David Kroenlein
Editor’s Note: 50 Events is one of the most popular items on the 1960 Reunion Website. It is being republished as one of the Top 20 in 2020. Are there 10 more events from 1957-60 that have emerged as significant and should be added?
The 50 Events were compiled by David Kroenlein and friends for the 2010 Messenger
Wichita High School East Class of 1960
Fifty Events for Our Fiftieth Reunion
Thanks to Wikipedia, Google, and the Internet generally, we put together a list of 50 events that occurred during our high school years. Some of these events were important for us at the time and influenced our lives in the years following graduation, and some foreshadowed events that would prove to have a major effect on our lives in the years after our graduation even thought we may not have been aware of them at the time. Other items were important to us at the time, but not so much since graduation. And some were, and still are, ironically amusing. We do not suggest that these are the most important events, but maybe they will provide topics of conversation and recollections at the Reunion. We hope they trigger memories, reflection and conversations for us.
1957
John Lennon and Paul McCartney meet in July. (They become The Beatles in August, 1960.)
The Class of 1960 enters East High School in August.
American Bandstand goes national in August.
President Eisenhower orders federal troops to escort the Little Rock Nine to class at Little Rock Central High after Gov. Faubus uses the National Guard to prevent their enrollment in September.
The USSR launches Sputnik 1 in October.
Toyota begins exporting automobiles to the U.S. in October.
“Leave It to Beaver” debuts and Dan Castellaneta (the voice of Homer Simpson) is born in October.
Boeing 707 flies for the first time in December.
“Gunsmoke” is the top TV show for the years 1957-60.
Chrysler produces the 300C, powered by a 392 cubic inch, 375 horsepower V-8 engine.
Irritated about being fired for being pregnant, Betty Friedan surveys her female college classmates in the spring at the time of the 15th college reunion on their views of the roles of women.
The Bob Cousy Fan Club and Dave Alldritt are overjoyed as Cousy is selected as the NBA’s most valuable player in the 1957 All-Star Game, and for the 1956-57 season, and leads the Boston Celtics to its first of eleven consecutive NBA Championships.
1958
The European Economic Community is founded in January.
LEGO patents its modern bricks in January.
Nikita Krushchev becomes premier of the USSR in March.
Elvis is inducted into the U.S. Army in March.
IBM delivers the first compiler for FORTRAN scientific programming in April.
Plans for the construction of Atlas ICBM missile silos, including in Kansas, become public in April.
Eddie Fisher and Liz Taylor wed in May following his divorce from Debbie Reynolds.
The Carney brothers open the first Pizza Hut in June at Bluff and Kellogg.
Picketing and sit-ins begin at Dockums in Wichita in July.
NASA is established in July.
Michael Jackson is born in August.
Jack Kilby demonstrates the first integrated circuit in September with subsequent improvements by Robert Noyce.
The John Birch Society is founded in December with Fred Koch of Wichita as a founding member.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story is published.
1959
The HIV-1 sequence is identified in blood plasma collected in 1959.
An Eveready Battery engineer invents the long-lasting alkaline battery.
Pantyhose are introduced by Glen Raven Mills.
Fidel Castro enters Havana in January and become premier in February.
Alaska achieves statehood in January and Hawaii in August.
Barry Gordy, Jr. founds Motown records in January.
Richie Valens, Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper die in an airplane crash in February.
Renee Fleming is born in February.
Lee Petty wins the first Daytona 500 in February.
Mattel introduces Barbie in March.
Major Dale Buis and MSgt. Chester Ovnand are the first U.S. military casualties in Vietnam in July.
The Clutter family is murdered in Holcomb in November.
Charles Van Doren admits to Congress that game show Twenty One gave him answers, and disc jockey Alan Freed is fired for refusing to sign an affidavit that he did not take payola in November.
1960
John F. Kennedy announces his candidacy for president in January.
3,500 troops are sent to Viet Nam in March.
Sabin oral polio vaccine tested in large-scale clinical trial in Cincinnati in April.
Bono is born in May.
Civil Rights Act of 1960 became law in May after a lengthy filibuster.
Francis Gary Powers and his U-2 are shot down by the USSR in May.
The first laser is demonstrated in May.
East High School Class of 1960 graduates on June 1.
Jeff Farrell qualifies for the U.S. Olympic Swimming Team in August, six days after having an appendectomy and subsequently wins two gold medals in relays at the Rome Olympics.
Cassius Clay wins the light heavy weight championship, and Wilma Rudolph wins three sprinting gold medals at the Rom Olympic in September.
Through 1960, African nations achieve independence as colonialism ends.
Editor’s Note: Thanks to John Van Slyke for sharing this photo of David at the Vietnam War Memorial following the memorial service for our classmate Dave Miller at Arlington National Cemetery.
And how many things would we have even noted then? I so wanted that 300C Chrysler instead of our Saratoga four door…but ever after I always owned at least one convertible. I understand the Dockums sit-ins were blocked from being reported as news by advertising pressure on the Wichita Eagle and Beacon papers from what one person involved with the papers told me. The yellow and brown Dash-80 707 prototype was at the Boeing plant various times in 1958 at least….great coloring. Thanks for the collection. Gene C.
David, Thanks for doing this research.
. Note for the archives: the Bob Cousy Fan Club met in the basement recreation room at Art Casado’s home; and was officially designated as the “furthest west” by the Boston Celtics.
. The item about Castro entering Havana brings to mind the geography lesson during the Cuban Missile Crisis . . . that Cuba was only 90 miles from Florida.
. We have lived in interesting times.
. Somehow fitting that the 50 event history starts with the Beatles. Just yesterday, a friend from our Wichita days, Larry Haddock, whose father was a B-47 pilot at McConnell AFB, now a retired Georgia Tech Professor, sent me a video of the “Hey Jude” performance at Prince Albert Hall by Paul McCartney, Elton John and Sting. Will post below.
Just have been “reading up” in anticipation of the reunion.
David – a wonderful review of the historic events that occurred during our high school years.
And Lee – what a fab video. A great find. Thank you for sharing. Brought back such great memories.
Kay Ellen 🌻 🌻
(Consolver)
kconsolver@mac.com