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And he hasn’t. He was always more interested in survival, anyway.

Photo by Peter J Thompson/National Post

Beach was living in Chicago and working as a general contractor and electrical engineer around the time that President John F. Kennedy was advising Americans to stock up on canned goods and build backyard bomb shelters. He figured a better approach to ride out the coming nuclear war was to abandon the city entirely. So he moved to Canada in 1970.

Beach eventually settled in the village where Jean was born. Now 90 and practically deaf, though sharp, she responded quickly when asked why she fell in love with her husband.

“I’ve often asked myself that question,” she said, laughing. “I almost married another guy but my Dad broke it up, and I am glad he did. Bruce takes care of me — and I take care of him.”

Photo by Peter J Thompson/National Post

She made him a peanut butter sandwich (on white bread) for lunch the day we visited. He cut it into three sections, washing it down with a Dr. Pepper, a beverage, he noted, that was invented in Texas.

Jean’s family also had land that was perfect for a bomb shelter, and over time Beach’s idea blossomed beneath the ground in a field bordered by a stream, and neighbours who aren’t interested in discussing Bruce Beach.

“People think, ‘What a nut,’ and I know that, but I don’t mind,” he says. “I understand the world looks upon me that way.”

Photo by Peter J Thompson/National Post

Photo by Peter J Thompson/National Post

Construction began in 1980. Beach started buying old school buses – for $300 a piece — and excavated the property, eventually planting 42 buses in the earth and covering them with concrete and soil. (Buses have reinforced steel roofs, and make for good bomb shelter molds). All was ready by 1982. Thirty-five years later, the Ark still is ready, sort of.