Where were you when President Kennedy was assassinated?

Question

Everyone always says they remember exactly what they were doing and where they were when they found out that President Kennedy had been shot. It happened 29 years before I was born, but I've recently become fascinated by the Kennedys, and tomorrow is the anniversary of the assassination, so I'm just wondering, where were you, what were you doing, how did you find out, and how did you react?

Answer 1

I was in the 10th grade, age 15, in geometry class at Bishop Kelley in Tulsa, Ok. Our teacher was sick that day and the football coach was riding herd on us. Just before 1:20 p.m. CST when classes would change he was handed a note saying only that the president had been shot.
Since the word was "shot" and not "assassinated"
we speculated that the wound must not have been life threatening. When I went to my next class (biology) the intercom was on with a radio broadcast of the events as the reporters could discern them. It became obvious from the tone that the president's was in far worse shape than we first imagined. About 2:00 the radio went to a live announcement from Parkland Hospital which informed us that the President was dead. What I mostly remember thinking was "Wonder who did it? "

Answer 2

Yes I can remember it exactly as well. I'm in the UK so it was different timing. I was a teenager and still at school, I was waking up on the Saturday morning and my mother told me as I came down to breakfast. There was no morning TV news then and my parents didn't have a radio so it must have been in their newspaper that they had delivered. People in the UK were I think all very shaken and there was a lot of TV news coverage. I went on with what I had planned to do for the day, but with a shocked, heavy sort of sinking feeling that nothing was going to be the same from now on, some boundary had somehow been transgressed. As soon I left the house I was very conscious of how the outside world was going to 'feel' that day...

Answer 3

I was a freshman in high school, in English class, the final period of the day. It was about 2:40 in the afternoon, and the principal announced on the PA system that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas. A few minutes later, he announced that the president was dead. We sat in stunned silence. The English teacher made some comments to the effect that she is a Republican but feels awful about this. A girl on the other side of the room from me started weeping. After class, I remember walking home on a gray November afternoon, and everything and everyone seemed dreary and sad.

Answer 4

When President Kennedy was assassinated I was at work and the radio was on. Suddenly, the news came on and everyone were absolutely speachless! He was loved everywhere and this seemed impossble to believe! Unfortunately, it was for real! He was a great man no matter what people write about him.

Answer 5

A friend and I went from high school into town (population 700 at that time) to the Pontiac dealer to look at a new GTO. Hal Pasley, the dealer, told us that President Kennedy had just been shot. We went back to school immediately and told some people.
The principal, who was a nasty little man with a big nose from New York said he was going to have us expelled for lying.The superintendent came over the intercom telling everyone that the president had been shot.
The nasty little man tried to have us expelled for not being of proper moral fiber to remain students at the school.

Answer 6

Sitting in the college library "pumping up" for a test on the Roman Empire in my Western Civilization class later that afternoon. (Our professor canceled the class and rescheduled the test.)

********
To those like yourself I recommend a book: A Question of Character, A Life of JFK by Thomas Reeves. This critical biography serves as an objective counterweight to all the adulatory works that see JFK as the second coming of Lincoln.

Answer 7

Outside the American Embassy in Grosvenor Square ,London.
I was walking home and saw a large group of people on the steps in front of the embassy listening to a radio .
It was relaying the news direct from Dallas.

Answer 8

I was attending the Third Army NCO Academy at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. My unit was on the drill pad going through precise marching orders when the information arrived.

We dismissed for the rest of the day amid all sorts of speculative reactions the U.S. might take.

Answer 9

I was at school and I was in 1st grade. Don't remember exactly what I was doing though. : )
School closed early and my mother met me at the bus stop and I remember that she was crying. I don't recall my reaction but I was upset because my parents were upset.
I remember seeing Lee Harvey Oswald get shot by Jack Ruby on TV too.

Answer 10

Well, I was at school, I was walking by the stairs, I found out when a friend told me. I thought he was joking