , which would be carried aboard aircraft flying far from

4324-495: The US's primary weapon of nuclear war. Chief among these qualities was its digital computer, the D-17B. This could be updated in the field with new targets and better information about the flight paths with relative ease, gaining accuracy for little cost. One of the unavoidable effects on the warhead's trajectory was the mass of the Earth, which contains many mass concentrations that pull on

4416-519: The bases had 150 missiles emplaced; F.E. Warren had 200 of the Minuteman IB missiles. Malmstrom had 150 of the Minuteman I, and about five years later added 50 of the Minuteman II similar to those installed at Grand Forks AFB , ND. The Minuteman I's length varied based on which variation one was to look at. The Minuteman I/A had a length of 53 ft 8 in (16.36 m) and the Minuteman I/B had

4508-402: The burn, which made them questionable for the sort of accuracy required to hit a target at intercontinental range. While this initially appeared to be an insurmountable problem, it ended up being solved in an almost trivial fashion. A series of ports were added inside the rocket nozzle that were opened when the guidance systems called for engine cut-off. The reduction in pressure was so abrupt that

4600-589: The center of Lancaster and ending at Safe Harbor along the Susquehanna River, approximately 16 miles (26 km) north of the Pennsylvania- Maryland state line . The principal tributaries of the Conestoga River are Cocalico Creek , Mill Creek , and Little Conestoga Creek ; they drain into the Conestoga River watershed in the order listed. The Conestoga River and its principal tributaries comprise approximately 114 stream miles, and they drain

4692-553: The computer, the D-17B , was built in the form of a drum machine but used a hard disk in place of the drum. Building a computer with the required performance, size and weight demanded the use of transistors , which were at that time very expensive and not very reliable. Earlier efforts to use computers for guidance, BINAC and the system on the SM-64 Navaho , had failed and were abandoned. The Air Force and Autonetics spent millions on

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4784-564: The corps is a charter member Drum Corps Associates and an 11-time DCA World Champion. Reading is home to Berks Opera Company, founded in 2007 as Berks Opera Workshop. There are two Pennsylvania state parks and one natural area in Berks County. There are two Pennsylvania Historic Sites in Berks County. The Old Morlatton Village in Douglassville is maintained by the Historic Preservation Trust of Berks County. The village

4876-435: The county. The population density was 479 inhabitants per square mile (185/km ). There were 164,827 housing units at an average density of 191.9 per square mile (74.1/km ). According to Muninet Guide's 2010 analysis, the median household income for Berks County is $ 54,105. There were 154,356 households, out of which 33.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 52.1% were married couples living together, 12.0% had

4968-411: The electronics industry. Using a general-purpose computer also had long-lasting effects on the Minuteman program and the US's nuclear stance in general. With Minuteman, the targeting could be easily changed by loading new trajectory information into the computer's hard drive, a task that could be completed in a few hours. Earlier ICBMs' custom wired computers, on the other hand, could have attacked only

5060-696: The engine nozzles. Unlike modern computers, which use descendants of that technology for secondary storage on hard disk , the disk was the active computer memory . The disk storage was considered hardened to radiation from nearby nuclear explosions, making it an ideal storage medium. To improve computational speed, the D-17 borrowed an instruction look-ahead feature from the Autonetics-built Field Artillery Data Computer ( M18 FADAC ) that permitted simple instruction execution every word time. At its introduction into service in 1962, Minuteman I

5152-477: The failed first attempt at deep space colonization. Land use along the stream has been traditionally agricultural, though spreading urbanization has affected the stream with erosion problems. Though scenic, the Conestoga River is impaired from nitrogen and phosphorus pollution , mostly runoff from animal waste and excessive commercial fertilizer . Other pollution sources are sediments from intense cropping, development, and urban runoff . The stream flows through

5244-402: The fuel into large cylinders with a star-shaped hole running along the inner axis. This allowed the fuel to burn along the entire length of the cylinder, rather than just the end as in earlier designs. The increased burn rate meant increased thrust. This also meant the heat was spread across the entire motor, instead of the end, and because it burned from the inside out it did not reach the wall of

5336-408: The future, as it allowed the missile to be extended and carry more fuel and payload. During Minuteman's early development, the Air Force maintained the policy that the manned strategic bomber was the primary weapon of nuclear war. Blind bombing accuracy on the order of 1,500 feet (0.46 km) was expected, and the weapons were sized to ensure even the hardest targets would be destroyed as long as

5428-408: The guidance system would have to be kept running and aligned at all times. This was a serious problem for the mechanical systems, especially the gyroscopes which used ball bearings . Autonetics had an experimental design using air bearings that they claimed had been running continually from 1952 to 1957. Autonetics further advanced the state of the art by building the platform in the form of

5520-414: The high atmosphere, and could be fitted to existing missiles like Minuteman. The shape of these reentry vehicles required more room on the front of the missile than a traditional reentry vehicle design. To allow for this future expansion, the Minuteman silos were revised to be built 13 feet (4.0 m) deeper. Although Minuteman would not deploy a boost-glide warhead, the extra space proved invaluable in

5612-418: The largest Soviet cities would promptly kill 30% of their population and destroy 50% of their industry. Larger attacks raised these numbers only slightly, as all of the larger targets would already have been hit. This suggested that there was a " finite deterrent " level around 400 megatons that would be enough to prevent a Soviet attack no matter how many missiles they had of their own. All that had to be ensured

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5704-573: The missile fuselage until the fuel was finished burning. In comparison, older designs burned primarily from one end to the other, meaning that at any instant one small section of the fuselage was being subjected to extreme loads and temperatures. Guidance of an ICBM is based not only on the direction the missile is traveling but the precise instant that thrust is cut off. Too much thrust and the warhead will overshoot its target, too little and it will fall short. Solids are normally very hard to predict in terms of burn time and their instantaneous thrust during

5796-456: The missile sat in the silo, the same computer was also used to run a program that monitored the various sensors and test equipment. With older designs this had been handled by external systems, requiring miles of extra wiring and many connectors to locations where test instruments could be connected during servicing. Now these could all be accomplished by communicating with the computer through a single connection. In order to store multiple programs,

5888-683: The missiles to fall short of their targets if launched over the North Pole as planned. The decision was made to station the missiles at Malmstrom AFB in Montana instead. These changes would allow the missiles, even with their defective boosters, to reach their intended targets in the case of a launch. The "improved" LGM-30B Minuteman I became operational at Ellsworth AFB , South Dakota , Minot AFB , North Dakota , F.E. Warren AFB , Wyoming , and Whiteman AFB , Missouri , in 1963 and 1964. All 800 Minuteman I missiles were delivered by June 1965. Each of

5980-430: The more established names in the ICBM field. Ramo-Wooldridge pressed for a system with higher accuracy, but Hall countered that the missile's role was to attack Soviet cities, and that "a force which provides numerical superiority over the enemy will provide a much stronger deterrent than a numerically inferior force of greater accuracy." Hall was known for his "friction with others" and in 1958 Schriever removed him from

6072-571: The name of the river gained wider recognition with the spread of the Conestoga wagon , first built in and named after this valley. The wagon assisted the transportation of freight throughout the East, and later was adapted to help transport goods to the western frontier of the United States . So many cigars were made in the watershed in the late 19th century that a local cigar named the Conestoga became known as

6164-544: The open. Since there was no system to detect the ICBMs being launched, the possibility was raised that the Soviets could launch a sneak attack with a few dozen missiles that would take out a significant portion of SAC's bomber fleet. In this environment, the Air Force saw their own ICBMs not as a primary weapon of war, but as a way to ensure that the Soviets would not risk a sneak attack. ICBMs, especially newer models that were housed in silos, could be expected to survive an attack by

6256-506: The remaining fuel broke up and blew out the nozzle without contributing to the thrust. The first to use these developments was the US Navy. It had been involved in a joint program with the US Army to develop the liquid-fueled PGM-19 Jupiter , but had always been skeptical of the system. The Navy felt that liquid fuels were too dangerous to use onboard ships, especially submarines. Rapid success in

6348-577: The river, and to the village the Susquehannock established about 1690. The name may be based on the Mohawk word tekanastoge , meaning "place of the upright pole." Conestoga may also be the anglicized form of Gandastogue which is possibly the closest to what the Susquehannock called themselves. An earlier Susquehannock palisaded village known as the Roberts Farm Site (36LA1) had been located nearby on

6440-427: The role of the missile was to present an unassailable threat to the Soviet population, Polaris was a far better solution than Minuteman. The document had long-lasting effects on the future of the Minuteman program, which, by 1961, was firmly evolving towards a counterforce capability. Minuteman's final tests coincided with the start of John F. Kennedy 's presidency. His new Secretary of Defense , Robert McNamara ,

6532-516: The settlement to the ground. Fourteen of the Conestoga had been absent from the village and were given shelter in the Lancaster workhouse . Two weeks later, however, the Paxton Boys broke into the workhouse and slaughtered the remaining Conestoga including woman and children. Robert Fulton’s early experiments to perfect the first commercial steamboat occurred on the Conestoga River. In the 19th century

6624-534: The solids development program, combined with Edward Teller 's promise of much lighter nuclear warheads during Project Nobska , led the Navy to abandon Jupiter and begin development of their own solid-fuel missile. Aerojet's work with Hall was adapted for their UGM-27 Polaris starting in December 1956. The US Air Force saw no pressing need for a solid fuel ICBM. Development of the SM-65 Atlas and SM-68 Titan ICBMs

6716-677: The state's third-largest city, and 64 miles (103 km) northwest of Philadelphia , the state's largest city. The Schuylkill River , a 135-mile-long (217 km) tributary of the Delaware River , flows through Berks County. The county is part of the Reading, PA metropolitan statistical area (MSA), which in turn is part of the Greater Philadelphia metropolitan area known as the Philadelphia -Reading- Camden , PA- NJ - DE - MD combined statistical area (CSA). Reading developed during

6808-523: The warhead as it passes over them. Through the 1960s, the Defense Mapping Agency (now part of National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency ) mapped these with increasing accuracy, feeding that information back into the Minuteman fleet. The Minuteman was initially deployed with a circular error probable (CEP) of about 1.1 nautical miles (2.0 km; 1.3 mi), but this had improved to about 0.6 nautical miles (1.1 km; 0.69 mi) by 1965. This

6900-552: The weapon fell within this range. The USAF had enough bombers to attack every military and industrial target in the USSR and was confident that its bombers would survive in sufficient numbers that such a strike would utterly destroy the country. Soviet ICBMs upset this equation to a degree. Their accuracy was known to be low, on the order of 4 nautical miles (7.4 km; 4.6 mi), but they carried large warheads that would be useful against Strategic Air Command 's bombers, which parked in

6992-465: Was 39.1 years. For every 100 females there were 95.90 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 92.70 males. Berks County is home to an Old Order Mennonite community consisting of about 160 families, located in the East Penn Valley near Kutztown and Fleetwood . The Old Order Mennonites first bought land in the area in 1949. In 2012, Old Order Mennonites bought two large farms in

7084-494: Was 428,849. The county seat is Reading , the fourth-most populous city in the state. The county is part of the South Central Pennsylvania region of the state. The county borders Lehigh County to its north and its east, Schuylkill County to its north, Lebanon and Lancaster counties to its west, and Chester County to its south. The county is approximately 26 miles (42 km) southwest of Allentown ,

7176-475: Was 76.9% White non-Hispanic, 4.9% Black or African American, 0.3% Native American, 1.3% Asian, and 2.5% were two or more races. 16.4% of the population was of Hispanic or Latino ancestry. Historically there is a large Pennsylvania Dutch population. It is known as part of Pennsylvania Dutch Country . More recently there is a large Puerto Rican population centered in the city of Reading. There were 411,442 people, 154,356 households, and 106,532 families residing in

7268-472: Was a Soviet anti-ballistic missile system which was known to be under development at Sary Shagan . WS-199 was expanded to develop a maneuvering reentry vehicle (MARV), which greatly complicated the problem of shooting down a warhead. Two designs were tested in 1957, Alpha Draco and the Boost Glide Reentry Vehicle. These used long and skinny arrow-like shapes that provided aerodynamic lift in

7360-451: Was accomplished without any mechanical changes to the missile or its navigation system. At those levels, the ICBM begins to approach the manned bomber in terms of accuracy; a small upgrade, roughly doubling the accuracy of the INS, would give it the same 1,500 feet (460 m) CEP as the manned bomber. Autonetics began such development even before the original Minuteman entered fleet service, and

7452-457: Was an advantage for weapons that might be attacked by Soviet aircraft. But Hall was convinced that they could be used for a true ICBM with a 5,500-nautical-mile (10,200 km; 6,300 mi) range. To achieve the required energy, that year Hall began funding research at Boeing and Thiokol into the use of ammonium perchlorate composite propellant . Adapting a concept developed in the UK , they cast

7544-518: Was an improved version of the Minuteman I missile. Its first test launch took place on September 24, 1964. Development on the Minuteman II began in 1962 as the Minuteman I entered the Strategic Air Command's nuclear force. Minuteman II production and deployment began in 1965 and completed in 1967. It had an increased range, greater throw weight and guidance system with better azimuthal coverage, providing military planners with better accuracy and

7636-422: Was effectively invulnerable and had enough accuracy to attack Soviet cities. If the Soviets improved the accuracy of their missiles this would present a serious threat to the Air Force's bombers and missiles, but none at all to the Navy's submarines. Based on the same 400 equivalent megatons calculation, they set about building a fleet of 41 submarines carrying 16 missiles each, giving the Navy a finite deterrent that

7728-663: Was fitted with the W59 warhead with a yield of 1 Mt. Production for the W56 warhead with a 1.2 Mt yield began in March 1963 and W59 production was ended in July 1963 with a production run of only 150 warheads before being retired in June 1969. The W56 would continue production until May 1969 with a production run of 1000 warheads. Mods 0 to 3 were retired by September 1966 and the Mod 4 version would remain in service until

7820-453: Was given charge of the solid-fuel-propulsion division of General Bernard Schriever's Western Development Division , created to lead development of the SM-65 Atlas and HGM-25A Titan I ICBMs. Solid fuels were already commonly used in short-range rockets. Hall's superiors were interested in short- and medium -range missiles with solids, especially for use in Europe where the fast reaction time

7912-415: Was not considered to be a problem at the time, because it took about the same amount of time to spin up the inertial guidance system , set the initial position, and program in the target coordinates. Minuteman was designed from the outset to be launched in minutes. While solid fuel eliminated the fueling delays, the delays in starting and aligning the guidance system remained. For the desired quick launch,

8004-405: Was one the Soviets could not afford. Zeus was canceled in 1963. Minuteman's selection as the primary Air Force ICBM was initially based on the same " second strike " logic as their earlier missiles: that the weapon was primarily one designed to survive any potential Soviet attack and ensure they would be hit in return. But Minuteman had a combination of features that led to its rapid evolution into

8096-478: Was progressing, and "storable" ( hypergolic ) liquid propellants were being developed that would allow missiles to be left in a ready-to-shoot form for extended periods. These could be placed in missile silos for added protection, and launch in minutes. This met their need for a weapon that would be safe from sneak attacks; hitting all of the silos within a limited time window before they could launch simply did not seem possible. But Hall saw solid fuels not only as

8188-629: Was tasked with continuing the expansion and modernisation of the US nuclear deterrent while limiting spending. McNamara began to apply cost/benefit analysis , and Minuteman's low production cost ensured its selection. Atlas and Titan were soon scrapped, and the storable liquid fueled Titan II deployment was severely curtailed. McNamara also cancelled the XB-70 bomber project. Minuteman's low cost had spin-off effects on non-ICBM programs. The Army's LIM-49 Nike Zeus , an interceptor missile capable of shooting down Soviet warheads, provided another way to prevent

8280-485: Was that the US missiles survived, which seemed likely given the low accuracy of the Soviet weapons. Reversing the problem, the addition of ICBMs to the US Air Force's arsenal did not eliminate the need, or desire, to attack Soviet military targets, and the Air Force maintained that bombers were the only suitable platform in that role. Into this argument came the Navy's UGM-27 Polaris . Launched from submarines, Polaris

8372-435: Was to build a number of integrated missile "farms" that included factories, missile silos , transport and recycling. He was aware that new computerized assembly lines would allow continual production, and that similar equipment would allow a small team to oversee operations for dozens or hundreds of missiles, radically reducing the manpower requirements. Each farm would support between 1,000 and 1,500 missiles being produced in

8464-510: Was unassailable. This presented a serious problem for the Air Force. They were still pressing for the development of newer bombers, like the supersonic B-70 , for attacks against military targets, but this role seemed increasingly unlikely in a nuclear war scenario. A February 1960 memo by RAND , entitled "The Puzzle of Polaris", was passed around among high-ranking Air Force officials. It suggested that Polaris negated any need for Air Force ICBMs if they were also being aimed at Soviet cities. If

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