ILoveToQuilt

I was in 3rd grade at PS 200 Brooklyn, NY. The announcement came over the PA system. I remember my teacher, Helen Schwartz, crying. This was just before my 9th birthday and I hate to admit it, but I really didn't understand the depth and scope of this event. When I got home, my mother was watching Walter Cronkite on the TV. What a sad day for the world.

Anita

Lyncat

I was in 2nd grade at recess when the announcement came over the intercom. I remember watching the funeral on T.V.

Seaside gal

I lived in Alexandria, VA and worked for the federal government in D.C. My friend worked down the hall and she called me and said the president has been shot and killed. I remember saying, Terry, that isn't funny. And she said, no it's true. It was such a shock I could hardly believe it. They dismissed us from work early. The buses ran frequently at rush hour times but not during the day so they had to call in drivers to get more buses running. I waited hours for a bus to get home that day. My parents came down from WV. We went to D.C. and got in line to file past the coffin. After standing there for a few hours we realized we would have to stand in line all night and we went back to my apartment and watched it all on TV. We were so devastated. All the people who were there with me, my parents, my girlfriend Carrol, my then boyfriend, are all gone too. It makes me sad to watch it on TV now. Camelot.

skaduzy

I was 19 and working at my first full time job. I can remember my Mom calling me to tell me. I felt like our whole country died that day and things were never the same. It was the end of innocence for us. My office closed and I watched it on television for the next few days. It made me so sad and even seeing it on tv now for the 50th anniversary brings tears to my eyes just like it happened yesterday.

Bebe2Ten

I was a sophomore in high school in Austin and had just come back from lunch. I was in the locker room getting ready for PE. Of course, the school sent us home, and my family and I stayed glued to the TV for the next several days. We were watching the live telecast when Jack Ruby shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald. For sure this was one of those events in history when you know exactly where you were and what you were doing. Kennedy was scheduled to come to Austin after the events in Dallas.

Gerbie

My parents and I were living in W. Va. at the time - my dad was in the oil/gas business (but I am a Native Texan). I was 19 and in college at the time. I was walking back to our apt. I had finished my last class for that day, and walked in to find my mother and college girlfriend (who was later Maid of Honor at my wedding) really upset and watching T.V. the shooting had happened minutes before. I couldn't really believe it when they told me he had been shot, and at the time I arrived it was not confirmed that he was dead. We watched it all, I couldn't believe what I was seeing when I saw Ruby shooting Oswald- I remember thinking to myself at the time- you crazy person! why would you do this, we need to find out why Oswald or whoever shot him did this. I watched the lines of people waiting to pay their respect to him and his family in the Capitol, it was so sad watching all who passed by his casket, the funeral, all of the events on T.V. . His loss was like losing a member of the family. I agree with others that horrible event changed our Great country forever, and I truly think we lost a great leader that horrible day. We will never know what changes might have been made in history. He had already started to make a lot of good things happen. I could not vote at the time, but my brother was able to cast his first vote and voted for Kennedy. We had a lot of people at the time where we were living who seemed to blame my family and me for what happened, just because it happened in Dallas and we were from Texas. I know it did cast a dark shadow on our state, and the people in Texas. I was then and still am today sorry that his death occurred, and hate that it happened in Dallas, but it could have been in any state or country, the location did not cause his death. I have always believed that there were others involved in his death and not just Oswald alone. Like so many others I remember all of the details just as though it was yesterday, and these memories will be with me forever.
It is such a shame that the young people of today know little if anything at all about this tragic event or any of our past history. So many are trying to rewrite history, it's as though they don't want the people who were not alive during the time of some of these historical events to know what has happened in our country.
I remember vividly where I was on 9/11- between classes again, only this time taking my own first grade students to their computer class. History is so important to all of us, that we no matter how great or how painful it was, we must not let any of it ever be forgotten.

miriam

I was in the 7th grade. They did not announce it at the school. There was a rumor when we got on the bus that the president was shot. When I got home it was confirmed - yes he had been shot. Not much was known at that point. I had a paper route. The papers did not come until very late - people were calling wanting their newspapers. Then it started to rain and rain and rain and I still had to deliver the newspapers. My dad still has a copy.

While we were out delivering papers, a lady came to the house in tears. My dad was suppose to perform her wedding ceremony but forgot. My little brother answered the door. The very excited bride was in tears and said to my brother that his daddy was suppose to marry her tonight. My brother got very upset because he thought we wouldn't have a dad any more if she married her.

weezie

I was in our Canadian Air Force barracks room with my roommate when we heard the news on the radio. That day was the 20th birthday of the man who became my husband the following summer.

MissM

I was in the 6th grade and was in school paying volley ball when the announcement came over the intercom. Everyone was silent and stunned. They let school out. The world was changed forever.

Abby'smom

I was walking across the campus of the University of Texas after my classes and going back to the dorm when I heard about Kennedy's assassination -- everyone was talking about it and made sure that everyone else heard about it -- everyone was shocked and saddened, especially that such a thing could happen in Texas --the end of an era of innocence in our nation -- the months that followed were interesting to me because I lived in the same dorm with Lynda Bird Johnson, President Johnson's elder daughter, and my suitemates played bridge with the her secret service agents