BS: twentysecond of November

Subject: twentysecond of November
From: mkebenn
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 02:38 PM

Any 'catters care to join me in a moment of silence and memory for what happened 37 years ago today?

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: kendall
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 02:50 PM

Sure..I was hanging storm windows at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: SINSULL
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 02:52 PM

I grew up that day.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Wesley S
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 02:56 PM

I was in math class in the 7th grade. It changed my view of the world. I thought all Texans were animals for a while. Now I live and Texas and drive by the Book Depository often. But every time I do I can't help but think about how the world was changed by what happened there.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Kim C
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 03:33 PM

Aw man, I am such a dolt... I wasn't born yet and most of my history knowledge comes to a screeching halt at 1917 (when Buffalo Bill died). Mister, though, was a boy in grade school, and remembers being sent home early. Another friend of mine, about Mister's same age, went to Catholic school and said she remembered some of the nuns crying, and the headline on the newspaper was in the largest print she had ever seen.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: bflat
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 04:46 PM

mkebenn,

Thank you for this thread. I can't remember when I haven't paused to reflect on JFK on November 22. Like so many, I felt devastated. I was a college freshman with my good friend from High School, who's Dad was an AP correspondant in Wahington. She shared many stories about JFK and somehow that translated into sometime more personal for me. Of course, the saddness was for his family and the nation which mourned and grieved. He was inspiring and that was never given enough time to mature. He will always be missed.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Snuffy
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 06:17 PM

Thread creep (but in a musical direction:

'Twas the Twentysecond day of that November
And the clouds were hanging low
When he took old '97 out of Washington station
Like an arrow shot from a bow.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: campfire
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 06:32 PM

I hate to admit that all I remember is Mom watching the funeral, and I was wondering why "Deputy Dawg" wasn't on. I was four years old.

campfire

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 06:45 PM

I was ten. I went home sick that day and when mom and I were riding in the car to home we heard it on the radio. I remember mom and dad making us stand up during the funeral on tv, I think because of the flag draped on his coffin. It was a terrible day in our history.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 06:56 PM

Thanks for the start....This was the one I was going to start this evening. I was in a freshman Civics class and the news came over the loudspeakers......No lead in from the principal, just the news. Like Sinsull, I grew up that day. None of it seemed possible. We went home early and my family like so many others were glued to the coverage. I remember not really believing I'd seen Oswald shot. We did a lot of talking and a lot of listening.

Funny thing happened a few years ago. Karen and I were doing the "tourist" thing in DC, she'd never been there. We are riding the little bus out of the parking lot and up into the Arlington Cememtery. I look out across the bridge towards the Lincoln Memorial and I swear I have no idea what was on the bridge at the time. What my minds eye saw, in black and white, was the massive funeral procession coming across the bridge. I knew it wasn't real and I knew that the camera must have been very close to the place I was at right then.........but it completely shook me nonetheless. Deja vu like, but just unreal.....and yet so very real. We stayed at the first stop for over an hour while I talked to Karen about what that time meant and how deeply it affected me. It was the first time I had ever actually gotten into it so deeply. I had been to DC many times before, but it was the first time I ever had such an experience. Very cathartic and I was happy to have Karen to talk with......as I usually am.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Alice
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 08:27 PM

I remember that day very well. I was supposed to be at a piano lesson before school started, but forgot my music and had to run home and then run back to school because I was late. I met my best friend on the way, and I felt so upset that I said to her, "Everything is going wrong today, and before it is over, I will be dead." I was 11 years old. It scared me, what I said, because it felt like a prophesy that was going to come true. I immediately said to her, "No, I take that back, I didn't mean it." It felt like my words had created a fateful death sentence. The nun who taught us was called out of the classroom, and she came back very upset. Later, kids in another class told us that President Kennedy was dead. We were all in shock. It seemed unreal, that it couldn't have happened. It seemed like the earth stood still for days as we watched the news and the funeral. That magical Camelot time was over. It was definitely the end of an innocent era that lulled us from the 50's into the early 60's.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 09:09 PM

There was a thread about this last year I remember. And probably every year the Mudcat's been around.

I was just getting ready to go into the Oxford University Folk Society's weekly session in a room in a pub. Standing pissing against a toilet wall, the old black slate type with a gutter at the bottom. A stranger next to me suddenly says "Have you hewrd - they've shot President Kennedy."

Which at first I thought was some jokers attempt at humour. But up in the room everyone was sitting round looking shell-shocked. Especially the Yanks, including the Yanks who you'd have thought wouldn't give a damn.

So we spent the evening singing appropriate songs, like the Shooting of President Mackinley, which is the one I remember, and Civil Rights songs and so forth I suppose, and the non-Americans racking their brains for stuff that wouldn't seem tasteless, but I can't remember what that might have been. Probably a few Irish songs. And afterwards drifting round to people's lodgings gossiping trying to catch up with the news, such as Jack Ruby doing his stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: rangeroger
Date: 22 Nov 00 - 11:14 PM

I was 17,fresh out of high school, and working as a Psych Tech at Patton State Hospital. A group of us were in the break room when another staff member came in and said the President's been shot.We didn't believe him, and he had to repeat it 3 times before we all rushed out to the day room to see it on TV.

I've always wondered where this country would be now if it hadn't happened.

Or if his brother hadn't been killed while I was in Vietnam.

rr

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: jaze
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 01:49 AM

I was in 3rd grade in a Catholic orphanage in Phila. Another Nun came in and told us Kennedy had been assassinated. I was in shock. I thought that went out with Lincoln! It really did seem like the world stood still for a few days. And the world seemed forever changed afterwards.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: BigDaddy
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 02:49 AM

A sixth-grade kid (elementary school in thise days), walking home with my mom , having seen attended a play (Peter Pan) put on at the nearby junior high school by the "big kids." Approaching our house when the boy next door ran out to tell us President Kennedy had been shot. We didn't believe it because he was such a liar and because it was too preposterous anyway. When we got in the house, Mom switched on the TV to catch one of her afternoon soaps. Then we knew. The rest of that day and much of the next a blur of sadness and black and white funeral scenes. I (and many my young age) had felt that this was "our" president." I'd seen him speak at a local park in my home town when he was campaigning. I'd been allowed to stay home from school to watch the inauguration. We even had JFK "bubble gum cards," for heaven's sake. Two days after the assassination, my parents and I drove to Canada for a change of pace and a change of scenery. Everywhere we went, we were greeted with heartfelt condolences over our loss, as though we had lost a family member. And we felt as though we had. All these years later I still feel it. And, in anticipation of some who may be lurking out there just waiting to crash this remembrance: Yes, he was flawed (aren't we all?). Yes, he could have done a better job (who couldn't?). Yes, he was just a person (so what?). There was a an air, a magic about him, that caught the imagination and admiration of much of the world. When his brother Bobby came along, it was like discovering hope at the bottom of Pandora's box. My mom awoke me one fair spring day to tell me that he, too, had been shot and probably killed. I had had the good fortune to see him as well, a couple of years earlier when he had come to our town, campaigning for some local politicians. I even shook his hand. The world has been a sadder place since the loss of these two men. I mourned for them then and I mourn their loss now.

Subject: November 22...
From: Clinton Hammond2
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 02:58 AM

Back... and to the left.

Back... and to the left.

Back... and to the left.

Back... and to the left.

Back... and to the left.

Back... and to the left.

I'm just a patsy...

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Patrish(inactive)
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 04:05 AM

I was eight, sitting quietly doing a jigsaw puzzle on the floor. I knew very little about politics in this country let alone what was happening in America. The initial news was just another piece of news. But I do remember watching his funeral and wondering why so many people were there. My Grandmother died about six weeks before JFK and there had only been about 50 or so at her funeral - I couldn't comprehend the difference between my grandmother dying and JFK death.
Being a little older now and hopefully wiser, I understand the difference between a world leader and my grandmother.
Patrish

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Tomsk
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 05:37 AM

I was about 3 yrs (and in England) at the time.. The first real interest I took was about 10 years later after hearing a heavy rock track by a Sheffield band called Saxon...

"The World was shocked that fatefull day... A young mans life was blown away.. away.. away.. Dallas 1pm."

Now I work for a company out of Houston, Texas and today that is all anybody is talking about... (in between G W Bush and that other chappie...)

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Gervase
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 05:46 AM

I think I recall sitting under the kitchen table while my mother made orange marmalade that day. She burst into tears - but that's about all I can remember.
The problem is that the images have become so iconic that a lot of people my age think they saw them in newspapers or on the television at the time.
Whatever, it was something my parents talked about for years afterwards - the Cuban missile crisis had made a big impression on them, and I think my mother was star-struck by JFK (like most other people).
For meself, Churchill's funeral in 1965 is more vivid - but only because I was two years older.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: mkebenn
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 06:57 AM

At that time, I lived right across the street from thr high school. I had walked home for lunch. My mother and I watched "Concentration" on tv everyday...no word. When I got back to school, everyone was talking about it, and as someone said, I couldn't believe it could happen in those "modern" times. As hard as that was, though, it pales compared to comming down to breakfast five years later and having my father tell me "they shot your man last night" Clack, clack clack. MB

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 06:08 PM

Gervase - Manitas' dad remembers Winnie's funeral - he told us of the derricks along the river, all dipping to the water as the barge went past. I was just coming up to 4 months, but still have a Churchill Crown from that day......

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Banjer
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 07:49 PM

I was just coming home from school. It was my duty to babysit my two younger brothers while mom went to work. She worked the 3 to 11 shift at the old Doctor's Hospital in St Petersburg. School let out at 2:30 and she left at 2:45 to got to work. It took me about 10 to 15 minutes to walk home. Mom was backing out of the driveway, leaving for work. Instead of the usual chat as we passed about the boys were taking a nap or one of them was sick or anything like that, all she could muster between sobs was that the president has been shot in Dallas, she would call us later from work. Dad got home about 5:30 and we stayed glued to the TV for the rest of the evening.

Subject: RE: BS: twentysecond of November
From: Bill D
Date: 23 Nov 00 - 10:34 PM

....heading for American history class at Wichita State Univ....heard people talking...went on over to class, and teacher came in and confirmed that it had happened...ran to student union and heard Walter Cronkite deliver the bad news...and THEN I had a paper route to deliver for extra money. I had to wait while they stopped the presses and ran what news they had...so I collected 3 editions of the local paper as they tried to keep up....and then found myself meeting all the people on the paper route as they learned..............watched TV and delivered the newspapers as the drama developed.........what a time!.

I am just old enough to remember my mother crying when she heard of the death of Franklin Roosevelt in 1945.