Dealing With Reality: Part 1

1960 wasn't noteworthy for me and I was not worried about the state of the world. 1963 was better. I graduated from 8th grade and discovered girls. Weeks before the graduation dance I had lessons from my parents and watching American Bandstand. They didn't take. Overcoming shyness I approached one of the girls in my class and we tripped the light fantastic. I only tromped on her toes 2 or 3 times. I've never been a good dancer (as my wife Dorothy would have confirmed) but I like to dance. In 1964 I attended Monroe High School in Fairbanks, AK. Between the wider exposure of a higher education and my parents' efforts my view of the world widened and I became more aware of what was going on around me.

One of John F. Kennedy's actions was to put the nation's space program into high gear. After WWII there were plans of eventually reaching space and the planets but there was no hurry to do so. After the Soviets launched their first Sputnik satellite that changed. The Space Race was on and it was a pressure cooker for the nation. The world held its breath waiting to see who would win.

I followed every moment of the launches and flights of Alan Shepard, John Glenn and the others. The nation as a whole was electrified by these events. We were glued to the radio and TV every time a man was launched from Cape Canaveral. It was exciting to realize that we were doing something that had never been done before. Like the motto of Star Trek, we were going where no man had gone before.

The excitement of the Space Race was tempered by the hard realities that fueled it. The threat of Soviet nuclear warheads in orbit over our heads was intolerable. It was a matter of national survival. The United States had to be the first to conquer space and make it ours. Nuclear warheads had to be kept out of orbit. Forget anything else you might have learned about the reasons for the Space Race – this was the major reason for it. Fear of nuclear destruction can be a great motivator. We were scared to death of Soviet nuclear missiles screaming down out of space and obliterating everything and everyone in the U.S.

Then came the Cuban missile crisis. The Soviets got every thing they were after, and we got nothing but a bunch of empty promises, thanks to Kennedy and his milquetoast coterie. The liberal media touted his great leadership and strength of character as the reasons why the Soviets backed down and nuclear war was averted. Bull pucky! Sounds like the liberal media of today, don't it?

The Soviets scared hell out of us and we all but rolled over and played dead – "don't shoot me mister, please." The missile bases were still in Cuba. No one knew where the birds were hiding. There were pictures of Soviet ships outbound from Cuba with missile sized tarp covered containers on the decks. No one ever boarded those ships and looked under the tarps! There was no way to prove the missiles left the island. The result of Kennedy's courage and diplomacy? We agreed to keep our hands off Castro and Cuba, which was the Russians' reason for whole thing in the beginning. There may not have been any missiles to begin with!

Something else happened as a result of the missile crisis. Our family got caught up in the nuclear fever that was gripping the nation as a whole. Dad thought it would be a good idea if we got some practical training in surviving a nuclear attack. Mom, dad and I took a Civil Defense course titled "Fallout Shelter Management" that was held at the University of Alaska.

We learned how to use Geiger counters, basic first aid, and how to survive a nuclear attack... maybe. The graduation exercise was to be a simulated fallout shelter experience. We gathered late one Friday afternoon in our classroom. We knew the exercise would be held sometime during the course. As far as we knew there were still 3 more classes to complete.

On that fateful evening, during a coffee break one of the instructors turned on the radio to hear the weekend weather forecast. The radio was hooked up to a fake announcer in another room of the University, but we didn't know that. In the middle of the afternoon weather report, the announcer broke in with an emergency notice. He said that a nuclear attack was imminent and to "seek shelter immediately, this is not a drill." The warning was repeated a couple of times, then the air raid sirens on the campus went off with the signal for a nuclear attack. (To be continued in Part 2)