The Ground Observer Corps was a World War II Civil Defense program of the United States Army Air Forces to protect against air attack. The 1.5 million civilian observers at 14,000 coastal observation posts used naked eye and binocular searches to search for German and Japanese aircraft until the program ended in 1944.
add-on The program did NOT end in 1944. I was an active participant in 1955. It also added data to "Operation Bluebook" There were operation centres that took all the information in and compiled on plotting boards in every state - not just the coasts. I was a P52 designator as well as backup plotter. Directly linked to U.S. Air Force bases, etc. It morphed into watch system for bombers coming in "under the radar." Quite effective until radar caught up. Larry 'Bevo' Beavers
The Ground Observer Corps was thanked in the credits at the end of the 1957 sci-fi movie, The Deadly Mantis, which suggests that the program still existed in the late 1950s.
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