The Apocalypse will be Televised: Representations of the Cold War on Network Television, 1976

293 Pages·2017·1.39 MB·English

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History Dissertations Department of History
Summer 8-2011
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Aubrey Underwood
Georgia State University
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Underwood, Aubrey, "The Apocalypse will be Televised: Representations of the Cold War on Network
Television, 1976-1987." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2011.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/2009490
This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of History at ScholarWorks @
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THE APOCALYPSE WILL BE TELEVISED: REPRESENTATIONS OF THE COLD WAR
ON NETWORK TELEVISION, 1976-1987

by

AUBREY N. UNDERWOOD

Under the Direction of Michelle Brattain

ABSTRACT

This dissertation examines how the major television networks, in conjunction with the Reagan
administration, launched a lingering cloud of nuclear anxiety that helped to revive the Cold War
during the 1980s. Placed within a larger political and cultural post-war context, this national
preoccupation with a global show-down with the Soviet Union at times both hindered and
bolstered Reagan‘s image as the archetypal conservative, cowboy President that could free
America from its liberal adolescent past now caustically referred to as ―the sixties.‖ This stalwart
image of Reagan, created and carefully managed by a number of highly-paid marketing
executives, as one of the embodiment of peaceful deterrence, came under attack in the early
1980s when the ―liberal‖ Nuclear Freeze movement showed signs of becoming politically
threatening to the staunch conservative pledging to win the Cold War at any cost. And even if the
nuclear freeze movement itself was not powerful enough to undergo the Herculean task of
removing the President in 1984, the movement was compassionate enough to appeal to a mass
audience, especially when framed in narrative form on network television. In the early 1980s,
debates over the possibility of nuclear war and other pertinent Cold War related issues became
much more democratized in their visibility on the network airwaves. However, the message
disseminated from the networks was not placed in an educational framework, nor did these
television productions clarify complicated nuclear issues such as nuclear winter theory and
proliferation. I argue this renewed network attention on nuclear issues was not placed in an
historical framework and likely confused American viewers because it routinely exposed
audiences to both fact and fiction, undifferentiated at the level of the mass media.
INDEX WORDS: Ronald Reagan, Cold War, Network television, Made-for-television movies,
World War III, Special Bulletin, The Day After, Threads, Amerika, Nuclear freeze movement,
Nuclear winter theory, Nuclear weapons, Strategic Defensive Initiative, ―Star Wars,‖, Great
Nuclear Arms Debate, Infotainment, ―Morning in America campaign‖ 1984 US Presidential
Campaign, Walter Mondale.
THE APOCALYPSE WILL BE TELEVISED: REPRESENTATIONS OF THE COLD WAR
ON NETWORK TELEVISION, 1976-1987

by

AUBREY N. UNDERWOOD

A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

in the College of Arts and Sciences

Georgia State University

2011
Copyright by

Aubrey Nell Underwood

2011
THE APOCALYPSE WILL BE TELEVISED: REPRESENTATIONS OF THE COLD WAR
ON NETWORK TELEVISION, 1976-1987

by

AUBREY N. UNDERWOOD

Committee Chair: Michelle Brattain
Committee: Joe Perry
Kathryn Fuller-Seeley

Electronic Version Approved:

Office of Graduate Studies

College of Arts and Sciences

Georgia State University

August 2011
iv

DEDICATION
This work is dedicated to Dr. Donald Dixon and his amazing daughter, Elaine Lett.
v

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

A great many people, including faculty, family, friends and colleagues as well as
numerous others I have meet through this project, have been generous in helping shape my
understanding of this vast topic. When I first began this process of looking at the Cold War
during the Reagan administration through the lens of the made-for-television movie, I was
warmly received by my dissertation advisor, Dr. Michelle Brattain. Her insight into archival
research, organization, writing, teaching, and overall insight into the profession of the historian
has been incalculable throughout the years. Her continued support for this endeavor and ability
to see the work‘s potential has also been a great source of motivation. In addition, I am indebted
to another early mentor from the history department, Dr. Joe Perry, who continued to provide
thoughtful, critical comments into writing and the process of undertaking a historical project of
this magnitude. Kathy Fuller-Seeley has demonstrated how crucial it was to interweave the
political with cultural history and as a scholar illustrated that looking at popular culture was
indeed academic.
Many archival sources were used in this project. I would like to thank the archivists at the
Ronald Reagan Presidential Library who I spent a considerable amount of time working with in
Simi Valley, California. In addition, the archivists in the UCLA‘s Digital Library offered more
visual texts to work with and really aided in the research process. Vanderbilt‘s archival
collection of television news brought more historical context and visual content of which to
position many of the arguments presented in this work. Finally, the Museum of Television and
Radio, in Beverly Hills, California, has some of the most knowledgeable, helpful, delightful
archivist that is unparalleled in their passion for historical television scholarship.
vi

As a graduate student at Georgia State University department of history, I entered into an
existing community of talented, intelligent graduate students who have been invaluable
throughout the years. Fellow graduate students in various fields of study have been most
supportive, offering encouragement, ideas, and in many cases critical assessments of this work in
different phases. Thanks, then, to Dana Wiggins, Robert Woodrum, Charmayne Patterson, John
Farris, Mike Stevens, Fakhari Hagani, Jennifer Dickey, Edie Riehm, Steve Blankenship, Christy
Garrison-Harrison, Heather Lucas, Julie Anderson, Larry Youngs, and of course, Laurel Koontz.
Special thanks also to the staff of Georgia State University Department of History, and
particularly to Caroline Whiters, Paul Sorrell, and Robin Jackson. In addition, a special
acknowledge to the faculty and staff at Clark Atlanta University, who have also provided
encouragement, but also with the benefit of insight and experience.
Finally, my entire family including my sisters, April and Erin, who watched these made-
for-television movies with me as children and remained frightened by the imagery, have been
most supportive and generous of spirit during my work on this project. I wish to express
particular appreciation to my husband, David Eidson, for his continued patience, encouragement,
and support. And to whom this book is dedicated, my grandfather, Dr. Donald Dixon, who
showed me the importance of academics and a commitment to knowledge and my mother, Elaine
Lett, who instilled the importance of intellectual curiosity and literature, I am indebted and
forever grateful for valuing education above all else throughout my life.
vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v

1 INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Television and the Cold War: A Brief History 12
1.2 The End of Détente and the Rise of Reaganism 18
1.3 Cold War Historiography 20
1.4 A Contradiction of Periodization: The Long 1970s 24
1.5 Methodology on Cultural History 27
1.6 Chapter Outlines 32
2 CHAPTER ONE: The Rejuvenation of Cold War Fears: Reagan,
Nuclear Freeze, and the Made-for-Television film World War III 44

2.1 The Rising Tide of Nuclear Fears: How Network Television,
the Mass Media, Activists, and the Reagan White House
Created the Late Atomic Period 47

2.2 World War III: Presenting the Nuclear Nightmare 56
2.3 The Nuclear Freeze Movement 63
2.4 The Reagan Response to Nuclear Freeze 69
2.5 Nuclear Freeze and the Threat of Soviet Aggression 72

3 CHAPTER TWO: Special Bulletin and Blurring the Line
Between Fact and Fiction 84
3.1 Catering to the Individual: The ‘80s Emphasis on Technology 87
3.2 The Development of News as ―Infotainment‖ 91