February 17, 1962...wazzup?

Huzzah! My internet has remained connected for nearly three days! No funky screens with diagrams of broken components, no flashing red light on the modem. No wondering if I should post Mosaic Monday on Wednesday or just wait till next week. I'm going to celebrate by finding out what was being reported by the Los Angeles Times 50 years ago.

Former presidential candidate Richard Nixon refused to endorse a couple of Republican congressional candidates who were members of the John Birch Society. Remember them? I see on Wikipedia that they consider themselves anti-totalitarian and strict original constitutionalists (meaning what? that they believe in counting slaves as 3/5 of a person? or that only white men can vote?)  Hmmm...Wikipedia says Fred Koch was a founding member. Where have I heard that name before? Anyway, the John Birchers were very much against the Civil Rights Movement, believing it was riddled with Communists.

Since Nixon was mulling a run for governor--and shaking hands and kissing babies as he toured gold country up north--that was news. He made that run and lost--this picture is from October. (what is that stuffed animal doing on the ladder?)

We were getting ready to shoot John Glenn into space--that anniversary will be on Feb 20--fist man to orbit earth!

Conductor Bruno Walter died in Beverly Hills on Feb. 17, 1962--at his home, and the address was thoughtfully given on the front page of the paper. TV actor Joseph Kearns--Mr. Wilson on Dennis the Menace--died also, after spending a week in a coma following a cerebral hemorrhage.

Our population was up by 58,870 in one year. The city of Los Angeles boasted 2, 572,616 people, and the county: 6,332,538.

The photo on the left is not from the Times, but from the Hollywood Citizen News/Valley Times collection of the Los Angeles Library. I include it because it's dated February 15, 1962. It shows the Lenack family of Reseda stocking their backyard fallout shelter.  Seriously. "Their underground shelter houses a TV set, phone, canned goods, lanterns, and furniture," according to the library notes. And pillows.