Anyone remember school drills in the 60s?

[undeterred]

We were afraid that the communists were going to drop a bomb on us. We all went down into the basement single file. Now that was a threat you could sort of make sense of, even though you didn't really understand it.

[2on2u]

1. Scared the bejeebus out of us..... yes it did. n/t

[spockeye]

2. Yes.

I attended school in Texas. Everyone has bomb shelters. $$$

[RKP5637]

3. Yep, we had them in the 50's too. Sit on the floor by the hall wall, head down, arms crossed over

your head and don't look at any bright flashes. ... and in the classrooms climb under the desks and do the same.

[upaloopa]

4. Yeah the civil defense turrtle said to duck and cover

[PoliticAverse]

10. Duck.... and Cover!...

[Surya Gayatri]

19. Thanks for the memories, PA. Was going to look for this myself.

I remember seeing this in my grade school classroom in the 50s and doing the "Duck and Cover drill"!

We all had scary visions of the dreaded Mushroom Cloud...

[Archae]

5. Fire drills, but that's all.

I hated those when it was raining or it was -5 degrees outside with "brisk" winds.

[Marrah_G]

6. 10+ years ago my kids had gun/intruder drills

When I was in school in the 70's and 80's it was only fire drills...

[Journeyman]

7. "Be sure to face away from the windows, children. . ."

"Be sure to face away from the windows, children. The greatest danger in a nuclear attack is flying glass."

Yeah, in a nuclear attack your primary worry will be molten glass in your ass.

[baldguy]

8. In our elementary school, the bomb shelter was under the gym floor.

It was huge & awesome - in a classical brutalist mid-century sort of way. 20ft ceilings, concrete arches, dim incandescent lights overhead. They stopped using it in the '70s & gave it over to storage & the kids got to play on the grass during safety drills.

[moondust]

9. Duck and Cover.

[CountAllVotes]

11. yeah I do

and even as a little kid I failed to see how my desk was going to save me if we were blown up by a bomb.

Nope, never did quite "get it" ... not that I wanted to!

[adigal]

21. Me too. I lived. Right near NYC, how was putting my arms over my neck

Going to,save me from a nuclear attack?

[prairierose]

24. That is exactly the question I asked my Dad a few years ago...

we were watching something about the cuban missle crisis. I said, ..."was having us file into the hall and cover ourselves with our coats so that we would be incinerated in nice neat rows to make it seem as if we were doing something useful?"

We lived in NJ just outside NYC.

[ThoughtCriminal]

12. Surprisingly - We never did.

I think we were so close to a juicy bulls-eye that if they Soviet missiles were on the way, they would have just sent us outside to play.

[Cleita]

13. I remember duck and cover.

What a joke. It would have been more accurate to bend over and kiss your ass good-by because there was no way you were going to survive a nuke by pulling your sweater over your head and hiding under your desk.

[Cha]

14. Yes, I vaguely remember them.. and when I just talked

to my sister who teaches grade school in New York.. she told me of the "Lock Down" drills that they have in their school.

They just had a real incident not too long ago where a pissed off boyfriend was "threatening" and a mother called 911 and the school was notified immediately and they went into Lock Down until he was arrested and the police still came out and checked the building to make sure no one was in there who shouldn't be.

[undeterred]

15. So that threat never materialized

and with few exceptions I cannot ever remember being afraid at school or hearing of some terrible unsafe thing happening at school.

I can't imagine being afraid of somebody's brother or father going crazy and shooting up an elementary school or a theatre or a mall.

I can't imagine a local swat team having practices at the elementary school...

I can't imagine children preparing for these kinds of events...

[OldDem2012]

16. Yes. Lived in St. Pete, FL from 1958 to 1964. Stressful times even for a kid. nt.

[MannyGoldstein]

17. We lined up in the hallway, facing the wall.

New York City.

[jerseygal]

18. In the 1950's, I remember a siren would sound and we

would be told to sit under our desks and put our hands at the back of our necks with our arms covering our ears.

How this was supposed to protect us from radiation, I never quite understood once I learned what radiation was.

But what I do remember was the fear that something bad was going to happen.

I think what is going on is worse now - schools under lockdown, random shootings in movie theaters or malls or churchs as well as school.

[undeterred]

22. I think the threat of a foreign enemy is totally different

than the threat of someone from your own community. Now the threat of communism seems like it was pretty trumped up. But the threat of violence at school popping up just about anywhere now is all too real.

[adigal]

20. We do lockdown drills now

Once or twice a year

[TheCowsCameHome]

23. 50's: Under the school desk until the all-clear was sounded.