(November 22, 1963)

"May I have your attention please..."

The Principle’s voice over the public address system was stern but uncharacteristically shaken.  I turned  toward the 10” speaker near the door with my fellow seventh grade science students and awaited further word.

“…we have just received word that the President and the Governor of Texas have been shot…”

His words trailed away as I searched my understanding for meaning. 

“…we have no word on their condition, we will announce further details as we find them out.”  

The teacher gasped, told us to talk quietly amongst ourselves and then ran out into the hall where a gaggle of other teachers had gathered, talking in hushed, animated tones.

“Hey,” I whispered to the kid next to me, “who’s the President of Texas?”

•     •      •

Thus, like the rest of the country, my initial reaction to the news of the assassination of President John Kennedy was steeped in confusion and misinformation.  The teacher returned and said there was still no further word on details or the President’s condition.  Science class ended and we spilled out into the halls where the news was the only topic of conversation. 

My next class was music.  Shortly after the bell rang and we had all taken our seats, the shaken voice again came over the loudspeaker to announce that John F. Kennedy, thirty-fifth President of the United States, had been shot by an unknown gunman in Dallas, Texas. 

The President, he said, was dead. 

The National Anthem was played and we all stood in confused silence.  The music teacher sobbed uncontrollably, said a few words about public service and patriotism and then left the room in tears. 

Two boys with reputations of being sophisticated and politically savvy, were sitting behind me quietly arguing over who might be responsible. Alternately they blamed the communists, the Cubans, the mafia and Richard Nixon. 

“How do they know this stuff?” I marveled.  I was still trying to figure out who the President of Texas was.

•     •     •

It was a Friday.  School let out and we boarded the bus for home.  The bus was filled with chatter about the news although, as children, we had little basis for discussion.  Presidents don’t get shot… not in America.  True, Lincoln had been shot but that was way back during the Civil War.  That was then.  This is now.

We exited the bus in twos and threes at bus stops along the way, often met by mothers who had not yet heard the news – uttering unbelieving gasps and cries of disbelief.  Everywhere, people ran home to turn on their television sets – the newly emerging medium – for news.

The television never lied and as they were turned on, the unmistakably graven voices and images confirmed what the rumors had suggested: the President had been shot in cold blood.  Over the course of the late afternoon and evening, details began to emerge: he had been shot in the head, he had been rushed to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.  They had found a rifle near an open window in a warehouse along the parade route.  Images of Jacqueline Kennedy still wearing a blood and brain-soaked pink dress, of the plaza in Dallas where the shooting occurred and finally, the finality of Lyndon B. Johnson taking the oath of office on the flight back to Washington were seared forever into our psyche.

It was true.  The President was dead.  Long live the President.

What came next?

America spent the weekend huddled together in front of the television set.  Walter Cronkite helped us through it.  Together we learned of Lee Harvey Oswald’s capture and then were shocked to witness HIS Sunday morning murder on live TV.  A live, actual murder, caught on TV - nothing like that had ever happened before.  We watched the funeral with the riderless horse and sobbed as the President’s tiny fatherless son saluted the casket as it rolled by. 

•     •     •

I am of the opinion that the world changed fundamentally for my generation on that day in November… as fundamentally as the world changed on December 7, 1941 or on September 11, 2001.   It was the death of innocence and the end of exuberance.  It was the end of looking forward unquestioningly and the beginning of our collective glancing over our shoulders for the dangers that lurked unseen.

There WAS no President of Texas.  I learned that very quickly in 1963.