Where were you in 1962 - Write about then...

1962

12/30/2010

1962 was a year colored by the Cuban Missile Crisis, an escalating involvement in Vietnam, the Berlin Wall and the Cold War with Russia, Civil Rights issues, a nascent space program, Nelson Mandela in prison, the Beatles, Rolling Stones and the death of Marilyn Monroe.

In the face of all of this, Pat, Judy and I blithely took off for Europe with the intention of traveling through Europe and North Africa until our money ran out.

There was no such thing as a cell phone, a computer, Twitter or Facebook. Our parents didn't hear from us for weeks on end. We wrote regularly, but letters took forever to deliver and we only vaguely knew where we would be next. It was a very cold winter and we followed the sun.

Where were you and what were you doing in 1962? Go to the Diary for the details.

18 Comments

Sue

1/3/2011 12:56:44 am

For some crazy reason, I decided to hurry through my years at Cornell to get married. That was certainly the expectation for many women in those days. So on December 22, 1962 I married my first husband. It was a beautiful winter wedding. I wore a cream velvet dress and the brides maids wore red. We honeymooned in the Pocono Mts. Then I went back to school for a month to finish final exams.

Sandy Hunt

1/5/2011 01:44:25 pm

In 1963, between my Sophomore and Junior years in college, I went with two friends on a road trip. We traveled through 42 states of the US and three provices of Canada. We each had $250.00 and that was the extent of our funding. Gas was 25 cents a gallon. We slept in camp grounds when possible, sometimes parks where we slept on the hood of the car and sometimes on empty beaches. Our parents had no idea of our whereabouts. The most memorable place was in Columbus, Ohio, where we looked up some long-lost relatives that were not at home. We went to the neighbors and this kind, older couple took us in for the night and packed a large lunch for us the next day that lasted several days. They didn't even know that we had the "California girls" look because they were blind. I have always been comforted by these generous people.

Harvey Hunt

1/6/2011 01:04:41 am

1963 was a big turning point in my life. I had been living in San Diego, going to college and having a great time. I felt it was time to get serious so I transferred to my home town college, Whittier, and tried to become a student.
It was a struggle because the expectations in my new school were a lot higher than I expected, but somehow I survived.

Karen Kent

1/6/2011 08:19:01 am

I was living in Mill Valley in the first house my first husband and I owned, and taking care of 2 toddlers. Susan was nearing 3 and Tom was almost 2. Ward had been discharged from the Army two years earlier and was in the Army reserves. The Cuban Missile crisis was the first time I can remember that national events impacted me personally. We had real fears that the reserves would be called up and we would not be able to live on his pay. I decided to have my Oregon teaching credential and my college records reviewed to see what to do to get a CA credential. I was missing one class--Audio Visual Aides--so I signed up to take it a USF in evening classes.

Felicia Coates Eppley

1/7/2011 05:37:01 am

In 1962, I was in graduate school at the University of Texas. I had wanted to go to George Washington University but my father thought that Washington was a dangerous place to be during the Cold War. If an attack came, DC would be high on the list for primary strikes. So, I settled, instead, for the University of Texas in Austin. I never did tell my father that, from my carrel in the library tower, I could see the airplanes lined up on the tarmac at the Strategic Air Command base on the outskirts of town.

In those days, history was primarily a male pursuit. I was only one of two women in the graduate section of the History Department and my presence was not readily acknowledged. . The fact that I was more interested in European History than in American History, the department’s major focus, also relegated me to a backwater. Mail addressed to me was routinely returned

My thesis advisor, born in the Middle West, was a specialist in Middle European History. He wore tweeds, smoked a pipe, affected an Austrian accent, called me Elizabeth and maneuvered me into researching Franco-Soviet relations between WWI and WWII about which I knew or cared nothing and for which there was no access to primary resources. I was reduced to paraphrasing Arnold Toynbee et al.

It was, therefore a relief, when Herr Professor moved on and I set about finding another mentor. I had taken a course in Western American History, which students referred to as “Buffalo Chips”, given by Dr. John Sunder, a delightful and enthusiastic teacher, who at the time, lived with his mother and carried his books in an old record case. I became eternally indebted to him when he agreed to be my advisor. He introduced me to a friend of his, a delightful woman, who was in charge of the archives of the missionary arm of the Episcopal Church. These archives were being housed in the local Episcopal seminary. At that moment, documents from missions in Alaska were being catalogued and the As had been completed. Thus I jettisoned my work in Franco-Soviet relations and found my self going over to the Episcopal Seminary every week, having tea and working my way through primary source documents relating to Anvik, the first Episcopal mission in Alaska. It was a delightful experience and I did, in 1963, receive an MA in History.

Suzanne Riley

1/7/2011 06:27:05 am

I was in 8th grade in 1962. We were all in love with a new guy at our junior high school named Jeff Westmoreland who was a surfer....for real...like he had actually been in the ocean on a surf board. "Going to surf city where it's two to one....two boys for every girl" sang the Beach Boys! I lived in Glendale CA. I remember going to the store with my Mom during the Cuban missile crises. People were grabbing things off the shelf in fear, but I remember my Mom saying..."It is not good to act out of fear. We will just shop normally for what we need as we always do". Good lesson.

Carla

1/8/2011 02:44:03 am

Summer 1962 my sister, her fiance and , my boyfriend (first husband) and I drove to a little village near Rimini Italia. 4 poor college kids, no money but we drove Wolframs fathers Mercedes. We stayed in a very cheap hotel, lived on peaches bread and some times pasta.
On our way to Rimini we stopped in Venice but we did not go to the Marcus Placa. We did not want to do what every body does. .... We were spacial!!!
One morning we read in the news paper that Marilyn Monroe had died.
On our way back to Germany after 3 weeks of lazy beach life we met my parents in Salzburg where they stayed in a beautiful hotel and I ate 2 big Wiener Schnitzel for dinner.

Bobbie Harms

1/9/2011 12:52:33 am

In 1962, I was a young 17 year old bride and the mother of a beautiful baby boy. As my first husband was overseas, I was living with my in-laws, a large loving family, in a rural setting in Milan, Michigan. Had I finished my high school years, this would have been my year of graduation. I was a happy young girl.

Charis Wedgeworth Smith

1/9/2011 10:16:59 pm

In January 1962 I had just married a Texan and begun adjusting. I learned terms like "blue norther" and "three alarm chili" which I cooked in a match box kitchen with one counter and half a cabinet - the other half was pipes from the sink.
I taught in the growing Spring Branch School District in the second middle school they opened. I drove from the inner city to the last exit on the Katy Freeway. Twenty more exits and fifty years later, it's still know by that name. Roads are called by where they go, not by the map number. Our biggest worry about the Cuban Misile was what we would do if war erupted in the middle of the day, and we couldn't send children home.
All in all, it was a good year. Gas was cheap for trips to the beach in Galveston. The low point was a wall heater not equal to even the mildest Houston winters, so I graded papers in mittens.

Derek Chin link

1/13/2011 04:57:52 am

There's a good chance I was still wearing diapers.
I was born in November 1959, so I'd turn 3 later in 1962. Of course, an early genius, I'm sure I was already reading the funny papers by then. Just kidding.
When I was born to my 22 year old father and 19 year old mother, we lived with my grandparents in a 2-flat building on Montgomery Street just above Broadway. After serving in the US Army Air Force during WWII, as a tailgunner who'd been shot down over Germany and taken a POW for some months, my grandfather returned to San Francisco and became one of the first, if not the first, Chinese real estate brokers in the City. "Dick Chin Realtors" was a fixture at 813 Clay Street above Grant Avenue in Chinatown for over 35 years. I still remember the green with white squares linoleum, and the ashtray stand on which you'd push a knob down and the cigarette butts and ashes would spin downward and out of sight.
Little did I know that 22 years later, I'd become a third-generation SF Realtor.
A funny story: My grandfather's real estate office was a campaign headquarter for Harold Dobbs, a SF attorney and politician who ran for Mayor in the 1960s. His law partner, John Doty, was Marcia Doty's first husband. Marcia told me John Doty was most likely present during a big campaign party, complete with fireworks and lion dancing. I was there, too. If I had the foresight, I could have walked up to John Doty and said, "In 30 years, I'm going to grow up and your wife will be my real estate business partner."
In 1962, my father bought our first house, a newly constructed 3 bedroom, 2 bath modern home with a 2 car side-by-side garage and a view of Glen Canyon and Diamond Heights (then only a grassy hill). I may be imagining this, but I seem to recall spending lots of time on the Harvest Gold wall to wall carpet.
One thing I distinctly remember, it was on that carpet that I sat and watched JFK's funeral procession on TV in 1963. For some reason I was mesmerized by the shape of the flag-draped casket. It's one of my earliest recollections, and I don't really remember anything else about that day or the event.

Dan Buchalter

11/4/2018 06:24:48 am

Hello Derek, I was just doing a web search on 'Dick Chin Realtors' this morning because I just sold something online to someone that I correctly guessed is located not far from where 'Dick Chin Realtors' was at least when that company was a client of mine in the late 70's through maybe late 80's (I was a real estate attorney at the time and used to represent several landlords and property managers) and found your post. My contact there was Susan Tinloy (I think she got married at some point and her name changed). The reason I'm contacting you (if this web site is still active and you see this response) is that, like your grandfather (who I may never actually have met), my father was in the US Army Air Force in Europe in WWII, based in England. He was assigned to a fighter base and spent most of his time there in Intelligence, which was photo reconnaissance mainly to support bombing raids. So it is possible that some work my father did might have supported what your grandfather did. And I just made my first trip to England this year to visit WWII air war related sites, including a brief stop at what remains of his air base. I even have maybe over 40 original 8x10 photos from that time, including those showing plotted-out bombing runs (big wall maps with yarn or string held in place by pins), and others showing the effects of bombing runs (craters all over the ground, photographed from very high altitude). I'm starting to give away some of those photos, so if you'd like 1 or 2 of them, please let me know. And if your grandfather is still alive (my father passed away relatively young, in 1984), please thank him for his service, for me.

Ron

1/20/2011 05:32:07 am

In 1962-63, I was approaching my teenage years. My sister and I would now be called latch-key kids, since we stayed at home after school by ourselves while our parents worked; but we knew how to amuse our selves without video games or a computer. What a difference a few years make - we did not worry about someone "grabbing us". We wandered around the neighborhood, playing with friends, having a good time; never worried about locking a door - boy, have times changed.

Annette

1/20/2011 09:05:52 am

In 1962 I was just a teenager, 14 going on 15. Living in Germany and only dreaming of other places in the world. Not aware of the Cuban missile crisis, I think, no TV and not that much interest of political goings on in my Dad's intellectual "Frankfurter Allgemeine" newspaper. We were not allowed to use the phone for anything except emergency use. Most of my interest was necking with boys older than myself never letting on my age. Reading romantic stories. Jazz, however, was my passion, probably because there were opportunities to hang out with my best friend whose brothers played the saxophone, be "cool" and to meet boys. Now that I think of it, it must have been extremely loud then too.
I think I was just enjoying growing out of my 10 year old "chubby" body. Back-combing my hair and then pinning it up to look older was popular then and I think the hoola hoop was in vogue then too. Also busy being a "mommy" to my little brothers and sister (10/11 years my juniors). Weekends were spent in the country cottage, no distractions, only nature and board games and drawing and crafts.

Michael Lewis

1/27/2011 04:49:12 am

In 1962, I was beginning high school in New York--Christian Brothers Academy. Very quickly, another boy and I were targeted as the class sissies and the bullying commenced. The teachers did nothing and I did not dare tell my parents for fear of what they might think about their son. It was a time of great pain. However, long-term benefits emerged from the experience. I made a conscious decision to "show them all" by performing at the top of my class. I learned self-reliance and compassion for others. I learned what it is like to be different and to cherish differences in a world that values sameness. I dreamed big Ivy League dreams for myself and cried myself to sleep many nights--waiting impatiently for the chance to move out and to move on. As I reflect back on those high schools days--beginning in 1962--I still feel the pain from the bullying. But I also feel pride in what I have done with my life as a teacher and teacher educator and as a husband to a wonderful, wonderful man. As they say in the current media debate over bullying of GLTB children and youth, "It does get better."

Janelle

1/30/2011 02:12:29 pm

I was 15 years old and experimenting with my boyfriend's anatomy (while remaining a virgin). I still watched the Mickey Mouse Show with my youngest sister (she was 9). It was my job to be caring for Delynne while my Mom was preparing dinner. So, it was The Mousekateers; where I would sing and dance my heart out to Mousekateer routines and wish I was one of them! By that time we had been to Disneyland 4 times (my Dad was one of Disney Properties attorneys) and the family got a free trip once a year. My asperations were limited to being a guide at Disneyland in the summertime when going off to college. BIG IN MY MIND - my Mom and the woman next door to us had a major falling out over Betty Friedan's Book, The Feminine Mystique. My mother thought "Jean" was "a horrible person for reading such trash"! Wow, did that touch a nerve or WHAT??? So, I asked my Grandma (my Dad's mother and a true feminist) to buy the book for me. All I really retained at the time of my first reading was that there were better things my mother could talk about, beside gossip, and her choice of detergent - TIDE OR ALL. Another job I had in the family was to hang all the clothes and sheets out on the clothesline each day. This is when I started steeling Chesterfield Cigarettes from my Dad's desk and taught myself how to smoke (outside under the clothesline where no one could see me)! SUCH A WOMAN!!

Janelle

1/31/2011 10:40:04 am

I wanted to add a P.S. to my comments from yesterday. We had a neighbor who was a member of the John Birtch Society who was so sure the "Russians Were Coming". Prior to 1962, having experience the "pretend" raids where we hid under our desks at school, this same man had built a bomb shelter in his back yard. In 1962 his son and I hid out in the shelter and shared our biggest secrets and smoked more of my Dad's Chesterfield Cigarettes.

Susie

2/5/2011 12:24:08 pm

1962! Wow! Being that I am working on my 50th high school reunion for the class of '61, I was in my first year of college. I was headed on to my dream of becoming a teacher. I was going to save the world and concerned about all the poverty, violence, and injustices. I would have made a perfect "flower child", but ended up just being a bystander.

Phil Roos

2/18/2011 12:31:27 am

I added this comment to the first day, but it really belongs here.
I was there before their story began. I was a graduate student at MIT at the time, and Pat and I had dated, on and off, from my senior year in high school. Pat, Dede and Judy visited me in Cambridge, MA a few days before their departure for Europe. After a day or two I drove Dede and Judy to White River Junction, VT where they caught a bus to Montreal to board the ship. Pat stayed with me a couple of more days and then followed them. (At least that is how I remember it.) After they left I continued to study for my upcoming qualifying exam. While they toured Europe, I slaved away as a grad student at MIT - lots of fun. I guess in the end it all worked out well, since Pat and I married at the end of 1964. She only had to endure the life of a graduate students wife for only eight months.

1962

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