Nuclear Car, What Could Have Been

Forget pedal power, back in the 50′s some enterprising folks over at Ford thought the atom was the way to go. Hence the Ford Nucleon!

Don’t worry Billy, the car won’t make your hair fall out.

Let’s take it back to the 1950′s, the age of innocence, the age, of the atom. Nuclear Power. Unlimited power to create, and destroy.

See back in the 50′s a group of enterprising scientists had thought of creating nuclear powered cars, which would have worked like nuclear submarines, just on a smaller scale. Their reasoning was that as technology advanced and nuclear shielding became smaller, these cars would be feasible and safe to use. This was a rather forward thinking idea as the popular conventions of the time dictated that technology would not necessarily decrease in size as it advanced.




Now you’re probably thinking, “What the hell, if anything, were they thinking? A nuclear car!” You gotta bear in mind that way back then, nuclear power was seen as a clean way of producing energy and the effects on the body were still largely unknown meaning that this is not as crazy an idea as it sounds.

It also looked so cool it inspired the look of the ‘Corvega’, the ubiquitous wreaked car of the Fallout series.

You see, due to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, people were convinced of the great power of the atom; the power to create and destroy. Harnessed, it could provide clean energy for decades upon decades. But what of the body, how would such power affect the body? Back before Nuclear power was in vogue  it was either chemistry, or lightning, which could basically make people’s imaginations, or the plot of a story, run wild.

Now I'm not saying that all people were idiots, many simply didn't know any better, many who knew some of the dangers would have simply ignored it in favour of a good story. But by and large people thought that radiation would create monstrous mutants and horrible abnormalities, while entertaining the idea that these same forces could also, in the right circumstances, create supermen beyond our wildest dreams.


These conceptions are reflected, both amusingly and disturbingly in modern media, most notably (in my honest & in this case quite biased opinion) in the Fallout series.

Slightly disturbing.

Pretty Creepy.

HOLY HELL!

Yes the people of the 50′s had what we’d call, at best, funny ideas of what nuclear power could do to the body, whether wild mutations or awesome superpowers (Spider-Man, anyone?). Thankfully, we know better, having learned the hard way.


Originally written for and posted on Comikkazee.
Posted on the 2nd of April, 2012