Posted on 11/22/2014 6:13:15 PM PST by GOJPN
22 November 1963. 51 years ago. Do you remember where you were and what you were doing that day? I was in phys ed class and had just finished running the cross country course. As I walked up the locker room door, Coach Waite was sitting on the steps with his face in his hands. He was crying. I asked what was wrong and he told me that President Kennedy had been shot and killed. That was a bad day for me.
I was in sixth grade. Our principal announced it over the intercom- very calmly and respectfully- only that he’d been shot though. I think they wanted us to learn he was dead from our families. My teacher was Catholic and she took out her rosary and began to pray. .and quietly weep. She regained her composure and shortly after that school was dismissed early.
Walking home was so odd. My friend and I tried to understand what it meant. .and saw grown-ups driving to the churches in our little town. There were 3 churches on our walk home and at each one cars were pulling in like Sunday morning. I can’t imagine that today.
No one in my family had voted for him but politics were forgotten. He was OUR president.
The TV was on for days. .when Oswald was shot through the funeral. .it was on. That was rare as we only used it occasionally.
My class is too lazy. We go with the class of 66 because they know how to throw a party
Thanx anyway, you got the number right
Taking a dump in Cambridge, MA, at the moment the message came thru, "Tranquility base here. The Eagle has landed".
Kennedy? I was in English class. The head of the department came into the classroom and announced the news. Several days before things became normal.
9/11? I slept thru it, having worked until dawn on a project. When I woke up, ----, shaved, showered, the radio was reporting the news. First thought was Saddam. Second thought was bin Laden. Second thought was right.
I was in Dealy Plaza, undercover. I remember what I was doing, but it is classified.
You can read about it online.
I had stepped into the bathroom for a few minutes. When I came out one of the guys said to me “The President has been shot”. Since he was always joking around, I thought he was trying to tell another tasteless joke, and told him off. I told him that's not funny and you shouldn't say stuff like that, etc. etc.
He said no it's true look at the TV. The rest of the time there was a blur of crying and choking back tears as we competed with other students.
When I got home, I turned on the TV, and watched it constantly. My Dad and I were watching it together when Jack Ruby shot Oswald. We looked at each other, and I said, now we'll never know the whole story, and he said Yep.
Most of the time I watched the whole thing including the funeral all alone. It was one of the saddest days of my life. During these years of my life, the cities were burning all over the place, the Cuban missile crisis, then an Assassination all made me feel like I closed my eyes and woke up in some strange world somewhere else, and I wondered what was going on in my country and in the world. I was afraid that Russia and Cuba were behind it, and that nuclear war could be on the way.
Riding up Germantown Avenue on a trolley on the way back to the west Philly campus from running more subjects for my dissertation - lots of mumbling and tears from the passengers, but didn’t get the full story until I got back to College Hall - at least we had the next Monday off......
Nope, I wasn’t here either, and wouldn’t be for several more years.
It was pretty bewildering for me too, and I was a teenager.
I was really concerned that it involved Russia/Cuba, and we were on the road to mutual nuclear destruction.
I was on duty at a small Air Force Security Service station in southern Italy as an E-4. I was working a teletype circuit but I didn’t see anything. My Mission Supervisor informed me that JFK had been assassinated in Dallas. Being an Irish Catholic boy, I took it pretty hard. We all went to the NCO Club around 1900CST and joined the crowd gathered around a radio which was tuned to the Armed Forces Network for updates on the situation. It was the base’s only source.
I have voted for some decent Democrats for local and state office though. I came to detest hearing LBJ's voice, but it's even worse with the Won. Not only detest it, but it makes me nauseous as well.
On 9/11, I had fallen asleep on the couch, and I was having a bad dream about a burning inferno, no doubt influenced by the TV news.
I got up and made coffee, and listened to the news. At first I thought they were talking about a small private plane. I was sitting in the Rocking Chair watching TV as the second plane hit.
I wasn’t sure what terrorist group it was, but I felt sure it was one from the Middle East.
Watched with my parents and sister when Oswald was shot.
My dad said the same thin almost immediately
I also thought for just an instant of Lincoln and Booth. I wasn’t a big Kennedy fan, but I did have great respect for the office of the President back then. LBJ kinda changed that and BHO has totally trashed it.
you’re a good shot.
Ditto
School was let out at the normal time, and when we got home, Mom was washing the refrigerator. When we asked her what she thought, she told us it was a terrible thing, but life will go on.
Life did go on, but TV was screwed up for the whole weekend. I was at my friends house, and left there to go home for lunch. It wasn't until I went back there after lunch did I find the Oswald had been shot.
In hindsight, I can remember the 50's as a calm time. Ike was like any of my uncles. Calm and steady. Even with the "Duck and Cover" drills, I never felt unsure or afraid. I was sure that ducking under my desk would shield me from any blast I could imagine. By 11/63 I was 11 and started to pay attention to the wider world, and maybe that was spurred by various theories about the events of that day. My thoughts on that don't matter to anyone but me, but I've always thought that LBJ had the most to gain.
I remember that. It said, “Cindy, will you marry me?” About 15 minutes later, it said, “She said . . . maybe?”
In California I was just walking out of my early morning class when a very agitated friend walked by and called out that the President had been shot. We all congregated in the student union and stood outside the glassed-in faculty lounge and watched events on the wall-mounted TV. The faculty soon opened the doors for students to come in. Classes were cancelled and we went home and spent the rest of the day watching events on TV.
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