• Sunday-What'sUP April 20 - 09:03 am

Now here are some strange Shoebox Memory connections.

I grew up during those "duck and cover" times. We had the evacuation route signs on highways out of the cities, the shelters with food and water, fallout shelters, and the drills. Maybe there was some hope in the early days when aircraft where the delivery systems, we had radar, fighters, and the Nike missile sites. Some would have been shot down. Then came ICBM's and the hydrogen bomb. Not much defense for those; slowly the whole "duck and cover" plans just faded away. It all became very real during my sophomore year in High School - the Cuban missile crisis. We had plans to get to the shelters, but no one really had much hope of getting out. Being a Catholic School, we did allot of praying.
That might of worked, history tells us we owe our present existence to a Russian sub Captain who, while authorized, chose not to take a shot with a nuclear torpedo. Maybe he had some inspiration. We were that close.

My understanding after numerous conversations with Bernard Shute, Fire Chief of Calumet for many years and the owner of SHUTE"S Bar nothing is being done by the City Fathers or the National Park to maintain/restore this important building. I have toured this museum a number of times and while small it maintains a lot of important artifacts not withstanding the AMERICAN La FRANCE trucks which truly are beautiful and with all the many fires since the 40's there is a story to each fire and truck of which Bernie has notes on.

And the AMERICAN La FRANCE fire trucks stored there are collectors items along with all the other arifacts collected over the years pertaining to the local fire departments. A must see if in the area!

I don't remember doing duck and cover drills or seeing films like this (thank goodness: not "if the flash comes," but "when the flash comes." Kids must have been scared to death!). I suppose this was because every school in our district was within half a mile of a Nike missile site. We would have been ground zero and no duck and cover would have saved us, so why bother?

When I was in middle scool it was the late 80's and I remember a class when we were discussing those old drills where they told you to go under the desks. My teacher had remembered them as a kid. They never bothered with those drills then and I remember someone asking the teacher why. His response was "you might see the flash" basically letting us know it was pointless.

Back in the duck and cover days we had a Communist in every closet and now we have a terrorist in every closet.

Dave, the way things are going we are lucky to have a closet.

I don't remember ever seeing that film but when I was in grade school($Bay) we got a warning. Then we would have to file into the hall by the Superintendents office. We faced the wall and got down on our knees and covered our heads and necks. It was scary.

How about WORLD WAS 11 when we filled the bath tubs to the top, pulled all blinds down right at dusk and then the Warden walked thru the neigborhood checking out to make sure all was complied with. Was not much transportation in those days as cars were limited and certainly no new ones till after the war as every one was useing ration stamps.

Here is a NIKE missle that is on display in front of the RIVERVIEW, MICH city hall.

http://ed-thelen.org/D-54-Dunlap-Nike-Hercules-.jpg

William M. (Bama): Yep, I remember those days and all that as a little boy in Detroit. My dad was serving overseas in Europe, my mom was a "Rosy the Riveter" in a plant in Detroit! Us kids in school had to all lay down on cots in the Gym or auditorium and cover up completely with scratchy wool blankets!
All fats, meat drippings suet etc. had to be returned to the meat markets. All metal containers, even rolled up toothpaste tubes had to be turned in. Only 1 pair of shoes per person in every so many months. Shoe repair shops flourished then, can you find one today? Not hardly. Everyone had a "Victory" vegetable garden even if on the front lawn. Not many went hunting unless you had old ammo. Fishing yes, many did that. Most paints were hard to get as most had lead as an ingredient and used petroleum base. Thus the reason for the developement of water based paint. If you had a flat tire in a busy intersection or highway the police would actually stop traffic a bit to allow the changing of the tire immediately so as not to drive at all on it and ruin it since new tires were so very dear in those times almost impossible to find/buy a new one!

I remember being terrified as a little girl that I was going to be
hit with a nuclear bomb. In the 60's they made us do "nuclear
bomb drills," at my school in Pontiac, MI. Now I look back and I
think how blessed the children of this generation are they don't
have the fear placed in them like we did. I lived in terror for
about 7 years thinking it was about to happen any minute and it
was not that it might happen I REALLY was made to believe it
was going to happen. I was taught survival of a nuclear bombing
was slim to none.

If you go 2 the You Tube website, and type in CONELRAD activation simulation, you can watch what we would have seen on our TV's if a nuclear attack was about 2 happen. The person who put it on Y.T. says it was activated 4 real during the Cuban missile crisis in Oct. 1962. The only 2 things I can think of that might have activated it prematurely were 1 of our U2's being chased out of Soviet air space, or the American jet pilot that was shot down and killed over Cuban air space. I pray to God that something like this will never be activated for real.

Yep, EddyFitz, that's my hometown. There were actually two sites in Riverview. When the missile sites were decomissioned, the army turned the property over to the city and the south site is now the site of the city hall, library, post office, and other civic things. They still use the old mess hall for get-togethers. Only problem is that the site is contaminated with missile fuel and they still don't know what to do to clean it up. A child was electrocuted on that site many years ago when he got into one of the missile silos before the power to the site was turned off.