We're looking for items for my wife to add to the chest of items she keeps in her classroom so the students have tangible things to pass around.

She's found a few civil defense helmets & brassards of the traditional color but we saw this one & I can't find any info on it on line.

Anyone know what the green triangle is for?
I know the bolt signifies a Messenger.

According to what I found, it looks like it was for messengers. Don't know why the difference in colors though. I remember the duck and cover drills, and being taught to always know where the shelters were, but beyond that, it has been lost to time.

Wow, I had no idea, but I guess it makes sense there would be an organization and specialists etc. like this. Thanks for posting it, I learned something.

My recollection of the era is primarily around being a new first grader, we had a bunch of duck-and-cover drills over a few days, culminating with an "evacuation" where we were all sent home.

I remember teachers talking about missiles, and remember sitting in the playground "looking for missiles" in my imagination.

It was only many years later that I finally connected the dots and realized that was the Cuban Missile Crisis. It's different from the perspective of a six year old.

The last time I did a "duck and cover" drill was 1984 in Boston, fourth grade. Under the desk, one arm in front of the face, one arm over the back of the neck.

And Grumpy, I seriously LOVE your house. You just always have the coolest motifs. We were talking about Sammy October at work the other day. It's almost time isnt it?

Ugh, I can't find any photos anywhere of this.
The lighting bolt is a silver color.
My understanding is that there was a Boy Scout Civil Defense program and the green "may" have been where this comes from.
But I can't find anything that confirms this.
My wife teaches AP juniors & seniors so she likes that they can be trusted with real historical items.
Even if they're not expensive they love having tangible items to make history "cone to life".
That's why I'm asking for help on this .
It's in our friends antique store but no one seems to know anything.
It came from an estate auction so there's no back story with it.


mblinky- yes it is getting close.

I'm digging back in my brain some 60 years, but I think the symbol means that this facility has emergency power available.

As a side, my mother was very involved in civil defense back in the 50's. She was issued a badge, very much like a leo badge and had responsibilities for coordination of CD activities within the community. Somewhere in my stuff, I still have that badge.

It was an interesting time back then. Duck and cover drills occurred often as we were brainwashed to think we could survive an atomic bomb attack. Get under your desk, don't face the window and wait for the all clear signal. How about CONALRAD. Radios has AM reserved frequencies for CD. How naive could we get to think that crawling under a desk would mean we could survive.

We didn't know then that duck and cover meant kiss your ass goodbye.

Could it just be a locally produced version of the CD emblem and they didn't have any blue paint? Everything I see always shows a blue disc with white triangle.

It may be plausible that if you were far enough away, the concussion/shock wave might blow out windows and you might protect yourself from that. The nuclear cloud, blowing in your direction, not so much.

Correct. It was only useful at longer distances from the blast. But "Duck and cover" was also about pacifying the public and preventing anxiety and panic. People felt reassured that there was a plan in place, and that they knew what to do if there was an attack.