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I found this in my Dad's office. Prepared in Dec 1963 by The Survival Committee of Needham, MA which was an advisory committee to the Director of Needham's Department of Civil Defense. Seemed pretty serious and scary to me, same fear people face today IMO. I mean this is a small town of less than 30k now (25k then), but yes only 10 miles west of Boston.
They were still holding the duck and cover drills when I was in elementary school in the early 70's. Might be why so many from my generation take a nuke threat seriously. As another poster said at least there was preparation. The schools were designated fallout shelters as I remember.
There were fallout shelters in the cities. They were just buildings on the street with signs on them. We were told that the flash of light would be the brightest light we had ever seen and that meant that we were to run to the nearest shelter. Of course, it would have been too late and most of us knew that deep down inside.
In school we were led to the basement of the building where we were lined up sitting on the floor in the dark. Our classroom drills had us crouched under our desks with our hands covering our necks. Wouldn't have done much good.
We were told to build air raid shelters in our backyards and how to stock them. There were philosophical arguments about whether or not you would let your unprepared neighbor into your shelter if the time came.
Prepared or not, we knew deep down that if we ever survived and opened the door of the shelter when it was all over, there would be no reason to want to live. And there would be so much radiation that we probably wouldn't have survived anyway.
But at least we felt that in their own way, the powers that be were trying to help us. It was scary back then but I am much more afraid today because no one is looking out for people and no one seems to care. Today it feels as though no one is in charge and the powers that be don't care about anyone. Somehow even though it was scary back then, at least there was a feeling of cohesiveness, that we were all in this together. Nothing like that today in this hate filled shadow of a country that used to be.
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