Pushinka with her puppies on the White House Lawn, 1963, photographed by Cecil Stoughton.
Pushinka (Russian for "fluffy") was the daughter of Strelka, one of the dogs that the USSR had sent to space aboard the Korabl-Sputnik 2 on August 19th, 1960. Nikita Khrushchev gifted Pushinka to the Kennedys, marking a bright spot in the Cold War tensions. Pushinka and Charlie, one of the Kennedys' other dogs, had four puppies, which JFK called "the pupniks".
Below is a letter JFK wrote to Khrushchev, thanking him for Pushinka:

















