Built in 1958, SLC-10 is one of two launch pads built by the Douglas Aircraft Company to support combat training launches of the SM-75 THOR Intermediate-Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM).

The first missile was launched from SLC-10E in June 1959 by the Royal Air Force (United Kingdom). The first missile was launched from SLC-10W in August 1959, also by the Royal Air Force.

In 1962, the entire launch complex was dismantled and transported to Johnston Island, a remote atoll in the South Pacific, to support the nuclear testing project.

In 1963, SLC-10W was rebuilt at Vandenberg AFB using equipment shipped from England where sixty IRBM sites were being dismantled.

SLC-10W is the best surviving example of a launch complex built in the 1950s at the beginning of the American effort to explore space.

Source: Adapted from the NRHP nomination submitted in 1986.