Co-curator Michael Scheibach discusses and shows images from “Alert Today, Alive Tomorrow,” a Kansas City Public Library exhibit chronicling the atomic age.  Mr. Scheibach, author of “Atomic Narratives and American Youth,” and “In Case the Bombs Fall,” examines how Americans coped with the ever-present threat of nuclear war in the post-world war two era.   This event was held at the Kansas City Public Library in Missouri. 

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On November 1, 1952 the U.S. conducted its first test of a hydrogen bomb at Eniwetok, an atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The 10.4 megaton explosion generated a three-mile-wide fireball. It also left a mile-wide crater with a depth of 175 feet. This is a 1952 film produced by the Defense Department and the Atomic Energy Commission titled, "Operation Ivy."

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On July 16th, 1945, the United States conducted the first test of an atomic bomb, code named Trinity, three weeks before the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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Peter Hannaford is the author of "Presidential Retreats: Where the Presidents Went and Why They Went There." He spoke at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library about the getaways that have offered the nation's chief executives solace, recreation and privacy.   

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50 years ago, on April 16, 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” while being held in prison for his involvement in a city-wide civil rights protest called the Birmingham Campaign. King’s daughter, Bernice King, CEO of the King Center in Atlanta, joins Alabama’s governor, Birmingham’s Mayor and others for the unveiling of a historical marker aside the Birmingham Jail.

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This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Birmingham civil rights campaign. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his famed “Letter from Birmingham Jail” after being arrested for taking part in the protests. The campaign gained national attention after local officials used dogs and water cannons on kids after they took to the streets in what was known as the “Children’s Crusade.” A panel of authors and historians recall the turmoil of the time, as well as how Birmingham has chosen to remember its past. This event was part of the Alabama Historical Association’s annual conference.

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At the direction of Congress, the voices and experiences from the Civil Rights Movement of the mid-20^th century are being documented in an oral history project. This effort is a collaboration of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture, the Library of Congress and the Southern Oral History Program at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

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This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Birmingham Civil Rights Campaign in Alabama. The protests gained national attention after local officials used dogs and water cannons on kids after they took to the streets in what was known as the “Children’s Crusade.” This event features first-person accounts of the events in Birmingham that spring, including remarks by those who took part in the children’s protest, as well as student leaders of a boycott of segregated businesses. The discussion took place at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham. 

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June 10th marks the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s commencement address at American University, when he called for high-level negotiations with the Soviet Union, a nuclear test ban treaty and an end to the Cold War.  This is a conversation with two veteran journalists, Tom Brokaw and Nick Clooney, on the Kennedy presidency and the significance of his “Peace Speech.”  This program is hosted by American University’s School of Communication and the Newseum, which is featuring two new exhibits on the Kennedy presidency – “Three Shots Were Fired” and "Creating Camelot".

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