And welcome. Were going to talk about cold war educational films, made even a classroom. Weve talked about classroom for. To do any history of classroom film, you have to understand the colors the scholarship. I will be pulling together works that i have done and from other historians. Scholars, even folklorists. This will be particularly interdisciplinary. For reasons that should by now be obvious, the topic is interdisciplinary. In particular im going to return to this question. What are the relations between art, science, and entertainment and culture, in cinema . How do they reinforce one another in these particular context . Were going to see the movement of people across institutions. Its all going to be living together. We have to consider what is the scientific and Technical Knowledge . To understand this historically, we have to how Science Education is with a product and driver of culture. What i mean is that any form of Science Education is going to great attitudes and approaches towards both education and. Cience before we moved to the 19th to the 1950s i want to unpack some assumptions you might have. Some of you are probably old enough to remember seeing bill nye the science guy . Right . Bill guy is this generations predominance tv science educator. He wears the white coat. Or actually its will, already contradicting myself. She does experience he does experiments enthusiastically. For you remember someone like sheldon the big bang. The science sitcom is another model. I did not put this year because i thought it would make me sound the things like e. R. Show or numbers. These are contemporary genres and images that we have of what lines. Of what science on tv is. To understand whats going on in the 1950s, you have to backup. Media was new, particularly for education. Frontier. Brave new it is not so new. It really comes out of the use of 16mm film and classroom, something we only talked about for the 20s and 30s. Whipping that discussion forward, there is a disk thats driven in part by technologies. Projector. Ak pageant that was a new project or kodak invented that was lighter and more portable and easier to read. The film did not burn. Although the film did sometimes burn. But it was advertised is not burning. This fostered the expansion of the educational film industry. Film historian Jeff Alexander in his book estimates there were approximately 100,000 or so films in this period. They were made by educational film companies. These would be Companies Like coronet, archer. We will see archer today. Even encyclopaedia britannica. Thatre the new media idea an encyclopedia producer would be branching out into classroom film. That captures the enthusiasm and expansion of this as a technology in the classroom. Technologythat a new is introduced into the classroom maybe this did not happen when teachers had pointers, but anytime new technology is introduced in the postwar period, there is a bit of handwringing that goes on. There is a series of books. This one particularly, television and education in the u. S. , who has credentials both in the school of education and communication. He asks the question, to which the obvious answer is yes. Can it be that education is suffering at sea change . With the use the verb suffering is really instructive. And also, what is excellence in classroom film and video instruction . And how is it absorb . Some handwringing to be expected. But theres also a lot of enthusiasm. 1951 hadommissioner in a piece in variety, a trade magazine for hollywood. In which she articulated her vision for television and education. Television, she said, is one of the greatest forces america has ever known. She was asked a had you question. Asked a hedgy question. Are we going to let hollywood take it over . Or can we somehow harness the genie perform wonders of public enlightenment unequaled since the days of the renaissance . This is what they are seeing, another enlightenment. In television, which is pretty mundane. Part of that enthusiasm is the very Successful Use of film in wartime context. Lonely propaganda in newsreels. Let me talk about newsreels. They were shorts shown before movies. People like them so much they eventually developed dedicated newsreel theaters. And in 1948, newsreels became a Television Program. Nbc launched a 10 minute tv program called channel newsreel leader. Something like the first cnn, only its not running 24 hours, every 10 minutes every once in a while. Newsreels are very popular. Propaganda films like why we fight. That was a major in or to buy tempora five rank cap, who already had armies. After the bombings in pearl harbor, he was immediately grabbed by his Commanding Officers. By that point he was in Oscarwinning Hollywood director. Use insome incentive to this way. Frank capras Commanding Officer documentedm to do factual information films that will explain to our boys in your meet the for which were fighting. Clearly meant to persuade. Capra himself talked about has approached this was friend in an answer to many recent films. Triumph of the will, considered to be one of the best propaganda films of all time. Excess have had a lot of with the use of film for conveying information, or persuading and convincing. Of course they would think it has more applications in the classroom. This became more urgent in the context of the dropping of atomic bombs on hiroshima and nagasaki. And the real escalation of what several people have called the nuclear culture, or the nuclear future. This nuclear future, on the one hand, everyone knew about this. They knew it was a massive loss of life. It was a very grim dark deed. Thats the dark side of atomic culture. He thought was that in the postwar period, harnessing Nuclear Energy for positive use. Eisenhower gave a speech in 1953 became known in retrospect as the atoms for peace speech. This became a Propaganda Campaign for the use of Atomic Energy. Peaceful uses of Atomic Energy would include reactors for generating energy, but also things like radioisotopes. Using reactors to create radioisotopes which then become medical tracers. Thats why in the look of that eventually gets made, you have the medical icon too. Medicine, science, engineering, agriculture will be part of our nuclear future. In case those methods of persuasion did not work, they had a series of traveling museum at the. Museum exhibit. It would be very likely if you are at school and went to a Natural History or science exam in the 1950s that you would see one of these. They have things like radioactive frogs. Frogs that had been injected with radioactive isotopes. Students would handle geiger counters and put them over the frogs and they would start clicking. Some of the First Interactive exhibits were under the context of this adams exhibit. Atoms for peace exhibit. Thats a good example of museums as a medium reinforcing other medium. Just like film becoming new on television. E,e goal of atoms for peac from looking at behind the scenes documents, because it would a marketed this way in public, was an emotional management of the tensions of involved in the nuclear culture. Attention being, on the one hand, escalating nuclear armament. Homefronter hand, uses of Atomic Energy they want to spin as particularly harmless, that they want to domesticate. Andating civilians educating children became a high priority. This generation was said to be the first that lives in a quoter world this is a from some at the Indian Springs school in nevada, next to air force base. They are not being taught to duck and cover, but i guess talk and hold one another. Duck and hold one another. The person from the school is hosting that they learned how to spell atom and bomb before mother. Just imagine that shift in learning those words that have a much bigger social and cultural meaning, and were certainly much scarier. The federal government was interested in educating a lot of civilians, but in particular a lot of children in the procedures of Civil Defense. They devised this film called talk and cover. Duck and cover. We will show a short some. Featuring the things on. Never got hurt he knew just what to do duck and cover he did what we all must learn to do you and you and you duck and cover be sure to remember what bert paternal just did, because ber the turtle just did, because all of us was member to do the same. This is an official Civil Defense film produced in operation with the federal Civil Defense administration and in consultation with the Safety Commission of the National Education association. Again,ader if it goes you are going to want to sing. [laughter] what do you notice about that introduction . The song soough that i could talk about the ways in which the production values, both the content and production values, were framed by andractions between artists those interested in the information. Those interested in conveying the information was the federal Civil Defense authority, Safety Organization for the National Education initial association. Government people collaborating with school teachers. Collaborating with fairly highquality talent right producers at orchard films. Ar4cher films. Jingle was written afterwards. It was written afterwards by the same team that it eyes that advised the chevrolet ads at the time. That was the advertising culture that is looking. Even the chevrolet slogan became a hit for a pop singer. It is a very up and positive song. It is very memorable. You have email and mail voices. The have female and male voices. The goal is to teach children how to survive an atomic attack by themselves. That is important, right . Part of what is going on are tw ofold. On one hand, you have to inform children what it is they are seeing when they see a nuclear attack. This is in a way domesticate. Something scary, you cannot choke on of you cannot show film of two children. Using the medium of animation, they portrayed the bright light. The light is described as a bright flash, brighter than the sun. Then he transitions into the animation where clearly the atomic bomb is, and the narrator is saying this in calm tones, smashing through buildings, causing a burn worse than your worst sunburn. These are ways to take this knowledge and convey it in a way that children would understand. Other side is not just what you are actually seeing, but what to do . The narrative takes a kind of domestication tone. It talks about responding to a bomb is not unlike responding to a fire or an automobile accident. These are all things that can happen in your daily life, just add atomic bomb to the list. Domestication through both the use of animation and technology and narrative is one of the hallmarks. The other thing jacobs talks about is the way in which this , and now imdges transitioning towards attitudes and education. The idea that you would have to respond as a child by yourself to atomic bomb rather than through a teacher or some Authority Figure is a real shift. That is a shift in traditional social roles that is part and parcel of the new atomic world. Assuree film does was children that grownups will be around. Older people will help us. By the way, its mental narrator pretending to be a child. Older people will help us like they always do, but there might not be any crops around when the atomic bomb explodes. And you are on your own. They can help you get across the street and find a shelter, but in that moment, what are you going to do to respond . Trying to heighten the alert of the children. When you are on your own, be aware of when this is happening. Like you can see the girl cowering against a School Building yard. It could happen while you are riding your bike. He immediately drops his bikes and covers. They talk about how in order to achieve these social roles, the film has to make them traditionally idyllic child spaces seem kind of scary. School right or riding your bike, and atomic bomb could fall. He says this is the dark side of cold war scientific education. A movie that tells a tale of a dangerous presence in a dismal future. Of course it begs the question, if you are a round and you did your duck and cover, when you come up, maybe its the future of this decimated nuclear world. Duck and cover educates about the phenomenon, but tries to persuade children so that they have a social role. Beyond what any role in the of the military to respond to an attack. But they have some control. Forty heady stuff elementary school. The lighter side of Science Education in this period, from the other angle, still adjusts children all the way through college, but focused on enhancing funding and investments by the government in Science Research and education. This is not new to the 1950s. This is something that comes out of world war ii. The president ial science advisor described on the cover of Time Magazine. The fact that science advisor is making the cover of Time Magazine should tell you something. That hes described as the general of physics. This is the vision of the future, that government will support Research Activities by public and private organizations. In particular, Science Education. The first thing to come out of , the general of as a National Science board that is rolled over into the National Science foundation. The National Science foundation becomes the first Big Government foundation. There were National Institutes of health before that, but this is a big puire research and education fund. Sputnik,50s progress, which you may or may not familiar with, the satellite that the soviets fired to space, circling the u. S. , spying on us. That really escalated cold war tensions between the russians and dust, in particular around issues what they were called the Pipeline Program pipeline problem. The idea that you need people at every level of Science Education. That way we can build what they call a scientific manpower. The sign language as the language of war, except with scientific manpower and womenpower, people were work for research to counter the soviet. In addition to sputnik and efforts to fund science, there was a massive economic boom after the war and a large corporate windfall. Particularly Companies Like at t and bell, who were science and technology companies. The thought among those companies was that some of this back into byed promoting Science Education. You can hear, why are we doing this . Promoted by at t understand natures law. Thats all well and good, but the other push for this was coming from advertising agencies. Which have ties not only to advertising in communication media, but to hollywood. Researchers have shown that the agencies was pushing bell to attract more family audiences. Them early on the brand. Hook them early on the brand. You will have a bigger market as time wears on. So this led to at t bell labs investing in a series of science films, which are among the most popular and widely held in classroom collections, even to this day. Although they are not shown as much. Vhs. Are in these are about various phenomena. Our mr. Sun. These are ones that capra was involved in. Unchained goddess, about the weather. They were 8 halfhour programs through which, joined the analogy between duck and cover, a similar recruitment of toplevel artists took place to produce these films. Congress to less in focus on frank capra to do his duty to make a propaganda film to imagine someone that has won 3 oscars deciding that hes going to do a science film. What gies with frank capra and his production of many of these films . Was thought toa have the perfect background for this. He had some Science Training as an undergrad in caltech in Chemical Engineering in 1918. During world war i he taught to artillery recruits he taught math to artillery recruits. His family immigrated to l. A. And he worked odd jobs. When he was working as a math teacher in san francisco, he saw an advertisement for a satellite films video. Film studio. He basically hustled himself in the door, let them think he had more experience than he did because he was interested. And that was the thing that got the ball rolling. Although she had a great deal of success in hollywood in the 1930s, he left hollywood to enlist in world war ii and make other films. He came back at a moment when his career was in a lull. It sounds incongruous because many of us are member him for its a wonderful life, which is a beloved christmas classic. At the time it got mixed article reviews. He was in a lull. Thats part of the reason why he wanted to do these films. The other piece was the fact that he was a deeply committed catholic. We will see that influence when we look at these films. Caprar thing to say about is that later in his life, he reflected back on what it was that made him a success. He subscribed strongly to what film studies scholars would call the author theory. The structure has the director has the vision, without any influence from anyone else, recruits the writers. Its kind of a team. The team is going to Work Together closely. He says, this is the way that Motion Pictures can become more important. He did that for bell labs in several ways. He picked wellknown actors. The cha