I love Cold War relics

[wilson]

Last night, the SciFi channel ran a 1983 film featuring Jason Robards entitled "The Day After." It was about what happened along the midwestern corridor of missile silos just before and after a nuclear war (it took place in Kansas). It was like "Red Dawn," only much more terrifying.
Jason Evans (or anyone), please tell me you've seen this?

[billybreen]

Last night, the SciFi channel ran a 1983 film featuring Jason Robards entitled "The Day After." It was about what happened along the midwestern corridor of missile silos just before and after a nuclear war (it took place in Kansas). It was like "Red Dawn," only much more terrifying.
Jason Evans (or anyone), please tell me you've seen this?

Ooh, that sounds awesome. I love me some post-apocalyptic theater, but I will quibble with one point: nothing is like "Red Dawn." Wolverines!

[TillyGalore]

I was in high school when the movie came out. I think for some classes in my school it was required viewing for discussion the following day.

[YmoBeThere]

There are many of us who have....I was 12 at the time. My parents had reservations. Luckily, the Presidential administration at that time greatly reduced the risk of The Day After happening.

[dkbaseball]

Luckily, the Presidential administration at that time greatly reduced the risk of The Day After happening.

That wasn't the thinking at the time. The movie was prompted in part by the idea that Reagan was a trigger-happy cowboy, and people needed to be aware of what he was capable of doing. In the first two years of his presidency he was vulnerable on the economy, but a few months into 1983 supply side spin was prevailing in the media, so the political opposition -- and there were millions of people at that time who still just couldn't believe Reagan had been elected -- turned to foreign policy.

The movie was sort of a national phenomenon, and it's another of those generation gap disconnects to see younger people just happening upon it as a curious historical relic.

[billybreen]

And off to the PPB we go. Nice going, Ymo. ;)

[YmoBeThere]

That wasn't the thinking at the time.

I was speaking more of the entirety of the administration, not at that particular moment. My vague recollections of the politics at the time tends to concur with your statement of him being considered trigger happy.

[DukieInKansas]

To bring it back to OTB: Wasn't at least part of it set in Lawrence, KS? Aren't you glad it didn't happen so they could beat the tar heels this year?

(or does this take it to EK?) :D

[wilson]

Yes. a good portion of it takes place on the KU campus, and KU shirts/banners/posters, etc. are featured repeatedly.

[blublood]

On the subject of Cold War relics, my husband is an avid photographer and camera collector and apparently FSU (that's former Soviet Union to the rest of us) cameras are actually very highly sought after. He picked up one at the thrift store for $3 and it's hilarious... some of the labels on the F-stops are in Russian, some are in English, and we think one of the characters may even be Japanese.

[Ignatius07]

My most recent summer involved a few Cold War novelties that - if anybody happens to be traveling to these locations - people should definitely check out.

1 - Statue Park outside of Budapest. When the Soviet Union collapsed, some guy bought up a bunch of Soviet statues for basically nothing (since they were going to be destroyed anyway) and put them all in a park a little outside the city. It's really pretty cool to see officially-sanctioned art in a society that generally stifled it.

2 - The subway system in Tbilisi, Georgia. I assume there are a few others like this in the FSU, but Tbilisi's still uses Soviet-era trains (despite the current aversion to all things Cyrillic there) and the stations are the 1960s' idea of the future. If people are interested I could try to post some pictures.

[wilson]

My most recent summer involved a few Cold War novelties that - if anybody happens to be traveling to these locations - people should definitely check out.

1 - Statue Park outside of Budapest. When the Soviet Union collapsed, some guy bought up a bunch of Soviet statues for basically nothing (since they were going to be destroyed anyway) and put them all in a park a little outside the city. It's really pretty cool to see officially-sanctioned art in a society that generally stifled it.

2 - The subway system in Tbilisi, Georgia. I assume there are a few others like this in the FSU, but Tbilisi's still uses Soviet-era trains (despite the current aversion to all things Cyrillic there) and the stations are the 1960s' idea of the future. If people are interested I could try to post some pictures.

Perhaps my favorite Cold War relic is the Carousel of Progress. Built for the 1964 World's Fair in NYC and later transferred to DisneyWorld, it chronicles the home technologies of the past with an increasingly anachronistic vision of the "future." Posits that by The Year 2000, kitchen robots (surely none will top Rosie Jetson for at least another 200 years), voice-activated, automated households, and family-sized virtual reality apparatus would be commonplace.

"There's a great, big, beautiful tomorrow
Shining at the end of every day!"

[billybreen]

Posits that by The Year 2000, kitchen robots (surely none will top Rosie Jetson for at least another 200 years)

I say 50, tops.

[gus]

And off to the PPB we go. Nice going, Ymo. ;)

It's funny - I opened this expecting it to be a thread about McCain.

[billybreen]

It's funny - I opened this expecting it to be a thread about McCain.

Zing!

I actually thought it was about Wilson's mom.

[rthomas]

The Day After came out (as a TV movie) at the same time that Carl Sagan began a heavy PR blitz on the hypothesis of Nuclear Winter, the concept that a massive attack and counter attack with nuclear weapons between the US and the Soviets Union would lead to rapid global cooling and ultimately that using nuclear weapons would affect the entire earth instead of just the country they were used on.

Carl Sagan (who was not associated with the movie, I think) and the movie made quite an impression on Americans who began to realize (if they hadn't before) the global consequences of nuclear war. Both made a strong impression on Reagan and Gorbachov (spelling?) and soon afer we had a new much better relationship with the Soviets. Glasnost began in the Russia and soon Ronald Reagan destroyed communism and we lived happily ever after. There, in a nutshell, is 30 years of history. All becasue of a (now cheesy) movie.

[Chard]

I remember seeing it as a child. I never got to see the very end since I didn't get to stay up that late. It had a chilling effect on me at the time. I remember it scared a lot of us.

I finally got to see the entire movie late last year.

[77devil]

The tunnels under east and west campus use to contain a lot of cold war civil defense supplies-cots, blankets, water, food you name it. All in army green with the federal civil defense symbol stamped on everything. It was pretty creepy and a stark reminder of the nuclear threat during that time.

[wilson]

There's all kinds of weird stuff down there. One time, I went tunneling with some buddies and we found a pickup truck tailgate. It was full-sized and appeared to have no damage. I always thought it would make a cool wall hanging.
Also, the elementary school where my mother retired as principal was built in the 1950s, and it has a fallout shelter, with a sign denoting such on the wall. I used to always try to convince her to let me go down there, but she claimed she didn't know how to get in (I don't think I believe her...I'm pretty sure someone passed the codes down to her when she got the gig).

[OldPhiKap]

"I Love Cold War Relics"


I thought this thread was about my mother in law.



(ba-dum-bump!)


Actually, I was going to post b/c of the reference to tunneling. We tunnelled a bunch on East but never could find a way into West. On East, though, you could get all the way down to the power station outside of the painted bridge on Campus Drive (or whatever the road was that ran b/t East and West). I recall going to the Duke Library to look at construction plans to find the West tunnels but had no luck. Can anyone confirm that there was indeed such a complex on West?

[wilson]

"I Love Cold War Relics"


I thought this thread was about my mother in law.



(ba-dum-bump!)


Actually, I was going to post b/c of the reference to tunneling. We tunnelled a bunch on East but never could find a way into West. On East, though, you could get all the way down to the power station outside of the painted bridge on Campus Drive (or whatever the road was that ran b/t East and West). I recall going to the Duke Library to look at construction plans to find the West tunnels but had no luck. Can anyone confirm that there was indeed such a complex on West?

Outstanding. We too made it to the power plant. We too wanted to get to West. We too failed to find any information about it or ever make it down there.

[77devil]

"I Love Cold War Relics"


I thought this thread was about my mother in law.



(ba-dum-bump!)


Actually, I was going to post b/c of the reference to tunneling. We tunnelled a bunch on East but never could find a way into West. On East, though, you could get all the way down to the power station outside of the painted bridge on Campus Drive (or whatever the road was that ran b/t East and West). I recall going to the Duke Library to look at construction plans to find the West tunnels but had no luck. Can anyone confirm that there was indeed such a complex on West?

There was entrance on West to a tunnel after entering the old section of Duke Hospital at the top of main quad. That area was not well lighted and I never explored it very far so I cannot confirm how extensive the West tunnels are.

There is the rumor, of course, that there is a tunnel under campus drive connecting the two complexes, but like you and others, I never made it past the power station from the East campus side.

In reference to Wilson's original post, there is another very good movie from the same genre and era called Testament starring Jane Alexander.