By David G. Firestone

I’m not a traveler. I don’t really travel as much as I should, because I don’t fly well. This last March, I went to Tuscon, Arizona, and spent a week at my parent’s condo. We did a whole bunch of fun stuff, including the Titan II museum, located southwest of Davis–Monthan Air Force Base. Davis–Monthan Air Force Base was the home of the 390th Strategic Missile Wing of the Strategic Air Command. The Titan II was also used by the 381st Strategic Missile Wing at McConnell Air Force Base near Wichita, Kansas, and the 308th Strategic Missile Wing located at Little Rock Air Force Base in Arkansas. Each of these wings had 18 Titan II silos, with fully contained launch facilities and crew quarters for the missile crews. A 4th group, the 1st Strategic Aerospace Division, located at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California had 3 silos for technical development and training.

The Titan II missile is a 3 stage missile carried nuclear warheads, and could be launched on several minutes notice. The launch process is carefully scripted to insure a false launch could not take place. Two individuals are needed for the missile to launch successful. Training was carefully planned. Regular inspections took place. The missile itself utilized a liquid fuel, Aerozine 50 and an oxidizer, Dinitrogen tetroxide. The two compounds were kept in separate tanks, and when the missile was launched, the two compounds were combined and the mixture caused the thrust needed to launch the rockets off the ground.

The Titan II museum consists of a tour given by former crew members. The majority of the museum is underground, but above it are a number of vintage items that were used on the base. To enter the base, you have to go underground through a staircase, and pass through a number of blast doors. You then get a tour of the control room, go through a launch sequence, and then you go see an actual Titan II, which was never fueled, and has been mounted in the silo. The blast doors are 6000 pound each, and require a special switch to secure and open them. I purchase one of them in the gift shop.

This particular door switch was used in Wichita Kansas, at the 381st Strategic Missile Wing at McConnell Air Force Base. When the silos were dismantled in the 1980’s, much of the equipment used was so obsolete, it couldn’t be recycled, so much of it was sold for scrapped. This was the only one they had in stock, and to hold a piece of the Cold War in your own hands is truly humbling. This was part of a machine that could have ended the world. While at the museum you can go to the top of the silo, and look down into the silo and see the missile and really get an idea of how big it is. There is a hole cut into the warhead because due to a treaty, this missile must not be able to fire or hold a payload. This hole and the permanently open silo doors conform to the treaty.

By David G. Firestone

Going to take a break from sports stuff on Vintage Item Spotlight for a while, the Senators numbers took a lot out of me. We all watched cartoons growing up. That goes without saying. What many people don’t realize is that animation cels from your favorite childhood programs are becoming collector items. They even have their own section on eBay. I’ve got a few, and today we will examine them this week.

One thing that I do is get a item that I use to familiarize myself with some of the aspects of other items to come. This example is a cel from a Super Bubble commercial from the 1970s. Each cel is 1/30^th of a second, and the motion comes from minute changes in the drawings. The shot is framed, and the clear acetate sheet is put under the camera and is held in place by the little holes in the bottom.This cel comes to us from Cap’n O. G. Readmore in 1985. This was from the first episode of his short-lived show where he told the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. This is the giant that Jack meets. The shot is set up so that he is high up in the left corner. It comes with a matching production drawing. Now we all get into collecting for something specific, and for me, that was to get cels from my all-time favorite show, Beavis and Butt-Head. The first one I got was from the episode Canoe and features the duo in their underwear. The shot in question takes place just after their teacher, Mr. Van Driessen gets mauled by a bear.

The second cel that I got was from It’s a Miserable Life, which was a parody of It’s a Wonderful Life. Butt-head was never born and Beavis is spending Christmas working in a soup kitchen with Stewart. This cel is from that scene.

The other Christmas episode was called “Huh Huh Humbug” and was an obvious parody of A Christmas Carol. This scene features principal McVicker sneaking a value meal home from Burger World for his kids. This cel is from that scene.

This scene from the “Madame Blavatsky” episode features the two walking down the street, after Beavis is convinced he is a psychic. It is set up to look like it was filmed from a distance away. There is an official MTV logo on the cel.

While at Stewart’s house, the duo watch the Olympics and decide to use a 17^th century antique plate as a discuss. This is a cel of the Olympic event they watched in Plate Frisbee.

One of their more intelligent ideas was to make some extra money selling sperm in Sperm Bank. During the episode Stewart’s dad visits the clinic and has a chat with this nice doctor:

One of the my favorite episodes is Closing Time. Throughout the course of the series, the duo work at Burger World, an obvious parody of McDonald’s. They get the owner in trouble and get the restaurant shut down numerous times. Despite that, they keep their jobs. This episode features the duo discovering how much fun it is to throw food into a ceiling fan. After they make a complete mess of the restaurant, health inspector Harry Butasker(who was featured in a later episode as “Sam Gluckman”) closes the restaurant. This cel is from when he first walks in.

This last cel is one of my personal favorites. Incognito is a banned episode that was pulled from MTV after numerous complaints that it featured a student bran dashing and firing a gun while in school. Beavis and Butt-Head changed their names to “Crevasse and Bum-Head” and this cel is from a scene when they are trying to disguise their identities.