Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture
Cultural scholar John Wills takes readers on a cultural tour of Doom Town, USA, designed to be the model 1950s American city and destroyed by an atomic bomb on live television to educate Americans on the need to prepare for possible nuclear war—but also to sell new products in the emerging postwar economic boom.

In March 1953 and May 1955, government officials—including the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA), the US Department of Defense, and the Atomic Energy Commission—released nuclear bombs on two model towns at Nevada Test Site, the continental nuclear test facility during the Cold War. These so-called “Doom Towns” were designed to illustrate in the most vivid way possible what might happen to a “typical American home” caught in a Soviet atomic blast. Instead of training troops for war overseas, the Doom Towns literally brought the Cold War home.

Drawing on newspaper articles, FCDA reports, and corporate documents, John Wills brings readers into Doom Town, USA—a place where life-size mannequins of the archetypal Mr. and Mrs. America walked the streets in JCPenney clothes, drove Chrysler cars, and lived in the latest trailer homes, tailor-made to escape in the event of nuclear war. The two Doom Towns of Operation Doorstep (1953) and Operation Cue (1955) were far more than just an exercise in developing a new civilian home front. They were a media spectacle and a cultural flashpoint, attracting corporate sponsors, drawing in atomic tourists, and generating new consumer products. The atom bomb may have been bad for world peace, but it was good for business. In the excitement about these experiments, real people even volunteered to be living test subjects—but most were turned away.

Doom Town became an unusual but effective banner for corporate and consumer life in the 1950s. Doom Town was an effective simulacrum of white middle-class America, right down to the racially segregated social spaces and the hierarchical gender roles of the dummies living in their classic suburban homes. But these homegrown Hiroshimas also contributed to a broader culture of catastrophe and fear in the late 1950s. Concerns over Communist invasion, Soviet spies, and ICBM missiles coalesced in the Nevada desert, framing a national culture of anxiety. The sudden explosion of the model towns revealed the shocking fragility of postwar living, calling into question the 1950s American Dream and the survivability of American ideals. The cultural crater left by these nuclear test sites exists even today in the many movies, television shows, and video games that dwell on the existential crisis of impending apocalypse.

Doom Town, USA is an eye-opening tour guide of one of the most bizarre and uniquely American places in history.

1148187449
Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture
Cultural scholar John Wills takes readers on a cultural tour of Doom Town, USA, designed to be the model 1950s American city and destroyed by an atomic bomb on live television to educate Americans on the need to prepare for possible nuclear war—but also to sell new products in the emerging postwar economic boom.

In March 1953 and May 1955, government officials—including the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA), the US Department of Defense, and the Atomic Energy Commission—released nuclear bombs on two model towns at Nevada Test Site, the continental nuclear test facility during the Cold War. These so-called “Doom Towns” were designed to illustrate in the most vivid way possible what might happen to a “typical American home” caught in a Soviet atomic blast. Instead of training troops for war overseas, the Doom Towns literally brought the Cold War home.

Drawing on newspaper articles, FCDA reports, and corporate documents, John Wills brings readers into Doom Town, USA—a place where life-size mannequins of the archetypal Mr. and Mrs. America walked the streets in JCPenney clothes, drove Chrysler cars, and lived in the latest trailer homes, tailor-made to escape in the event of nuclear war. The two Doom Towns of Operation Doorstep (1953) and Operation Cue (1955) were far more than just an exercise in developing a new civilian home front. They were a media spectacle and a cultural flashpoint, attracting corporate sponsors, drawing in atomic tourists, and generating new consumer products. The atom bomb may have been bad for world peace, but it was good for business. In the excitement about these experiments, real people even volunteered to be living test subjects—but most were turned away.

Doom Town became an unusual but effective banner for corporate and consumer life in the 1950s. Doom Town was an effective simulacrum of white middle-class America, right down to the racially segregated social spaces and the hierarchical gender roles of the dummies living in their classic suburban homes. But these homegrown Hiroshimas also contributed to a broader culture of catastrophe and fear in the late 1950s. Concerns over Communist invasion, Soviet spies, and ICBM missiles coalesced in the Nevada desert, framing a national culture of anxiety. The sudden explosion of the model towns revealed the shocking fragility of postwar living, calling into question the 1950s American Dream and the survivability of American ideals. The cultural crater left by these nuclear test sites exists even today in the many movies, television shows, and video games that dwell on the existential crisis of impending apocalypse.

Doom Town, USA is an eye-opening tour guide of one of the most bizarre and uniquely American places in history.

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Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

by John Wills
Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture
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Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

Doom Town, USA: The Nevada Test Site as Ground Zero of 1950s American Culture

by John Wills

Overview

Cultural scholar John Wills takes readers on a cultural tour of Doom Town, USA, designed to be the model 1950s American city and destroyed by an atomic bomb on live television to educate Americans on the need to prepare for possible nuclear war—but also to sell new products in the emerging postwar economic boom.

In March 1953 and May 1955, government officials—including the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA), the US Department of Defense, and the Atomic Energy Commission—released nuclear bombs on two model towns at Nevada Test Site, the continental nuclear test facility during the Cold War. These so-called “Doom Towns” were designed to illustrate in the most vivid way possible what might happen to a “typical American home” caught in a Soviet atomic blast. Instead of training troops for war overseas, the Doom Towns literally brought the Cold War home.

Drawing on newspaper articles, FCDA reports, and corporate documents, John Wills brings readers into Doom Town, USA—a place where life-size mannequins of the archetypal Mr. and Mrs. America walked the streets in JCPenney clothes, drove Chrysler cars, and lived in the latest trailer homes, tailor-made to escape in the event of nuclear war. The two Doom Towns of Operation Doorstep (1953) and Operation Cue (1955) were far more than just an exercise in developing a new civilian home front. They were a media spectacle and a cultural flashpoint, attracting corporate sponsors, drawing in atomic tourists, and generating new consumer products. The atom bomb may have been bad for world peace, but it was good for business. In the excitement about these experiments, real people even volunteered to be living test subjects—but most were turned away.

Doom Town became an unusual but effective banner for corporate and consumer life in the 1950s. Doom Town was an effective simulacrum of white middle-class America, right down to the racially segregated social spaces and the hierarchical gender roles of the dummies living in their classic suburban homes. But these homegrown Hiroshimas also contributed to a broader culture of catastrophe and fear in the late 1950s. Concerns over Communist invasion, Soviet spies, and ICBM missiles coalesced in the Nevada desert, framing a national culture of anxiety. The sudden explosion of the model towns revealed the shocking fragility of postwar living, calling into question the 1950s American Dream and the survivability of American ideals. The cultural crater left by these nuclear test sites exists even today in the many movies, television shows, and video games that dwell on the existential crisis of impending apocalypse.

Doom Town, USA is an eye-opening tour guide of one of the most bizarre and uniquely American places in history.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780700641352
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Publication date: 04/28/2026
Pages: 224
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

John Wills is Professor of American Media and Culture at the University of Kent. He is the author of several books, including Conservation Fallout: Nuclear Protest At Diablo Canyon and Gamer Nation: Video Games and American Culture.

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