Where were you when JFK was shot?
- Thread starter BigBill
- Start date
I was standing guard in a guard tower inside the nuclear weapons facility at Clark Air Base, Philippines.
dentkimterry
Member
I was in 6th grade class. Our teacher came running in and said "something terrible has happened boys and girls". I thought she was going to tell us we couldn't go to gym class. It was way more significant than that.........................
Where Were You When..........
Standing in the chow line for lunch on a Radar Site outside of Dickinson, N.D.
Standing in the chow line for lunch on a Radar Site outside of Dickinson, N.D.
I was a college freshman sitting in small windowless basement seminar room with six other students in a Connecticut college town. We were about to start our second hour of conversational Russian that day with one of the staff native speakers when one of the other native speakers stepped into the room with an absolutely ashen face and said, "The president has been shot." I didn't even know that he spoke English; we had always interacted with him in his language.
Needless to say, the second hour of Russian didn't happen. We all rushed out of the room and up the stairs to the street, wondering how we could confirm what we had just heard. As we stepped out through the building portico, we saw a red Ford convertible with its top down illegally parked in front of the Law School main entry half a block away. Dozens of people were moving toward the car from many directions, and it was already mostly surrounded. They had to have been listening to the radio. That pretty much told me what I needed to know without even hearing a word.
Needless to say, the second hour of Russian didn't happen. We all rushed out of the room and up the stairs to the street, wondering how we could confirm what we had just heard. As we stepped out through the building portico, we saw a red Ford convertible with its top down illegally parked in front of the Law School main entry half a block away. Dozens of people were moving toward the car from many directions, and it was already mostly surrounded. They had to have been listening to the radio. That pretty much told me what I needed to know without even hearing a word.
Comrad
Member
School #9 in Clifton, NJ
Mickey D
Member
If you are trying to solve this mystery, I didn't do it!
vito
US Veteran
Cruising with a friend looking for girls. We were 20 and girls were about all we thought about. My friend pulled to the curb and turned up the volume on the car radio. We thought it would attract some girls. Not much thought about what it meant for the country. Then I went home and told my dad, who didn't believe me. We turned on the TV and watched pretty much nonstop for the next few days.
w-30dreamin
Member
I was conceived about 2 months after JFK was shot 
DodgeCity1951
Member
7th grade social science class.
I was on George Washington Parkway heading from the Pentagon to Fort Belvoir..............I heard the news and thought, "That news cast must be a joke and it is in bad taste." But, it wasn't a joke!
A sad day for America..............and the world as JFK would have handled the Vietnam mess in a much different way than LBJ did.
A sad day for America..............and the world as JFK would have handled the Vietnam mess in a much different way than LBJ did.
bmcgilvray
Member
In the 2nd grade water fountain line after afternoon recess. Overheard two teachers whispering about it.
I was an Army Captain, stationed at the Air Force radar squadron at Cape Charles VA. We were having an exercise, when one of the airmen at the plotting board called out that he'd had a message that President Kennedy had been shot. They had 'fade out' (exercise over) a few minutes later. We were all a little jumpy and we were held at advanced readiness for a while. We flew the flag at half staff for several days, I remember. That night there was to have been a party and it was the first date with the lady that later became my wife.
luangtom
US Veteran
I was a sixth-grader lying on the couch with a bowl of chicken-noodle soup, sicker than heck. I watched it on the TV with my parents and had never seen my father get that emotional over the news before. It is a day that I will never forget, as I had just received an autographed 8X10 of JFK and his wife as part of a school letter-writing project. I had written to him and got the photo not long before that sad day. I still have it.
HS chemistry class. Jefferson High School, Jefferson City, Tennessee.
bgrone
Member
11/22/1963
Sister Michael Edward's 7th Grade class Corpus Christi Academy, Ft Dodge Ia. At the first announcement the nuns led us across the street to the church to pray for the President, then we learned he had died. The next day was my mother's birthday,I remember the Iowa/Notre Dame football game was cancelled. My father was a local radio newsman, I still have a recording of him interviewing JFK when he was campaigning for president.
Sister Michael Edward's 7th Grade class Corpus Christi Academy, Ft Dodge Ia. At the first announcement the nuns led us across the street to the church to pray for the President, then we learned he had died. The next day was my mother's birthday,I remember the Iowa/Notre Dame football game was cancelled. My father was a local radio newsman, I still have a recording of him interviewing JFK when he was campaigning for president.
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Mule88
Member
3rd grade class, I remember it was announced over the loud speaker and the teacher was crying.
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