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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFifty-seven years ago today we lost this President
Last edited Sun Nov 22, 2020, 08:30 AM - Edit history (1)
ucrdem
(15,512 posts)Inspirational excerpts:
pazzyanne
(6,546 posts)ucrdem
(15,512 posts)like maybe a light year further
lame54
(35,277 posts)Rhiannon12866
(205,035 posts)Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)For those interested, the aircraft is at the USAF Museum in Dayton, Ohio. Preserved with the other Presidential aircraft. We went there last year and saw the whole collection.
roamer65
(36,745 posts)1963-2020.
Sloumeau
(2,657 posts)and I am 57 years old.
roamer65
(36,745 posts)disalitervisum
(470 posts)Yes, your math was off by one year, it's been 57, but let's not focus on that. Instead, let us consider the promise of hope, the legacy of peace, the desire for reconciliation, and above all, the recognition of our common fate.
The Kennedy family has long urged its following to ignore this day, and rather celebrate May 29, the birthday of our guiding light and hope for the future.
May we all live in peace.
And, I know where I was.. I wasn't even into politics but I pulled over to the side of the road in Phoenix, Arizona bc I was crying so hard.
I got to my mom's home in Tempe and Dan Rather was on the news talking about it.
CaliforniaPeggy
(149,560 posts)Someone said the President's been shot, and I grabbed a newspaper to read the headlines.
It was horrifying.
I still have the newspaper.
rainin
(3,010 posts)LastLiberal in PalmSprings
(12,577 posts)The night before JFK was assassinated, Alan Funt's "Candid Camera" was asking people on the street if they could name the vice president. Of course, no one could.
The strangest thing was that my parents didn't talk about it at all. Even after I told them that I had watched on live television Lee Harvey Oswald getting shot by Jack Ruby. It was like the whole event never happened. Weird.
BHDem53
(1,061 posts)early. My dad was a big JFK fan. It's the only time I remember seeing him cry.
Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)They put the news broadcast through the PA system and we were one scared group of kids.
Ford_Prefect
(7,875 posts)None of us knew what to think except for the seemingly obvious "The Russians did it" rumors. We were very cold war in suburban Philadelphia when this went down.
My parents were deeply shocked. They were big fans of JFK and the perspective his administration represented.
It reminded me of the Cuban missile crisis when it seemed that every moment was waiting for worse news.
Regime change by those with another agenda for us did not occur to me then but it seems inescapable now. I don't claim to know who did it or how exactly it was arranged. I have some ideas of what may have lead to it and what some of the driving forces were. I know it was much more complicated than one lone wolf with an attitude and a weapon. Too much of what I have seen in my life confirms that.
dweller
(23,620 posts)and got an announcement also no idea what it all meant til I got home and saw my mom crying and the nonstop news with Walter Cronkite ... its burned into my memory now
😕
✌🏻
Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)As I mentioned, they kept us in school, but there was no more classes for the day, we just listened to the PA system.
Raster
(20,998 posts)yellowcanine
(35,698 posts)I was a news junkie even then and listen to the radio all weekend.
Lonestarblue
(9,958 posts)In 57 years, instead of the lone shooters we have evolved into mass shooters and domestic terrorist groups like the Proud Boys, who have threatened violence against Biden. The violence then and the violence now stems from racism and white anger. Are we never to escape its clutches and accept that skin color has nothing to do with who we are as human beings?
I suppose we will never know the truth behind JFKs assassination, but I have never believed that it was simply one lone man with a grudge. What a turbulent decade the 60s was.
ailsagirl
(22,893 posts)I believe that, after his assassination, things have never been the same for our country.
lastlib
(23,191 posts)Saw that on a documentary several years ago, and it seems more plausible than anything else I've seen.
Of course, we'll never know the truth.
hlthe2b
(102,188 posts)Larissa
(790 posts)I was eleven-years-old on the day that President Kennedy was assassinated. There are some things about those days that remain in my memory as fresh as if it happened yesterday. It was the only day, in my entire life, that I ever witnessed people sobbing -- men, women, white, black, brown -- openly in the street. When Lyndon Johnson was sworn in on Air Force One -- just hours after Kennedy was killed -- Jackie Kennedy stood next to him wearing the pink suit stained with blood. I vividly remember that she had blood all over her legs. (At one point, in the Zapruder video, President Kennedy lurches and there appears to be a portion of brain matter that flew to the hood of the trunk of the presidential limo. Jackie immediately crawled out of her seat and retrieved it.) There was real concern that the Soviets had assassinated Kennedy and that we were about to go to war over it. Two days after Kennedy was assassinated, Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald -- President Kennedy's assassin -- on live television.
TuxedoKat
(3,818 posts)But I remember when Pres. Kennedy was shot then a few days later my dad and I saw Oswald shot on live tv.
Hotler
(11,409 posts)peggysue2
(10,826 posts)I was a kid but my mother's side of the family idolized JFK and Jackie. My father, never a big Kennedy fan, cried when he heard the news. Teachers, too. Even my dentist with whom I had an appointment that day. I recall walking into the office and the receptionist saying the doctor was too upset to take patients. She teared up when she said it.
I may not have fully realized the significance at the time but the adults around me falling apart was burned into my brain and sensibility.
Things are never the same after that. Innocence, naivety lost? I don't know. But the world shifted into a darker space.
electric_blue68
(14,845 posts)the WH the Christmas that The Clinton's had themed "The American Craftsman" - each of the biggest trees had Artisan Crafters working in one medium each - wood, metal, ceramics, fiber etc and in the long hallway flanking the Rose garden those trees had crafts from school kids...
We turned at one point on the first floor, and suddenly there was that JFK Portrait! I think I almost gasped.
I was in 5th grade in '63. I knew it was horrible, but It'd be longer before I understood the real loss.
And oh, the Pall of misery of the Adults was astonishing (I didn't know any astute teens at that point)! Watched much of it on TV, etc.
By coincidence the next summer we visited, and stayed with one of my relatives and family who lived right outside of DC proper.
We did visit the original White Picket Fence grave with Eternal Flame. I know I still had that B&W photo at least a few years back.
ailsagirl
(22,893 posts)I saw it in person, many years ago. I was surprised that it wasn't a very large painting-- and of course Jackie's portrait alongside it.
Thanks for sharing your memories.
electric_blue68
(14,845 posts)Yeah, I thought it would have been bigger. You're right - it is rather haunting.
Considering the Cuban Missile Crisis I could imagine this image reflecting the gravity of that. Read his American University speech - Summer, or early Fall '63 if you haven't. This portrait reflects that imho. I didn't read the speech till decades later.
Touring the WH is both fun, and serious.
It'll be great to have The Obama's portraits finally up, too!
Dem2
(8,168 posts)Oh wait, no I don't, I was only 1.9 years old.