A review by hollyd19
The Broadcast 41: Women and the Anti-Communist Blacklist by Carol A. Stabile

challenging informative sad tense slow-paced

3.0

This book serves as an excellent primer on FBI tactics and attitude in the 1950s. I learned a great deal about Hoover’s approach and the cultivation of a G-Man persona. The Bureau promoted a misogynistic, racist worldview and made use of media channels and friendly journalists to validate their existence. Did you know that the preponderance of police procedurals embedded in our television culture is a direct result of FBI influence? 

The American Business Consultants was a private firm founded by former agents that relied on its implied ties to the FBI to stoke fear and legitimize its blacklist, profiting off said concerns and offering to “clear” the accused. Their actions ruined many a career and effectively stopped progressive programming in its tracks (with the ironic exception of children’s shows which they didn’t consider worth the effort). 

While that part of the book was fascinating and detailed, I was once again struck by disappointment in that the purported focus of the book — the women — did not make up a majority of the content. The final chapter explores what media could have been like if the inclusive, creative minds that had been blacklisted had a chance to create the programming they’d envisioned. But on the whole, I learned a lot less about these women than about the FBI’s efforts during the Cold War. 

Several of the women mentioned were actually part of one of my favorite  reads from a few years back: How Women Invented Television by Jennifer Keishin Armstrong. Chronologically, it takes place before the Broadcast 41, but does an excellent job of profiling several prominent women who were shaping the industry ahead of this ideological crackdown. I strongly recommend it.