Postcards from Heaven: Critical Geographies of the Cold War Military–Industrial–Academic Complex Alasdair Pinkerton Department of Geography, University of London, Egham, Surrey, UK; a.d.pinkerton@rhul.ac.uk Stephen Young Department of Geography, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA; sjy2@u.washington.edu Klaus Dodds Department of Geography, University of London, Egham, Surrey, UK; k.dodds@rhul.ac.uk Abstract: This article examines a little-known project funded by the US Air Force and CIA, and carried out by communications scientists at the University of Washington during the early 1950s. Project Revere sought to investigate how the seemingly humble information leaflet could be deployed, via air drops, as a “flexible weapon” to spark “interpersonal communications” and spread rumours throughout particular target populations. While the testing ground for these aerial experiments was the northwest United States (Washington State, Utah, Idaho), Revere scientists were aware that their work would find particular application in supporting America’s Cold War activities overseas, notleast in the Korean peninsula. At the same time, however, the Revere tests were implicated in the intensification of domestic anxieties as leaflets dropped over rural Washington State and Utah mobilised issues of civil defence, emergency procedures and warnings about “enemy bombers”. In this way, we suggest that Revere corresponded with, and heightened, efforts by national and local governments to mobilise citizens into a Cold War “call to arms”. Keywords: communications research, civil defence, United States, Cold War, leafleting, rumour Introduction A leaflet is simply a piece of paper that carries a message. But the right message in the right place at the right time can save lives, stop waste, and bring order out of confusion. 1 They [military and political leaders] also believed that total war demanded unrelenting attention to public opinion. The American Antipode Vol. 43 No. 3 2011 ISSN 0066-4812, pp 820–844 doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2010.00821.x C  2010 The Authors Journal compilation C  2010 Editorial Board of Antipode.