Broadcasting the ‘Voice of Science’ on America’s Town Meeting of the Air: Public Education, Popular Entertainment, and Post-World War II Scientific Ambivalence

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between radio broadcasting and post-World War II discourses of scientific and technological ambivalence, specifically looking at a special broadcast of the America’s Town Meeting of the Air radio discussion program conducted at the 1946 George Westinghouse Centennial Forum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Titled ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind?’, the broadcast posited that there were two possible paths for science – one leading to future peace and prosperity, and the other bringing about world catastrophe. Here, the ‘voice of science’ – atomic scientist Harold C. Urey, microbiologist Selman A. Waksman, science reporter William L. Laurence, and medical doctor Herman N. Bundesen – addressed the new scientific challenges facing society after World War II, where the question of humanity’s future was presented as a matter of life and death. An examination of the rhetoric of this broadcast within the broader historical context of the George Westinghouse Centennial Forum demonstrates how the liberating or dangerous potentials of science intersected with the challenges of presenting science on the air, revealing some of the inherent contradictions in broadcasting’s relationship to science and placing radio itself in a position that parallels the ‘two sciences’ question posed on Town Meeting.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Brenton J. Malin, of the Department of Communication, University of Pittsburgh, for his insightful comments on earlier versions of this article. Thanks are also due to the staff of the Moving Image and Sound Branch at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 David Sarnoff. ‘“Science for Life or Death” Discussed by Sarnoff: Mankind Must Make a Fateful Decision As Atomic, Other New Weapons Appear’, The New York Times, 10 August 1945, 6.

2 The Westinghouse Educational Foundation. Science and Civilization | The Future of Atomic Energy. Vol. I. Science and Life in the World (New York: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill, 1946), Vii.

3 Sarnoff, ‘Science for Life or Death’, 6; The Westinghouse Educational Foundation. Science and Civilization | The Future of Atomic Energy, vii.

4 ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind?’, 16 May 1946, Audio Recordings of ‘America’s Town Meeting of the Air’ Radio Programs, 1935–1954, New York University Collection, 1935–1954, National Archives Identifier 117852, Local Identifier NYU-ATMA-319, Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Research Room, Special Media Archives Services Division, National Archives, College Park, MD.

5 ‘Will the Machine Dominate Man?’, 16 April 1936, Audio Recordings of ‘America’s Town Meeting of the Air’ Radio Programs, 1935–1954, New York University Collection, 1935–1954, National Archives Identifier 117639, Local Identifier NYU-ATMA-26, Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Research Room, Special Media Archives Services Division, National Archives, College Park, MD; ‘Has Science Advanced Human Happiness?’, 25 November 1937, Audio Recordings of ‘America’s Town Meeting of the Air’ Radio Programs, 1935–1954, New York University Collection, 1935–1954, National Archives Identifier 117657, Local Identifier NYU-ATMA-56, Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Research Room, Special Media Archives Services Division, National Archives, College Park, MD.

6 Janice Peck, ‘Introduction: Moments of Danger and Challenges to the “Selective Tradition” in U.S. Communication History’, in A Moment of Danger: Critical Studies in the History of U.S. Communication Since World War II, eds. Janice Peck and Inger L. Stole, 1–11 (Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press, 2011), 2–3.

7 Sol Taishoff, ‘Truman Calls for Free, Competitive Radio: Sees “Even Freer” Competition with Advent of FM and Television’, Broadcasting, 9 July 1945, 15.

8 Walter Lippmann, The Phantom Public (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1925), 21.

9 Ibid., 77.

10 James W. Carey, Communication as Culture: Essays on Media and Society (New York: Routledge, 2009), 62.

11 John Dewey, The Public and Its Problems (New York: Henry Holt, 1927), 184.

12 Carey, Communication as Culture, 62.

13 Susan J. Douglas, Listening In: Radio and the American Imagination (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 9.

14 Robert K. Richards, ‘Airborne Relays for FM, TV Confirmed: Sky Transmitters Would Blanket Nation’, Broadcasting, 13 August 1945, 17, 75.

15 ‘Science Controls Urged at Academy: Sarnoff Tells Seasonal Meeting’, The New York Times, 6 October 1945, 13.

16 H. H. Goldstine and Adele Goldstine, ‘The Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC)’, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation 2, no. 15 (July 1946): 97.

17 Leslie R. Groves, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1962), 384.

18 David E. Nye, American Technological Sublime (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1994), 225.

19 Isaac Asimov, ‘The Machine and the Robot’, in Science Fiction: Contemporary Mythology: The SFWA-SFRA Anthology, eds. Patricia Warrick, Martin Harry Greenberg, and Joseph Olander, 244–254 (New York: Harper & Row, 1978), 252.

20 Advertisement for the ‘George Westinghouse Centennial Forum’, Science 103, no. 2681 (17 May 1946): 19.

21 Price, Gwilym A. ‘Science and Civilization’, in A Challenge to the World. Vol. III. Science and Life in the World, ed. The Westinghouse Educational Foundation, 5–11 (New York: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill, 1946), 11.

22 Douglas, Listening In, 162.

23 ‘Sarnoff Predicts Weather Control And Delivery of the Mail by Radio’, The New York Times, 1 October 1946, 1, 48.

24 Gosling, John, Radio Script by Howard Koch. Waging The War of the Worlds: A History of the 1938 Radio Broadcast and Resulting Panic, Including the Original Script (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2009), 67.

25 Cantril, Hadley, with the assistance of Hazel Gaudet and Herta Herzog. The Invasion from Mars: A Study in the Psychology of Panic: With the Complete Script of the Famous Orson Welles Broadcast (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947), viii.

26 Ibid., x.

27 Gosling, Waging The War of the Worlds, 75.

28 Marcel C. LaFollette, Science on the Air: Popularizers and Personalities on Radio and Early Television (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008), 153.

29 Gosling, Waging The War of the Worlds, 77.

30 H. G. Wells, A Critical Edition of the War of the Worlds: H.G. Wells’s Scientific Romance, ed. David Y. Hughes and Harry M. Geduld. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993), 84.

31 John Durham Peters, ‘The Uncanniness of Mass Communication in Interwar Social Thought’, Journal of Communication 46, no. 3 (1996): 116.

32 Douglas, Listening In, 165.

33 H. G. Wells, ‘Popularising Science’, Nature 50, no. 1291 (26 July 1894): 300.

34 John E. Pfeiffer, ‘Science on the Air’, New York Times, 14 December 1947, X11

35 LaFollette, Science on the Air, 3.

36 Ibid.

37 Malin, Brenton J. ‘Electrifying Speeches: Emotional Control and the Technological Aesthetic of the Voice in the Early 20th Century US’, Journal of Social History 45, no. 1 (2011): 11–14.

38 David Goodman, ‘Programming in the Public Interest: America’s Town Meeting of the Air’, in NBC: America’s Network, eds. Michele Hilmes and Michael Henry, 44–60 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007), 44–9.

39 George V. Denny, Jr. A Handbook for Discussion Leaders (New York: Town Hall Advisory Service, 1939), 9–10.

40 Ibid., 13–14.

41 Ibid., 10.

42 Goodman, ‘Programming in the Public Interest’, 45.

43 George V. Denny, Jr. ‘Radio Builds Democracy’, Journal of Educational Sociology, Education Turns the Dial, 14, no. 6 (1941): 377.

44 Edna Chappell. ‘Radio Is Unrivalled As Medium For Teaching “True” Democracy’, The Pittsburgh Courier, 10 February 1945, 2.

45 Edgar Kobak, ‘Radio and Public Service’, The New York Times, 29 July 1945, X5.

46 The average of available Hooper Ratings for the 1945-46 and 1946-47 seasons were 5.7 and 4.9, respectively, during the program’s Thursday 8:30 PM time slot. See Jim Ramsburg, Network Radio Ratings, 1932-1953: A History of Prime Time Programs Through the Ratings of Nielsen, Crossley and Hooper (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2012), 273, 278, 306.

47 Earl Sparling, ‘Town Meeting’s on the Air Again’, Forum and Century, 102, no. 4, October 1939, 166–7.

48 Paul F. Lazarsfeld, Radio and the Printed Page: An Introduction to the Study of Radio and Its Role in the Communication of Ideas (New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, Inc., 1940), 11–12.

49 George V. Denny, Jr. ‘“Town Meetin’ Tonight!” The Revival of a Great American Institution’, The Atlantic 170, no. 3, September 1942, 68–9.

50 Denny Jr., A Handbook for Discussion Leaders, 7.

51 Ibid., 9.

52 Sparling, ‘Town Meeting’s on the Air Again’, 164.

53 John Dunning. On the Air: The Encyclopedia of Old-time Radio (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 31.

54 Goodman, ‘Programming in the Public Interest’, 48.

55 Peters, ‘The Uncanniness of Mass Communication’, 112.

56 Ibid., 114

57 Ibid.

58 Denny Jr., A Handbook for Discussion Leaders, 9.

59 Orrin E. Dunlap, Jr. ‘America’s Old Town Meeting Spreads to the Radio’, The New York Times, 30 June 1935, X11.

60 Herbert Lyons, Jr. ‘Free Speech in Action’, The New York Times, 25 May 1941, X8.

61 LaFollette, Science on the Air, 180.

62 Jane Gregory and Steve Miller. Science in Public: Communication, Culture, and Credibility (New York: Plenum Press, 1998), 37.

63 Ibid.

64 In recognition of its public service role, Town Meeting was awarded the Peabody for ‘Outstanding Educational Program’ in 1943 and 1945. See ‘“America’s Town Meeting of the Air” for Outstanding Educational Program’, The Peabody Awards, https://peabodyawards.com/award-profile/americas-town-meeting-of-the-air/ (accessed November 21, 2021). In the 9 March 1946 issue of The Billboard featuring the ‘15th Annual Radio Editors Poll,’ America’s Town Meeting of the Air was ranked number one in the ‘Outstanding Public Service Network Programs’ category. It was number ten on the ‘Editors’ Favorite Programs’ list. See ‘Editors Crown Radio’s Best’, The Billboard, 58, no. 10 (9 March 1946): 8–9.

65 ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind? A Transcript of the Town Meeting Broadcast’, in A Challenge to the World. Vol. III. Science and Life in the World, ed. The Westinghouse Educational Foundation, 123–48 (New York: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill, 1946), 126.

66 Ibid.

67 Selman A. Waksman, ‘The Microbe, Friend and Enemy of Man’, In Transportation—A Measurement of Civilization | Light, Life, and Man. Vol. II. Science and Life in the World, ed. The Westinghouse Educational Foundation, 195–211 (New York: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill, 1946), 196.

68 Selman A. Waksman, Scientific Contributions of Selman A. Waksman: Selected Articles Published in Honor of His 80th Birthday, July 22, 1968, ed. Harold Boyd Woodruff (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1968), 366, 369.

69 William L. Laurence, ‘Drama of the Atomic Bomb Found Climax in July 16 Test’, The New York Times, 26 September 1945, 1, 9.

70 William L. Laurence, Dawn over Zero: The Story of the Atomic Bomb (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1972), xiv–xv.

71 ‘Association News: Herman N. Bundesen, M. D., President of the A.P.H.A’, American Journal of Public Health and the Nation’s Health 17, no. 12 (1927): 1254–5.

72 LaFollette, Science on the Air, 120.

73 Ibid., 180.

74 ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind? A Transcript of the Town Meeting Broadcast’, 126.

75 Ibid.

76 Ibid., 127.

77 Ibid., 133.

78 Ibid., 136.

79 Ibid., 137.

80 Ibid., 130.

81 Ibid., 131–2.

82 Ibid., 127.

83 Ibid., 129.

84 Ibid., 135.

85 Ibid., 132.

86 Ibid., 136.

87 Ibid., 138.

88 Ibid.

89 Ibid., 139.

90 Ibid., 140.

91 Ibid., 144.

92 Ibid., 145.

93 Ibid.

94 Ibid., 141.

95 Harold C. Urey, ‘Introduction’, in Atomics for the Millions, eds. Maxwell Leigh Eidinoff and Hyman Ruchlis, xi–xii (New York and London: McGraw-Hill, 1947), xi.

96 ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind? A Transcript of the Town Meeting Broadcast’, 147.

97 ‘Westinghouse Centennial’, The New York Times, 18 May 1946, 18.

98 Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (New York: Random House, 1995), 11–12.

99 Edward J. Hackett, Olga Amsterdamska, Michael E. Lynch, and Judy Wajcman, eds. The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, 3rd ed. (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007), 5–6.

100 The Pew Research Center For The People & The Press. ‘Public Praises Science; Scientists Fault Public, Media: Scientific Achievements Less Prominent Than a Decade Ago,’ Pew Research Center, 9 July 2009. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2009/07/09/public-praises-science-scientists-fault-public-media/ (accessed November 21, 2021).

101 ‘Science: Salvation or Destroyer of Mankind? A Transcript of the Town Meeting Broadcast’, 148.

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Notes on contributors

Nicholas R. Maradin

Nicholas R. Maradin III is an Assistant Professor of Communication Arts at Washington & Jefferson College in Washington, PA. He also serves as the General Manager of WNJR-FM, Washington & Jefferson College’s non-commercial educational radio station.