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Post by Deleted on Mar 15, 2009 19:51:22 GMT
Some of the younger generation here did not grow up worrying about nuclear annihiliation and how to survive it. Older people spent their entire childhood with the thought that a nuclear war was inevitable, because the other side was so horribly evil and intent upon attacking. So there were quite a few books like this one. This dates from 1962.  The cover is classic: your average white American family enjoying life as best as they can after an atomic attack. What I love the most about it is that Mom is in her day dress, apron and all, preparing dinner, and Dad is relaxing in his jacket, smoking a pipe, having just finished reading the liner notes to something by the Ray Coniff Singers. All of the how-to magazines had lots of articles on this subject. Basically, it was expected that a properly equipped family would just have to spend maybe two weeks in one of these shelters before exiting and rebuilding the country. I think that a lot of us were embarrassed and more than a little worried that our parents were not out digging a big hole in the backyard or drillingdown through the living room floor. Here are some more pages from one of these publications.         |
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 15, 2009 20:43:53 GMT
>>shudder<<
I'm taking big gasping gulps of air after reading that last part.
What's the woman on the Shelter-Cycle saying? "I've pedaled enough -- go make some toast!"
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2009 22:55:45 GMT
During my childhood I have never felt that my parents were much worried about the possibility of a nuclear war. War was something of the past for them I think.
My parents were not communists (oh well, they may have voted for a communist candidate once or twice, who has not?) but they never have presented me the USSR as the empire of evil.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2009 23:04:27 GMT
The French never entered the same psychosis as the Americans, lucky for them.
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 17, 2009 3:16:31 GMT
When I was really little I saw the movie "Song of Bernadette" (about Bernadette of Lourdes). The only thing I really remember from the movie is Bernadette being harshly questioned by a group of skeptical men.
There were a bunch of mean men in lumpy suits grilling this girl and I was thinking, "Those must be the Communists!"
When I was four and five we lived on Eielson Air Force, a little south of Fairbanks, Alaska. That's where I went to kindergarten and learned to "duck and cover". That's when you leap out of your desk during atomic bomb drill, kneel down in a ball with your head between your arms and keep your eyes squinched real tight so they won't turn into jelly with the insanely bright light of the bomb. What a thing to tell children! We were also always reminded that the commies were only bare miles away in Russia.
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Post by bjd on Mar 17, 2009 19:23:46 GMT
I mostly grew up in Toronto, Canada and I remember people talking about how kids in the States had to learn to hide under their desks in case of attack. We weren't far away from the border, but never had anything like that.
I remember the first time I went into a department store in Buffalo, NY when I was about 20. There were signs showing the way to the bomb shelter.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 17, 2009 19:36:11 GMT
The buildings still have 'fallout shelter' signs on them.
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Post by happytraveller on Mar 18, 2009 16:16:35 GMT
The first picture reminds me of the Fritzl-story.
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Post by rikita on Mar 18, 2009 22:58:25 GMT
well we didn't have bomb drills in school - i suppose that was a few years too late for that - but we were still told that the americans hate us and want to kill us... and when our teacher told us about nuclear bombs i got really worried and wondered if having all windows closed might help - so i asked her if the stuff from the bomb can get through the glas, and she told me it gets even through the walls... that really freaked me out, and for years (even after the wall came down) i got scared each time i heard an airplane over the house, thinking they were going to drop a bomb... and since we were quite close to a big military base, there were actually regularly military airplanes flying over our house...
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Post by Deleted on Mar 18, 2009 23:18:13 GMT
I remember some of these same booklets,particularly the black and white of the mushroom cloud. We had frequent drills at home and school. My brothers used to mess with me whenever a plane flew over especially when they would break the sound barrier."it's them,they're coming".
My best friend in 1st grade was from Cuba and the nuns would allow her to come to my house for weekends,she told me stories about her father who was a dentist in Havanna and how he was not allowed out. I was very confused about it all. Still am...
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Aussielover
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Yo ho! Yo ho! A pirate's life for me.
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Post by Aussielover on Mar 20, 2009 0:05:37 GMT
I remember having to do those duck and cover drills at school. Sometimes it was under our desks. Sometimes it was in the school basement and we had to line up against the wall with our faces to the wall and our hands clasped behind our heads (like we were all going to be shot execution style.)
I think it would be kind of cool to own a property with one of those old fallout shelters still on it. I wonder if any still exist? My husband and I talk about having one in case of a raging bushfire, like the one that recently ravaged Victoria.
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