The Kitchen Debate was a series of impromptu exchanges through interpreters between U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon and Chairman of the Council of Ministers Nikita Khrushchev, at the opening of the American National Exhibition at Sokolniki Park in Moscow on July 24, 1959.
Vice-president Nixon spars with Premier Khrushchev before reporters and onlookers, including Politburo members Leonid Brezhnev, Anastas Mikoyan and Yekaterina Furtseva at the American National Exhibition at Sokolniki Park, in Moscow, 1959
Soviet Prime Minister Nikita Khrushchev (left, foreground) and United States Vice President Richard Nixon (right) debate the merits of communism versus capitalism in a model American kitchen at the American National Exhibition in Moscow (July 1959); photo by Thomas J. O'Halloran, Library of Congress collection
American National Exhibition
The American National Exhibition, held from July 25 to September 4, 1959, was an exhibition of American art, fashion, cars, capitalism, model homes and futuristic kitchens. Held at Sokolniki Park in Moscow, then capital of the Soviet Union, the exhibition attracted 3 million visitors during its six-week run. The Cold War event is historic for the "Kitchen Debate" between then-Vice President of the United States Richard Nixon and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, held first at the model kitchen table, outfitted by General Electric, and then continued in the color television studio where it was broadcast to both countries, with each leader arguing the merits of his system, and a conversation that "escalated from washing machines to nuclear warfare."
Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev at the American National Exhibition, July 1959
By 1949, Michigan Representative George Dondero was already denouncing NCASF as communist.
In 1957, Rockwell Kent had the first American solo exhibition in the Soviet Union.
In 1959, Francis E. Walter, the HUAC Chair, found links between half the artists and communism.
