Secret Service Office

Secret Service Office. Eisenhower National Historic Site. , Originally the barn’s milk house, this building was established as an office for President Eisenhower’s Secret Service detail in 1955. During the presidential years, one of the 8 – 10 agents who worked each shift would be stationed in the office to monitor the alarm control panel and radio communications equipment. The back room served as a firearms and ammunitions cache and was used by White House communication specialists who manned a plug-in switchboard, teletype machine, and microwave radio. Secured within a safe in the back room was the satchel containing nuclear codes that always accompanied the President., The agents left the farm at the end of Eisenhower’s presidency, but returned in 1965 after Kennedy’s assassination prompted legislation providing protection to former presidents. Once again the agents utilized the old milk house as an office. The office today appears as it did in the late 1960s and includes some of the original furnishings. One Major improvement to site security in the 1960s was the addition of closed circuit TV cameras that allowed the agents to survey the grounds via monitors above their office desk.