In memoriam: President John F. Kennedy

[gopiscrap]

60. I was at a Roman Catholic School in Tacoma, WA first grade

the announcement came at about 1130am right before..the nun lined us up and we immediately went to the church as a school body to pray...No lunch that day. After they announced he died, we prayed for about a half hour and then they dismissed school. Those who could walk home (lots less liability in those days) we sent home, busses were called in and those who had to get rides from carpools and parents were told to wait in the lunch room while lunch was served to them.

I remember being very sad, the spring before I was living in Frankfurt and Kennedy had come to Berlin. My family and I took a flight toi Berlin very early that morning and saw him. # months later I was in Tacoma and my parents pulled me out of school to see him appear in Tacoma at Cheney Stadium.

We had just come to Tacoma and didn't have a tv, so right after the radio announcement my parents had gone to a radio and tv store to rent a tv for the week. We got so enamored with the tv after the assassination coverage the rest of the week that we wound up buying a tv thus we slid into being culutrated as Americans.

THis was the first news item in my life that I cognizant of. The ensuing coverage of the the murder of Oswald, the lying instate and the funeral itself, let deep impressions upon me...as an older child I began to study Kennedy and fell in love with his founding of the Peace Corps and while not serving with them, became a misiionary teacher in Hong Kong and have spent my adult career in service work.