Difficult as it might be to believe, the United States government once promoted science education on the nation’s airwaves. It was the 1950s, and the United States and the Soviet Union were locked in the first decade of the Cold War. Governmental leaders saw scientific literacy as a way to gain the upper hand in the tense political, military, and ideological rivalry.

Major corporations were onboard, including AT&T, which was trying to foster a scientifically literate workforce capable of advancing communications technology.

Television seemed a novel medium to increase American’s understanding of science and technology, and in 1954 The Bell Telephone Company – which was part of AT&T – released the first of a nine-part series called The Bell System Science Series.

A few things stand out here. First, the involvement of Frank Capra. The three-time Academy Award winner directed four of the nine installments. But why Capra? How did a luminary of feel-good cinema (“Mr. Deeds Goes to Town”, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”, et al) come to direct educational science films.

Sure it was paycheck but Capra had worked on governmental films during World War II. Notably, “Why We Fight”, a collection of seven documentary films produced for the the US Army between 1942 and 1945 that were designed to educate American troops and the public about the reasons behind US involvement in the war.

While the fusion of art and science in educational media was relatively novel, it seems Capra was a geek who simply wanted to turn his lens toward the scientific frontier, and bring complex ideas into American living rooms. His work on “The Unchained Goddess,” part of the Bell System Science Series, stands as a testament to this unique intersection.

What Really Stands Out

If you haven’t yet, watch the video above. It’s a seventy second clip from “The Unchained Goddess”, one of Capra’s contributions to the series, and it not only discusses the dangers of climate change, but pinpoints how human activities contribute to it.

“Man may be unwittingly changing the world’s climate through the waste products of his civilization. Due to our release through factories and automobiles every year of more than six billion tons of carbon dioxide which helps air absorb heat from the sun, our atmosphere seems to be getting warmer.”

Remember, this is on American television in 1958, almost seventy years ago.

It’s an early warning about climate change that probably wasn’t much noted at the time but is and was a prophetic message for its time.

Add to this the corresponding imagery of “the polar ice caps” melting and cities like Miami drowning under “150 feet of tropical water,” and these scenarios, once speculative, are now eerily prescient.

And here we are seventy years later. Our media is lightyears more sophisticated, our understanding more thorough, but, at least in (upcoming) United States governmental circles, it’s falling on deaf ears.

Or, maybe, the ears hear, they just don’t care.

The complete film is available on YouTube.