Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

Cultural scholar John Wills takes readers on a cultural tour of Doom Town, USA, designed to be the model 1950s American city and destroyed by an atomic bomb on live television to educate Americans on the need to prepare for possible nuclear war—but also to sell new products in the emerging postwar economic boom. In March 1953 and May 1955, government officials—including the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA), the US Department of Defense, and the Atomic Energy Commission—released nuclear bombs on two model towns at Nevada Test Site, the continental nuclear test facility during the Cold War. These so-called “Doom Towns” were designed to illustrate in the most vivid way possible what might happen to a “typical American home” caught in a Soviet atomic blast. Instead of training troops for war overseas, the Doom Towns literally brought the Cold War home. Drawing on newspaper articles, FCDA reports, and corporate documents, John Wills brings readers into Doom Town, USA—a place where life-size mannequins of the archetypal Mr. and Mrs. America walked the streets in JCPenney clothes, drove Chrysler cars, and lived in the latest trailer homes, tailor-made to escape in the event of nuclear war. The two Doom Towns of Operation Doorstep (1953) and Operation Cue (1955) were far more than just an exercise in developing a new civilian home front. They were a media spectacle and a cultural flashpoint, attracting corporate sponsors, drawing in atomic tourists, and generating new consumer products. The atom bomb may have been bad for world peace, but it was good for business. In the excitement about these experiments, real people even volunteered to be living test subjects—but most were turned away. Doom Town became an unusual but effective banner for corporate and consumer life in the 1950s. Doom Town was an effective simulacrum of white middle-class America, right down to the racially segregated social spaces and the hierarchical gender roles of the dummies living in their classic suburban homes. But these homegrown Hiroshimas also contributed to a broader culture of catastrophe and fear in the late 1950s. Concerns over Communist invasion, Soviet spies, and ICBM missiles coalesced in the Nevada desert, framing a national culture of anxiety. The sudden explosion of the model towns revealed the shocking fragility of postwar living, calling into question the 1950s American Dream and the survivability of American ideals. The cultural crater left by these nuclear test sites exists even today in the many movies, television shows, and video games that dwell on the existential crisis of impending apocalypse. Doom Town, USA is an eye-opening tour guide of one of the most bizarre and uniquely American places in history. “An insightful, deeply researched and entertaining new history of atomic culture. Richly detailed and grounded in the lived experience of nuclear testing, Doom Town, USA reveals the complex relationship between Cold War science and American life and culture. Excellent.”— Andy Kirk , author of Doom Towns: The People and Landscapes of Atomic Testing “A must-read for anyone interested in the everyday realities of nuclear America, the book transforms the lifeless mannequin families of suburban test houses—long frozen in silence—into voices that reveal how Cold War America imagined survival in an atomic age.”— Thomas Bishop , author of Every Home a Fortress: Cold War Fatherhood and the Family Fallout Shelter “This journey to America’s ground zero will not disappoint. Beautifully written and filled with deep reflections about the atomic age, Doom Town, USA reveals the ways in which the smoldering ruins of Nevada have haunted popular culture from the mid-1950s until the present day.”— Ian Klinke , coauthor of Human Geography: A Very Short Introduction “Meticulously researched and expertly written, Doom Town, USA, Nevada traces how the fear and hope inherent in developments surrounding nuclear science informed public policy, industry, pop culture, and consumerism in the United States during the Cold War. The book’s blend of topics—ranging from politics to Airstream trailers to mannequins on the battlefield—creates a fascinating narrative of 1950s America that reveals how the country’s histories of culture, science, politics, religion, race, and gender are so deeply intertwined. A must-read for anyone interested in policy, consumerism, media studies, or American society.”— Chad R. Diehl , author of Resurrecting Nagasaki: Reconstruction and the Formation of Atomic Narratives “ Doom Town USA offers a fascinating picture of the Doom Town atomic tests of 1953 and 1955, describing the efforts of the Federal Civilian Defense Administration as it sought to motivate an unenthusiastic population to prepare for potential nuclear attack. Wills explains everything from the FDCA’s initial conceptions of the Doom Town projects, to the corporate cooperation elicited by the FDCA, and the project’s relation to 1950s consume