This chapter describes John F. Kennedy's time as president, during a period considered the height of government and media hyperbole in support of civil defense measures. Kennedy advised citizens to build and stock fallout shelters in their homes, creating his civil defense hype to counter the political appeal of his rival, New York governor Nelson Rockefeller, a devoted supporter of civil defense. Rockefeller failed in his effort to require fallout shelters for all citizens of New York, which was partially defeated by hundreds of marching female anti-civil defense protesters in Albany. Meanwhile, housewives, students, Catholic workers, and members of the War Resisters League turned the 1960 and 1961 New York City Operation Alert exercises into the largest mass peace actions since the 1930s. They revitalized the American peace movement, adopting the direct action style of American Gandhism and providing tactical inspiration for the larger revolts that shaped the 1960s.
Keywords: John F. Kennedy, civil defense, defense policy, bomb shelters, Nelson Rockefeller, War Resisters League, peace movement