CAP remembers President Kennedy

[Eclipse]

http://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/JFKWHP-1962-05-07-A.aspx





It would be interesting to hear some perspective from the cadets in these photos, they themselves being well into their retirement years.

Note in his remarks he addresses the timely concern about missiles replacing manned aircraft, essentially the same
issue as the drone vs. manned aircraft debate fifty years later:



Of course with respect to the last line, he was well on his way to his storied Naval career by the time CAP was initially chartered,
having been disqualified for Army service because of his infamous back issues.

[Eclipse]

I had the opportunity about 20 years ago to get to Dealey Plaza during a business trip to Dallas, and I have to say its a surreal place.

This would have been only shortly after the 6th Floor Museum opened, and as Dallas was finally coming to terms with
their circumstantial involvement in Kennedy's assassination. 

It was after Stone's movie, but before Dealey became the macabre tourist attraction it is today.  It was essentially empty.

I'm glad I was able to see it before it became a circus.

[Майор Хаткевич]

Took a class on JFK in college. It was a great learning experience for someone who wasn't even born a quarter century after the assassination.

When my JR. High started a "technology class" rotation, I didn't get to do Model Rocketry, even though I requested it. (The following year, all students got to rotate through ALL the tech classes). I got into model rocketry on my own because of that, and arranged to take all rockets from the school after students were done, and was a founding member of the model rocketry club. On the anniversary of the assassination, in 2003, I named a few rockets I fired that day JFK-1 and so on (all others were my initials - MVH-XX). Back then the History channel actually had history programs, so being a history guy, I watched JFK specials after the launches.

[Eclipse]

Very cool.  (From Cadet Blog)

FORMER CADET REMEMBERS PRESIDENT KENNEDY
http://www.capmembers.com/cadet_programs/?former_cadet_remembers_president_kennedy&show=entry&blogID=1154





"A simple Google search located her. She's Dr. Julianne Glowacki. Dr. Glowacki earned her PhD from Harvard and is now a distinguished scientist at one of America's top hospitals, Brigham & Women's in Boston. That cadet you see smiling at JFK went on to establish the Children's Hospital Plastic Surgery Research Laboratory and is an internationally recognized scientist in the field of orthopedic research. I spoke with Dr. Glowacki via email today. Here's what she said:

I am that cadet – Major Glowacki.  Civil Air Patrol was important in my development, giving me experiences in teaching course such as "Power for Aircraft" and "Navigation and Weather", giving me leadership training, and teaching me the importance of service to community, in light of the many search missions we undertook.  Those tools provided a foundation for both career and citizenship.  I was primarily part of the unit at the Naval Air Station in Weymouth Massachusetts and also participated in activities with the unit at the Fargo Building, Boston, Massachusetts.  Can you imagine the thrill for an inner-city high-school girl to become Massachusetts Cadet of the Year and visit the White House and Congress?  As the cadet representing Massachusetts, I vividly remember my conversation with Pres. Kennedy at the moment of that photo on May 7, 1962.    He shook my hand and asked where I went to school (Girls' Latin School) and where I lived (Dorchester).  He commented that his Mother and I were neighbors!  He asked about my aspirations (a career in medical research) and wished me well.  I have many pictures from that tour to Dayton, Washington, and New York, but I expect that you have all the archives.  I very recently discovered that my Father's cousin and her husband, Capt. Josie and Lt. Al Farnsworth, were adult leaders in the Swampscott MA unit at that town's high school.  We talked today about sharing our photos and memories of experiences in the CAP.


You'll find CAP cadet alumni in all walks of life. If anyone is able to identify other cadets in the JFK photos, share your findings in the comments.


"Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men."  -- President Kennedy"

[bosshawk]

Interesting stuff on cadets of that day.  I was an Army Captain, MI, serving in Seoul, Korea on that fateful day.  We were awakened around 4 or 5 AM on Sat: Korea being about 15-16 hours ahead of Dallas.  We went into DEFCON Three after the shooting became known: didn't know how North Korea would react.  Sat around my office in G-2, Eighth Army in my combat uniform all day.  We were finally released late in the afternoon.  Remember, no satellite TV in those days.  We had to depend on tapes being flown across the Pacific and then broadcast on Armed Forces Radio and TV.  I have never forgotten that day.

[THRAWN]

Here's my issue with things like this: great that she enjoyed being a Cadet. Great that she enjoyed meeting the President. Great that she has had a wonderful medical career. Why did it take a Google search to find her? Why are these wonderfully successful people who have obviously gotten so much out of the Cadet Program, not aggressively retained after their time as a Cadet? We see it all the time. I see it often. I still keep in touch with some of my former Cadets and there is not a conversation where I don't say "We need people like you, come back!" We're bleeding talent.

"A simple Google search located her. She's Dr. Julianne Glowacki. Dr. Glowacki earned her PhD from Harvard and is now a distinguished scientist at one of America's top hospitals, Brigham & Women's in Boston. That cadet you see smiling at JFK went on to establish the Children's Hospital Plastic Surgery Research Laboratory and is an internationally recognized scientist in the field of orthopedic research."

[Eclipse]

For the same reason that high schools and colleges have alumni committees to constantly track down donors graduates.

72(ish) years x 20% churn based on 60,000 members a year is over 860,000 people (probably more) to keep track of in a pre-personal
computer universe where even today records are spotty and whole segments of people who purport military service
can't verify it for various reasons.

A lot of members, especially cadets, get what they needed / wanted from CAP and then leave, never to think about it again.
Units close, people move on, records are lost, destroyed, etc.

I was in the BSA for over ten years - the pack and troop are long since shut down.  The evidence of my involvement is a few faded photos
and my cub scout vest.

I'll grant from a journalistic perspective, the writer should have tried to track down identifiable people without reference to Google.
I suppose in a fully-manned and staffed organization with plenty of free time, that's the kind of thing people have time for.  CAP has
too little of either.

[Private Investigator]

Interesting stuff on cadets of that day.  I was an Army Captain, MI, serving in Seoul, Korea on that fateful day.  We were awakened around 4 or 5 AM on Sat: Korea being about 15-16 hours ahead of Dallas.  We went into DEFCON Three after the shooting became known: didn't know how North Korea would react.  Sat around my office in G-2, Eighth Army in my combat uniform all day.  We were finally released late in the afternoon.  Remember, no satellite TV in those days.  We had to depend on tapes being flown across the Pacific and then broadcast on Armed Forces Radio and TV.  I have never forgotten that day.

Thanks for sharing, that was interesting.

[flyboy53]

Yes, thanx for sharing.

I was 10 that day and remember it vividly. The closest I ever got occurred 30 years later when I was on TDY in the Air Force and stayed at the Fort Worth Hilton where President Kennedy gave his last speech. I think the room where he stayed is long gone, but there are photos of that speech and the visit to Fort Worth that line a second floor hallway that overlooks the front of the hotel.

Amazing how he mobilized an entire generation into some form of public service...