Bomboozled: How the U.S. Government Misled Itself and Its People into Believing They Could Survive a Nuclear Attack

Not long after the invention of the hydrogen bomb in 1952 (about a thousand times that of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945) the U.S. government began a comically wrongheaded propaganda campaign to persuade citizens to build "family fallout shelters"%E2%80%94even though those near ground zero had very little chance of surviving an H-bomb blast. As the government cultivated "bomb fever," hysteria swept over the cultural landscape. The entertainment industry explored the coming "Third World War," and government agencies churned out informational pamphlets%E2%80%94beautifully reproduced in this book%E2%80%94with such questionable advice as keep homes tidy%E2%80%94a messy house is more likely to catch fire after an H-bomb explosion. Roy, a journalist with a background in architecture and design, provides a brief textual and extensive graphic look (featuring comics for children, shrill posters, and advertisements) at the governmental push for such shelters, as well as various construction methods%E2%80%94some fanciful ones including simulated outdoor patios and trompe l'oeil painted "landscapes." Roy argues that the fallout shelter campaign was designed less to protect the citizenry than to groom them into becoming "Citizen Cold Warriors," ready to accept and endure a more militarized society. As one critic argues, the shelter campaign, like the post-9/11 security color codes, has become part of "security theater"%E2%80%94giving this whimsical look into our past a rueful relevance. (June)