In Seattle, they used to test the air raid siren every Wednesday at noon. I was in 9th grade in 1962 and that Wednesday, when that siren went off a girl in my class started screaming.

YUP, .Right up there with "where were you when Kennedy was shot and where were you on 9-11? I was 22 yrs old, in a hospital bed (10 patient ward), pregnant, sick,someone dying in the next bed, no TV or radio, heard my brother's leave (and every service member's) was cancelled, and to top it off, just finished reading "Fail Safe". My husband came in during the one hr pr day visiting hours with a radio and I listened to my world ending while I was bedbound, sure we would never make it out of October alive. That sure stiffened my spine for the next 50 years. God help us now... the press will never let us know again how close we are...O and his minions will pass out fiddles while Rome burns.

I never worried about the Cuban Missile "crisis". I figured the liberals would surrender first. To this day there have been no "inspections". I considered it a staged "crisis" by the JFK administration. Sen. Keating and other Republicans were warning about the Soviets putting missiles in Cuba but the wonderful and beloved JFK kept ignoring it until 2 weeks before the midterm elections. A staged event. IMHO.

My father was a veterinarian (O-3) on a SAC AFB in Mississippi. His two-year active duty ended that week in October 1962. He was supposed to have his duty extended due to the Missile Crisis, but a beer buddy of his in the admin office was able to finagle him out of it.

As the anniversary of these events comes each year, I am reminded of my father's direct role as a participant at the highest security level in the Pentagon to the events now known as the Cuban missile crisis. For years he did not divulge much and my older siblings just remember a two week period when he did not come home from work and then showed up gaunt with noticeably grayer hair. One little known fact that will put your hair on ends is that, not only were we at a high DEFCON level, but that before backing down, Kruchev waited to confirm with his own early warning network that our strategic bombers were over Soviet Air Space on their way to Russian targets. We came to within minutes of a nuclear exchange. At one point during the tense standoff, firearms in the Pentagon were confiscated for fear of mass suicides.

Was living in San Francisco at the time, in a crummy apartment in a posh part of town, and partying was the main thing on all our minds. Was totally sober that night, we were all scared!

...was when Hussein-Obama walked into The White House.

I was 9 years old, in rural NE Oregon.At the height of the Crisis we were sent home in school buses. about 2 hrs early, No one knew why. Just did.
Had a co-worker who was an Recon Pilot-tiUSAF Full Bird Colonel,who flew RB-57's he said that
they worked 20 hrs flight days over Cuba.The Russians would take potshots at them but the
'57 had oblique cameras so they were able to do most of the work over international waters.
The U-2 guys had the hardest job, as they had to fly over the Island...

The scariest day of my life was when Zippy was elected.

Back in 1962 I felt like experienced adults were in charge. Today, not so much. We are getting closer and closer to being defenseless. Who knew it would take one man less than four years to destroy US from within ?