50 years ago today, on September 22nd, 1961, Congress passed the Peace Corps Act. While President John F. Kennedy and R. Sargent Shriver usually get the credit for launching the Peace Corps, Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey was one to introduce the actual idea. In 1960 Representative Henry S. Reuss of Wisconsin proposed that the government study the idea, and Senator Humphrey asked for the establishment of a Peace Corps itself (source: http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/peace-corps/).
In Kennedy's last State of the Union address he said, "Nothing carries
the spirit of American idealism and expresses our hopes better and more
effectively to the far corners of the earth than the Peace Corps."
Today, several thousand Americans every year answer his call to "ask not
what your country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country"
by serving in the Peace Corps (source: http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/peace-corps/).
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