{"title":"Doom Town, Nevada Test Site, and the Popular Imagination of Atomic Disaster","authors":"J. Wills","doi":"10.1017/S0021875823000105","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the effect of Doom Town, a civil defense experiment conducted at Nevada Test Site in March 1953 and May 1955, on American attitudes toward the atom. Initially conceived by the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA) as a means to progress knowledge and understanding of how to survive nuclear attack, the creation and destruction of two “Survival Towns” in the Nevadan desert instead accelerated national anxieties. My article looks at how local and national media negatively framed the two experiments, and how the public responded, with two specific images of Doom Town undermining public confidence in the atom: the ruined city (or homegrown Hiroshima) and the projected death of the American nuclear family.","PeriodicalId":14966,"journal":{"name":"Journal of American Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-02-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of American Studies","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1017/S0021875823000105","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"HUMANITIES, MULTIDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This article explores the effect of Doom Town, a civil defense experiment conducted at Nevada Test Site in March 1953 and May 1955, on American attitudes toward the atom. Initially conceived by the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA) as a means to progress knowledge and understanding of how to survive nuclear attack, the creation and destruction of two “Survival Towns” in the Nevadan desert instead accelerated national anxieties. My article looks at how local and national media negatively framed the two experiments, and how the public responded, with two specific images of Doom Town undermining public confidence in the atom: the ruined city (or homegrown Hiroshima) and the projected death of the American nuclear family.
期刊介绍:
Journal of American Studies seeks to critique and interrogate the notion of "America", pursuing this through international perspectives on the history, literature, politics and culture of the United States. The Journal publishes original peer-reviewed research and analysis by established and emerging scholars throughout the world, considering US history, politics, literature, institutions, economics, film, popular culture, geography, sociology and related subjects in domestic, continental, hemispheric, and global contexts. Its expanded book review section offers in-depth analysis of recent American Studies scholarship to promote further discussion and debate.