1958 was an incredible year in America. After the Russians launched Sputnik in October 1957 and a second Sputnik with the dog aboard one month later, the American government freaked out. We began testing larger numbers of nuclear weapons above ground and building ICBMs – missiles - by the thousands. In my school, we had nuclear weapons air raid drills every week. And this event on June 10, 1958 was major, with tens of millions of people participating and the president and other government leaders moving to safe locations away from the White House. As the coronavirus pandemic grows, I thought I would post this memory because I believe that reflecting on history can be helpful at stressful times like now. If you are reading this in the future, I hope that this pandemic is long gone and defeated by science. The clip that I post here is a portion of my documentary feature film on America's reaction to Sputnik, Sputnik Mania.
