Nixon calls Armstrong on the moon (July 20, 1969)
For the first time, human beings land on the moon. So, what’s the best way to follow up this achievement? Well, by congratulating them the same day. Who does it? US President Richard M Nixon, of course. Nixon called Neil Armstrong, the first man who landed on lunar surface, and congratulated him and his fellow astronauts Michael Collins and Edwin ‘Buzz’ Aldrin Jr.
The first call: Rings a Bell? (March 10, 1876)
“Watson, come here. I need you.” This is where it all began. Alexander Graham Bell made the first telephone call in his Boston laboratory, summoning his assistant, Thomas A. Watson, from the next room. While working on a device to send multiple telegraph signals over the same wire by using harmonics, he heard a twang. That led Bell to investigate whether his apparatus could be used to transmit the sound of a human voice. Bell’s journal contains the following entry: “I then shouted into M [the mouthpiece] the following sentence: ‘Mr Watson, come here — I want to see you’. To my delight he came and declared that he had heard and understood what I said.”
Call that prevented nuke war (Oct 26, 1972)
The closest the world came to a nuclear war was in 1962 when Soviet Union began placing missiles in Cuba to defend against a possible US invasion of the island nation. There was no dialogue between the US and Soviet Union, but things started moving toward a peaceful resolution on October 26, 1962 after a telephone call between President Kennedy and his brother and attorney general, Robert F. Kennedy. The President told Robert that the US would remove missiles from Turkey if Soviet Union got its missiles out of Cuba. Robert conveyed this information to Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin, which put an end to the looming crisis.
Bush’s ‘wake-up’ call to Rice after WTC attack (Sept 11, 2001)
No one expects to wake up in the morning to watch footage of planes crashing into the World Trade Centre, New York City. It was Sept 11, 2001. Then American President George W Bush, who had been to a photo-op event in Florida, immediately called National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice to find out what was going on. That telephone call ignited Bush administration’s response to terrorism.
Rakesh Sharma calling from space (April 1984)
Squadron Leader Rakesh Sharma was the first Indian in space, whose telephonic conversation with Indira Gandhi is still talked about. When the then Prime Minister asked Sharma how India looked from above, he replied: ‘Saare Jahan Se Achcha.’ Sharma’s maiden space flight was on April 3, 1984. He conducted experiments during his mission on Soviet Union’s Salyut 7 Space Station.
Obama’s call to Iran President (Sept 27, 2013)
After seeing off Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh after their summit meeting in September, President Barack Obama hurried back to his Oval office in the White House to make a historic phone call. Obama’s 15-minute call to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani at around 2:30 pm on Sept 27 – as the latter headed in a car to the airport after attending the UN session in New York – laid the foundation for the landmark nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers led by the US.
source:::: Manjunath R Setty, India Syndicate in msn.com
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