The Hollybush Summit took place in Glassboro, New Jersey from June 23 to June 25, 1967. During these days, President Lyndon B. Johnson and Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin met to discuss Soviet-American relations. This meeting was during the height of an accelerating arms race and against the backdrop of ongoing wars in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. This period has been referred to as the “beginning of the end” of the Cold War. During this summit, no major agreements were met, though the summit boosted morale, gave hope for the future of Soviet-American relations, and set the groundwork for later discussions.

Glassboro State was suggested as the site of the Summit by then-New Jersey Governor Richard Hughes. Kosygin, who was in the United States for the first time speaking at the United Nations, did not want to travel to Washington, D.C. Johnson did not want to meet in New York City. Glassboro, halfway point, was seen as the perfect alternative.

In addition to Johnson and Kosygin, some of the most powerful statesmen in the world attended the summit. Among them: Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko, Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy and Ambassador at Large W. Averell Harriman.

“I shall always remember this town as a place of warm friendship and hospitable people,” Johnson said in his speech. “The world will remember Glassboro, I hope, as a place where understanding between nations was advanced by the United States and the Soviet Union. The town of Glassboro--and this wonderful college campus--will always be associated with the goal of leaving this world a little more orderly than we found it.”