Abstract
The Cosmos Club, located just off of Q Street on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington, was the home away from home for the nation’s scientific elite. Informal business was frequently conducted in the parlors of the club’s mansion over cocktails, and it was there in July 1956 that Jerrold Zacharias pitched his physics curriculum project to Harry Kelly. Zacharias had initially laid out his plans to develop 90-some instructional movies in physics for high school use in a memo to MIT president James Killian earlier that spring—a proposal that languished even after Killian publicized it in a Life Magazine feature article on MIT and the scientific manpower shortage. It was only after Zacharias had shown the memo to NSF director Alan Waterman during a visit to Washington that things began to happen.That same evening Waterman sent Kelly over to the club to work out the details of the proposal.1 “As we talked,” Kelly noted, “most of the members of the Science Advisory Committee joined us. They all were enthusiastic and helpful in convincing Zach that he should take some time off to tackle the problem of a film course in physics.”2 Kelly, perhaps, was the most enthusiastic of all. As Zacharias recalled,Kelly insisted that he undertake the project. “You’ve got to use up all the money we’ve got,” he said.3 Before the night was over, Zacharias walked away with assurances of $200,000 to $300,000 of NSF start-up money for his project.
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Chapter 4
Zacharias to Killian, 15 March 1956, box 170, C/K Papers; Kelly diary note, 14 July 1956, box 19,NSF/ODSF;Zacharias interview,PSSC/OHC; James R. Killian, “A Bold Strategy to Beat Shortage,” Life, 7 May 1956, 147–149
This chapter incorporates material from a previously published article entitled, “From World War to Woods Hole: The Use of Wartime Research Models for Curriculum Reform,” first published in Teachers College Record. 5. Bruce Hevly, “Reflections on Big Science and Big History,” in Big Science: The Growth of Large-Scale Research, ed. Peter Galison and Bruce Hevly (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 355; James H. Capshew and Karen A. Rader, “Big Science: Price to the Present,” Osiris, 2d series, 7 (1992): 3–25
A. Hunter Dupree, “The Great Instauration of 1940:The Organization of Scientific Research for War,” in The Twentieth-Century Sciences: Studies in the Biography of Ideas, ed. Gerald Holton (New York:W.W. Norton & Company, 1972), 457–459
Daniel J. Kevles, The Physicists:The History of a Scientific Community in Modern America (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987), 302–308; Jack S. SCIENTISTS IN THE CLASSROOM Goldstein, A Different Sort of Time:The Life of Jerrold Zacharias (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992), 50–59; and Charles Thorpe and Steven Shapin, “Who Was J. Robert Oppenheimer: Charisma and Complex Organization,” Social Studies of Science 30 (2000): 545–548
Goldstein, Different Sort of Time, 50–59; Peter Galison, “Physics between War and Peace,” in Science,Technology, and the Military, ed. Everett Mendelsohn, Merit Roe Smith, and Peter Weingart (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988), 47–86, describes this approach as characteristic of much of the research undertaken during the war
11. Galison, “Physics between War and Peace,” 73. For an extended discussion of this point, see Galison, Image and Logic:A Material Culture of Microphysics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 239–311.
Paul E. Klopsteg, “Support of Basic Research from Government,” in Symposium on Basic Research, ed. Dael Wolfle (Washington, D.C.:AAAS, 1959), 193
J. R. Marvin and F. J.Weyl, “The Summer Study,” Naval Research Reviews 19, no. 8 (1966): 2.
16. Allan A. Needell, “Project Troy and the Cold War Annexation of the Social Sciences,” in Universities and Empire: Money and Politics in the Social Sciences during the Cold War, ed. Christopher Simpson (New York: New Press, 1998) 3–38. For a discussion of the “Campaign of Truth,” see Walter L. Hixson, Parting the Curtain: Propaganda, Culture, and the Cold War, 1945–1961 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), 1–27. Connections between academic psychologists, communication experts, and the government’s psychological warfare efforts after the war are well documented in NOTE S Christopher Simpson, Science of Coercion: Communication Research and Psychological Warfare, 1945–1960 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).
W. Henry Lambright, Powering Apollo: James E.Webb of NASA (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), 80–81.
See J. Merton England, A Patron for Pure Science:The National Science Foundation’s Formative Years, 1945–57 (Washington, D.C.: National Science Foundation, 1982), 227–254.
James R. Killian, The Education of a College President (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1985), 166.
House Committee on Science and Technology, Subcommittee on Science, Research, and Technology, The National Science Foundation and Pre-College Science Education: 1950–1975, report prepared by Science Policy Research Division, 94th Cong., 2d sess., 1976, Committee Print, appendix C, 230
Jerrold R. Zacharias, “Team Approach to Education,” AJP 29 (1961): 348.
34. Paul E. Marsh, “The Physical Science Study Committee: A Case History of Nationwide Curriculum Development, 1956–1961” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1964), 45–47
House Committee on Appropriations, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Independent Offices, 84th Cong., 1st sess., 9 February 1955, 234–235, emphasis added.
For membership of NSF hierarchy, see NSF, Sixth Annual Report (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1956); James R. Killian, Sputnik, Scientists, and Eisenhower:A Memoir of the First Special Assistant to the President for Science and Technology (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1977), 277–279; Zacharias interview, PSSC/OHC
C. E. Sunderlin to Waterman, 20 November 1956, box 19, NSF/ODSF; Kelly to Waterman, “Principles for Support of Curriculum Development,” memo, 26 June 1958, box 39, NSF/ODSF; Kevin Smith interview, PSSC/OHC.
Zacharias to D. R. Corson, 26 December 1957, box 33, NSF/ODSF; Zacharias interview, PSSC/OHC; Paul Boyer, By the Bomb’s Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994), 77–78
David Hounshell, “The Cold War, RAND, and the Generation of Knowledge, 1946–1962,” HSPS 27 (1997): 237–267; Fortun and Schweber, “Scientists and the State,” 327–338; Hughes, Rescuing Prometheus, 15–67; Comm. on Operations Research, Operations Research … Non-Military Applications, 4–10
C. R. Carpenter, “A Challenge for Research,” Educational Screen 27 (1948): 119–121; Arthur A. Lumsdaine, “Mass Communication Experiments in Wartime and Thereafter,” Social Psychology Quarterly 47 (1984): 198–206; Ellen Herman, The Romance of American Psychology: Political Culture in the Age of Experts (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 69–72
Henry Chauncey, “Teaching Personnel: More Effective Utilization of Teachers,” in National Manpower Council, Proceedings of a Conference on The Utilization of Scientific and Professional Manpower, October 7–11, 1953 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1954), 139–146
Physical Science Study Committee, PSSC Physics:Teacher’s Resource Book and Guide (Boston: D.C. Heath, 1960).
Randall Whaley to Bronk, 2 July 1959, NAS/ABE. The NAS provided both the facilities at the Whitney Estate and its expertise to the Air Research and Development Command over the previous two summers for the study of potential Air Force weapon systems; Michael H. Gorn, Harnessing the Genie: Science and Technology Forecasting for the Air Force, 1944–1986 (Washington,D.C.: Office of Air Force History,U.S.Air Force, 1988), 63–78.
Whaley, “Proposal for Summer Study on Fundamental Processes in Education,” 29 April 1959, NAS/ABE.
Bruner, “Notes for the Woods Hole Conference,” 22 July 1959, NAS/ABE
Jerome Bruner, In Search of Mind: Essays in Autobiography (New York: Harper and Row, 1983), 45; Burnham Kelly to Killian, 20 October 1950, box 4, Records of the Office of the Chancellor (Stratton), MIT Archives; Woods Hole study group participants, 9 September 1959, box 41, Carpenter Papers
Whaley, “Proposal for Summer Study on Fundamental Processes in Education,” 29 April 1959, NAS/ABE
Arthur W. Melton, Report of the NAS-NRC Symposium on Education and Training Media, 18–19 August 1959, Glass Papers.
Philip Morrison, “Insight and Taste,” AJP 31 (1963): 477.
80. AIBS Executive Committee meeting minutes, 4 January 1952, box 2,AIBS papers. NRC, Conference on Biological Education meeting minutes, 10 March 1953, NAS/CEP.
CEP meeting minutes, 13 November 1954, NAS/CEP; see also Richard E. Paulson, “The Committee on Educational Policies,” AIBS Bulletin 5, no. 5 (1955): 17–18.
Frank L. Campbell, “Committee on Educational Policies in Biology,” 1958, NAS/CEP;Chester A. Lawson and Richard E.Paulson, Laboratory and Field Studies in Biology:A Sourcebook for Secondary Schools (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1958).
86. SPE Divisional Committee meeting minutes, 6 May 1958, NSF/HF
89. Kelly to Waterman, “Principles for Support of Curriculum Development,” memo, 26 June 1958, box 39, NSF/ODSF.
91. Paulson, memo re: conversations with NABT, 12 February 1958,NAS/CEP.
95. Paulson, “Proposals and Grants for the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study,” NSF internal document, 1963 (?), box 69, NSF/ODSF;Kelly diary note, 16 December 1958; Litwin diary note, 28 January 1959, box 2, NSF Assoc. Dir. Papers. The five biologists from the “Zach” list were: H. Burr Steinbach, David R. Goddard, Paul B. Sears,Wallace O. Fenn, and Alfred S. Romer.
For scandal, see J. Merton England’s, “The National Science Foundation and Curriculum Reform: A Problem of Stewardship,” Public Historian 11 (1989): 23–36; P. Handler to Waterman, 21 January 1963, NSF/HF; for missteps, see McCulloch to Hartgering, 2 April 1963, box 255, OST.
Paulson, “Proposals and Grants for the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study,” NSF internal document, 1963 (?), box 69, NSF/ODSF; Kelly to Glass, 30 June 1960, BSCS Papers.
Robert A. Divine, Blowing on the Wind: The Nuclear Test Ban Debate, 1954–1960 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 135; see also Bentley Glass, “The Academic Scientist, 1940–1960,” Science 132 (1960): 598–603; National Research Council, The Biological Effects of Atomic Radiation: A Report from a Study (Washington, D.C.: NAS-NRC, 1956).
Grobman, “The BSCS,” unpublished report, spring 1959 (?), box 9, Bates Papers.
BSCS Course Content Committee meeting report, 30 October 1959;
Arnold B. Grobman, The Changing Classroom:The Role of the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (Garden City,NY: Doubleday & Company, 1969), 2.
Diane Ravitch, The Troubled Crusade: American Education, 1945–1980 (New York: Basic Books, 1983), 229; Philip W. Jackson, “The Reform of Science Education: A Cautionary Tale,” Daedalus 112 (1983): 147; and Frank G. Jennings, “ It Didn’t Start with Sputnik,” Saturday Review, 16 September 1967, 96
In addition to aiding the scientists’ reform efforts in education, Sputnik catalyzed federal support of NSF’s longstanding push for increased funds and support for basic research. Roger L. Geiger, “What Happened After Sputnik? Shaping University Research in the United States,” Minerva 35 (1997): 349–367.
126. For a complete historical account of the political events precipitated by Sputnik, and President Eisenhower’s management of the crisis, see Robert A. Divine, The Sputnik Challenge: Eisenhower’s Response to the Soviet Satellite (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993); and Killian, Sputnik, Scientists, and Eisenhower.
Michael Amrine, “The Meaning of the Red Moons,” Progressive, December 1957, 13.
“The 3 R’s in Russia Are Really Tough,” USN, 15 November 1957, 137; “The Fighting Challenge of Russia’s Schools,” Look, 14 October 1958, 38–42; John Gunther, “Russia Rings the School Bell,” Readers’ Digest, March 1959, 176–179; Hyman G. Rickover, Education and Freedom (New York: Dutton, 1959). Interestingly enough, during the height of the Sputnik crisis a Gallup poll showed that, although 90 percent of school administrators stated schools demanded too little work from students, only 51 percent of parents shared that sentiment, suggesting that pressure for reform came from the top rather than from the grassroots.
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953–1961, vol. 5 (Washington, D.C.:U.S. Government Printing Office, 1958), 796.
W.A. Jaracz diary note, 16 January 1959, box 2, NSF Assoc. Dir. Papers; see also Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Recommendations Relative to Our Educational System,” Science Education 42 (1958):103–106.
For a discussion of membership and origins of PSAC, see Killian, Sputnik Scientists, and Eisenhower. For science advising more generally, see Gregg Herken, Cardinal Choices: Presidential Science Advising from the Atomic Bomb to SDI (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992)
Internal memo on NSF relationship with U.S. Office of Education, 28 March 1956, NSF/HF; NSF meeting summary, NSF-OE, 24 July 1957, box 25, NSF/ODSF. The U.S. Office of Education prior to Sputnik had very little involvement in curriculum development, its primary task historically being the collection of educational statistics. What little curriculum work there was was targeted to specific immediate need-type areas, such as civil defense education, see, for example, JoAnne Brown, “‘A is for Atom, B is for Bomb’: Civil Defense in American Public Education, 1948–1963,” Journal of American History 75 (1988): 68–90.
For a complete legislative history of the National Defense Education Act, see Barbara Barksdale Clowse, Brainpower for the Cold War:The Sputnik Crisis and National Defense Education Act of 1958 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1981). The full text of the NDEA can be found in the appendix of Clowse’s book.
“Do-It-Yourself Physics,” Life, 14 April 1958, 122–123; Bess Furman, “School Aid Bills to Stress Science,”NYT, 26 December 1957;Thomas M. Pryor, “School Science Gets a New Look,” NYT, 17 November 1957
J.Boyer Jarvis, “The Role of the United States Office of Education in Curriculum Experimentation,” speech, 27 September 1961, box 3, USOE Sel. Central Files. See also, J. J. McPherson, “Let’s Look at the Systems Concept of Educational Planning,” High School Journal 44 (1960): 66–72147. PSAC Education Panel meeting summary, 1 March 1962, box 138, OST
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© 2002 John L. Rudolph
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Rudolph, J.L. (2002). Wartime Techniques for Cold War Education. In: Scientists in the Classroom. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230107366_5
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