171. The ground-breaking ceremony at Shippingport was a bit strange. President Eisenhower, standing in the Western White House in Denver, Colorado, passed a “magic wand,” consisting of a neutron source in a small globe at the end of a stick, over a Nancy Wood BF3 neutron detector tube. A neutron rate-meter on his desk responded, closed a circuit, and relayed a signal to the Shippingport site, 1,200 miles away, via a dedicated phone line. The signal activated an electrical highlift, which lurched forward and scooped the first dirt. Guests and dignitaries at the site watched the elaborate ceremony on 20 closed-circuit television monitors.