Author | Taras Young |
---|---|
Subject | Nuclear war |
Genre | Nonfiction |
Publisher | Four Corners Books |
Publication date | October 2019 |
Pages | 132 |
ISBN | 978-1-909829-16-9 |
Nuclear War in the UK is a 2019 non-fiction book by British historian and researcher Taras Young. It is a history of official British public information documents and guidance prepared in case of nuclear attack, drawn from the author's collection. [1] The book charts the development of public information campaigns, such as posters, pamphlets and propaganda, from the dropping of nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1946 up to the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s. [2]
It includes detailed accounts of the creation of official guidance by the Home Office, including the Protect and Survive campaign in the 1970s and 1980s. It also includes materials produced by local authorities, as well as privately created publications such as Protect and Survive Monthly magazine and advertisements for nuclear bunkers. [3]
The book was published as part of Four Corners Books' Irregulars series of books about modern British visual culture. [4]
Response to Nuclear War in the UK was positive, with popular media citing the book's accessible take on the subject matter, and specialist publications praising its new take on the subject and previously unseen material. In its review of the book, the Morning Star called it "entertaining, informative and chilling", adding that it "offers a startling insight into the government's attitude to its citizens". [5] Broadcaster Iain Lee praised the book on his Talksport radio show, calling it "fascinating, terrifying, and strangely comforting to see all this stuff gathered in one place". [6]
In his review of the book, Fortean Times editor David Sutton called it a "a handsome book with excellent reproductions of rarely seen material ... Young’s succinct account provides the necessary context". [7] Specialist underground exploration magazine Subterranea said the book was a "welcome addition covering a new angle on the UK's preparation for the Cold War," adding: "Many of us lived through the period under analysis, but few would have been aware of the wide range of publications produced to protect the population." [8]
Threads is a 1984 British-Australian apocalyptic war drama television film jointly produced by the BBC, Nine Network and Western-World Television Inc. Written by Barry Hines and directed and produced by Mick Jackson, it is a dramatic account of nuclear war and its effects in Britain, specifically on the city of Sheffield in Northern England. The plot centres on two families as a confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union erupts. As the nuclear exchange between NATO and the Warsaw Pact begins, the film depicts the medical, economic, social and environmental consequences of nuclear war.
Charles Hoy Fort was an American writer and researcher who specialized in anomalous phenomena. The terms "Fortean" and "Forteana" are sometimes used to characterize various such phenomena. Fort's books sold well and are still in print. His work continues to inspire admirers, who refer to themselves as "Forteans", and has influenced some aspects of science fiction.
Eric Frank Russell was a British writer best known for his science fiction novels and short stories. Much of his work was first published in the United States, in John W. Campbell's Astounding Science Fiction and other pulp magazines. Russell also wrote horror fiction for Weird Tales and non-fiction articles on Fortean topics. Up to 1955 several of his stories were published under pseudonyms, at least Duncan H. Munro and Niall(e) Wilde.
Protect and Survive was a public information campaign on civil defence. Produced by the British government between 1974 and 1980, it intended to advise the public on how to protect themselves during a nuclear attack. The campaign comprised a pamphlet, newspaper advertisements, radio broadcasts, and public information films. The series had originally been intended for distribution only in the event of dire national emergency, but provoked such intense public interest that the pamphlet was published, in slightly amended form, in 1980. Due to its controversial subject, and the nature of its publication, the cultural impact of Protect and Survive was greater and longer-lasting than most public information campaigns.
Fortean Times is a British monthly magazine devoted to the anomalous phenomena popularised by Charles Fort. Previously published by John Brown Publishing, I Feel Good Publishing, Dennis Publishing, and Exponent (2021), as of December 2021 it is published by Diamond Publishing, part of Metropolis International.
Iain Sinclair FRSL is a writer and filmmaker. Much of his work is rooted in London, recently within the influences of psychogeography.
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Paul R.A. De Giberne Sieveking is a British journalist and former magazine editor.
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Donna J. Kossy is a US writer, zine publisher, and online used book dealer based in Portland, Oregon. Specializing in the history of "forgotten, discredited and extreme ideas", which she calls "crackpotology and kookology", she is better known for her books Kooks: A Guide to the Outer Limits of Human Belief and Strange Creations: Aberrant Ideas of Human Origins from Ancient Astronauts to Aquatic Apes (2001). Kossy was also the founder and curator of the Kooks Museum, and the editor-publisher of the magazine Book Happy.
Nuclear War Survival Skills or NWSS, by Cresson Kearny, is a civil defense manual. It contains information gleaned from research performed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory during the Cold War, as well as from Kearny's extensive jungle living and international travels.
RAF Barnham is a Royal Air Force station situated in the English county of Suffolk 2 miles (3.2 km) south of the Norfolk town of Thetford. It is located to the north of the village of Barnham on Thetford Heaths. The camp is a satellite station of RAF Honington.
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Royal Air Force Holmpton or more simply RAF Holmpton is a former Royal Air Force Cold War era nuclear bunker that was built in the 1950s as an early warning radar station as part of the ROTOR Radar Defence Programme. Located just south of the village of Holmpton, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, RAF Holmpton remained a part of the Defence Estate right up to 8 December 2014 when it was sold into private ownership after 62 years of military service.
Royal Air Force Shipton was a First World War era airfield located north of the village of Shipton-by-Beningbrough, in North Yorkshire, England. During the First World War, it was used by No. 76 Squadron RAF whose remit was to provide Home Defence (HD).
The Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy, often known as the Integrated Review, and titled as Global Britain in a Competitive Age, was a review carried out by the British government led by Boris Johnson into the foreign, defence, security and international development policies of the United Kingdom. Described by Johnson as "the largest review of its kind since the Cold War", the review was published on 16 March 2021.
Ron Weighell was a British writer of fiction in the supernatural, fantasy and horror genre, whose work was published in the U.K., the U.S.A., Canada, Germany, Ireland, Romania, Finland, Belgium and Mexico. His stories were included in over fifty anthologies and published in six volumes containing his own work exclusively. Weighell is listed as an author in the online Bibliothèque Nationale de France, with a selected bibliography. A short biography and limited bibliography are available in the goodreads.com website. A more extensive bibliography of his published work is available in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database. Weighell died on 24 December 2020, some weeks after suffering a stroke. Obituaries have been published by the Fortean Times magazine, the newsletter of The Sherlock Holmes Society of London, and Locus Magazine.
Ruby Spark is a fictional character from the BBC medical drama Casualty, played by Maddy Hill. She first appears in the forty-first episode of series thirty-two, originally broadcast on 14 July 2018. The character and Hill's casting details were announced on 18 January 2018 and she began filming during the following month. For the role, the actress qualified as a Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV) driver. Ruby is a paramedic and is characterised as a smart, caring and opinionated perfectionist who lacks social skills. Her near-photographic memory of procedures and medication serves as an important character point as she struggles to deviate from the rules. The character's backstory states that she has just graduated from university, adding to her over-emphasis on rules. Ruby is introduced as part of the show's increased focus on paramedics and producers wanted to explore the profession through the character.