This website seeks to encourage researchers and collectors to discover and study obscure ephemera that document American culture and life.  Worldcat reveals that most of the items that I post cannot be found in more than a few research libraries–often none at all.  Alternately, research libraries do not bother to catalog ephemeral publications like these.  I believe, however, that because these were distributed free, or at nominal cost, to consumers, they were the publications most likely to make their way into homes and be read by large numbers of Americans.

I acquire pre-1960 examples of the kinds of publications that prove so useful when scholars study 19th-Century America.  The limited competition that I encounter for them suggests that libraries, which could easily outbid me, have little interest in post-Civil War and 20th-century ephemeral publications in general.

I try to anticipate what materials future historians will find useful.  Being an historian first and a collector second, I organized this website to encourage others to do this too—even if this means new competition for me. I am aware that I could be wrong in prizing particular ephemera or even whole classes of ephemera.  I may even be wrong to encourage scholars to study obscure ephemeral publications; these may be obscure for good reason.

Ephemerastudies.org will permit me to share with others the information and imagery that I am acquiring, and to benefit from the knowledge, intelligence and experience of other scholars and collectors.  Please contact me with your impressions of the site.

~ Saul Zalesch

Title

Atom Bomb Test, Bikini Atoll 1946
Category
Booklet, gallery
Date

1946
Why It's Interesting

This is the logo of the 58th wing photographic unit, on the cover of a booklet it published in 1946 commemorating its work in photographing A-Bomb tests on Bikini Atoll just after World War II ended.  This booklet is entitled Air Photo Unit.  I have another volume issued then called A.A.F. Drones, which described the development and use of the first drone aircraft [now so much is favor] to photograph explosions without subjecting crews to radiation.  [A third volume appeared simultaneous;y on ebay when I bought these but I was outbid.]

These booklets are primarily photographs of the staffs and facilities, and equipment and tests.  The back cover of this booklet is filled with a mushroom cloud.  The air photo unit was proud enough of this pioneering job that, as seen here, it incorporated a mushroom cloud into its logo.  The 2 bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nakasaki, and those tested on Bikini, ushered in a half century of MAD tension.  Few would have predicted then that not one nuclear weapon would be exploded in anger in the 65 years that have passed.

This item completes my postings marking the 70th anniversary of the U.S. entering the War.  It seems an appropriate conclusion both because triggering the nuclear arms race, and through the invention of the drone, which now seems poised–for some military planners–to replace piloted aircraft in future warfare.  Other items from the War will, however, be posted from time to time as they seem appropriate.
 
Atom Bomb Test, Bikini Atoll 1946 Atom Bomb Test, Bikini Atoll 1946