Hands Across the Baltics: The Story of the Baltic Way

In 1986, between 5 and 6.5 million Americans held hands for 15 minutes in an attempt to create a human chain across the United States. The event was known as “Hands Across America” and aimed to raise money for poverty and hunger. Three years later, two million Latvian, Estonian, and Lithuanian citizens joined hands, not to raise money, but to protest the illegal occupation of their countries by the Soviet Union.