The steel panels used by Behlen Manufacturing, of Columbus, Nebraska, in the construction of their buildings proved their durability in an atomic bomb test at Yucca Flats, Nevada, on May 5, 1955. Exposed to a thirty-kiloton blast alongside two competitors’ metal buildings, two Behlen buildings were the sole survivors still in serviceable condition. Both were returned to Nebraska to be exhibited, one at the state fair and later at the factory, and the other on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln east campus.
Behlen building that withstood the atomic blast.
