TIM MAGUIRE

     
     
     
     
   
In a televised speech of extraordinary gravity, President John F.
Kennedy announced on October 22, 1962 that U.S. spy planes
have discovered Soviet missile bases in Cuba.

These missile sites—under construction but nearing completion —housed medium-range missiles capable of striking a number
of major cities in the United States, including Washington, D.C.

Kennedy announced that he was ordering a naval “quarantine”
of Cuba to prevent Soviet ships from transporting any more
offensive weapons to the island and explained that the United
States would not tolerate the existence of the missile sites
currently in place.

The Soviet Union inaugurated the “Space Age” with its launch
of , the world’s first artificial satellite, on October 4, 1957.

The spacecraft, named Sputnik after the Russian word for
“fellow traveler,” was launched at 10:29 p.m. Moscow time
from the Tyuratam launch base in the Kazakh Republic.

Sputnik had a diameter of 22 inches and weighed 184 pounds
and circled Earth once every hour and 36 minutes. Traveling
at 18,000 miles an hour, its elliptical orbit had an apogee
(farthest point from Earth) of 584 miles and a perigee (nearest
point) of 143 miles.

On May 1, 1960, a U-2 flight piloted by Francis Gary Powers
disappeared while on a flight over Russia. 

With no small degree of pleasure, Khrushchev pulled off one
of the most dramatic moments of the Cold War by producing
not only the mostly-intact wreckage of the U-2, but also the
captured pilot-very much alive.

Francis Gary Powers (center) sits accused in Moscow’s Hall
of Columns, during the opening of his espionage trial, 17
August 1960. (AP)

Francis Gary Powers (1929 – 1977)

SANDY KOZEL

Alexander Graham Bell‘s “liquid” transmitter design
permitted the first successful transmission of speech
by Bell to his assistant, Thomas Watson in another
room when he said…“Mr. Watson, come here; I want
you.”