Valles Mines, Missouri, U S A
Founded in 1749 by Francois Valle in the French Upper Louisiana before Lewis and Clark. 275 years later the Valle Mining Company's
4000+ acre property every year absorbs 21,000 tons of carbon dioxide and generates
14,000 tons of oxygen, enough to meet the needs of 63,000 people. [USDA Forest Facts]
Major General William H. Harrison
Patton's youngest officer in his General Staff Headquarters, ETO, Harrison made colonel at age 34. Below, his career decorations. Promoted to
a Major General, he commanded Missouri's Ozark Division, the 102nd Infantry Division which he assembled and trained into 35,000 soldiers
strong before Defense Secretary McNamera under John F. Kennedy cut it down to 1,200 men, the rest shipped to Vietnam.
See the "102nd Infantry Division", now part of the Lost History Museum's Military exhibits.
His Medals
Some included: European African Middle Eastern Campaign with 5 Bronze Stars; World War II ("Freedom From Fear And Want. Freedom of Speech
And Religion"); French Crois De Guerre with Star; Legion Of Merit with Oak Leaf Cluster; American Defense (Unlimited National Emergency May 27, 1941);
American Campaign; Army of Occupation (Germany); Armed Forces Reserve with two bronze Hour Glasses.
Zoom In
The Valles Mines Airfield - "...in event of war."
As proposed by Maj. General William H. Harrison 1982
As a mapping expert, Harrison helped Gen. George Patton target and bomb roads, railroads, airfields,
and obstacles to the US 3rd Army's path across Europe to victory in 1945. During the Cold War he continued
his military service and would fly to the Pentagon for readiness meetings.
In the course of all this, he designed a defensive airfield for St. Louis and nearby counties in the event of war.
[Click Here to see a larger view of the Valles Mines Airfield].
A Possible Scenario commonly considered during the Cold War:
- the City of St Louis obliterated as a wartime casualty such as after
the delivery of a nuclear missile targeting then McDonnell-Douglas (now Boeing),
obliterating the City and
- in a worst case coming with a possible invasion.
- The Valles Mines airfield pictured above, being outside the primary blast zone,
would unite Hillsboro with the historic Colonial French Triangle, that is, French
Village-Farmington-Ste. Genevieve against any foe, repeating the way in which
they had fought in 1780
in the days of the Kingdom of New France, to keep St. Louis (then called Fort San Carlos) from the hands of an
invading English war party of a thousand men then. .
The Road Restored from building that airfield would reinstate the Hillsboro-Farmington Road first built in 1850 and
abandoned in modern times which
- used to connect the County seats
- today starts at Buster Cemetery/Crossing on Valles Mines Road
- running over the Valle Mines Railroad Tunnel
- due east to the former Halifax Post Office then
- joining the present Crow Lane which
- doglegs into Y-Highway Spur
- and from there as the present Y-Highway to French Village and on eastward to Ste. Genevieve.