ngdawg

a) JFK was shot
4th grade. The 7th graders were watching/listening to his Dallas visit in class and came running down the halls of the school, shouting into every classroom "The President's been shot!" My teacher thought they were playing a cruel stunt. We got sent home soon after.
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon
Outside playing with a visiting friend, but then, just as the sun was going down, we went inside to watch.
c) John Lennon was shot
Monday night. Had just gone to bed, spouse was watching MNF when it got interrupted with the news. I cried myself to sleep. Work the next morning was surreal for everyone.
d) the Berlin Wall fell
Don't remember where I was, etc. Just that it was about fukkin time. Seeing the news highlighting families divided for decades was cool
e) the 9/11 attacks occurred
At work at the middle school. At first, a few teachers put on their tv's in their classrooms to see the coverage of the attacks and the tv's in the lounges were on. I was in one of the lounges watching as they tumbled. Two teachers had direct connections; one, her husband. He called in sick that day. But the other one had a son who worked there and after the collapse, ran out of her room screaming "My David!!!!" and she had to be taken into a secluded area. As it turned out, David had overslept and was on his way in at the time of the attacks.
My cousin was a NYFD lieutenant and was just heading home from his shift when he got the call. He lost a LOT of friends that day. After the clean-up he retired.

__________________
Don't blame me. I didn't vote for either of'em.

oracle2380

A,B: Not born yet
C: Too young
D: I vaguelly remember watching it from kindergarten
E: I was in class, but as I was leaving one of the guys from my NG unit came and told me.
F: I was in school, they may have turned it on the TV.
G: I watched it in the living w/ my family
H: See D
I: I don't remember
J: Saw it on CNN from Germany in my barracks room

__________________
"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference." - Robert Frost

Dilbert1234567

a) JFK was shot
Tiny glint in my fathers eye
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon
Slightly larger glint in my fathers eye
c) John Lennon was shot
Still a glint in my fathers eye
d) the Berlin Wall fell
I was 4, no real recollection of this.
e) the 9/11 attacks occurred
I was getting ready for school, my junior year. Each morning i watched CNN while I cooked break fast, so I watched the initial aftermath of the first, and the second live. at the time of the first collapse, I was in my car, listening to it on the radio, I lost control of my car when it collapsed, and did a 270 on the freeway. My first class was American history, so we ended up going to the library and watching the news and surfed the internet for news all morning.

__________________
Donate Blood!

"Love is not finding the perfect person, but learning to see an imperfect person perfectly." -Sam Keen

Gilda

a) JFK was shot Let's see, 1963, right? My mom was seven at the time. I doubt she remembers where she was.

b) Apollo 11 landed on the moonAlmost a decade before I was born.

c) John Lennon was shotHmmm. I was alive for this one, but only about four or five, I think. I doubt if it would have meant anything special to me.

d) the Berlin Wall fell: I was 13, so probably in front of the tv in my living room.

e) the 9/11 attacks occurred:

One of my students asked me first hour if we could watch it on the tv in the room. I didn't know what he was talking about, as I hadn't seen the news yet--I typically don't watch the news in the morning. I turned on the tv, and there was extensive coverage on every channel, and that's what we did that day, watch tv. So, about 7:50, in my classroom. That would have been close to 11:00 Eastern time, so both towers had fallen by then. I'm grateful that I wasn't watching as it happened.

f) the first attack on the World Trade Center occured? It would have been about 5:45 California time, so probably just getting out of bed.

g) the Gulf War started?Watching tv in my living room.

h) the US Space Shuttle Challenger accident occured? At school, fifth grade, I think.

i) the US Space Shuttle Columbia accident occured? Watching tv at home.

Gilda

Fire

a-not born

b-not born

c- not even sure what year it happened in, in any event unaware of any memory of it

d- in Jr high- remember going hiking with a friend after school, and having watched some of it at school, remarking that everything was changing now- he did not get it-

E - was asleep, as I worked nights at the time- but was woken up by phone calls from the various friends and relatives, and turned on the tv to see every channel covering it- went to fuel my nearly empty car and there were gas lines- and then drove into work to see every single restraunt and gas station marquee with a patriotic slogan- and then being ordered to patroll the roof of the building I was assigned to guard (a factory) (i was a security guard working for a complete moron) in case terrorists tried to climb up there to do....something.. )did I mention we had GLASS doors- and windows, and loading docks with unlocked doors oh, yeah, thats right I worked for a moron......

__________________
Thought the harder, Heart the bolder,
Mood the more as our might lessens

Bill O'Rights

a) JFK was shot - I was 1 year old, so I don't remeber the actual incident. I do, however, remember watching the funeral procession on TV.

b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon - I was glued to my families black and white television set. Even then I was a "space nut".

c) John Lennon was shot - I heard it the next day, on a news report over my car radio, on my way to work assembling Egg McMuffins.

d) the Berlin Wall fell - Saw it on the evening news. I thought it odd that after all those years in the cold war...it was over...just like that.

e) the 9/11 attacks occurred - Mrs. ORights called me up at work and told me that a plane had just crashed into the WTC. I asked..."On purpose?"

f) the first attack on the World Trade Center occured? - Saw it on the evening news.

g) the Gulf War started? - The company that I worked for was hosting a meeting of a professional organization. The news broke and the meeting abruptly ended as everyone watched the news.

h) the US Space Shuttle Challenger accident occured? - I was in the Air Force, and was just getting ready to go to work when the news broke. As I recall, I was in the process of lacing my boots.

i) the US Space Shuttle Columbia accident occured? - Watching cartoons with my second amendment. He was highly annoyed that his shows were not on.

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

warrrreagl

I'm digging all these old threads coming back up. I didn't get to answer the addenda questions, so here I go.

No idea. I don't have any memory of that particular attack.


Visitng my parents. Normally, my folks left their kitchen door wide open because they were known for having a parade of folks "drop by" at suppertime. This particular night, Grancey and I walked up to the door and it was LOCKED?!? When finally I got my mother to open the door and I asked her why it was locked, she said it was because "the war just started." She was dead serious; she locked her door because the U.S. was bombing Kuwait. I didn't laugh out loud, but I was DYING inside....

At home preparing a poster for a band I was playing in (Saucy Jack). I was sitting on the floor with all my material scattered around me and watching it unfold live on TV in front of me. The phone rang and it was a secretary with the Board of Education at a school system where I'd just applied for a job (I'd just gotten my teacher's certification in December) and they wanted me to come in for an interview. I would end up getting the job, but the secretary had no idea what was going on when I tried to explain to her about the shuttle.

Heading to a storage unit that was 30 miles away in order to clean it out and listening to the truck radio.

__________________
Living is easy with eyes closed.

Rodney

I'll tell you where I was when I _heard_ these things, not necessarily where I was when they happened:

a) JFK was shot

It was my birthday. I was eight years old. I was in school, playing on the playground at recess when our teacher came out to tell us that the president had been shot. She looked upset, so we acted grave. When she went back inside, we started playing again. After recess, she made us put our heads down on our desks for a while, but I think it was for her, not us.

Later, I was peeved that I couldn't see my favorite TV shows on my birthday because of all the special programming. But I did get a phonograph as a present. Kids. What ya gonna say?

b) Apollo 11. In the TV/stereo section of a department store with my parents; I was 12, I think. A big, silent crowd formed around the television and watched patiently. There was tension during the LEM descent. I don't remember any kind of big cheer when the lander touched down; but I do remember, when the "Eagle has landed" message came through, seeing Walter Cronkite lose it on camera. All he could say was "Golly."

c) John Lennon was shot

In a Tower Records in Concord, California. I have a horrible confession to make; I always though that John Lennon was George Harrison, and that George Harrison was John Lennon. I had them completely mixed up. It took his death to straighten me out.

d) the Berlin Wall fell

Don't remember; didn't make any impression. The conclusion was forgone; the falling wall was just the exclamation point on the sentence.

e) the 9/11 attacks occurred

I was out bicycling for exercise before work. When I came home my wife had the TV on -- unusual for her in the morning, but she'd picked up the news off the Internet. And I watched that plane slam into that tower again and again.

f) the first attack on the World Trade Center occured?

No idea. It was just some bomb plot in New York. I'm on the West Coast. It was too small and too far away.

g) the Gulf War started?

No idea. The buildup to war took months; it was obvious that war was coming, so the actual commencement of hostilities doesn't stand out.

h) the US Space Shuttle Challenger accident occured?

The shuttle program was still relatively new, and Americans had a lot of emotion invested in it. I was at work, on the second floor of a two story office. The president of our company ran upstairs and shouted "The Challenger has exploded!" Everybody ran downstairs to see the footage on his TV. I stayed upstairs, alone. I wanted to process the tragedy in my mind before I let TV hit me in the face with it. I avoided seeing the explosion footage for two days, until I was finally ready.

i) the US Space Shuttle Columbia accident occured?

Saw it at home on TV. Didn't affect me nearly as much. I, like many Americans, have distanced myself from the shuttle program. It's no longer America's future; it's just another government program that's not going to accomplish very much. I got a lot more out of the X-Prize-winning flight of Burt Rutan's SpaceShip One.


One other thing I remember well, as an old-time resident of the Bay Area: where I was when Mayor George Moscone of San Francisco was shot. This was in '78 or '79. I was in a print shop in Dixon, 90 miles away from SF, picking up a job. And even the folks in Dixon were shocked. The SF Bay Area has no leader, but in those days the Mayor of San Francisco was the most well-known politician in the region, the symbolic head of the region and its ambassador to the world. That's no longer true, but it was then, and we were all affected. I can't tell you when I heard about Jonestown, but I do remember Moscone's death, so that tells you something.

snowy

a) JFK was shot--not born yet
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon--not born yet
c) John Lennon was shot--not born yet


d) the Berlin Wall fell

I remember watching the wall fall on CNN. We were big into watching CNN in those days. Before the advent of other cable news outlets, they were the only place you could get this stuff live.

e) the 9/11 attacks occurred

I woke up at 5:30 PST that morning because I had cut my finger pretty badly on a meat slicer at work the night before, and my mom wanted my dad to look at it before he left for work. Once up, I couldn't go back to sleep, so I settled down on the couch to watch the early morning news with my mom. Shortly before 6am, the national news interrupted the local broadcast with the word that a "small plane" had crashed into one of the towers. I watched live on TV as the second plane hit the WTC. I'll never forget that.

I also remember where I was when we declared war on Iraq the first time, when Operation Desert Shield turned into Operation Desert Storm and the Persian Gulf War. I was in the checkout line at the grocery store with my mom, and the manager came over the PA with the announcement that we had declared war. Again, we watched the war on CNN.

Challenger: my mom was crying, and all I could wonder was why she was crying at two clouds that to me looked like bunny ears.

Columbia: my mom called me at college and woke me up with the news that the space shuttle had crashed again.

__________________
If I am not better, at least I am different. --Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Grasshopper Green

JFK - Not born.

Moon landing - Not born.

John Lennon - Too young to remember.

Challenger - I was in third grade and the principal came over the intercom and told everyone what had happened. My teacher left the room crying.

Berlin Wall - I watched it on TV as it happened. I had been studying the Cold War in school (I was in 7th grade I think), so I was glued to the TV all night.

Gulf War - I was riding home with my family after having eaten dinner out; I was terrified that something bad was going to happen to us. I was in 8th grade.

First WTC attack - I was in high school, but I really don't remember what I was doing when I first heard about it.

9/11 - I was 5 months pregnant at the time and had just dropped my hubby off at work; he had been gone for a month long military training and had flown in the night before. I had to take my mom to the dentist that day and didn't actually get to see coverage until late afternoon; I listened to everything as it happened on the radio.

Columbia - I think I was at home, but I don't really remember that well.

How about Waco? I remember that clearly...I was in 10th grade health class, and my normally very boring, very calm teacher ran in wild-eyed shouting "Waco is on fire! Waco is on fire!". He turned on the TV and we didn't do any work the rest of the day.

__________________
"They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings; steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king"

Formerly Medusa

rhaevyn

a-c: not born yet
d: 3 years old, so I don't remember
e: French II class

__________________
~Alex~

You've come far, and though you're far from the end, you don't mind where you are, 'cause you know where you've been.

Gatorade Frost

Whenever I see this thread I have the uncontrollable urge to sing "Where were you, when they built the stairway to heaven?" in reference to the South Park episode where the kids build a stair way to heaven to figure out where Kenny left the ticket to their winning the candy store shopping spree.

__________________
I got in a fight one time with a really big guy, and he said, "I'm going to mop the floor with your face." I said, "You'll be sorry." He said, "Oh, yeah? Why?" I said, "Well, you won't be able to get into the corners very well."
Emo Philips

hotzot

1.Having a roy rogers at the NCO club (suppertime in england)
2.watching it early in the morning (england again)
3.working the night shift
4.working the night shift
5.slept through it after working the night shift.

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The Bully Boys are here!

la petite moi

Was not alive for the first three, don't remember the Berlin Wall, and I was in school (starting sophomore year of high school) during 9/11. I think it was second period- all the TVs and radios were on.

MoonDog

Where were you when....?

a) JFK was shot
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon
c) John Lennon was shot
d) the Berlin Wall fell
e) the 9/11 attacks occurred

A) Not born yet!

B) Watching with my parents. As the first steps were taken on the Moon's surface, I decided to copycat the astronaut and took my first steps as well! All of my parents friends who were there thought that was cool as hell!

C) I was in 7th Grade. It didn't mean much to me at the time, since I wasn't a huge Beatles fan, nor even really aware of them.

D) I was in college at the University of Buffalo. I don't remember much beyond that, except that all of my friends and I were wondering what would happen next, and if all hell would break loose because of it.

E) I was sitting at my desk at work. I was trying to research something, and the Internet was DAMN slow, so I went onto the news sites to see if there was a major Internet outage. That's when I discovered that the tower had been hit. I told everyone in the office, and we sat around while I tried to glean info from the net and the local radio. At that point, we weren't sure if we were under military attack or terrorist.

After about 30 minutes, my boss says, "OK - we all have things to do, nothing much to learn right now". I couldn't believe it, because we had no clue as to what happened, how many people died, who was attacking us, etc. All I could think of was that, when Kennedy was shot, my boss probably stayed glued to the radio.

Average_Joe

A. JFK shot: not even sperm yet.
B. Apollo 11: only a toddler, no memory
C. John Lennon: I was in 7th grade, and I had not yet begun to appreciate his music or the Beatles, so my memory of this is vague. I do remember watching it on the news in the morning before school, and then all of the radio play his music got soon after.
D. Berlin Wall: Listening to the events on the radio while driving around during my college days.
E. 9/11: At work. The TV in the cafeteria showed the events on CNN. Saw the second plane hit on live TV. I was in total shock for the whole day, and got no work done.

One event not on this list that I clearly remember is the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. I was listening to it on AM radio in a truck with my cousin during a snowstorm as we were plowing the snow. Just before the launch, my cousin said out loud to me, jokingly, "bet this thing blows up". About 5 minutes later, his prediction came true. He sat there in stunned silence for a long time.

highthief

a) not yet born
b) in my grandmothers house in England, asleep I think (I was one year old)
c) not entirely sure, I recall hearing about it when I got to school
d) having fun with this little Spanish/French number
e) at the gym

__________________
Si vis pacem parabellum.

swmnkdinthervr

Where were you when....?

a) JFK was shot......in class, 4th grade
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon......playing strip poker with my girlfriend (parents were gone)
c) John Lennon was shot.....on my way to work
d) the Berlin Wall fell.....on vaction in Fla.
e) the 9/11 attacks occurred.....at work, sent the whole crew home

We heard it on the radio (9/11) and listened through the collapse...

__________________
Fear not living...fear instead never having lived!

SaltPork

a) JFK was shot
wasn't born yet

b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon
I was in utero

c) John Lennon was shot
I was in 7th grade, maybe 6th. I remember there was one girl in my class that wore black for the rest of high school after that. I thought it was weird then and still think it's weird now. She didn't go goth, goth wasn't the thing then, wasn't even A thing then.

d) the Berlin Wall fell
In college; we knew it was going to happen about a year before. No one knew it was going to be such a huge event like it was. Seeing the images on TV of it being torn down was great.

e) the 9/11 attacks occurred
At my desk at work talking to a friend of mine on IM who was talking to his sister on the phone who lived just a few blocks away. We couldn't get any feeds on the internet so we went next door to the gas station where they have tv's mounted on the wall. We stood there in awe at the whole scene unfolding. I had a friend working in the Gannett towers in Arlington, VA that overlook the Pentagon and I talked to him as he was evactuating the towers. It was one of the most surreal things I have ever experienced.

__________________
It was like that when I got here....I swear.

water_bug

I wasn't born for JFK, Apollo 11, or John Lennon. When the Berlin Wall came down I was in second grade, and didn't have a clue what the signifiance was.

911 was interesting. I was going to the bathroom when I heard my stepmother screaming from the other room. When I came out she told me aplane had hit the World Trade Center. All I could think was, they shouldn't build buildings that high. I had no clue that it was terrorism, not untill the second plane hit. Then me and my step mom and my dad sat, glued to the TV, all day.

Infinite_Loser

A.) Not born.
B.) Not born.
C.) Not born.
D.) No idea.
E.) In physics class.

Destrox

a) parents were like 5
b) parents were like 10
c) i was 2 years 2 months~ after this
d) I was only 6, probably more worried about recess then anyting outside of the room i'm in.
e) In English 102, Professor Bhone. Got to go home early, and listened to the whole thing on the AM radio driving home. (25 min drive)

__________________
You bore me.... next.

analog

a) JFK was shot
b) Apollo 11 landed on the moon
c) John Lennon was shot
d) the Berlin Wall fell
e) the 9/11 attacks occurred

c) fetus- lennon died December 1980, I was born March '81.
d) Nov '89... I was 8. I was probably watching cartoons or asleep or something.

e) 9/11/01 - I was 20. I was standing in the cafe portion of the campus bookstore at the University of Central Florida. My bag slung over my left shoulder, I was holding what is normally a coffee cup full of regular milk, because on that day they'd run out of regular plastic cups. I had just finished eating a cinnamon raisin bagel and gotten up to browse the bookstore before heading to class. The speakers in the ceiling were playing music. The exact song I can't recall, because it wasn't very loud and I wasn't paying attention to the sound coming from the speakers until they had changed the audio over to Katie Couric and Matt Lauer covering the first crash. It was 8:57am and the volume on the speakers was also raised to a loud level, gathering the attention of everyone in the cafe and bookstore. No one spoke except to mutter quiet expressions of shock over the "accident". Practically no one moved a muscle while sitting or standing in place, listening to the shock of the "accident" and hearing Matt and Katie try to give updates on what info they had. At 9:03am, the second plane hit the second tower, and pretty much everyone knew what that had to mean. I only stayed for a minute after the second hit, and there was nothing but shock on the faces of the people I saw as I ran out of the cafe. Some had begun crying and tearing up already. I went right to my car and drove straight to my parents' house. For the first minute or two, several radio stations were still playing their normal stuff... but after that, every single radio station was playing either ABC or CBS or NBC or CNN or whatever station they feed from for big news. When I got home, I sat down and started watching Peter Jennings... after a period, I watched as the towers collapsed. After that, I watched Peter Jennings for the entirety of his continuous 48 hours of coverage. When day two was over and Jennings finally signed off, I realized I'd not slept the entire time. I had, in fact, only left the couch to answer the door for two pizza deliveries, to get more water to drink, and to use the bathroom. I didn't lose anyone personally- I could have because my uncle sometimes had meetings there- but I was calmly handling the shock of the loss of life and the horror of it all by shutting off the rest of the world. (I can literally replay pretty much every waking moment from the event to about 3 or 4 days later, almost to the minute. It's like... tattooed on my brain.)

little_tippler

a) not born yet
b)not born yet
c) not born yet
d) no recollection - was little
e) I was having lunch and watching Sky News and it was on live - I saw the 2nd tower get hit and all the rest of it...horrible and didn't seem real - I was incredulous.
f) don't recall
g) don't recall
h) don't recall
i) saw this live on TV too and felt terrible

__________________
Whether we write or speak or do but look
We are ever unapparent. What we are
Cannot be transfused into word or book.
Our soul from us is infinitely far.
However much we give our thoughts the will
To be our soul and gesture it abroad,
Our hearts are incommunicable still.
In what we show ourselves we are ignored.
The abyss from soul to soul cannot be bridged
By any skill of thought or trick of seeming.
Unto our very selves we are abridged
When we would utter to our thought our being.
We are our dreams of ourselves, souls by gleams,
And each to each other dreams of others' dreams.

Fernando Pessoa, 1918