Countdown to Collision

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DATE: 1972

LENGTH: 27 min

CATEGORY: Educational & Instructional, Sound, Black & White

DIRECTOR: Charles E. Francis

PRODUCER/PUBLISHER: Frank Kavanaugh; Murdock Head, Airlie Productions

Summary

Film historian Jennifer Peterson analyzes a set of six 1960s-era films about air and water pollution and the growing environmental and human ruin they’ve wrought. The 1960s marked a turning point in the expansion of popular awareness about environmental problems. The six titles, made between 1960 and 1972, show the emergence of modern environmentalist discourses. All frame pollution as a problem caused by human industry. But in the films made later in the decade, we see the emergence of a broader critique of post-World War II consumerism and waste. Co-produced by the U.S. Public Health Service and a range of commercial and nonprofit institutions, the films reflect an era in which government took a leading role in educating the public about environmental health threats. This title reflects a broader environmentalist rhetoric characteristic of the environmental movement after 1970, the year the first Earth Day took place. Moving beyond a simple documentation of pollution as a public health threat, it’s a veritable manifesto of ecological thinking in the early 1970s…. Read The Essay

Supplementary Materials

Stills from Countdown to Collision

Man dress in blue, white, and red holding something round, with the title "Countdown to..."

A polluting Uncle Sam in Countdown to Collision.

a woman in a pink collared shirt with brown hair in a up-do

little kids holding two signs; one says THE and the other says END

poeple standing on rubbish between two tall buildings

Guy standing on street behind a burning box in front of a freight liner container

Water pouring from a pipe out of a building into a body of water

On the road with other cars around surrounded by city lights

Las Vegas as consumerist dystopia in Countdown to Collision.

Man bottom right of screen with a picture of the United States Capitol dome

Hugh Downs in Countdown to Collision

Other Films Featured in the Essay “Darkening Day: Air Pollution Films and Environmental Awareness, 1960-1972”

Beware the Wind
Cars in a junkyard sit next to factory smokestacks.

Don’t Leave It All to the Experts
A man stands to speak in a microphone at a public meeting.

Public Enemy
A coffee table covered in soot with Public Enemy written in it.

Run Around
An animated image of a tall slick man grinning at a small grumpy male figure.

Sources of Air Pollution
A landscape of an urban industrial area.

In the Collections of the National Library of Medicine

NLM Rare Books & Early Manuscripts Collection

Air pollution in Donora, Pa: Epidemiology of the Unusual Smog Episode of October 1948

Free Films on Air Pollution [Many of these films are available from the National Archives and Records Administration]

Cover of a pamphlet advertising public health films for group showing.

First page of a pamphlet advertising films on air pollution for public screening.

Page of a pamphlet advertising a film called Pall Over America.

Page of a pamphlet advertising a series of films titled Sources, Effects, and Control of Air Pollution..

Page of a pamphlet advertising a film called This Buisiness of Air.

Page of a pamphlet advertising a film called Take a Deep Breath.

Back cover of a pamphlet advertising Public Health Service films for group showing.

NLM Archives and Modern Manuscripts Collection

Pope A. Lawrence Papers 1924-1983. Located in: Archives and Modern Manuscripts Collection, History of Medicine Division, National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, MD; MS C 539. Series 3: Air Pollution Control Office.

Remarks by John E. Fogarty at the Air Pollution Control Association Dinner, 1958 in Profiles in Science

NLM Prints & Photographs Collection

Let’s Fight Air Pollution, 1977
*National Library of Medicine #101584655X41*

An artistic rendering of a town with smog blowing along a bend in a river seen from a flowered hillside. — Donora, Pa. 1949 #40 Artist’s rendition of smog episode of 1948
*National Library of Medicine #101450758*

Donora, Pa. – 1949 #7 Riverboat adds to air pollution on Monongahela River
*National Library of Medicine #101450738*

Water Pollution, 1881. Nineteen vignettes of dams, watersheds, and pollution evident in the water supply of New York.
*National Library of Medicine #101435651*

A poster illustrated by a black boy and an asian girl playing in the surf. — Let the World Breath, ca. 1980s
*National Library of Medicine #101444671*

A four color poster illustrated with an industrial skyline and line of smoke rising throught the text. — Ill Winds on a Sunny Day: A Film on Air Pollution, ca.1970s
*National Library of Medicine #101454436*

Men sit at a table signing documents while many other men in suits stand behind them. — President Richard Nixon and Soviet President Nikolai Podgorny sign the agreement May 23rd on joint action against cancer, heart disease and air and water pollution, 1972
*National Library of Medicine #101677201*

A row of smokestacks along a railroad track in an industrial area. — Donora, Pa. 1949 #8 American Steel & Wire Co. Plant
*National Library of Medicine #101450739*

Related Resources from the National Library of Medicine

See current information on air pollution from MedlinePlus and NLM Environmental Health & Toxicology resources.

External Resources

Articles and Websites

A woman speaking and wearing headphones in an outdoor setting. — Jennifer Lynn Peterson, PhD, presents at the NYU Orphan Film Symposium, held virtually, 2020

Orphan Film Symposium 2020: Climate, Water, Migration. Several of the films featured in this essay were presented at the 2020 Orphan Film Symposium. Dozens of other rare titles dealing with the environment were also presented at the international conference.

Watch: Darkening Days, 11:00 am session on “Climate Wednesday,” Orphans Online, May 27, 2020.

Other Related Resources

Learn more about disparities in the impact of air pollution, how to check air quality in your area, and children and the environment.