Bomb Shelter Myth Pursued At Penn Manor- Does It Exist?

“If I showed you, I’d have to kill you.”

There are many mysteries among us here at Penn Manor High School.

What are teachers’ firsts names? What makes our popcorn chicken so delectable? Is Mr. Kaufhold the same man we all love and know after 2:45?

But the greatest perplexity of all…Where, and is there such a thing as a bomb shelter here under the campus of Penn Manor?

With our senior year rapidly coming to an end, we have made it our mission to tackle this myth and to unveil the biggest kept-secret of Penn Manor High School.

Our first step was to find out what the word on the street, or in the hallways, was concerning the existence of any possible bomb shelters among the staff and student body.

Bomb shelter listening
Kenny Tomaszefski looks and listens for shelters.

We wanted to see what the students’ take was on this legend.

“There is definitely one underneath the English wing,” said senior Dave Karabaich. “When the school was being created in the 1950s, the country was being threatened, [so we needed one].”

Senior, Kenny Tomaszefski, describes the supposed bomb shelters as,“not just secret hiding places, but a haven for magical and mythical events that the human mind cannot explain.”

“I think there is basically another underground school somewhere underneath [Penn Manor],” said Alysha Kreider who is a firm believer in the existence of the bomb shelter.

However, not all students are believers.

“I don’t think there is one to my knowledge. I think my mom would have told me if there was one,” said senior, Ryan O’Day, who is the son of long-time English teacher, Cece O’Day.

ryan o'day confused bomb shelter
Ryan O'Day expresses his curiousity concerning the shelter.

Cory Delmonte, another senior, said, “There is just a generator – No bomb shelter.”

Overhearing the topic of conversation, curious senior, Henry Stewart said, “There is one under the science wing – You have to go outside to get to it.”

Throughout our search for more knowledge, we stumbled across another pupil who shared the same lust for unraveling this mind boggler.

“It’s in the math wing stocked with food,” said Sam Cornell who claimed to gain these facts from previous head principal, Dr. Jan Mindish. “If any serious event would have happened, [Dr. Mindish] would have taken the twenty brightest students and teachers [to the bomb shelter].”

With so much talk about the old math/science wing, we decided to further investigate.

“We are sitting on top of it right now,” said math teacher, Bruce Pierce.

“During the Three Mile Island scare (1979), they considered having students and faculty spend the night in the bomb shelter,” said Pierce.

These convincing words, from a seemingly reliable source, almost guaranteed us that there was, in fact, a bomb shelter here at Penn Manor High School.

The bomb shelter had to be big if it was going to fit Penn Manor’s student and faculty 30 years ago.

We still wanted to see it for ourselves.

“If I showed you, I’d have to kill you,” said custodian Janitor John who admitted it was possible to access Penn Manor’s bomb shelter.

“This is top secret stuff,” said John. “This is like Watergate.”

With the devoted secret-keeping custodians, we hoped the administration would be an easier nut to crack.

We were wrong.

Soon after, we approached the principals with high hopes, our ambitions were crushed, as they belittled us for even requesting to see such a mystical place.

Although we were denied access right off the bat from the bomb shelter, we weren’t going to throw in the towel just yet.

We decided to approach the custodians and administration with a willingness to abide by whatever terms were needed to catch a glimpse of this shelter.

After days of consulting and agreeing to a binding contract, a figure, who wanted to be kept anonymous, decided to allow us access to the all-mighty bomb shelter of Penn Manor High School.

Although excited, we would later find out that this wasn’t going to be a light stroll through the school.

Stay tuned for the actual trip to the bomb shelter…

By Cody Erb and Dessie Jackson

12 thoughts on “Bomb Shelter Myth Pursued At Penn Manor- Does It Exist?”

  1. Dessie!!! You got our Music Theory class all pumped up for this article and then you leave us hanging in the end?? Geez! 🙂

  2. Let me know when you find it. I want to go on the “field trip” too!

  3. If ur going for myths…for some reason ppl think there is a locker that goes to either a teacher’s lounge, a bomb shelter, or an alternate dimension. sad isnt it

  4. Excellent story. While Mr. Pierce is a VERY reliable source, having been around longer than almost anybody in the district, the people who really know their way around the high school building…I take that back…the entire district…are the members of the tech team. They string wire for a living. At least one of the members of the tech team actually attended Penn Manor High School way back in the day and was rumored to have disappeared for long stretches of time instead of attending class.

  5. they should of got pictures of the bomb shelter. not people feeling the ground?!?! and listening for a bomb shelter?!?! doesnt seem real interesting to me

  6. maybe the pictures will be in the NEXT article.
    I wanna know what happens!!!!

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