• the Autumn of Nations, which began in Poland, marked the end of the Cold War?
• the Corfu Channel Incident, involving the United Kingdom and Albania, is considered one of the early episodes of the Cold War?
• the Athénée Palace hotel in Bucharest, Romania, now a Hilton, may have been Europe's most notorious den of spies in the years leading up to World War II, and only slightly less so during the Cold War?
• the 1991 Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy has been called a major political accomplishment of the post-Cold War era?
• people used home-made balloons and submarines to escape across the inner German border between East and West Germany during the Cold War?
• the 1959 NBC series Five Fingers features David Hedison as an American counterintelligence officer in the Cold War who poses as a theatrical agent to investigate communist activities in Europe?
• the High Arctic relocation of 87 Inuit people in the Cold War was called "one of the worst human rights violations in the history of Canada" by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples?
• the Hotel Bellevue Palace in Berne (pictured) was called "the best-protected building in Europe" by participants in Cold War negotiations?
• the movie I Am Cuba was filmed in 1964 as Cold War Soviet propaganda but only became widely viewed internationally when it was shown to audiences in the United States in 1994?
• the obscure T-44 Soviet medium tank, designed and first built in Kharkiv, Ukraine, was the missing link between the T-34 of WWII and the T-54/55 series of the Cold War?
• the efforts by Taiwan to distinguish itself from mainland China have their roots in the Cold War of the 1950s?
• the Philharmonia Hungarica made the first complete recording of Haydn's symphonies, was an orchestra founded by Hungarian exiles and funded by the West German government during the Cold War?
• the K-1000 class was a hoax class of battleship made up by the Soviet Union at the start of the Cold War as propaganda?
• one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's first state visits was to Mongolia, aimed at rebuilding their bilateral relations in the post-Cold War era?
• in the film Kommandør Treholt & ninjatroppen, real-life convicted spy Arne Treholt is presented as the leader of a band of ninjas who saved Norway during the Cold War?
• Igor Britanov captained the Soviet submarine K-219 when it sank northeast of Bermuda during the Cold War?
• at the height of the Cold War, U.S. President Ronald Reagan committed a microphone gaffe when he joked that he had signed legislation to bomb Russia?
• Building 470 at Fort Detrick in Frederick, Maryland housed fermentor tanks for producing Bacillus anthracis during the Cold War?
• Rear Admiral Ellis M. Zacharias, who had been deputy chief of Navy intelligence in World War II, later narrated the NBC Cold War docudrama Behind Closed Doors, titled after one of his own books?
• Dave Brubeck's The Real Ambassadors was largely based on the goodwill tours of Louis Armstrong and other jazz musicians on behalf of the U.S. State Department during the Cold War?
• Hungarian ballerina Nora Kovach's 1953 defection to the West was the first highly publicized Cold War-era defection of individuals in the field of dance?
• at the height of the Cold War, Lynne Cox became the first person to swim from the USA to the USSR?
• during the Cold War, Soviet leaders used "And you are lynching Negroes..." as an ad hominem attack against the U.S.?
• in 1990, it was revealed that a stay-behind army backed by NATO had been active in Switzerland throughout the Cold War, preparing for a possible Soviet invasion?
• in his first TV series, Crusader (CBS, 1955–1956), Brian Keith portrayed fictional journalist Matt Anders, who during the Cold War liberates oppressed people from communism?
• in 1989, Michel Hansenne was elected the first post-Cold War Director-General of the International Labour Organization?
• during the midst of the Cold War, Alan Shulman and Dmitri Shostakovich were invited to join a Soviet–American composers' symposium organised by Nicolas Slonimsky for NBC?
• during the Cold War, Canada permitted the United States to practice photo reconnaissance over Grey Goose Island with the RB-52C Stratofortress?
• cosmonauts such as Grigori Nelyubov, dismissed from the Soviet space program, were airbrushed out of official photographs, leading to early Cold War speculation of failed missions even when the actual reasons for dismissal were sometimes mundane?

Facts on topics related to Cold War

Central Intelligence Agency

• JMWAVE was a secret CIA base on University of Miami campus grounds during the 1960s?
• Jim Sanborn's sculpture Kryptos (pictured), located at the United States CIA headquarters, contains text that remains undeciphered after more than 18 years?
• Michigan State University, which gave technical assistance to South Vietnam from 1955 to 1962, provided cover for the CIA?
• an exploding cigar was at the heart of an alleged plot by the Central Intelligence Agency to assassinate Fidel Castro?
• the attack on Camp Chapman in Afghanistan on December 30, 2009, was the most lethal sustained by the CIA in 25 years?
• the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency supported the Chushi Gangdruk guerilla fighters in their attempts to overthrow the Communist Party of China in Tibet in the 1950s?
• the United States Youth Council received more than 90 percent of its funds from the Central Intelligence Agency?
• visual evidence of the installation of Soviet missiles in Cuba which triggered the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 was found in reconnaissance photographs by CIA analysts led by Arthur C. Lundahl?

Joseph Stalin

• U.S. Ambassador Charles E. Bohlen received the secret protocol to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which contained an understanding between Hitler and Stalin to split Central Europe, from German diplomat Hans von Herwarth?
• Joseph Stalin imposed a tax on childlessness, which forced bachelors and childless families to pay an additional 6% income tax until the collapse of the Soviet Union?
• Joseph Stalin personally rewrote Falsifiers of History to respond to U.S.-released information about the German–Soviet Axis talks?
• Soviet defector Boris Bazhanov became the only assistant at Joseph Stalin's secretariat to ever turn against the Soviet regime?
• Soviet sculptor Sergey Merkurov was the author of the three biggest monuments of Joseph Stalin erected in the USSR during the period of Stalinism?
• Alexander Novikov, double Hero of the Soviet Union and pioneering commander of the Soviet Air Force, was used to frame Marshal Zhukov, then thrown in prison by Joseph Stalin?
• Miron Merzhanov was a personal architect to Joseph Stalin from 1933–1941?
• Ujazdów Avenue in Warsaw was renamed after Stalin in 1953, but the traditional name was restored three years later?
• Vasili Blokhin, chief executioner of the Stalinist NKVD, led a company of executioners that performed more than 828,000 official executions during Joseph Stalin's reign, including tens of thousands by his own hands?
• according to legend, Joseph Stalin remained in Moscow during World War II partly due to a prophecy from Matryona Nikonova, who he covertly visited while she was hiding from his government?

Harry S. Truman

• President Truman's own pastor came out publicly against his appointment of General Mark Wayne Clark (pictured) as ambassador to Pope Pius XII?
• U.S. Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Harry S. Truman once lived in the Kennedy-Warren Apartment Building?
• Leon Keyserling was the head of the Council of Economic Advisers advising U.S. President Truman, yet never finished his own graduate dissertation in economics?
• as part of the redesign of the Grand Staircase in the Truman-era White House, architect Lorenzo Winslow developed a series of maquettes, detailed scale models showing the proposed designs?
• award-winning television editor Walter Balderson was the only TV cameraman inside the White House for the 1953 Inauguration Day meeting between U.S. President Truman and President-elect Eisenhower?
• the Dean of Barnard College and Teddy Roosevelt's grandson founded an organization that lobbied the Truman administration to prevent the creation of the State of Israel?
• the White House Entrance Hall (pictured) had the President's seal removed from its floor in the early 1950s because President Truman thought it inappropriate to walk across it?

Ronald Reagan

• 40th U.S. President Ronald Reagan was born in an apartment above a 19th century commercial building (pictured) in downtown Tampico, Illinois?
• U.S. President Ronald Reagan timed his first proclamation of National Sanctity of Human Life Day to coincide with the anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in the Roe v. Wade abortion case?
• Ronald Reagan announced his engagement to his first wife, Jane Wyman, at the Chicago Theatre (pictured)?
• Ronald Reagan is the only American President to have his diaries published into a best selling book?
• Ronald Reagan was propelled to stardom playing a double amputee in the 1942 film Kings Row?
• Ronald Reagan's autobiography, An American Life, reached number eight on The New York Times' bestsellers list?
• labor leader Victor Kamber created playing cards with public figures in 1968 and the "Rappin' Ronnie" music video depicting a rapping Ronald Reagan in 1984?
• U.S. President Ronald Reagan lived in an apartment on the second floor of the H.C. Pitney Variety Store from 1919 to 1920?
• Brad Johnson, the deputy Lofty Craig on the western TV series Annie Oakley, portrayed one of six unnamed students in Ronald Reagan's 1951 film Bedtime for Bonzo?
• Grits Gresham, the former host of ABC's The American Sportsman, revealed that Ronald Reagan used a gun to rescue a nurse from a mugging?

Mikhail Gorbachev

• Yegor Ligachev is renowned for being Gorbachev's main critic, even though he has repudiated that in many speeches and his memoirs?
• after losing a fight with Mikhail Gorbachev's cat, Dmitry Medvedev's cat Dorofei was castrated?
• the Ghurni clay dolls of West Bengal have been inaugurated by Bill Clinton and Mikhail Gorbachev?
• the Malta Summit was the first face-to-face meeting between George H. W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev?

Boris Yeltsin

• Boris Yeltsin wanted to remove the body of Vladimir Lenin from public display in Lenin's Mausoleum but failed to achieve his goal while in power?

John F. Kennedy

• actress Dorothy Kilgallen, who claimed to have information about the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, died under suspicious circumstances?
• James W. Treffinger went on to become a Republican County executive of Essex County, New Jersey, even though his Catholic family "idolized" FDR and Kennedy?
• Louis Lesser developed Barrington Plaza, the largest urban renewal project in the western United States under President John F. Kennedy, as well as many of Howard Hughes' properties?
• Malcolm Perry was the first doctor to attend to President Kennedy and performed a tracheotomy which inadvertently destroyed ballistics evidence key to determining who assassinated the president?
• Nigel Hamilton's biography of the young John F. Kennedy, JFK: Reckless Youth, was turned into a television miniseries of the same name starring Patrick Dempsey as JFK?
• The University of Texas Longhorn Band performed for inaugurations of Presidents Theodore Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush?
• Women Strike for Peace played a crucial role in bringing down the HUAC and were acknowledged by both U Thant and John F. Kennedy as a factor in the adoption of the Limited Test Ban Treaty?
• Dr. Fred Conklin received the Legion of Merit for setting up a mobile hospital in New Caledonia and later presented a medal to John F. Kennedy for heroism on the PT 109?
• an attack on Freedom Riders in May 1961 at the Greyhound Bus Station in Montgomery, Alabama, led the Kennedy administration to side, for the first time, with civil rights activists?
• during the January 1961 nor'easter on the eve of John F. Kennedy's presidential inauguration, thousands of abandoned cars led to massive traffic jams, including on the inauguration parade route?

Gerald Ford

• All-American footballer Paul G. Goebel (pictured) recommended Gerald Ford to the coach of the Michigan football team and later urged Ford to run for Congress?
• Gerald Ford's two greatest regrets in life were losing the starting center job in college to All-American Chuck Bernard and losing a presidential election?
• comedian Bob Hope, U.S. President Gerald Ford and, according to the Washington Post, every great African American professional golfer except Tiger Woods have played at Langston Golf Course?
• future U.S. President Gerald Ford waited tables at the fraternity house of Michigan halfback Herman Everhardus?
• talks between President Gerald Ford and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1975 were held at the Deerwood Country Club in Jacksonville, Florida?
• team MVP Gerald Ford (pictured) recalled that Michigan's 1934 "Punt, Pass and Prayer" offense lost punter John Regeczi and passer "Hard Luck Bill" Renner and "all we had left was the prayer"?

George H. W. Bush

• Natural Law Party founder Bevan Morris suggested at a press conference that President Bush learn Transcendental Meditation?
• Robert J. Morris lost a bid for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate from New Jersey in 1958, and then ran for the Senate in Texas in 1964 and 1970, losing both times to George H. W. Bush?
• The University of Texas Longhorn Band performed for inaugurations of Presidents Theodore Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush?
• although Vic Gold co-wrote the first President Bush's autobiography and wrote a novel with Dick Cheney's wife, in 2007 he wrote a book attacking the second President Bush and Cheney?
• the Capital Area Food Bank in Washington, D.C. received ten tons of broccoli from Barbara Bush after it was banned from the White House and Air Force One by George H. W. Bush?
• the Malta Summit was the first face-to-face meeting between George H. W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev?
• while visiting Mödlareuth in 1983, then U.S. Vice President George H. W. Bush alluded to John F. Kennedy's statement "Ich bin ein Berliner" by exclaiming, "Ich bin ein Mödlareuther!"?

Korean War

• 1949 Michigan football MVP Dick Kempthorn later flew more than 100 missions as a jet fighter pilot in the Korean War and received the Distinguished Flying Cross?
• Australian troops fought their last battle of the Korean War just hours before the ceasefire, fighting off numerous Chinese attacks during the Battle of the Samichon River?
• air ace John S. Loisel spent more time in combat than any other American pilot in World War II and also served in the Korean War?
• China commemorates the Battle of Onjong by marking October 25 as the War to Resist America and Aid Korea Memorial Day?
• US soldier Rodolfo P. Hernandez (pictured) was awarded the Medal of Honor after the Korean War for attacking and delaying an enemy regiment, alone and wounded?
• US Army soldiers march to the top of Hill 303 in Korea every year to place flowers commemorating the victims of the Hill 303 massacre of the Korean War (memorial pictured)?
• Anthony T. Kahoʻohanohano was awarded the Medal of Honor 58 years after his death in the Korean War?
• Arne Sunde, Norwegian Olympian, politician and World War II veteran, was President of the United Nations Security Council at the start of the Korean War?
• Ben Chapman, the actor who portrayed the Gill-man in Creature from the Black Lagoon, was a veteran of the Korean War?
• George Chesworth was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for sorties against the Chinese in the Korean War?