Threats to Our Nation, 1957–1959: A Public Health Retrospective

Abstract

Today we recall the 1950s with nostalgia. Television sitcoms like Happy Days and the music of Sha Na Na are evidence of our positive views of this era. But there was a less appealing side of the period characterized by national insecurity. People wondered whether internal and external threats might strip from them their newfound political and economic power. The atomic bomb was no guarantee of security. The public health community planned for the impossible: surviving a nuclear attack on the nation's cities. George Moore, a prominent public health official who is now retired, was an eyewitness to the transformative effect of this period on the public health community. This installment of Public Health Chronicles focuses on one small part of Dr. Moore's venerable career: 1957 to 1960, when he was assigned the task of civil defense activities. Here, we have a firsthand look at the paradoxical position of public health workers during the Cold War. We learn of plans to evacuate cities despite the haunting prospect that 20-megaton nuclear bombs would incinerate all life within a 20-mile radius; we learn of drills aimed at allaying panic, if not survival. We learn that planners believed that well-stocked civil defense shelters might allay some of the destruction wrought by a nuclear attack. Yet, from the perspective of history, we learn the troubling lesson: that public health officials' actions were shaped by the political climate, thereby playing a role in perpetuating that repressive period. We learn that to apply rational planning to an irrational situation may lead to harsh historical judgments. This message is relevant as we confront the issues of our time as well.