Originally Posted By Goofyernmost For the first time since then no one has mentioned that this is the anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I know most of you were either not born or too young to remember it but I still remember it like it was yesterday. What a weekend that was...It was a Friday and the weather was unseasonably warm for the northeast. It took a long time for the numbness to fade. There was no closure. The films of the event didn't surface for a long time so it didn't hit us head on like events of today do with all the gory details and photo's. Seeing the casket with Jacqueline standing behind it, return from Dallas, laying in state at the Capital, the riderless horse with the reversed boot, Walter Cronkite unable to get the words out without breaking up. We witnessed an actual murder broadcast live when Lee Harvey Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby on live TV. As I get older fewer and fewer people that I see on a daily basis have a clue. Anyway, here's to you JFK and to your memory.
Originally Posted By gadzuux I have jackie to thank for my seventh birthday. The news of the assassination flattened my mom, and she spent two days on the couch with a box of tissues watching the news coverage. On the second day, barbara walters announced that mrs kennedy was in the white house throwing a birthday party for john jr. I happen to have the same birthday as him, and it struck a chord in my mom's head. She got up off the couch, went into the kitchen and baked me a birthday cake. If jackie could do a birthday party for her son, so could my mom. Years later she told me that it was my birthday - and jackie's celebration of john's birthday - that shook her out of her two days of grief and forced her to resume her life. So, thank you jackie, after all these years, for having the composure to celebrate your son's birthday during that incredibly terrible time. You were an example to all americans, but mostly my mom, on a day when she really needed it.
Originally Posted By Capstan I was in junior high school, in Dallas, in art class. My freind and I were modeling puppets out of clay, when the principal came on the intercom to announce Jack Kennedy had been shot. It got pretty quiet. A short while later, he came back on to say the president had died. The whole rest of the day, you could have heard a pin drop. Everything changed. Years later, I attended school at a campus downtown. It was within view of the School Book Depository building, where Oswald fired the shots from, and the triple underpass the motorcade was approaching. It seems the whole decade after that day was just lousy. King. Bobby. Ect. That is, until the moon trips in '68 and '69. Kennedy did that for us.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder I was in kindergarten on this date 43 years ago. They announced it, and told us our parents would be coming to get us. Many years later, in 1984, I was in Dallas and saw where it happened. It all seemed very small and closed in. As for Bobby Kennedy, my father in law was an LAPD Rampart sergeant. He was the crime scene manager at the Ambassador the night he was killed. I read about him before I ever met him. He's got Alzheimer's now, but the stories he told were very interesting.
Originally Posted By DAR This date has a more personal meaning to me. Nine years after JFK was assasinated my grandfather passed away. I never got the opportunity to meet him and that's one of my biggest regrets.
Originally Posted By ecdc I was at the 6th Floor Museum (Texas Book Depository) a few years ago and it was quite something to be there. Whether there's a correlation or not, it seemed from that moment on we've never looked at our political leaders the same way.
Originally Posted By trailsend I was a junior in high school and at a pep rally. I played basketball and both the men's team and women's team were undefeated. Our men's team went on to win State. During the pep rally, our principal announced what had happened. We dismissed and went back to our classes. I was in geometry class; my coach's class. We were stunned. I remember the moment Coach Reynolds told us Pres. Kennedy had died. I just could not believe it. In my American Government class, the bulletin board was loaded with pictures of Pres. Kennedy and Jackie. She was awesome ~ a more youthful First Lady than ever before. I was captivated by her hair, clothes, everything about her. She was classic. I'll never forget the sight of her aboard Air Force One with the Johnson's flying back to DC. I'll never forget her beautiful pink suit and pillbox hat; it was now blood stained and it seemd as if she never wanted to take it off; somehow that was really goodbye to the President. I can see her climbing over the back of the limo convertible that carried Pres. Kennedy after he was shot. My Mom, Dad, sister and I spent the next few days glued to the TV watching everything. I'll never forget the sound of the drums and the horse with the backward boot in the stirrup. I will never forget Jackie, Caroline and John Jr at the casket and the infamous picture, which I saw as it actually happened, John Jr. saluting his Dad, the Commander in Chief. This was an incredibly sad time for our country. I'll never forget it.
Originally Posted By crapshoot I was watching the Mickey Mouse Club in glorious black & white and playing Red Light - Green Light.
Originally Posted By Goofyernmost All you folks that were not born yet, please read this stuff. This is history, actual history. The shock of the nation was palpable. I know you won't believe me but it was even more intense then 9/11. We were living in camelot at the time. This broadsided us big time. By the time we got to 9/11 we were not nearly as innocent. We had seen a lot and, although devestating, by then we were expecting the worst we just didn't know what it would be. In 1963 we really didn't expect anything like that to happen. The decade that followed was just mind jaring and yet the republic survived. It was just assumed it would and it did.
Originally Posted By Goofyernmost Where was I at the time? A sophomore in High School. English class! All of a sudden the radio was broadcast through the PA system. The announcer said that President Kennedy had been shot. Then it went off and we resumed class. A few minutes later the radio was heard again. This time it said that President Kennedy was dead. School was dismissed and in a hallway filled with hundreds of kids, there was total silence. It was the strangest thing I have ever witnessed. It was the strangest year for our family. Both my grandmothers passed away within three months of each other, my father lost his job and we uprooted from New York State where generations of our family had been located, and moved to Vermont. He had a new job, I was going to a new school, it all seemed, and still does, so surreal.
Originally Posted By TALL Disney Guy <All you folks that were not born yet, please read this stuff. This is history, actual history.> <---reading...
Originally Posted By alexbook I've talked to people my age (I was 3 years old) who say their parents' reaction to JFK's death is their earliest childhood memory. (I don't remember it, myself. My earliest memories of news or politics are from about age 6.)
Originally Posted By jonvn And now, today, they are celebrating in Dallas with the assorted conspiracy loons, Elvis impersonators, and a party atmosphere. It has become a repugnant circus. <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061122/...fk_anniversary" target="_blank">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200 61122/...fk_anniversary</a>
Originally Posted By RAM1984 I have never forgotten exactly what happened that day. I was in 5th grade. I still get a shiver when I remember the radio announcer pausing and saying, "Lady's and gentlemen, our President is dead." One of the boys in class started to wail. Then we all broke down. Our teacher brought in a TV and we watched it the rest of the day. As heard years later in the movie "Mermaids" "It seememd like there was not an adult on the planet that day." I remember that feeling.
Originally Posted By DlandJB I was just two. I really don't remember it. But my dad told me later on that as a baby I was not very happy being held and would squirm away. He said I must have sensed everyone's sadness, because I pretty much didn't let them put me down for 2-3 days. He also told me once that he and my mom were scheduled to go to a party the evening of the assassination. The party was still held and pretty much everyone was there...but no one talked about the President's death. He said it was as if, should someone mention it, the whole evening would have disolved into tears. I do remember RFK and MLK's 1968 assassinations. Especially the riots.
