Vegas and the atom bomb (Thursday)

‘We need atomic testing to save democracy’. That was the cry post war to convince the American masses of the need to have an atomic testing program and it worked. I visited the Atomic Testing Museum today. In the early 1950,s, Nevada’s desert just west of Las Vegas was chosen from several proposed sites around USA and Mexico as an atomic bomb testing site. At the time about 26,000 people lived in Vagus and this announcement that atomic testing would be happening in their back yard was thought to scare people off and destroy the towns future. Graphic images from Japan demonstrated to the world the destructive power of atomic bombs and now they were going to test them here. Surprisingly the opposite happened. Employees of the testing site need to live somewhere and people flocked here to view the tests. One casino on Fremont Street prided itself in providing the best view in town of the test site. You could sit back and watch the explosions over a beer. Vegas flourished. Atomic themes flavored life in Vegas from burgers to beauty pageants. Yes, each year a Miss Atomic Queen was crowned.

Testing continued into the 1980’s. Even though the testing was done underground, mistakes were made (surprise, surprise) and radio active gases occasionally escaped. I can recall reading an article many years ago that the entire main cast of an old western movie shot in the Nevada desert eventually died of cancer, including John Wayne. Correlations between these deaths and the atomic testing were made.

I jumped on a bus and went where it took me, and that was Sam’s Town. This is a big casino and shopping complex away from the tourist strip and apparently there are plenty of these splattered around Vegas. Some casinos are designed for the locals, strategically placed near shopping centers for the complete shopping experience. Across the road is a giant Walmart. Yes at last I get to experience the heart and soul of American consumerism. It’s acres of air-conditioned floor space and there is very little you can’t buy here, although I couldn’t find a gun section. ‘What aisles are your guns at?’ no guns, only air rifles! The say the English are eccentric but America has its fair share and they seem to congregate at Walmart. How can the one species, Homo sapien, come in so many different shapes and sizes? They’re all represented here at Walmart. It’s an education just wandering around the place. And so many incapable people in electric carts. The shops especially cater for them. There seem to be a lot of damaged people in the US.