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President Nixon's Florida White House in Key Biscayne (1972-1974)


Florida White House in Key Biscayne
The Florida White House on Key Biscayne Island  

Coordinates:                           25.69028°N 80.165°W25.69028; -80.165  
Country
 United States
State
 Florida
County
 Miami-Dade
Elevation
 3 ft. (1 m)

Jun 1972 to Dec 1973 to work at the Florida White House in Key Biscayne FL

Key Biscayne is a village in Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States on the island of Key Biscayne. The population was 10,507 at the 2000 census. As of 2004, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau is 10,324. Key Biscayne is located on the island of Key Biscayne and lies south of Miami Beach and east of Miami. The Village is connected to Miami via the Rickenbacker Causeway, originally built in 1947. Because of its low elevation and direct exposure to the Atlantic Ocean, it is usually among the first Miami areas to be evacuated before an oncoming hurricane.

My families’ final move while I was assigned to WHCA came in 1972 when I was transferred once again this time to the Florida White House in Key Biscayne Fl. We were assigned Quarters and lived on Homestead AFB. 

President Richard Nixon purchased the first of his two waterfront homes, forming a compound known as The Florida White House, in 1969 to be close to his friend and confidant, C.G. (Bebe) Rebozo and industrialist Robert Abplanalp. There was a total of five houses plus the SSCP and helipad that made up the compound at Key Biscayne. President Nixon had two houses, then Bebe Robozo's home the SS/GSA house and finally WHCA/WHMO.

The Presidential compound at Key Biscayne was bounded by Biscayne Bay on the west, West Matheson Drive on the south, Bay Lane on the east, and a fence on the north. 

The Key Biscayne Compound (Helipad, USSS CU, 516 House, 500 House, Rebozo House)

The President's homes at 516 and 500 Bay Lane are the southernmost houses in the compound Bebe Rebozo owns and uses the house next door at 490 Bay Lane. The Federal Government leases the next two houses at 478 and 468 Bay Lane. The house at 478 Bay Lane, which is owned by Robert Abplanalp, was leased by the Government in February 1969 for use as an office for Secret Service and GSA personnel. Abplanalp purchased this residence after the owners expressed a desire to sell because of the heavy traffic of Government personnel. The house at 468 Bay Lane was leased in December 1968 and served as the telecommunications facility for the WHCA and an office for military aides to the President.

500 Bay Lane (1972)

The principal construction work by the Government began about December 15, 1968 and was largely completed by September 1, 1969. Nixon visited Key Biscayne more than 50 times between 1969 and 1973. During the summer of 1973 there was a new pool and Florida room constructed in the rear of the 500 house which was also added to the Federal Government’s expenditures in connection with the Key Biscayne compound. These expenditures totaled approximately $7.9 million. Of this, approximately $4.56 million was expended for Secret Service, GSA, Coast Guard, and WHCA personnel permanently assigned to that location. The DOD and WHCA spent $2. 1 million for communications, helipad and boat dock, shark net, and electric power generator; the Secret Service spent $67, 000 for security equipment and devices; and the Coast Guard spent $192,000 for boats, buoys, electronic equipment and boat house. 

516 Bay Lane prior to demolition (2004)

There were a continuous list of construction projects usually scheduled and coordinated by the GSA; however, one Monday morning Mr, Rebozo called a meeting with the USSS,WHCA, and the onsite GSA Rep, he announced he was building a swimming pool in the lanai at the President’s house at 500 Bay Lane as a gift. He then announced and this was to remain a surprise. This was Monday at opening of business. His next statement was, it needs to be completed and ready to swim in by the Presidents arrival on Friday at 6pm. This was also the first we knew of a pending visit in less than five days. He further informed us that he would manage the pool, lanai, electrical, excavating through his contractor, but WHCA and USSS would need to reroute many TELCO cables and replace the sod. Somehow, we made it happen, turned out the Dade County permit office was the biggest hurdle on a neighbor trespass, and improvement of his property without permission! The entire pool, lighting, screened lanai, multiple 100 pair cables were finished about 1pm on that Friday, last piece of sod about 2 hours before arrival. There were about 65 workers doing some form of labor with shovel, wheelbarrows, etc. on Friday morning finishing the construction. WHCA’s shielded Secure Voice wideband circuit was most difficult because it was at end of range for cable length. Fuzzy, but everything happened. In some cases, the wiring plan was completed on the fly and documented later. I always wondered what the cost for this project was to the USSS and WHCA. Southern Bell had some steep tariffs for that type of service.

In the 468 Bay Lane house WHCA installed a three position switchboard with FM radio paging, a Comm. Center with secure voice and secure TTY, and a Radio Console that had phone patch capabilities on Baker, Charlie, and Sierra FM frequencies. This console also had a KWM-2 HF transmitter installed. The WHCA house leased at about 3 times market value for 8 years with special clauses that the lease holder, (heirs of Campbell Soup), were excluded from periodic inspections of their property. 

The 468 House was a split plan with a swimming pool and lanai in the center of a horseshoe layout. Everything on one side was traditional bedrooms that were used for the Military Aide and traveling WH Medical Unit doctors and/or nurses. The center room was where the WECO 608 switchboard was located with a frame room built behind the board. The sunken living room was the WHCA office, and the kitchen was small, but had a refrigerator, stove, and primitive microwave oven.

When I arrived in 1972, the swimming pool was fully operational and available to our families on weekends if there were no visits. There was also a beachfront where the family could swim in Biscayne Bay. Unfortunately for us after Watergate it seems like the President was there every weekend to get away from the constant barrage of questions from the Press.

Enjoying the beach at the Key Biscayne Compound 

I remember of all of the circuits that either originated or terminated in the Key Biscayne Compound there was one AT&T wideband circuit from the White House to Key Biscayne used to support the secure voice that was always giving us problems. Of course, there was a backup line, and both were very maintenance intensive. The common error reported was always a "tip/ring" cable reversal on either the transmit or receive which gets confusing when you have both ends on the line at the same time talking to the AT&T trouble desk. After months of spending hours, a week finding these problems repeatedly, a time was established where the trouble shooting would begin at one end and work its way through each Telco CO, in about 12-15 mile increments all the way from Washington DC to Florida. After about 18 hours, the job was completed. I think they found over 23 times the pairs were reversed. Each time someone would find their problem and fix it, the system would work as long as the remaining reversals were an even number. If you remember, back then, it was a work of art in the telco CO's to cable lace with beeswax twine each time a change was made. I am sure plenty of CO's were upset at some of the efforts required to cut the lacing to track pairs. After this exercise was complete, we rarely ever had another outage the rest of our time in KB.

Marine One awaits the President's arrival

There was always a great deal of activity at Homestead AFB. Most of the detachment lived on base and all of the arrivals/departures took place at the base. Air Force One and Marine One were secured on the base while the President was at Key Biscayne. The crews and all of the support staff also stayed at Homestead. After the President arrived he would climb aboard Marine One and head for the Key Biscayne compounds Helipad.

Patty as Air Force One taxi's up to the ramp

Air Force One arrives at Homestead AFB

President Nixon’s arrival at Homestead AFB

I was in the process of moving my family to Key Biscayne when the Watergate break in occurred, little did anybody realize the impact that this incident would have on the Nixon White House and the personnel at Key Biscayne Compound.

 My Family barely got moved into our quarters on Homestead AFB. when I had to get ready for the 1972 Republican Convention. 

The convention was not originally supposed to be held in Miami, but rather in more summer-friendly San Diego. When the Republican National Committee had problems with the City of San Diego they started looking elsewhere. And what better place than Miami Beach, who had already set themselves up for two conventions in the previous four years and had the hotel space and phone, lines to accommodate them. Not to mention a drivable distance to Nixon’s summer home on Key Biscayne where there was all the communications that the USSS needed for security during the time of the convention. The convention was carefully organized to take advantage of television coverage. Because the war in Vietnam was still going on, the White House was expecting large demonstrations at the Miami Beach Convention Center. Some antiwar demonstrations did take place but without the violence that had erupted in Chicago four years earlier!

The Miami Convention Center

During the 1972 re-election campaign and despite his overwhelmingly strong position, Richard Nixon had engaged in a variety of dirty tricks, culminating in the botched burglary in the Watergate Complex on June 17, 1972.  President Nixon was actually visiting Key Biscayne and staying on Grand Cay in the Bahama Islands the day of the Watergate break-in. The Commcenter delivered the TTY message to H.R. Haldeman at the Key Biscayne Hotel on Saturday morning. He glanced at the message, put it back in the envelope dismissed me as he was laying it on the credenza in his Villa. At the end of the visit, that message was still in the envelope on the credenza when the Commcenter did their sweep at the end of the trip.

 Seeing lots of messages in the Commcenter, and the 3M Post-It notes that were attached and sent back made it difficult to track, once the reader pulls the Post-It off the document. When President Nixon would travel to Grand Cay, the Commcenter would frequently transmit messages to all levels of the Staff. He issued the order for the Tet Offensive effort in Viet Nam while at Grand Cay in the Bahamas. There were also many messages giving guidance for Watergate issues, once again, all on Post-It notes attached to a TTY message reply with the simple initials "RN" somewhere on the page. The Commcenter would sometimes have to transmit long TTY messages multiple times, and then piece together to get all the garble out. Nothing worse that have the last page have a few characters missing! At 100 wpm, a slow process.

Whenever the President came to Key Biscayne for a visit we had to set up and check all of the communications in the Compound, but we also had to place equipment in the Villas at the Key Biscayne Hotel for the Sr. Staff.  H.R. Halderman and Henry Kissinger would have an IBM Dictaphone with a recorder coupler installed on their WH extension, so when they picked up the phone their conversation would be recorded. When the trip ended the villas were swept by Commcenter operators to ensure that no sensitive information was left behind. Truth of the matter is that rarely did we find classified on the sweeps.

The Watergate complex located in Washington D.C.

The Watergate scandal would ultimately be his undoing, leading to his resignation in 1974, but it had no impact on the 1972 campaign.

The 1972 Republican National Convention was held in Miami Beach, Florida from August 21-23. President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew were re-nominated on their first ballots.

Whenever the President came to Key Biscayne for a visit we had to set up and check all of the communications in the Compound, but we also had to place equipment in the Villas at the Key Biscayne Hotel for the Sr. Staff. H.R. Halderman and Henry Kissinger would have an IBM Dictaphone with a recorder coupler installed on their WH extension, so when they picked up the phone their conversation would be recorded. When the trip ended the villas were swept by Comm. Center operators to insure that no sensitive information was left behind.

09 Feb 73 to Jacksonville FL to support Julie Nixon

In Feb.1973 I was sent to Jacksonville FL. for a couple of days to install a radio base station for the Secret Service who was supporting Julie Nixon Eisenhower while she visited the city on official business. This visit was very low key, no staff, no press, just Secret Service support. All I had to do was to install a “Charlie” FM Base station and a remote console in the residence where she was staying. She stayed for two days and then returned to Washington DC.

Things really started to change in 1973 the War in Vietnam was finally over and the POW,s came home, the armed forces moved toward the all voluntary Army and WHCA was lowering its standards as candidates dwindled. WHCA, s mission was changing and they were also going through major technology changes. 

The Watergate scandal was front page news after it was disclosed by Alexander Butterfield that WHCA had installed tape recorders so there was a record of the private Presidential conversations and President Nixon refused to release them to Congress. The Bugging of the White House was disclosed during the Watergate Hearings and only then did the country realize that this was a long standing practice within the White House dating back to Franklin Roosevelt.   

Vice President Agnew resigned from office and Gerald Ford was appointed the new Vice President.

The main reason that I left WHCA after nine years was that I grew tired of traveling and wanted to spend more time at home with my Family, and the office of the President had been surrounded with corruption and was disgraced. I was discharged on December 20 1973 to begin life as a civilian.  It would be only eight months later when President Richard Nixon would resign to end the Watergate scandal.

The WHCA detachment on Key Biscayne began to shut down soon after the President  resigned in August 1974 since he was not expected to return. The CCT at Homestead AFB stayed in place and supported President Ford’s trips until January 1975.

Closing down the compound included the moving of the Homestead CCT to Andrews AFB. I believe most of that was completed by the end of 1974. The contracts that GSA had for their Office and USSS, and the WHCA house, which belonged to heirs of the Campbell Soup company were 8-year leases that required some negotiations and lots of restoral rehab. to return them to their original condition.

Southern Florida suffered the worst hurricane in their history when Andrew ripped through in 2004. Homestead AFB was reduced to rubble and all of the military quarters were demolished, Homestead was never rebuild and was closed and never re-opened.

Key Biscayne also received severe damage many of the hotels that were used during visits were demolished and rebuilt including the Sonesta Beach and Key Biscayne Hotels. The same was true for the Key Biscayne’s Florida White House the 500 and 516 houses were torn down in 2004.

Driving in that neighborhood today, there is NOTHING left of any of the 5 houses, now all multi-story condo's, but I do believe the massive concrete helipad is still protruding into Biscayne Bay along with the Key Biscayne Lighthouse both survived the storms. 

FM Radio Network Key Biscayne (Key Biscayne)

Base Station Site locations of the Key Biscayne FM Radio Network 
             
The FM radio Network covered all activity from Key Largo in the south, Homestead AFB, Miami, Key Biscayne, and the Coast Guard station in Opa-Locka to the north.  Baker, Charlie and Sierra base stations were installed in the following locations:
                                                                                
1.      Homestead AFB, this site insured coverage of all arrivals and departures, as well as any trips to The Ocean Reef Club in Key Largo where Bebe Rebozo had a vacation house that the President would visit.

FM Radio Site at Homestead AFB

2.      The Miami site was on top of One Biscayne Tower; this was the tallest building in south Miami  1n 1972 and had line of site to most locations including the Convention Center which was the site of the 1972 Republican Convention.  This site also covered all of Key Biscayne and the Rickenbacker Causeway as well as south Dade County.

One Biscayne Tower overlooking the Rickenbacker Causeway

3.   The Key Biscayne site was on top of the Sonesta Beach Hotel, this site provided coverage of the beach and hotels where the senior staff stayed.

The Sonesta Beach Hotel on Key Biscayne

4.  Opa-Locka FL, the Coast Guard based at Opa-Locka provided all of the coastal security for the Key Biscayne Compound, the Coast Guard had two chase boats that would patrol the restricted area off of the compound and would challenge and watercraft that might stray to close. The Coast Guard was also available for any trips to the Bahamas. The USCG Cutter, Point Barnes was assigned to assist the USSS for both Biscayne Bay and Walkers Cay support. when we arrived at GBI.

Coast Guard Patrol Boats

We installed a set of WHCA radios on the Point Barnes as well as the two chase boats. For some reason...probably thought that it would be fun, that after an orientation trip for the USCG folks to both Walkers Cay and Grand Cay, there were a couple of us that decided to catch a ride on the Point Barnes from Grand Cay over to Grand Bahama Island and then catch the USAF helicopter from there back to Homestead. The fun wore off after about 10 minutes, I think they tried to beat us to death with the waves. We were not ready to get on the helicopter 

All radio circuits terminated at the Key Biscayne Compound either at the Secret Service Command Post (CP), or the WHCA radio console, switchboard and Comm. Center.

13 comments:

  1. I was with WHCA from 1967 to 1974, was at Key Biscayne when we opened it and left in 1974 to attend "flight school" at Fort rucker , Alabama to learn to fly helicopters. Spent many great hours at KB and worked with some AWESOME individuals. Made many trips to Wlakers Cay and our trip to China in '72 was SUPER! thanks John for the blog. Scotty Johnson scottyanddawn4u@hotmail.com

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  2. I don't know if you have kept in touch with anyone but I have heard from a number of people that we worked with back then. Mike Fincher, Ed Williams and Don Cammel are all living in Florida. Ronnie Belcher and Tramp Crowder both live in the south, Chuck Rasmussin is still around although I don't know where and Hazen Stevens is in Va.
    Thanks for the Comment to let all of know what you are up to!

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  3. John...thank you! Haven't heard many of those names in years. Glad to hear they are still around. Those were GREAT times!

    scotty

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  4. These articles bring back memories of days long ago. I enjoy making the annual WHCA/Camp David Detachment Picnic and talking with old friends. I was in WHCA from 1968 until 1975 -- most interesting period in Presidential duty.

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    1. Sgt. Smith from Cartwheel/Corkscrew? Does Gene, Lee, John G., Mr. J., Earle, Mayes, and me (Mike M.) sound familiar?

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    2. Earle maybe Earle Ainsworth.

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  5. Where were you stationed and in what group? We do have a number of people on this Blog that served in WHCA during the time frame that you did.

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  6. I spent a month at Key B. sometime in 1969, I think. Maybe 1970. Eddie Julian was permanent staff. The President made one visit while I was there. Otherwise it was pretty easy duty. We had a Pontiac station wagon that we drove all over the place. Stayed at a small motel on Key B. Tried to get the WHCA House swimming pool operational. Can't remember if we succeeded or not. BTW, I first met Eddie Julian when he was one of my instructors at Ft. Gordon. He was also on President Nixon's with me to Brussels Belgium.

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    1. Hello, Eddie Julian is my dad and he's living in Orlando. He'd love to hear from any of the old WHCA guys. If you'd like to get in touch, please reach out to me, orlandomikej@gmail.com

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  7. I WAS THERE FROM THE START TO FINISH. AFTER THE END I WENT TO CHARLOTTE AND RETIRED THERE IN 1980. MOVED TO PALM BEACH COUNTY AND STILL THERE.
    EARL MOORE. earlmoore33@gmail.com

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  8. Distance between Hialeah, FL and Key Biscayne, FL
    29 min (18.4 mi) via FL-913 S
    Distance between Biscayne Park, FL and Key Biscayne, FL
    E .Howard Hunt.
    Address 11337 NE 8th Ct
    Biscayne Park, Florida 33161
    26 min (17.6 mi) via I-95 S and FL-913 S
    2450 N.W. North River Dr. Miami, Fla.
    north river road to Key Biscayne Fl
    22 min (10.3 mi) via SW 12th Ave and FL-913 S
    Frank Fiorini Sturgis
    N.W.122nd St N Miami Fl to Key Biscayne Fl.
    22 min (16.7 mi) via I-95 S and FL-913 S
    Richard Nixon
    500 Bay Lane Key Biscayne, FL Miami island suburb
    George Smathers visit Nixon (1969 to 1974.) sold him home.
    Next door was a home owned by close friend Charles
    "Bebe" Rebozo,

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  9. I worked in Miami in the 80's. I spent a lot of time working at the One Biscayne building where Motorola had a bunch of repeaters installed. The equipment "rooms" were actually open areas that outcropped from the top of the building (see picture above) that contained down lighting spot lights. Some genius thought that putting equipment in those locations was safe for the equipment and technicians. Access was via a rickety rolling ladder. You were literally climbing from the ladder into an elevated room with only the ten foot gap, open air and street below to slow your fall! Once inside these "rooms" there were 3 foot diameter open holes for the spotlights. To make this "safe" an iron mesh was placed over each. Unfortunately they were rusty and there were story's of a technician almost falling through one. The rooms were wide open to the environment and so equipment got rusty and dirty as well. Pigeons would visit and dump poop all over the cabinets and the dirt would migrate into the electronics. Later to accommodate sensitive 800 MHz trunking equipment, they actually blocked up and airconditioned one of these "rooms". It was an improvement, but you still had the dangerous climb up the ladder and still had the feeling once inside that you were cantilevered over the street in a "room" that was poorly engineered.

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  10. Errata on the date for Hurricane Andrew in your blog above. Hurricane Andrew was 1992 not 2004, though 2004 was another bad year for hurricanes. I lived in Coconut Grove until 1994. Key Biscayne was indeed pretty decimated. Two years later we rented a still damaged home on Hampton Ln in KB for a short period and the entire home and yard were overrun by cockroaches. I used packing tape to seal them out of the house. The exterminators just laughed when we told them we were on KB. There were families of Raccoons that were dislocated from the Bill Bags park. We would go and feed them pet food.

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