8mm Forum: 50 years Ago Today

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Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on November 22, 2013, 06:46 AM:

50 years ago today, Nov 22 1963, President Kennedy was assasinated in Dallas. Many of us, I am sure, remember that day like it was yesterday, and know exactly where they were standing and what they were doing at that particular moment. I had just been in the USA two weeks, and was working at Sylvania in Williamsport Pa. The whole plant came to an immediate halt and workers crowded around a black and white TV. When it was announced that the President was dead, people just left the building in tears and shock.
Another significant event that day, Walt Disney completed his tour of Florida and committed to making Orlando the future home of Disney World and Epcot. Walt was told the news of the Presidents death when his plane landed in New Orleans on the way baxk to California.
Florida and the World were both changed forever that fateful day.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on November 22, 2013, 09:36 AM:

That day was also a Friday. I was driving to do a film show for the IFL (International Friendship League) in Taunton, Somerset. Just after 6.30 pm GMT the car radio announcer broke in to deliver the sad news.

I may have been the first to give the details a few minutes later when I arrived at the club headquarters. As more came in they were also informed, the whole room was in a state of shock.

I can remember that vividly, but cannot remember what 16mm films I showed that evening.

Posted by Lars-Goran Ahlm (Member # 1908) on November 22, 2013, 10:38 AM:

This is my oldest news memory.
I was only three years, one month and twenty days old when it happened but I still remember the TV news and the extensive coverage in the Swedish newspapers the following days.
I may not have understood everything but remember how all grown-ups where devastated and shocked and that made me realise that something really terrible had happened.

My next news memory was not until five years later when Czechoslovakia was invaded and the "Prague Spring" was crushed.

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on November 22, 2013, 11:47 AM:

I'm just a little too young. I was born in 1962 so JFK to me is more history than current events. What is shocking to me is that something I grew up with as a recent happening is now a half century down the road.

Time catches up to all of us!

Posted by Larry Arpin (Member # 744) on November 22, 2013, 12:06 PM:

My family and I were on our way to Oregon. I remembered it like it was yesterday. I was 11 years old.

Posted by Janice Glesser (Member # 2758) on November 22, 2013, 02:39 PM:

Hard to believe it was 50 years ago. I was in my high School German class when the annoucement came over the PA system. I just remember the gasping from classmates and then an unsettling silence of disbelief in the room and in the hall. I made it to my next class...but then we were told we could all go home. My family spent the next 3 days around the TV trying to process what just happened. At that time and all the years since it still felt so unreal to me... until a couple years ago I visited Dallas. I stood in Dealey Plaza where the President was shot...stood on the grassy knoll...and looked out the 6th floor book depository window which is now part of a JFK museum. This all finally made it real to me and helped bring some closer...but it will never be forgotten.

[ November 22, 2013, 03:59 PM: Message edited by: Janice Glesser ]

Posted by Graham Ritchie (Member # 559) on November 22, 2013, 04:16 PM:

Wintery Friday night, attending the Boys Brigade, 10yrs old, Glasgow, Scotland. I don't think anyone back then could believe that could happen and were in shock. The 1960s was also a dangerous time, with what had happened regarding the Cuba Crisis, the cold war, the distrust and the real possibility of a nuclear exchange between Russia and America.

The assassination of President Kennedy was a moment in time that shook the world.

Graham.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on November 22, 2013, 04:48 PM:

I have some family in Burleson Texas which is a suburb of Dallas/Fort Worth and back in 2006 we rode the train to Dallas and wandered about town and went to Dealey Plaza to see where it happened. I was born in 1968 but I have always been fascinated by the Zapruder film and I had my super 8 camera with me and I stood about where he stood and filmed the same panning shot down the street and to the freeway underpass...it was very sad to stand there and imagine what had happened that day...

Bill [Frown]

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