Cold War Interview
Carol Hughes
Carol Hughes
- During the Cold War we lived in New Mexico then Colorado. Yes living here had influences on my experience it felt like you wanted to be by family. Politics were a big talk when we got back to Colorado, nuclear talk. Also in Albuquerque they were developing the nuclear bomb, of course we didn't know about it but we knew something was up.
- Fears we had were that there was going to be a nuclear war was our main fear, after the Bay of Pigs we thought there would be nuclear retaliation. We both left work to meet at home that how much we thought it could happen.
- We heard that it was wrong and bad but at the same time watched a lot of innocent people being accused and thought it was wrong. Directors and movie stars were taken to trial, questioned, careers ruined by Mccarthy.
- Not much with civil defense efforts because we were out of school but all you would do was hide under your desk. Colorado Springs was home of Norad and had the defense system set up in Cheyenne Mountain.
- We had trust in Kennedy the President we felt like the right things were being done.
- Khrushchev the leader of Russia seems to be ruthless, that was fearful just not knowing what he was going to do.We reacted to this by watching a lot of news and keeping as updated as possible.
- I do think nuclear war is still possible. I think cyber war and those things are our biggest national issue.
- One lesson I learned is that fear leads to a lot of mistakes and misconceptions