Postcards from Heaven

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Postcards from Heaven

• Exploring Archives on the Cold War
  Military-Industrial-Academic Complex

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The Cold War
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Truman doctrine (1947)

• Binary separation of global space between
• two competing ideologies fear of contagion
• All places and conflicts refracted through the
• lens of the Cold Warevery nation must
• Choose between alternative ways of life
  President Truman, 1947
• Mr.X The federal government must
• therefore take responsibility for informing
• the people about the realities of the Cold
• War and for reforming the national
• Character.

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The Red Tide
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Psychological warfare

• By the mid-20th century, the military had a
  growing interest in psychological warfare
• Airborne propaganda leaflets had been used in
  wars since the late 19th century, and over 3
  billion dropped in WWII
• The military wanted research into how to make
  their leaflets more effective

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Korean War

• In 1950, war broke out between North and South
  Korea
• The country had been divided along the 38th
  parallel at the end of WWII
• The Chinese, Soviets and US quickly became
  involved as Korea became one of the first
  hotspots of the Cold War

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Stuart Dodd the WPOL

• Stuart Dodd was born in 1900 in Turkey, where his
  father was working as a Presbyterian missionary
  physician.
• Attended Princeton University and then worked for
  a year in a psychological clinic in New Jersey,
  assisting with the development of intelligence
  and personality tests.
• Joined the social sciences program at the
  American University of Beirut from 1927-1947.
  Also served as a consultant to the US Armys
  Psychological Warfare Branch in WWII

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Dodd WPOL (cont.)

• In 1946, the Washington State Legislator approved
  funds to create a research center that would
  serve the people of Washington by identifying
  and studying questions of public interest.
• Dodd moved to the UW department of Sociology and
  also became director of the new Washington Public
  Opinion Laboratory, a position he held until
  1961. He remained at the UW until his death in
  1977.

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Project Revere

• In Feb, 1951, the Director of the Air
  Universitys Psychological Warfare Division came
  to the UW to discuss 3 or 4 projects
• Contract for research on psychological warfare -
  Project Revere signed with WPOL
• Team of sociologists, geographers, physicists,
  mathematicians and psychologists would try to
  answer Who? Acts how? On what? Why? When? Where?
  And under what conditions?

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The tests

• The research team designed a series of
  experiments to test which kinds of messages are
  effective in prompting a reaction from which
  people.
• In total, over 20 tests were conducted.
• The first couple of tests took place on campus,
  others required more elaborate planning

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Pretest C

• First experiment to take place off campus, in
  July 1951. Designed to test the potency of rumors
  across space when combined with commercial
  motivations
• Researchers from the WPOL went to C-ville
  actually Issaquah on a Monday morning and told
  20 of housewives in the town a new six-word
  advertising slogan for a coffee company Gold
  Shield Coffee Good as Gold
• The women were told that if they could recite
  this when an interviewer returned to the town a
  few days later, they would receive a free bag of
  coffee. They were also encouraged to tell the
  slogan to others so that they too could receive
  free coffee

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Pretest C (cont.)

• On Tuesday, at noon, an airplane dropped 30, 000
  booster leaflets on the town, announcing that 1
  in 5 housewives had been told a marketing slogan
  and that anyone who could find out what it was by
  the next day would receive a free pound of
  coffee

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Pretest C (cont.)

• On Wednesday, the researchers went to Issaquah
  and established how many people knew the slogan
  and the company duly dispatched the free coffee.
• They checked how people had found out, whether
  through the leaflets or orally and, in the latter
  case, who had told them and when

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Pretest C (cont.)

• Tellers and hearers were matched, mapped and
  studied
• The researchers were extremely impressed with how
  many people had heard the rumor so quickly 82
  of housewives learned it in 48 hours
• However, whilst women were very efficient in
  diffusing messages within smaller communities
  (the household, the neighborhood), they concluded
  that diffusion across larger areas was more
  commonly undertaken by men

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Pretest F

• Pretest F took place in March 1952 in a Seattle
  school. It is indicative of the Revere teams
  growing interest in the role of children in
  spreading rumors
• 198 children were given 33 cards containing
  messages. 32 of their cards had words missing and
  the pupils had to interact with one another to
  discover which words they were missing. A prize
  was offered for the first person to have a
  complete set of cards
• The team were extremely impressed with how
  quickly all the boys finished. Dodd noted that,
  in wartime children are more immune to police
  control than adults and may de important
  diffusing agents

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Testing motivation

• In another test 4 similar towns were selected to
  have 4 different leaflets dropped on them. The
  leaflets asked people to fill out required
  information on the leaflet and send it to the
  WPOL for 4 different reasons
• 1. To help science
• 2. To help national security
• 3. To receive 1
• 4. To be a modern Paul Revere
• Which do you think had the highest response
  rate?..

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Cold War Citizenship

• After WWII, there was concern that returning
  soldiers would not be attentive to their ongoing
  civil defense duties
• Project Revere, alongside other disaster
  preparation experiments, aimed to put US
  citizens on a war footing and alert them to
  their different roles and responsibilities in
  combating Soviet aggression

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Meanwhile, in Korea

• The results of these tests were turned into an
  extensive report for the military
• They were then used to inform psychological
  warfare techniques in Korea

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Rumor Centers in the 60s and 70s

• Rumor Centers were set up in various US cities
  at least 19 in the late-1960s.
• The catalyst was the racial violence that took
  place in the July 1967.
• Riots in Detroit had left 43 dead and led to over
  7, 000 arrests. Major riots also took place in
  Newark, Tampa, and New Haven, and there were
  civil disturbances across the US.

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Rumor Centers (cont.)

• In response to this violence, the City of
  Chicagos Commission on Human Relations set up
  Rumor Central.
• The Center functioned primarily to dispel
  unfounded rumors and quiet the anxieties that
  accompany fear of disorder. It also proved a
  source of intelligence. Individuals did call with
  tips. Rumor Central would in turn relay
  information to the Police Department so that they
  might be able to avert an incident.

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Seattles Rumor Center

• Civil society groups also established a Rumor
  Center in Seattle in 1967, which was open until
  1973
• As well as providing information for concerned
  callers, the rumor center ran clinics in
  Seattle schools to teach children about the
  harmful effects of rumors

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Questions?