Regardless of what anyone thinks of Kennedy, the U.S. and the world came very close to an all out nuclear war.<<<<
I well remember was a young teenager all the waiting for the crisis to go one way or the other. My neighbors had brought out guns, which was so strange to me as I had never seen one in the neighborhood or even up close. I wondered what they thought they would use them for if we got bombed.
People were nervous wrecks, and everyone was gathered around radios and TV to see what was going to happen. No ‘net, no cable stations, no cell phones, LOL, just the newspapers, TV and radio.
Most today don't realize, and many at the time didn't realize that we had warships out there dropping depth charges on top of Soviet submarines...That had nuclear missiles on them... Even our commanders didn't know this until much later.
We, and the world, were truly on the brink.
I was in high school then and one afternoon during the height of the crisis, a USAF F-102 (we had a squadron based in the area) hit his afterburners right above us and set off the loudest damn sonic boom I ever heard.
Some kids dove on the floor --- they thought it was an atom bomb going off. Girls started crying.
It was a damn tense time.