News travels fast. Well it does now because of social media. It travelled a bit more slowly when I was young. In the absence of a landline phone at home, if you wanted to contact someone, you walked to their house and knocked on the door.
When the news was big there was another key channel for news-spreading – the huddle at school. In the half-hour before the school doors opened groups of friends would gather, form a huddle and it was all “did you see …… on tv last night?”
I specifically remember two morning huddles. The first was in 1960 when the rumour spread that someone had brought the first unexpurgated copy of Lady Chatterly’s Lover into school. It was true; we just needed to know who it was and how we could get a look.
The other was in 1962 and was truly scary. One October morning we huddled because we were convinced nuclear war was about to be declared. The Soviet Union and the US were squaring up over the Cuban Missile Crisis and President Kennedy had set a deadline.
The Soviets backed down and since then we have consoled ourselves with the the thought that the balance of power would continue to protect us from nuclear war. Circumstances have changed though. Two days ago the members of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists acknowledged this fact by moving the time on their Domesday Clock 30 seconds closer to midnight. Why? Because the idea of a balance of power no longer rings true. The threat now comes from “rogue” leaders, be they North Korean or North American. Or terrorist. One thing I’m sure of, however, is that if someone like Trump had come to power in the 1960s it would have been huddle time at school.