Three weeks after the hydrogen bomb was detonated in the Pacific Ocean, soldiers at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, saw a simulated atomic bomb. The stated purpose of the explosion was to “familiarize troops with the sight and sound of the atomic bomb without the danger of radioactivity.” In 1954, the United States was involved in the Cold War (1947-1989) and a nuclear arms race. This country and the Soviet Union had developed atomic bombs and in 1952, the U.S. detonated its first hydrogen bomb. The general public, fearing that a bomb might be dropped here, built fallout shelters and into the early 1960s, school children participated in “duck and cover” drills.
Greenfield Recorder-Gazette. “800 Troops See Dummy ‘A-Bomb’ At Fort Devens.” March 25, 1954. Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, American Centuries. https://americancenturies.org/collection/l07-017/. Accessed on October 16, 2024.
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