"Oh Lord, don't let them drop that atomic bomb on me" - Charles Mingus

1957 looks relatively calm on the timeline of the 20th century, but some very smart people were thinking about how to change that. Only twelve years out from the end of World War II, and still within the timespan that separated I from II, there was every reason to believe a third was inevitable. If that happened it would lead to another seeming inevitability: nuclear war.

Americans knew that, and they were worried about what they could do if it happened here. The men who were designing the new bombs knew the answer was nothing, but it wouldn’t do to say that out loud. So instead they decided to give us busywork! Take our mind off, you know?