BLAST CITY

One of the scariest of all - Mutual of Omaha's Accident Insurance diagram from Heat Flash to Partial Structural Damage - and etched on the visual imagination of the world. January 1951
 

An image of the respective blast zones for the Atomic Bomb and the Hydrogen Bomb, photograph September 1950.
 
ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS July 13 1946 full page

BIKINI 

scenes of leave taking, preparing to abandon the atoll on American suggestions

Illustrated London News August 1st 1946, p.229; the scene from a drone plane 15,000 feet above the test explosion at the Bikini Atoll.

Ralston Crawford's paintings suggested by the same explosion for FORTUNE magazine, emphasising the same concentric circles of blast. Other images in the issue of the magazine such as USS Nevada treat the destruction up close, and, in an abstracted way, much related to his pre-war paintings.
 

BOHN AND THE REDS

Bohn Aluminium and Brass Corporation of Detroit always projected a dynamic, thrusting image of themselves in the ads, and usually in fanciful images of the Future (Database). In the period 1950 - 1953, they generated some of the most alarmist and vitriolic propaganda imagery against the Soviet Union. The copyline was that the Reds mustn't sabotage America's strength (Bohn). The most effective images are painted by Robert Thom who is an excellent artist in many ways - and celebrated for his re-creations of great moments in medicine. Here he creates images of Soviet deceit and power that have few equals. The severed hand that goes about its business is particularly inspired. I have a collection of about 30 of the images and they all make your flesh creep.

left to right

July 1952
March 1952
January 1952

BOMB

LOOK July 1951 17 x 23cms illustration and detail to , "A Mission with the ATOMIC BOMB; What it looks like and how it is delivered", by Jim Berryman, Cartoonist for the Washington Star. "I was there because Major.Gen Roscoe C.Wilson, Deputy Chief of Staff on operations for atomic energy - and once a cartoonist at West Point - thought a cartoonist illustrator could tell a big part of the A Bomb story without giving away any vital technical information to our enemies."
 
 
 

 
 
lower image - silver lining advert for INCO Nickel March 1954 20 x 24cms
 

CIVIL DEFENCE

advert for PURE PAK November 1956 a simulated exercise - you can tell because of the ELASTOPLAST bandages and mentionable wounds. Various details

ATTACK AND JIBE

First Insult Your Enemy

LOOK magazine feature April 10 1951.
SOVPHOTO captioned by the Saturday Evening Post in August 1951.

a most revealing indication of America's belief in its own technical superiority - yet none of this lessens the Fear. From LOOK magazine April 10th 1951.

LOOK magazine, to the feature, "Communism Heir of Fascism" by William Henry Chamberlin. November 1948.

detail of US Savings Bond advert, March 1964 7 x 8cms.

advert for Western Electric; October 1951 17 x 24 cms. The Reds haven't ... a telephone network. Well, and there I was, getting all scared about a nation without a telephone network ! Signed "Moore"

Then Overestimate Them ...

November 1961, advert for Radio Free Europe , 19 x 27cms.

HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI

Main images Illustrated London News Sept. 22nd 1945
 
But also coverage of Tokio Illustrated London News Sept. 15 1945
 

THE HOME FRONT

US Savings Bond ad (Censored) advert 1952

MAP, members of the Communist Party in each State and my clear favourite of all items kept in my Cold war Archive; like some mapping of the outbreak of disease or the sighting of some rare bird - Pity the Lone Commie in Mississippi s, January 1962. For those in the shelters just before the Cuban Missile Crisis, the note reads that Bonds are Fireproof.
How many Reds does it take.... ?

An advert for the American Railway Car Institute , January 1951. "Freight cars are a weapon..." 20 x 24cms.

Black and white drawing of the Bomber - Electric Light and Power Companies, , December 1951. Full page advert in the style of Ripley's "Believe it or Not". Even the Government are Reds. Trust your friendly local power companies - but also read the Diaries of David Lilienthal.

SENATOR JOE

Although the early stages of his conduct made him a suitable standard bearer for the anti-Communist left, Joe McCarthy's behaviour during the later stages of the Senate Investigation Committee revealed him to be out of control. Even a rightwing cartoonist on a conservatist journal in the UK (Illingworth at PUNCH) could only see a drab vision of McCarthy's pollution of the political landscape.

and as always with Illingworth, it may not be funny or clever but it was well drawn. From PUNCH March 17 1954, measuring 17 x 22cms.
 
 
 
Herblock, Washington Post August 1951 note McCarthy with the Smear bucket
 
 
DUFFY's cartoon in the Saturday Evening Post July 1951 10 x 15cms The editorial is headed "Reds Spread Myth That Fascism Threatens U.S.!" which in Cold War Code means Guilty your Honour. Or, "Blame That Bastard McCarthy"
 

How they are photographed..."The American Communist Party" Saturday Evening Post Sept 24 1954

SHELTERS
 
 
Weekly Illustrated (UK) July 1955
 
 
LOOK magazine October 1948 full page on an attractive substitute for burrowing
into the ground.
 
 
LOOK December 5 1961
 
 
LOOK December 5 1961
 
 
1952

and even your furniture can make it through c1949
 
 
 

ANTI-SOCIALISM

The Socialist Menace
 
 
America's Independent Light and Power Companies were
the most consistently anti-socialist of all advertisers in the
period after 1945.
 
Here are some their most characteristic images
 
 
 
Feb 1954
 
 
 
 
1954
 
 
 
February 1950
 
 
 
1955
 
 Electric Light and Power Companies, , December 1951. Full page advert in the style of Ripley's "Believe it or Not". Even the Government are Reds. To the friendly local power companies - read the Diaries of David Lilienthal.
 
 
 
 
Another single-minded advertiser was Republican Steel whose images regularly spooked the populace with predictions of Socialist America. October 1951 and July 1951
 
 
The DeMille Foundation LOOK April 1949, the DeMille Foundation anti-Union imagery
 

BRAINWASHING

Illustration by Larry Kritcher The Brainwashed Pilot written by Sidney Herschall Small Saturday Evening Post March 1951 18 x 25

OTHER WEAPONS AND DIAGRAMS

 
LOOK February 1957 16 x 22cms
 
 
undated c1949 16 x 24cms
 
 
LOOK magazine August 15th 1950 and a detail of the thing
  

LOOK October 28 1947

BOLSHEVISM AND THE BRITISH PRESS

Ghilchik's cover for The Passing Show , May 1922, Lloyd George flirting with the Bolshevik in the cause of British Trade; Batting for Britain. "The Cupboard Lover and his Loydie Love". Here the standard image of the Revolutionary is given formal dress to denote that he is a diplomat. MORE
 
Leo Cheney's illustration,"The Emissary of Progress - Does anybody want to buy some jewels ?", from The Passing Show October 1920 measuring the full page, 19 x 27 cms. The artist dwells on the concept of the regicide with severed heads and a bag of treasure from the Russian Royal family. The hatching of the background makes the scene gloomier. He uses stereotypical features. Many British critics of Communism/ Bolshevism played on the fact that many of the Soviet pioneers were Jewish. This humour magazine, The Passing Show , with its bluff John Bull figure, The Showman , was as Conservative/ conservative as Punch , and quite capable of brazenly linking what the British considered as continental excess with home-grown Socialism - hence the outlandish inclusion of the Daily Herald . Reading of that journal was, as we know, de rigeur among those committed to the furtherance of the Bolshevist Terror.

"The Darkening of the Sun", Punch's warning of the end of civilisation as we know it, June 22 1927, p.687, by Bernard Partridge; and the year after the General Srike. List of familiar items; the boots (snow still clinging); the dagger (Royal Blood); and flat peasant's cap. It always seems a defeat or laziness if Civilisation has to be written in letters.

The Showman's Rocket, November 1920 (Lloyd George views Bolshie strapped to a firework).

THE RED ARMY CAN BE BEATEN

Illustration to Robert Spencer Carr's Saturday Evening Post Story The Dictator's Double, November 1952 22 x 26cms
 

 
 
The Poor Old Earth May 1953 10 x 14cms, by Duffy.
 
 
 
Cummings of the Daily Express , 24 August 1953, "Back to Where it all Started"
see Cummings, These Uproarious Years, McGibbon and Key, London 1954.
 
 
 
 
cartoon by Shirvanian
December 1959
 
 
 
 
spot illustration 1947
5 x 11cms
 
 
 

A MISCELLANY - TOP BAR

FACE OFF

WHO RUNS AMERICA?

HAMMER AND SICKLE Unsigned cartoon in PUNCH magazine November 15 1950, 18 x 23 (Illingworth ?) of the Soviets and the Chinese threat to India; and a candidate for the Cliche of the Year.
 

TIMETABLE

GLACIER COLD WAR

SEIZING DETROIT

FRIENDLY IVAN

How Do You Do, Tovarich ! Sympathy for the Soviets.
These are sympathetic images of Russian people from the period of the Second World War and just after. The blockade of Berlin and finally, the Korean War put paid to any thoughts of treating Russians as if they were human beings.

IVAN advert for sweeteners 1944 19 x 27cms.

Superior Steel Corp., June 1944 22 x 26cms and the flags of Britain, China and the Soviet Union.

DESIGN and the Cold War a lecture and its notes Chris Mullen US 1945-1991

from ESQUIRE September 1951 10 x 22cms.

1. Definitions of the Cold War .
a) ideological
b) geopolitical
c) economic

2. Partners and Rivals, the historical background.
Some events referred to,
1941 Dec, Pearl Harbour, Japan attacks the West Coast.
1942, UK signs 20 year friendship treaty with USSR
1945, May Victory in Europe Day, August 6th, atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
1947, Allies conference in Moscow on the fate of Germany fails
March 12th The Truman Doctrine.
1948 USSR blockades Berlin.
1949, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation formed
1950 beginning of the Korean War
1956, UK France and Israel seize the Suez Canal Soviet troops put down Hungarian Revolution.
1962, Cuban Missile Crisis, Nuclear War narrowly averted.
1963 death of President Kennedy, escalation of the Vietnam War.

3. Images of Aggression,
3,1 advertisements for Bohn Copper products and the use of the Severed Hand
3.2 magazine spreads, "Could the Reds take Detroit"
(and what would they want with it anyway ?) ;
Build your own Foxhole, the ultimate dream of a world free of the working classes.
3.3 documentaries, Duck and Cover, the Government Civil Defence films. The March of Time Newsreels, directed by Louis de Rougemont.

Recommended Study Material

Films
Atomic Cafe US 1982;
US Propaganda documentary;
Dr.Strangelove, and How I Learnt to stop worrying and love the Bomb, directed by Stanley Kubrick, 1963;
Emilio de Antonio, Point of Order , documentary about Joseph McCarthy;
for Cold War films, particularly the impact of monster and atomic movies see Peter Biskind, Seeing is Believing , Pluto, London 1983.
Art
HB.Chipp, Theories 0f Modern Art , Univ of Calif Press, 1968, Chapter on Art and Politics;
Steven Heller(ed) War Heads, Cartoonists draw the Line, Sphere London 1983
Politics ;
David Caute, The Great Fear ; the anti-Communist purge under Truman and Eisenhower, Simon & Schuster NY 1979;
Jessica Mitford, A Fine Old Conflict, Quartet London 1978;
Duncan Campbell, The Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier , American Military Power in Britain, Paladin London 1986;
Duncan Campbell, War Plan UK , Burnett London 1982. Original Source Material .
Ernst and Loth, Report on the American Communist , Holt NY 1952.
 
Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation , My Years in the State Department, Norton NY 1969.
 
Herblock Looks at Communism , Washington Post Washington 1959
 
Popular Science , March 1951, How to build a Family Foxhole.
British Images of the Bolshevist. 1917 - .

 

THIS SITE IS STILL BEING CONSTRUCTED

FOR ANY DETAILS lacking to date EMAIL ME ON

[email protected]