In order to hide it from Japanese bombers during World War II, Lockheed covered its entire Burbank, Calif., manufacturing plant with a camouflage net of chicken wire, poles and cables, feathers, and tar. From the air it looked like another residential section of Burbank, complete with trees, roads, sidewalks, and houses:

“It was an engineering marvel,” reported Gil Cefaratt in his history of the company, “but when it rained, [engineer Richard P.] DeGrey remembers the odor of millions of wet chicken feathers almost made work impossible for a couple of days.”