Monday was the 49th anniversary of air raid sirens being sounded in Chicago at 10:30 PM for five minutes. This “sent thousands rushing into the streets and caused near panic in almost every section of the city” in fear of the start of a nuclear war, as the Chicago Tribune later reported. The Chicago White Sox had just won the American League pennant, their first pennant in 40 years, and city officials had ordered the sounding in celebration. Morons all.
I was 8 at the time, so I only have a vague memory of it. After checking the radio and tv stations and hearing nothing about a war, in a few minutes and we calmed down. But a family member later said he expected to see mushroom clouds over downtown.
how can you not see the humor in a city causing a panic by some idiot thinking it was a good idea to sound the air raid sirens to celebrate a baseball game? I’m sure it was scary at the time, but looking back from 50 years later if you can’t laugh then you’ve got a real stick up your ass.
The irony of the air raid sirens, is that it was White Sox fans who were most frightened. “We finally win the pennant . . . and the Series will be cancelled on account of nuclear war!”
My Mother was in Chicago that day, & 20 years later, a mention on a TV news broadcast made her cry. Just sob in fear. For 30-40 minutes.
She wasn’t married, then, & was trapped downtown, away from her parents; just a kid, scared out of her mind.
There’s no stick in anybody’s behind. Nuclear War was a very, very real possibility, then.
You wanna laugh? Go laugh at the Orson Welles Martian Panic. I’ve got a copy of the broadcast on CD. And several books on the subject. No real Martians.
But death, a very real, very possible death, with no hope of escape?
Living with roomates in the San Luis Obispo area, we had evacuation sirens that would go off should Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant decided to dust us up with Mr. Fission’s byproducts.
One morning, about 7:30, I was lying in bed and the siren went off. I was wild eyed, as were my roomates trying to tune in radio or TV with the story. Nothing. Then the siren started faltering and went off. Turns out a maintenance crew accidently turned it on by accident.