No city, no town, no community of more than one thousand people or two hundred buildings to the square mile, shall be built or permitted to exist anywhere in hte United States of America.
Constitution of the United States
Thirteenth Amendment.

Two generations after the Destruction, rumors persisted about a secred desert hideaway where scientists worked with dangerous machines and where men plotted to revive the cities. Almost a continent away, Len Coulter heard whisperings that fired his imagination. Then one day he found a strange wooden box...

SF Masterworks #134