If you couldn't get to the fallout shelter, then duck and cover

In the early 1960s, Americans were digging in — literally.

The Cold War had the United States on high alert. Cuba began seeking arms from Eastern Bloc nations. Following the failed 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed to Cuba's request to place nuclear missiles in Cuba.

All of this escalated into the Cuban missile crisis in 1962.

For many people in the United States, the missiles were too close for comfort. Fear and tension hung over the country like the mushroom cloud it feared.

President John Kennedy was encouraging home fallout shelters as a national priority. Ads for personal fallout shelters became as common in the newspapers as stories about the nuclear threat itself. For $999, you could own an all-steel bomb shelter with shelves for food, water pumps and a toilet.

Kennedy later altered his stance on home shelters and instead encouraged community fallout shelters. The Community Fallout Shelter Program began in September 1961.

Indiana Gov. Harold Handley approved plans for an atomic fallout shelter to accommodate 6,000 people in the new State Office Building complex. Other shelters were located in the sub-basement of the City-County Building, the Statehouse, the old Indiana Bell Telephone building, the old Federal Building, the World War Memorial, churches, schools and the basement of The Indianapolis Star building. There were at least 200 community fallout shelters throughout Marion County.

To lighten the tension, Indianapolis even crowned a “Miss Fallout Shelter.”

In 1971, The Star interviewed Indianapolis businessman James Marbaugh, who built at least two dozen shelters in the city, including one for himself. He quit his sewer construction business to manufacture home shelters. When the community shelters were favored, the home shelter movement evaporated, leaving Marbaugh $15,000 in the hole and overstocked with canned goods and radiation kits. Overall, an estimated 150 home fallout shelters were built in Indianapolis at that time.

Fortunately, the shelters were never used, although some were converted into storage areas or safe places to go during tornadoes.

Call IndyStar producer Dawn Mitchell at (317) 444-6497. Follow her on Twitter: @dawn_mitchell61.

What’s ‘duck and cover’?

Fallout shelters were only one of the local results of the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion and the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. Others were:

• In schools, students practiced the “duck and cover” maneuver (crouching under the desk and covering your head) in the event of a nuclear attack.

• People who were fearful of radioactivity carried around a “Chirpee,” a pen-sized Geiger counter to measure ionizing radiation.

• In November 1961, The Indianapolis Star had a full-page feature on survival chances, and a clip sheet of fallout facts and supply needs.

• The American Red Cross held instructional courses on how to treat radiation burns.

► Upbeat activity: Map how a nuclear blast would affect your city

► Fallout facts: Nov. 5, 1961, Indianapolis Star full page feature on survival chances, facts and fallout shelters