Our Friend the Atom
“A vista into a world of wondrous ideas, signifying Man's achievements . . . A step into the future, with predictions of constructed things to come. Tomorrow offers new frontiers in science, adventure and ideals. The Atomic Age, the challenge of Outer Space and the hope for a peaceful, unified world."
With President Eisenhower’s famous “Atoms for Peace” speech delivered before the United Nations General Assembly on December 8, 1953, the American government initiated its rhetorical campaign to simultaneously harness atomic energy for military strength and persuade the public of its safety. During this period of increased access to children’s literature, middle-class American children of the 1950s also had more access to television than ever before. At the height of the Cold War and the Age of Television, film producer Walt Disney capitalized on the domesticated, peaceful narrative of the atom through the guise of education.
German physicists Wernher von Braun and Heinz Haber were both solicited by Walt Disney to present educational science programs for children. The first television show in this series was Man in Space, which aired on ABC on March 9, 1955 to an estimated audience of 42 million. An apocryphal account by Disney archivist David R. Smith relates that President Eisenhower personally called Disney after the show’s airing to compliment him and request a copy for Pentagon officials.
Haber later became the chief scientific consultant to Walt Disney productions. In 1957 he presented Disney’s animated film Our Friend the Atom after writing the book of the same title, which helped to naturalize and culturally integrate the atom into everyday life in America. Disney’s utopian “science factual” television programs and Tomorrowland theme park opened in 1955 helped correlate science and technology with American exceptionalism for children of the 1950s.
Authors who worked on children’s science books came from a variety of backgrounds, including blacklisted New York City school teacher Irving Adler (1913–2012). In 1958, Adler (under the pen name Robert Irving) published Energy and Power, a general juvenile physics text on energy that also describes the potential uses for nuclear energy in space travel. The cover of this post-Sputnik work features visual representations and allusions to space and nuclear power created by illustrator Leonard Everett Fisher.