Dean Brittain has a big red connection. One that had quite a ring to it.
It wasn’t just any telephone that Brittain received upon retiring.
But an authentic military “red phone.”
“It was my job to connect this phone to the president —
24 hours a day,” the Fremont man said. “I was director of programming — in charge of the communications.”
That included communications on the ground and in the air. Military planes flew at up to 80,000 feet. He oversaw connections at 67 installations, traveling the world as part of an inspection team.
He never spoke much about his work.
“Not many people had the clearance I did,” Brittain said. “Beyond confidential.”
He retired from the Air Force after 36 years of federal service.
His calling came in 1955.
“My journey to the Army began in California with
six months of training,” Brittain said.
He served in Seattle, Wash., and then in Anchorage, Alaska — before it became a state. He settled near Offutt Air Force Base in the early ’60s, when the military ceased its operation of the Alaskan communication system.
“We were still in the Cold War. It was a hectic time,” Brittain said.
He watched over antennas in Elkhorn and Scribner.
He served in Greenland at a military satellite installation, where it was cold and dark. Brittain also spent much time in the underground military post at Strategic Air Command at Offutt Air Force Base in Bellevue.
In 1992, he retired to Morse Bluff, building a home on the site of an old dance hall built in 1915. He and his wife, Patsy, dug the foundation by hand.
“I built it stick by stick,” Brittain said.
It wasn’t his first experience with building.
He had already supervised the creation of a motor home for military Special Operations that could fly aboard an aircraft.
After his wife died in 2008, he moved to Illinois briefly. However, he missed his Fremont connection.
“I’ve enjoyed the North Bend and Fremont areas.”
He has landed back in Big Red country.
The phone is home.
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