S. S. Fehr's Letters to Mom

October 1960 - April 1961:

• 12 October 1960 - Soviet President Krushchev bangs his shoe at the U.N. declaring he will see capitalism's burial.
• 26 October 1960 - John F. Kennedy (JFK) calls Coretta King and uses his influence to have Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) released from a Georgia jail after he had been arrested at a sit-in at a lunch counter.
• 8 November 1960 - John F. Kennedy winning 70% of the black vote narrowly defeats Richard Nixon. The great black migration from the south to northern cities with fairer voting laws is a contributing factor
• December 1960 - Birth control pills hit the U.S. market.

• 1960 - Walk, Don't Run by the Ventures is popular in the AG Lakehurst barracks. Brenda Lee had multiple hits - I Want To Be Wanted, the plaintive I'm Sorry, and Sweet Nothin's, and Green Fields asked Are You Lonesome Tonight?
• Chubby Checker was doin' his Twist, Sam Cooke was on the Chain Gang, Ray Peterson was croonin' Corina, Corina, and Ray Charles had Georgia On My Mind.
• At the movies, Exodus and Hitchcock's Psycho were winners, but the Academy Award for Best Picture went to The Apartment.

• 17 January 1961- President Eisenhower prophetically warns against the "military-industrial-complex" in his farewell address.
• 20 January 1961 - JFK offers words of encouragement to young people proclaiming the torch has been passed to a new generation, and advises them, "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."
• March 1961 - College students flock to answer JFK's call to serve in the Peace Corps missions in Ethiopia and other countries helping to reverse the image of The Ugly American.
• March 1961 - JFK initiates an expensive nuclear missile program.
• 12 April 1961 - Yuri Gagarin shocks America as he circles the earth in 90 minutes.
• April 1961 - The # 1 hit is "Blue Moon" by the Marcels
• 25 April 1961 - Ike's CIA plan to liberate Cuba ends in disaster at the Bay of Pigs - an embarrassment to President Kennedy who allowed the plan to proceed. This incompetence encourages Soviet Premier Nikita Krushchev to challenge Kennedy in coming months with the Berlin Wall, the testing of more destructive nuclear weapons and the sneaking of missiles into Cuba.