As with many other cities and towns in northern and central Quebec, the small logging village of Parent played host to a guest of the Cold War.
In the early 1950s, the Royal Canadian Air Force established a string of radar stations along the 50th parallel to detect enemy bombers heading south. Personnel at these sites scanned the skies electronically night and day to monitor any and all unusual aerial activity and when such activity was detected, fighters were scrambled from a nearby base for a visual check. These radar stations were small towns of a size able to accommodate roughly 200 civilian and military members along with their dependants and for approximately one decade, RCAF Station Parent was one such village.
Construction began at Parent for its radar station in the spring of 1951 and two years later, regular operations were initiated. The station consisted of the requisite headquarters and mess halls along with barracks, residences (in official parlance, Permanent Married Quarters), schools for dependants, a chapel and Construction Engineering workshops. Most of the station was built up around Rainbow Lake a few miles south of the town proper but the operations site was placed on a mountain top south of the station. The operating unit at Parent was known as 14 Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron (14 AC&W Sqn.) whose Cree motto of Wemotat-chik translated into High Lookout. Officially, the squadron was created in May 1953.
Some of 14 AC&W Squadrons earlier radars included an FPS-3 Search Radar and two ISG-98 Height-Finders. The FPS-3s range initially extended to 230 miles but when a duplexer was added on, this increased to 300 miles. In fact on one particular day, an aircraft as far away as Newport, Vermont, 320 miles away was detected by the FPS-3. New equipment came and went at Parent with the ISG-98s replaced with a TPS-501 and an FPS-6 a few years after operations began and the FPS-3, by an FPS-508 in 1960. Initially, the radar antennae were encased in pressurized rubber domes but these were replaced with solid plastic lattices in the late 1950s to obviate the need for constant air pressure.
To refine skills and prepare airmen for the worse, training at these radar sites proved plentiful and diversified. Many exercises were carried out over the course of a year but these usually involved the radar personnel and fighter aircraft and not so much the support staff. One personal exception, narrated by Alexander Velleman in his third book on the RCAF The RCAF as Seen From the Ground, occurred in the fall of 1960.
One of the exercises occasionally carried out at radar bases was a ground attack on the operations site. If radars can be knocked out, the skies can be cleared for an aerial assault on strategic points further on. While the idea of a mock attack on the station at Parent was not an entirely new one, these had often failed because guards knew more or less what to expect and when. Recently given responsibility for base security, Al Velleman decided on a different tact this time.
Vellemans plan was to use the unexpected. With new airwomen due to arrive shortly, his plan was to employ several of these for the assault. As they were unknown to everyone, the troop could have passed off as a tour of recruits or visitors. His venture called for an approach to the site not from the standard route through the bush but rather brazenly by road in the bases shuttle bus through the operations sites front gate. Thanks to some discrete assistance from the station photographer. He had phony tower passes manufactured for the WDs and these in turn were dropped off at tower security the day before D-Day. Once arrived, the new staff was given a quick briefing in the Sergeants Mess and the plan to begin the assault the next day was finalized.
The following day, Velleman hijacked the shuttle and ordered the driver to pick up the airwomen. The assault force drove to the operations site in a normal fashion and the phony passes were collected at the guard house without question. Vellemans team spread into groups with one taking over the microwave terminal in one of the towers. Another member of the attacking team took the Commanding Officer prisoner but as the alarm had by then been sounded, the other women were captured. End of Story? No! One of the female detainees, who had her purse confiscated, asked for its return only to retrieve a 9mm pistol and aim it at the arresting officer. The exercise was officially declared invalid because of the use of prior knowledge but in real life, it could very well have succeeded.
With their role of aerial surveillance, air defence radar operators picked up practically every flying object within their area of responsibility. The most common tracks were for civilian aircraft but the odd time, base personnel saw objects with speeds or configurations which no earthly explanation held valid. Indeed, in 1954, the station itself was visited by one such craft.
On the 24th of August, two airmen on a normal weather check in the early hours spotted a small capsule-shaped colored object hanging motionless over the domestic area. The duo gazed intently at the object for three or four minutes after which it left quietly. The matter was soon reported to intelligence but no explanation was ever offered. Because of its small size and construction, one suspects this may have been an extra-terrestrial probe.
When the RCAFs budget was scaled back after the Liberal election victory of 1963, many stations and squadrons were closed down. With Senneterre and Mont Apica radars strong enough to cover Parents operating radius, the squadron shut down operations on 20 March 1964 and the station was disbanded eleven days later. The property by Rainbow Lake was sold to Laforest et Freres for $65,200 later that year but DND kept one of the radar buildings for some time.
Despite the loss of a major employer, the town of Parent has managed to live on; logging is still a major industry in the region and hunters still fly in during hunting season. Most of the married quarters at the base are inhabited but gone are station headquarters, the hospital, school and the operations site. Parent can still be reached by train and one has only to walk three miles southwards to reach the base.