TIME CAPSULE
1961: chocoholic, health club and Mothra flies over Tokyo
President John F. Kennedy enters America in the race to the moon after Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin beats astronaut Alan Shepard to outer space by a few weeks. Calls grow for civil rights here, while abroad, the Cold War divides Berlin with a wall. Roger Maris hits a record 61 homers. Kids have a gas at 101 Dalmatians, and adults are jazzed about The Guns of Navarone. On the small screen, Ben
Casey and Kildare are top docs. The songs of Roy Orbison and The Shirelles fill the airwaves. Mattel’s Barbie gets a boyfriend named Ken, and these terms are in common use, says Merriam-Webster.
A-OK: The “voice of the astronauts,” NASA public affairs officer John “Shorty” Powers, utters this upbeat assessment during Alan Shepard’s suborbital flight.
BIONIC: Biologically inspired engineering— like the first computeroperated mechanical hand invented by MIT’s Heinrich Ernst.
BLACK FRIDAY:
Associated first with shopping traffic chaos on the Friday after Thanksgiving, the name handily comes to signify department stores’ profits from that day.
CHOCOHOLIC:
A person who craves or compulsively eats chocolate, center.
CINEMA VERITE:
Invented in France, documentary-like films grow popular here after
Americans get a fly-on-the-wall look at JFK’s campaign in 1960’s Primary.
FREEDOM RIDE:
Taking a bus through the South—a dangerous trip to test the lack of enforcement of the Supreme Court’s ruling desegregating public transportation.
HEALTH CLUB: As the nature of work changes, Americans notice they’re out of shape. President Kennedy calls on the underexercised to get moving, center bottom.
JUNK ART: Sculpture and mixed media pieces made from scrap metal, used wood and other secondhand or discarded materials.
MAI TAI: A fruity tiki cocktail, center top, made with rum, curacao, orgeat (almond syrup) and lime, and showcased in Elvis Presley’s movie Blue Hawaii.
MINIBIKE: These small low-powered two-wheelers—fun, cheap and easy to build—set off a craze among young DIY mechanics and riders, above.
NUNCHAKU:
A Japanese-inspired martial art, the name comes to mean a simple weapon—two sticks joined by a cord or chain—that is difficult to master.
PAPARAZZO: Freelance photographer who stalks celebrities like Audrey Hepburn and Sophia Loren for candid shots. Time calls the scandal sheet shutterbugs “a ravenous wolf pack.”
UNITARD: Dancers and gymnasts move freely in Danskin’s new one-piece neck-to-ankle garment made of stretchy fabric.
VAQUITA: Scientists learn about this tiny porpoise only a few years before the World Wildlife Fund is established. But decades pass before it’s understood the “little cow” is endangered.