Teddy Roe took an extraordinary trip to the USSR in 1968. For three months, he travelled from one end of the USSR to the other. Most Americans at the time believed the USSR was their greatest enemy. Teddy was among tens of thousands who toured the Soviet Union. Why did Americans want to travel there? Why did the Soviets want them to come? What just what was the tourist experience like?
Episode Resources
Map of Teddy's Trip
Teddy's hand drawn map of his trip to the USSR from his diary.
Teddy's Photos
Photos Teddy took on his travels.
Beware! Tourists Reporting on Russia
Beware! Tourists Reporting on Russia: An Analysis of Tourist Testimony on Soviet Russia prepared for the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States, 86th Congress, second session, February 5, 1960.
Gilbert Becaud
English translation of Gilbert Becaud's "Nathalie."
Mister Twister
Mister Twister, 1963, is based on the popular children's poem written in 1933 by Samuel Marshak. Mister Twister tells the story of a wealthy American capitalist who travels with his family to Leningrad for a vacation. Twister cancels his reservation at the Angleterre Hotel when he learns they serves guests of color. In an expression of Soviet antiracism, the concierge calls ahead to the all other Leningrad hotels and advises them to refuse the American racist and his family a room. Mr. Twister returns to the Angleterre, and after spending the night in the lobby decides he has overcomes his racism. During the USSR school children regularly memorized Marshak's poem.
Reagan's "Evil Empire" Speech
President Ronald Reagan's famous "Evil Empire Speech" to the National Association of Evangelicals at Sheraton Twin Towers Hotel, Orlando, FL on March 8, 1983.
Newcomb Mott
Moscow Mailbag
Joe Adamov answers questions from American listeners about the USSR. Moscow Mailbag was one of those unique Cold War phenomena. In his perfect, unaccented English, Adamov was the Soviet voice to American. In this episode, Adamov answers, "How much would a weeks visit to the USSR cost, the type a working man could afford?" Here's an interview with Adamov as well as a profile of him in the Christian Science Monitor.
Intourist Advertisements
Soviet Intourist video promoting tourism in Siberia.
Intourist posters through the 20th century
London's Red Bus to Smolensk
Eliot Rothwell tells the story of a self-organised group of young British travellers who took a bus all the way to the Soviet Union at the height of the post-Stalin "Thaw." London's red bus was one of many innovative attempts to dissolve the boundaries of the Cold War. Read Eliot Rothwell's "London’s Red Bus to Smolensk" at Tribune Magazine.
Sources
Эдуард Андрющенко, “Советский дневник. Американец посетил СССР, а спустя полвека прочитал, что о нем писали в КГБ,” Настоящее время.
Dina Fainberg, Cold War Correspondents: Soviet and American Reporters on the Ideological Frontlines, John Hopkins University Press, 2021.
Alexander Hazanov, “Porous Empire: Foreign Visitors and the Post-Stalin Soviet State,” Dissertation, 2016.
Andrew Jacobs, “Contact and Control: Americans Visit the Soviet Union, 1956-1985,” Dissertation, 2019.
Donald Raleigh, Soviet Baby Boomers: An Oral History of Russia’s Cold War Generation, Oxford University Press, 2013.
Credits
Music:
“Disinter,” “Bauxite,” “Tango Rosino,” “Burough,” “Tarte Tatin,” and “Palms Down” by Blue Dot Sessions.
“Go Time” by Elliot Holmes.