Cresson Kearny, 89; Wrote Manual on Nuclear War Survival

Cresson Kearny, 89, the author of a best-selling manual on how to survive nuclear war, died Dec. 18 in Montrose, Colo., after years of declining health, his daughter, Stephanie Kearny, said Monday.

His book “Nuclear War Survival Skills” includes instructions on how to build a fallout shelter and a radiation meter. First published in 1979, the book had sold more than 600,000 copies by the mid-1990s.

Kearny, a native of San Antonio, earned a degree in civil engineering at Princeton and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship. At Oxford, he earned a degree in geology. After Oxford, he did geological exploration work in Peru and Venezuela.

During World War II, Kearny developed specialized jungle equipment, training and tactics for U.S. servicemen. He also served in the Office of Strategic Services as a demolition expert.

In 1964, he joined the civil defense project for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In 1972, he received the Army’s decoration for Distinguished Civilian Service.

Kearny, who retired in 1979, was a consistent critic of what he considered inadequate civil defense preparations. Through the 1980s, he also spoke out against the mutual assured destruction stance of the U.S. and Soviet governments.