Where were you (if you were alive) 50 years ago today?

[Fan Since '54]

First off, to the mods, if this is beyond the scope of what is allowed here, I understand if someone takes it down.

Anyway to the point, today is the 50th anniversary of the day JFK was shot & killed in Dallas. I lived at the same address I do today in the Oak Park area of Gentilly. I was a frosh @ LSUNO by the lake front. I had only afternoon classes on M-W-F, and the first I heard was via my automobile radio while I driving down Paris Ave for a class there. Stunned to say the least. And when I got to campus I was informed that classes were called off for the rest of the day. Then I returned home and pretty much watched the news on TV for the rest of the day, and for the weekend and until the president was laid to rest. I think that day was the saddest day I had as a citizen of the USA, at least until 9/11. So where were you and how did it affect you?

Fan since '54

[long green]

56 years ago today. Not yet born then.

[Poseidon]

If there is anyone who has seen the movies and documentaries, but hasn't been to the spot in Dallas where it took place you must next time your in that town. The films etc doesn't give proper scale. The book depository and grassy knoll are much closer than they appear in the films. It's hard to describe, but a real eye-opener.

[Fan Since '54]

56 years ago today. Not yet born then.

My mistake. Sometimes I get the dates of my high school and college graduation year mixed up. And the funny thing about that is the names of the schools I graduated from are not the same as they are today...Cor Jesu/Brother Martin and SLC/SLU.

Fan since '54

[Fan Since '54]

If there is anyone who has seen the movies and documentaries, but hasn't been to the spot in Dallas where it took place you must next time your in that town. The films etc doesn't give proper scale. The book depository and grassy knoll are much closer than they appear in the films. It's hard to describe, but a real eye-opener.

My wife has been there and she said the same thing. There is going to be a documentary on TV about this. It is being done in conjunction with the book Bill O'Reilly wrote. The previews they showed totally peaked my interest.

Fan since '54

[TUPF]

JFK was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963—56 years ago today.

I was seven years old and in the second grade living in New Mexico with my mother and two siblings while my Navy father was on one year unaccompanied duty manning a listening post in the Caribbean near Cuba. Because we were in the Mountain Time zone, the teachers learned about the shooting right after lunch. The school was let out and we walked home in a small town of 10,000. I remember teachers crying and for whatever reason one of the kids in our gaggle said there “was going to be a war” and the gaggle panicked and ran all the way to our houses. It’s funny what you remember.

The next few days are all hazy. I don’t remember if we had school or not. We were glued to the B&W TV watching the funeral. I remember the drum beat cadence of the funeral procession like it was yesterday. A very very shocking and sad time.

I visited “downtown” Dallas (not much there there) for the first time a couple of years ago on one of those Segway tours. The sight line from the book depository to the points of impact were an impressive bit of shooting but not one in a million like some conspiracy nuts would have you believe. The scale is much smaller than I had believed, kind of like seeing the Alamo the first time. Even poked around the grassy knoll. Conspiracy theories really graduated into the big time after 1963.

[PeteRasche]

Not born but visited there a few years back when visiting relatives in Dallas. It's very surreal to be there after seeing it in the media my whole life. Other than the model of cars on the street, it still looks pretty much like it did in 1963.

[krewe of ham and eggs]

I was the 2nd gunman on the grassy knoll

[Cheerleader]

I was a senior at Tulane living in the fraternity house. I had just come back from my last Friday class, looking forward to the TGIF party we had planned that afternoon with a Tulane sorority. We had a TV room with a regular group of guys who watched "Days of Our Lives" and they were doing it that day. I went upstairs and heard them hollering that the President had been shot. I ran down to the TV room and Days of our Lives was back on, so I thought they were kidding. About that time, it went off and the news people took over.

After about an hour, it was announced that our party had been cancelled. I have to admit that I was disappointed, seeing there was nothing we could do about it. So, a brother and I went to a local bar and spent the afternoon watching it on TV. On Sunday morning, I was up early (for a Sunday) and went down to the TV room to see what was going on. Sitting there drinking my coffee, I watched Jack Ruby jump out and shoot Lee Harvey Oswald. It was so stunning, it didn't register for a few seconds what had just happened live on TV.

[Fan Since '54]

I was the 2nd gunman on the grassy knoll

Funny thing here. For any of you were "X-Files" fans, there was an episode that showed "the cigarette smoking man" inside of a water drain on the parade route in Dallas with a rifle which he fired when the president's limosene passed by. The "X-Files" never missed an opportunity to suggest some sort of a conspiracy theory.

Fan since '54

[Fan Since '54]

I was a senior at Tulane living in the fraternity house. I had just come back from my last Friday class, looking forward to the TGIF party we had planned that afternoon with a Tulane sorority. We had a TV room with a regular group of guys who watched "Days of Our Lives" and they were doing it that day. I went upstairs and heard them hollering that the President had been shot. I ran down to the TV room and Days of our Lives was back on, so I thought they were kidding. About that time, it went off and the news people took over.

After about an hour, it was announced that our party had been cancelled. I have to admit that I was disappointed, seeing there was nothing we could do about it. So, a brother and I went to a local bar and spent the afternoon watching it on TV. On Sunday morning, I was up early (for a Sunday) and went down to the TV room to see what was going on. Sitting there drinking my coffee, I watched Jack Ruby jump out and shoot Lee Harvey Oswald. It was so stunning, it didn't register for a few seconds what had just happened live on TV.

There were probably millions of people who saw that live on TV. I know I did.

Fan since '54

[Roller]

I was a High School Senior. Coming out of the cafeteria at lunch when I met a friend who told me the news. I thought he was joking, until somebody else confirmed it. Classes were cancelled for the afternoon, but nobody was allowed to go home. The radio coverage (which was 24/7 assassination coverage on all stations) was piped to the classrooms over the PA system. There was an annual "Powder Puff Football Game" (which featured girls (mostly the cheerleaders and pep squad) playing football, with the football team providing their coaches and cheerleaders. That was postponed until the following Friday.

I was in church when Ruby shot Oswald, but when I got to work at noon, we sat and watched it replayed over and over.

Then, New Orleans (if not the rest of the world) became captivated by the Garrison investigations. We watched recaps every evening on the news, and the Times-Picayune and States-Item were packed with articles every day. My friends and I all believed (and I still do) that Garrison had the story correct, but some powerful people conspired to change the narrative against him, and the conspiracy got swept under a rug.

[gerryb323]

I was the 2nd gunman on the grassy knoll

[PeteRasche]

Then, New Orleans (if not the rest of the world) became captivated by the Garrison investigations. We watched recaps every evening on the news, and the Times-Picayune and States-Item were packed with articles every day. My friends and I all believed (and I still do) that Garrison had the story correct, but some powerful people conspired to change the narrative against him, and the conspiracy got swept under a rug.

I was working a summer job downtown at 650 Poydras in 1991 and got to look out the windows down to Lafayette Square where Kevin Costner was shooting Oliver Stone's "JFK", while at the same time one of the attorneys at the firm was named Marcello. Does that count?

[Johnny Mac]

dammit, Fanny.. I thought I was 50 again instead of 56... I was 3 days old when JFK was shot.

[doncecco]

Then, New Orleans (if not the rest of the world) became captivated by the Garrison investigations. We watched recaps every evening on the news, and the Times-Picayune and States-Item were packed with articles every day. My friends and I all believed (and I still do) that Garrison had the story correct, but some powerful people conspired to change the narrative against him, and the conspiracy got swept under a rug.

I was working a summer job downtown at 650 Poydras in 1991 and got to look out the windows down to Lafayette Square where Kevin Costner was shooting Oliver Stone's "JFK", while at the same time one of the attorneys at the firm was named Marcello. Does that count?

Sure, and I've eaten at Mosca's, so it counts too.

Top 10 Breaking news/Live moments in TV history?

Moon Landing
JFK assassination/Ruby being shot
Plane hitting the 2nd Tower
Reagan being shot
Space Shuttle Challenger
Space Shuttle Columbia
Watergate
Princess Diana accident
Pope John Paul II shot
Berlin Wall coming down


Although I'm sure some will probably put John Lennon assassination in there, but to me, it was well after the fact. Same with Chernobyl. I would put Three Mile Island on there, but it seemed to end up being more of a non-event, just a scare.

I have to presume on the first 2 as wasn't around.

I probably have missed something that is worthy.

[doncecco]

Aww geez, forgot the White Bronco. Horrible to fathom it fits in with the rest of these world-impacting events/tragedies.

[Cheerleader]

You forgot the big one...the day Elvis died.

[AO Sig]

I was attending Ben Franklin Middle School in Springfield, Illinois. I was heavily involved in AAU swimming. At the time my parents were investigating options for high school, as our school system were on a split shift, with Juniors and seniors going in the mornings, freshmen going in the afternoons. The system nearly lost accreditation over that problem.

That summer my family went on the first of two months' vacation in Cuernavaca, Mexico. We had rented a house, shopped in the open-air market, gone to archaeological sites and museums, and learned to play bridge. A college aged cousin spent the month with us (her mother had attended Newcomb, was a Chi Omega while in New Orleans).

[PeteRasche]

Don, hard to believe there are that many "where were you" incidents since we've been old enough to remember.

I'd quibble with a few of them (did Watergate, Chernobyl, or Berlin Wall actually cut in to TV as a single event, or were they just ongoing stories in every newscast?), but otherwise, yeah. You could also add the Oklahoma City bombing. Maybe the Miracle on Ice (though as we know it happened earlier than it was shown here and was pre-internet so not everyone got the story at once).

Was going to mention Elvis dying but Cheerleader beat me while I was typing!

[WaveProf]

I watched challenger, princes di, and Berlin Wall on tv. Watched the WTC fall with my own eyes. And was too young (or not invested) for the rest of them.

[gerryb323]

My parents were 4

[windywave]

Start of the Gulf War. Watching Baghdad get bombed live on CNN.

Mic dropped

[TUPF]

Don, hard to believe there are that many "where were you" incidents since we've been old enough to remember.

Here’s one which may or may not have even registered with any of you but it caused my shipmates and me 24 hours of white knuckles.

May 1987 my fast attack submarine was conducting routine patrol operations in the Eastern Mediterranean when we get flash traffic—the highest level of comms at sea which is 99% of the time a drill exercise, but this time it wasn’t. Since I was the OPS officer and 3rd officer on the boat, after the Officer of the Deck was notified of flash traffic, I went into the radio room to read a very cryptic, very short message. Something to the effect that a US warship had been attacked in theater with loss of life...amplifying info to follow. Nothing else. No guidance. No nothing.

I took the message across the passageway to the CO and we both agreed that in the absence of further info we should assume this was the opening salvo of war. He immediately ordered the boat to Battle Stations and we loaded warshots in 3 torpedo tubes and a Tomahawk cruise missile in the fourth. We stayed at Battle Stations for the next day or so until amplifying messages gave the full story on the attack of the USS Stark. Over 30 sailors died in that attack by the Iraqis on a non-Aegis equipped ship. I don’t think it barely registered in the US consciousness but it sure spun our world.

And windy, you are right. Watching the willy-nilly AA fire trying to knock down our Wobbly Goblins in the opening minutes of the Gulf War live on CNN was incredible. I’d throw in GEN Schwarzkopf’s live presser showing that bridge being bombed and the “luckiest driver in the world” right up there.

[Roller]

My wife was one of those who never paid attention to the news, and didn't care.

Until, that is, she became riveted to the coverage of Tienanmen Square.

On 09/11/01, I had inadvertently left my cable box turned on, tuned to CNN. My trip out of DC to the suburbs is another story, but when I finally got home, I was able to rewind the feed back to the first plane hitting, and I watched continuously until about 4:00 AM (with fast-forwards through the breaks), when I got caught up to live coverage.

And, as previously mentioned, I, too, pulled a few all-nighters watching live coverage of the bombing in Iraq.