http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2015/08/ghost_fleet_the_government_needs_to_work_with_silicon_valley_to_create_our.html

In 1931, the city fathers of Sunnyvale, California, came up with a unique plan to rescue their town from the doldrums of the Great Depression. They raised $480,000 to buy nearly 1,000 acres of farmland and then sold off the land to the U.S. government for $1. The deal was that Sunnyvale would then become the home for a new planned Navy fleet of “flying aircraft carriers,” massive helium-filled airships that would serve as bases in the air for propeller biplanes.