Mo Rocca and a crew from CBS Sunday Morning spent a day with the Maine State Museum! It was a wonderful opportunity to share the museum’s collection of materials related to Samantha Smith, the Maine schoolgirl who became famous for her antiwar outreach during the Cold War.

Samantha Smith was featured on CBS Sunday Morning in January, 2023. Correspondent Mo Rocca traveled to Maine to speak with curator Laurie LaBar and to study photographs, artifacts, and letters assembled by archives curator Zach Selley. He was accompanied by producer Mary Lou Teel and cameraman Efrain Robles. You can watch the segment here. 

Samantha was also the subject of an episode of Rocca’s podcast “Mobituaries.” You can listen to the episode here.

It has been forty years since ten-year-old Samantha Smith wrote her historic letter to USSR Chairman Yuri Andropov asking why he wanted to destroy the world with nuclear weapons. To prove to her that he wanted no such thing, he invited her to the USSR. Samantha and her parents, Jane and Arthur, spent two weeks in the USSR as Andropov’s guest. They never met the Chairman, due to his ill health.

The Maine State Museum’s Online Collection Database includes several items related to Samantha Smith. Follow this link to see them. 

MSM 2010.37.50 – Russian Sarafan Outfit given to Samantha Smith

Gallery of Images from the December 2022 Visit