Fly-by-night: Export and the "Bomb"

Sunday, 23 October 2011

Export and the "Bomb"

"The automatic atom-splitting process can be likened to loading nervous and high-spirited horses into a corral."

So says Richard Gerstell in the appendix in his How to Survive an Atomic Bomb (New York: Bantam, 1950). In addition to being absurdly optimistic and simple-minded ("reading it will actually make you feel better") about its topic the book was already out of date as thermonuclear bombs are not mentioned.

Earlier in 1950 Export Publishing Enterprises Ltd of New Toronto published Let Out the Beast - "the World destroyed by Atomic Blast in 1965". It is the story of a "peace-loving journalist" who lives after the "world is suddenly enveloped in the blasting flames of a gigantic atomic explosion".