During the Cold War, the threat of a nuclear holocaust hung over every American’s head. One burning question consumed the populace: was it possible to prepare a home to survive an atomic blast? Hoping to collect hard data to begin to answer that question, the Federal Civil Defense Administration arranged an experiment known as Operation Doorstep, part of the 1953 Operation Upshot-Knothole nuclear tests in the Nevada desert.
To prepare for Operation Doorstep, federal workers constructed two suburban-style houses, which were furnished and populated with cheery department store mannequins.
Some were set up around the houses as if they were going about their everyday lives…
…some were posed in basement shelters…
…and some were set up in cars around the test site.
When everything was ready, the bomb was detonated.
Reportedly, the destruction done to the two test homes by the blast was “as expected.”
