Inventing atomic power, however, wasn't enough to usher in the Atomic Age–especially when you consider the rather alarming fashion with which the atom appeared on the world stage.  When the name of your product is associated with the capability of vapourising entire cities and as the featured weapon in a cold war that threatens the whole of mankind, this tends to induce what marketing managers call "consumer resistance".

To overcome this, in 1953 Sutherland Productions in the United States was commissioned by General Electric to create a fifteen minute animated short called A is for Atom.

Though it begins with an acknowledgement of the dangers of atomic weaponry, A is for Atom is more concerned with educating the public as to what atomic power is, how it works, and what its potential benefits are.  Not only does this include generating electricity, but  also, if the illustration on the right can be believed, lithium atoms gain self-awareness and one day rise to become an important contributor to the modern educational system.

Sounds logical to me.

It's actually fairly restrained in its prognostications; emphasising such things as power plants, medical radioisotopes, various industrial and scientific applications, and powering ships and other transportation.   The early years, atomic power was a time of few limits and vast potentials.  Today we regard atomic power as a glorified steam engine and radioisotopes are taken so much for granted that they don't even enter into debates about the pros and cons of nuclear energy.  But in 1953, the Atomic Age was a misty country beyond whose boundaries was terra incognita.  What was the actual potential of the atom?  No one knew for sure.  Maybe it would blast man off the face of the Earth.  Maybe it would eradicate disease, provide power to turn deserts into gardens and tundra into parks, and provide the means to probe the deepest secrets of the universe itself. 

Small wonder that the most arresting image of the short, after that weird little fever dream of an atom-headed man, is the silent, faceless form of a glowing colossus standing over the world with an air of patient obedience.

Or to turn the metaphor on its head, as Benjamin Franklin replied in Paris when asked what the point was of the hot-air balloon that had just been invented, Monsieur, à quoi peut bien servir l'enfant qui vient de naître?  (Sir, what's the use of a newborn baby ?)

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