explanation will satisfy you that we have agreed to the least possible intrusion … in admittedly adverse circumstances."[1]
Johnwill Faris' last two years at White Sands (1959–1960) were not a crowning achievement in his three-plus decades of service to the nation's parks. While his kidney failure may have forced his transfer to the quieter Platt National Park, the rush of military activity at decade's end disheartened him greatly. In June 1959, a Nike rocket, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead over 1,000 miles, landed off course near the heart of the dunes. Recovery crews from the missile range informed Faris "that the Nike contained classified material, which would necessitate its immediate destruction." The nose of the missile rested in several feet of water, making recovery costly if pumps were brought in. The recovery team decided to explode the missile with 500 pounds of TNT, driving it 18 feet deep into the gypsum. "Investigation after the blast," reported an anguished Faris, "almost gave me heart failure." The explosion created "a gaping crater full of black water, and an area with a radius of about 300 yards was as black as coal." Faris declared that he was "sick at the sight of it, and vowed never again would we allow any such disposal of fallen missiles."[2]
Late in 1959, Faris noted the dependency of the Tularosa basin on the military activities that disrupted life at White Sands. He could not recruit a teller to handle the monument's cash receipts because "we are too close to big defense installations to make our GS-3 [job classification] very attractive." Yet the declining American economy had also touched southern New Mexico, resulting in reduced visitation. "Rumors of a cutback in contracts" at Holloman, said Faris, "are not inducive to free spending." Then in January 1960, Faris went on patrol near Lake Lucero, only to discover "considerable construction by the Army along the right-of-way we granted them on our western boundary." Faris was "somewhat amazed at the intensity of the repairs." He also reported: "An infraction of our agreement occurred again in the vicinity of the lake, but we have been assured of its being corrected."[3]
Johnwill Faris' departure from White Sands coincided with the escalation of another series of military programs under the aegis of President John F. Kennedy's "New Frontier." The young Democratic senator from Massachusetts had campaigned in 1960 against the perceived drift of the nation under the leadership of the grandfatherly Eisenhower. Kennedy vowed to "get the country moving again" through an economic stimulus package that, in the words of historian Walter McDougall, "galvanized science, industry, and government." The 43-year old president proposed a two-track economic and security strategy of peaceful space research and advanced weapons testing. "The Apollo moon program was at the time the greatest open-ended peacetime commitment by Congress in history," said McDougall, while "the Kennedy missile program was the
