You're one of the first people who's never lived in a world without the atomic bomb.
In February 1949, J. Robert Oppenheimer, the director of the Manhattan Project, wrote that the United States must approach its international responsibility for the atomic bomb with an open mind.
Around the time you were born, the U.S. tested nuclear weapons in Operation Crossroads.
In December 1946, Karl T. Compton wrote about the U.S.'s decision to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima.
You were born in August of 1946. This year, The Atlantic celebrates its 160th birthday, making it 2 times as old as you.
The year you were born, Karl T. Compton wrote about the effect of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II—and the potential cost had they not been used.
John Springer Collection /Corbis via Getty
In 1961, Hayley Mills, who was born the same year as you, starred as twin sisters in the Disney movie The Parent Trap.
In February 2013, Ruth Graham wrote about the impact of the novel Polyanna. Mills starred in the film adaptation in 1960.
Around your 18th birthday, the U.S. Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing President Lyndon Johnson to send armed forces into Vietnam.
In April 1968, James C. Thompson, who served in the U.S. Department of State under Presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, examined and condemned the policy decisions behind American involvement in Vietnam.
NASA
At 22 years old, you were alive to behold people walking on the moon.
Over the years, the moon landing has come to be lauded as the pinnacle of human achievement, although it was often derided at the time. In 1963, NASA astronauts took to The Atlantic to plead the case for landing on the moon.
Your life can be divided into two halves: before and after MTV.
In August 2011, Leah Carroll talked with MTV News anchor Kurt Loder on the network's 30th birthday.
NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science Institute
When you turned 60, you watched humankind reach the outer solar system.
With NASA's Cassini-Huygens mission in 2005, humans landed a probe in the outer reaches of the solar system for the first time, a moment Ross Andersen called the most glorious mission in the history of planetary science.
History is happening all around you, every day.
The Atlantic is here to help you process it, in stories like these:
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