What Happened in Oct 1962

James Meredith Becomes First Black Student at the University of Mississippi

Meredith was born in Kosciusko, Mississippi of Native American (Choctaw) and Black American heritage. He enlisted in the United States Air Force... Read more

Cuban Missile Crisis

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation between the United States, the Soviet Union, and Cuba in October 1962, during the Cold War. In Russia,... Read more

Nelson Mandela's Imprisonment

Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island where he remained for the next eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison.[49] While in jail, his... Read more

Johnny Carson takes over as host of The Tonight Show

Johnny Carson premiered as the new host of The Tonight Show today. His first late-night guests included Joan Crawford, Tony Bennett and Mel Brooks.... Read more

1962 World Series

The 1962 World Series matched the defending American League champion New York Yankees against the National League champion San Francisco Giants,... Read more

Dr. No released

Dr. No (1962), starring Sean Connery, is the first James Bond film. Based on the 1958 Ian Fleming novel of the same name, it was adapted by Richard... Read more

"Long Day's Journey Into Night" Is Released

Long Day's Journey Into Night is a 1962 film adaptation of the Eugene O'Neill play. It was directed by Sidney Lumet and produced by Ely Landau with... Read more

United States U-2 Reconnaissance Mission Discovers SS-4 Medium Range Ballistic Missile (MRBM) Sites in Varying Stages of Readiness

The first consignment of SS-3 MRBMs (medium range ballistic missiles) arrived on the night of September 8, followed by a second on September 16.... Read more

President Kennedy Assembles EXCOMM Upon Viewing Photographs of Soviet Missiles in Cuba

Kennedy saw the photographs on October 16; he assembled the Executive Committee of the National Security Council (EXCOMM), fourteen key officials... Read more

U-2 Photograph of First IRBM Site Under Construction is Taken

U-2 flights identify the first of three Soviet SS-5 missile sites. The SS-5s have ranges of up to 2,200 nautical miles. The military estimates that... Read more

Kennedy Meets with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko

On October 18th the President ordered a build up of arms along the southern border of the United States, just in case war breaks out. No one... Read more

John F. Kennedy Decides to "Quarantine" Cuba in Response to Nuclear Threat

On October 21st, ExComm, and President Kennedy decided that a quarantine was the best course of action. The administration called it a quarantine,... Read more

President Kennedy Delivers First Speech on the Nuclear Buildup in Cuba

It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack on... Read more

President Kennedy signs the Proclamation for Interdiction of the Delivery of Offensive Weapons to Cuba

Only an hour [after Kennedy's address to the nation], at 11:24 a.m. a cable drafted by George Ball to the U.S. Ambassador in Turkey and the U.S.... Read more

Joint Chiefs of Staff Instructed Strategic Air Command to go to DEFCON 2 for the Only Confirmed Time in History

On the night of October 23, the Joint Chiefs of Staff instructed Strategic Air Command to go to DEFCON 2, for the only confirmed time in history.... Read more

"The Manchurian Candidate" Is Released

The Manchurian Candidate is a 1962 Cold War political thriller film starring Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey and Angela Lansbury, and featuring... Read more

Kennedy Issues Security Action Memorandum 199, Authorizing that Nuclear Weapons be Loaded onto Aircraft

At 1:45 a.m. on October 25, Kennedy responded to Khrushchev's telegram, stating that the U.S. was forced into action after receiving repeated... Read more

Fidel Castro Writes Letter to Khruschev in which he Urges the Soviet Union to Attack the US if it Invades Cuba

I would like to briefly express my own personal opinion. If [an invasion of Cuba] takes place and the imperialists invade Cuba with the aim of... Read more

John A. Scali of ABC Surreptitiously Meets with KGB Station Chief, Aleksandr Fomin

At 1:00 p.m., John A. Scali of ABC News had lunch with Aleksandr Fomin at Fomin's request. Fomin noted that "war seems about to break out" and... Read more

Rudolf Anderson, Jr., USAF Pilot, is Shot Down Over Banes, Cuba

While the meeting progressed, at 11:03 a.m. a new message began to arrive from Khrushchev. The message stated, in part, "You are disturbed over... Read more

Khruschev Announces Soviet Union will Remove Missiles from Cuba in Radio Moscow Address

After much deliberation between the Soviet Union and Kennedy's cabinet, Kennedy secretly agreed to remove all missiles set in Turkey on the border... Read more