The White Deer

These are two photographs of the famous white deer who inhabit the former Seneca Army Depot in Romulus, New York, in the Finger Lakes.  "Army Depot?" you ask.  "What did they store in the depot?"  You're going to love this:  They stored explosives.  Artillery shells, Bombs, and particularly, Atomic Bombs!  That seems almost unimaginable that they stored Atomic Bombs in the beautiful upstate landscape of the Finger Lakes.  Anyhow, this is a huge facility and it has a 24 mile long fence around it since the facility was built in1941.  The white deer - a genetic quirk that developed naturally on the 7,000-acre, fenced-in expanse - have thrived, even as the depot itself has transitioned from one of the most important Cold War storehouses of bombs and ammunition to a decommissioned relic.  Now the deer face an uncertain future after living and breeding largely undisturbed since the middle of last century.  With protection from the Army and its fence, the Seneca white deer have grown to an estimated 200.  Local officials want to put the old Seneca Army Depot up for bids next month, and so there is concern that the sale could also mean the end of the line for the unusual white deer. If buyers take down the fence, the white deer aren't expected to last long.  And that would be a tragedy.  People have come from all around the country to see these beautiful creatures.  There is hope that a group interested in conservation can purchase the land, and allow for some tourism, both for the deer, and for the bunkers where munitions were stored.