The Missles of October; 50 Years Later

Parent Cafe
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<p>Last night’s PBS documentary should remind Americans of how close we came mutually assured destruction in 1962.</p>

<p>Of course I don’t have any first hand memory of the event, but I do recall a history teacher in high school telling us that he had planned to evacuate his family to the nearby Cascade Mountain range if it seemed that a Soviet attack was imminent. Don’t know if that would have done much good, given all the U.S. military facilities, particularly Naval, in the Seattle area.</p>

<p>I was fascinated to learn from the PBS show that there was a shot fired during those tense 13 days. The Soviets shot down an American spy plane that was photographing the missle sites in Cuba. Wow. Apparently it was done without prior authorization from Moscow. And, another U.S. pilot lost his way over the North Pole and ended up in Soviet airspace and was chased by MiGs until he made it back to the Bering Sea. Double wow! Wars have started over less.</p>

<p>Finally, I always believed it was a Hollywood myth that an American general wised-mouthed President Kennedy in the situation room. Well, found out last night that it was true. War hawk General Lemay was all set for a fight and essentially demanded that Kennedy invade Cuba immediately. Lemay said ‘you’re in quite a fix, Mr. President.’ Loved JFK’s response…“In case you didn’t notice, you’re in it with me.”</p>

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<p>At the time, many people built bomb shelters of varying cost and sophistication in their houses and yards, and stocked them with items like bottled water and canned food, etc.</p>

<p>We were told at the high school that if there was a special alert, we should be ready to take responsibility for helping to evacuate our younger brothers and sisters from their schools.</p>

<p>Nevertheless, I don’t think most teenagers were very alarmed or believed that anything was really going to happen.</p>

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<p>I’m sorry to have missed the PBS program; thanks for posting about it because I feel certain it will be rerun a few times and now I can plan to record it. </p>

<p>Cuba seemed all too close to Florida in those days. My dad was career military and even though I was young I was aware of what was happening thanks to dinner table discussions. As I recall, even kids on the playground at school talked about it. I also remember that my dad had greater respect for JFK afterwards.</p>

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<p>I was 5 in 1962, but reportedly the elementary school i attended five years later was built on a Ajax site.
[Nike</a> Historical Society](<a href=“http://nikemissile.org/]Nike”>http://nikemissile.org/)</p>

<p>I don’t know how much was underground( or how much of that rumor was true) , but there were huge cement circles filled with gravel on the surface.</p>