October 16 in History

In October 1962, the United States and the Soviet Union came closer to nuclear war than at any other point in the Cold War. The confrontation began when American aircraft photographed Soviet nuclear missile sites under construction in Cuba, and it ended after thirteen tense days with a negotiated settlement. It mattered not only because of the danger itself, but because the shock of it reshaped how the superpowers managed their rivalry.

On October 16, 1968, two American sprinters stood on the medal podium at the Mexico City Summer Olympics and raised gloved fists as the U.S. national anthem played. Tommie Smith, who had just won gold in the 200 meters in world-record time, and John Carlos, who took bronze, turned a medal ceremony into one of the most recognizable political statements in sports history. The image endures because it carried the demands of the American civil rights movement onto the world's largest athletic stage.