A 10 year old girl wrote a letter to the new leader of USSR, Yuri Andropov in 1982.
Samantha Smith, seeing the news about nuclear arms race and high tensions between the US and USSR, decided to ask the leader of Soviet Union himself about his intentions.
She didn’t get a reply immediately. Her letter was published in Russian newspaper Pravda. Later she was invited to USSR by Andropov!
The two week journey of Samantha was covered in not only American, but also the Soviet newspapers. Although it didn’t have any real impact on the cold war (as expected) and both leaders continued to use harsh rhetoric against each other, the incident showed that at least ordinary people were in favor of peace.
After returning home, Samantha appeared on numerous interviews, actively advocating peace, and becoming a goodwill ambassador!
But her life was cut short when she was killed in a plane crash with her father in 1985.