US APO 432 NEW YORK – RESOLUTION ISLAND, NWT
Latitude and Longitude of Cape Warwick on Resolution Island:
Population:
Origin of Name:
Resolution Island was probably named by Thomas Button after his ship of the same name in 1611-1612. Cape Warwick was named by Davis in 1587 after his patron Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick.
General Military History:
The Port Burwell radio station, established under the Hudson Strait Expedition of 1927-1928, was considered unsuitable for future use so a site was chosen on a small island just south of Resolution Island. The station was completed in the summer of 1929 and was known as Resolution Island even though it was located on
Radio Island. The station was generally open year-round as a navigational aid and weather station until October 21, 1961 when the personnel were evacuated to Frobisher Bay. The station was reestablished at Cape Warwick on the northeast corner of Resolution Island in March 1962 where it operated until August 1975 under the Canadian Department of Transport.In 1951 the United States and Canada agreed to extend the Continental Air Defence Integrated North (CADIN)-Pinetree Line into Northern Canada. The Pinetree Line was a series of radar sites to warn of incoming aircraft and to guide interceptors to their targets. The US Navy surveyed the area around Cape Warwick in 1951 and 1952 in anticipation of the establishment of a Pinetree radar site. The US Air Force built an airstrip, radio towers, oil tanks and several buildings at Cape Warwick. The radar station went into operation in November 1954, about a year after the other sites along the Labrador coast and at Frobisher Bay. The 920th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron operated the Resolution Island radar site. The radar operations were terminated on November 1, 1961 and the site was turned over to the Canadian Marconi Company who may have operated the Polevault communications system mentioned below.
The Cape Warwick site on Resolution Island also operated as a US Air Force troposcatter communications facility (Polevault) serving the Distant Early Warning Line and the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System. All of the facilities at Resolution Island were abandoned in August 1975. Some of the buildings were demolished to make way for an unmanned North Warning System short range radar site that went into operation in 1993. Clean-up activities at the site continue as a result of the extensive contamination from the Pinetree and the Polevault operations.
US APO 432 Opened:
July 1, 1959 – New York Port of Embarkation
US APO 432 Closed:
1961
Units Suspected:
920th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron
References:
CPCGN 1980, Canadian Hydrographic Service 1983, Cardoulis 1990; Dushenko and Reimer 1990, Environment Canada 1989, Fletcher 1990, Howey 1968, Nicks et. Al. 1997, Shaffer 1985.
No Postal markings recorded.
This detail was made available by Kevin O’Reilly for use on the Pinetree Line web site in Decxember 1998.