In schools, children learned to “ duck and cover,” diving under their desks and staying far away from windows in drills designed to protect them during an atomic strike. With Cold War tensions escalating in the 1950s, the threat of a Soviet nuclear attack cast a terrifying shadow over everyday American life. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Civil Defense maintained an active program to instruct citizens in procedures to follow in the event of nuclear attack.What were postwar Americans planning to eat in the event of a nuclear attack? Hint: It wasn’t very appetizing. Media Images Civil Defense Control Center: The command center was constructed near the lakefront in the 1950s to serve as a base of operations.Ĭourtesy of Louisiana Division/City Archives, New Orleans Public Library "Ground Observers": Civilian volunteers trained by the Office of Civil Defense to spot enemy invaders were photographed atop the Hibernia Bank building in February, 1955. The bunker remains abandoned and in disrepair on the neutral ground between West End and Pontchartrain Boulevards. The city installed an elaborate warning system of 76 large sirens and even built a fully-equipped command center from which city officials could "safely" direct the operations of rescue and salvage following an attack. Fallout shelters were designated throughout the city, including the basements of the new City Hall and the Main Library (where fallout shelter signs can still be seen). Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Civil Defense maintained an active program to instruct citizens on procedures to follow in the event of a nuclear attack. In 1952, the Office of Civil Defense in New Orleans was commissioned to "prepare for, coordinate, and carry out all emergency measures other than military, necessary to minimize and repair injury and damage resulting from disasters caused by enemy attacks or other hostile action, or by fire, flood, earthquakes, or other natural causes." In 1950, the Louisiana Legislature created the Civil Defense Agency and authorized each community to establish a local organization for civil defense in accordance with the state plan. In the decade following World War II, the United States formulated a Civil Defense initiative that would attempt to preserve order during a nuclear attack. By Matt Woodard & New Orleans Public Library Text
0 kommentar(er)
