1962

ON THIS DAY

On Oct. 22, 1962, President John F. Kennedy announced an air and naval blockade of Cuba, following the discovery of Soviet missile bases on the island.

I was twenty years old in 1962, and just becoming aware of politics and really, of the world.  Since we lived on the east coast of the U.S.A., we were within striking distance of those missiles.   I was terrified; wondered if we were going to die during the night.

Seeing this ‘look back’ sentence in this morning’s New York Times made me remember…and wonder what else was going on back then.  Here goes:

• U.S. Military council established in Vietnam
• Adolf Eichmann hanged
• Uganda and Tanganyika become independent
• U-2 pilot Gary Powers is traded by USSR for spy Rudolf Abel
• In literature:  Steinbeck’s “Travels With Charlie,”  Loesser and Burrows “How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying,”  Solzhenitsyn, “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich,”   Albee, “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,”  James Baldwin, “Another Country,”  Kesey, “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,”  Jones, “The Thin Red Line,”  Porter, “Ship of Fools,”  and Charles Schultz, “Happiness is a Warm Puppy”
• Movies:  “Cleopatra,”  “The Trial,”  “The Manchrian Candidate”
• Marilyn Monroe died
• Popular songs:  “Days of Wine and Roses,”  “Blowin’ in the Wind,”
• Space men Glenn, Carpenter, and Schirra orbit separately
• Telstar satellite launched
• Rachel Carson:  “Silent Spring”
• Thalidomide causes children to be born with malformations
• Nobel Prize for Medicine to Crick, Wilkins and Watson for determining the molecular structure of DNA
• James Meredith is denied admission to University of Mississippi;  US marshals and 3,000 soldiers suppress riots when Meredith arrives on campus to begin classes
• Sonny Liston becomes world heavyweight boxing champion
• Eleanor Roosevelt died

What a time to be alive, with the Civil Rights movement just getting some momentum;  Vietnam showing up on our radar for the first time;   and Rachel Carson raising our awareness of the environment.  That world I had just discovered was pretty darned exciting.