WHERE WERE YOU? NOVEMBER 22, 1963



‘I WAS IN THE THIRD GRADE. Daddy took my mother, sister and I out of school that day to go to Love Field and welcome the President and Mrs. Kennedy to Dallas. WE had made posters – “WELDOME JFK & LBJ!”’ ‘My memories are like snapshots themselves. I remember the pressing crowd, a chain link fence. My sis, Karen, said Daddy would alternately lift her then me onto his shoulders for a better view. I do remember seeing the Kennedys get off the plane – though it is Jackie’s pretty pink suit that I have the clearer memory of.

We stopped for a ‘celebration lunch’ at Kip’s Big Boy on Zang on the way back to school. We had no radio in the car, but heard lots of sirens at one point. When we entered the school office, the principal came out to tell our father about the assassination. We returned to class, and the announcement was made over the P.A. system. A boy in my class cheered. My teacher cried. The next days of TV coverage – the horse-drawn caisson, John-John saluting as it passed – these are seared in my memory.’

-V. Gates Skinner


‘I just remember cartoons were off for days….’

-D. Teddlie


‘I remember that day so well. My little brother was born November 4, 1963 so he was 18 days old and our parents are from Germany. My mother LOVED President Kennedy and idolized Jackie. I was 3 and mama was holding my brother and we were watching the President on TV. When the shot rang out and they said that the President had been assassinated my mother dropped my brother in shock and disbelief and she was wailing in German saying ‘Oh God what have they done.” So that day will be burned om my memory forever and my brother has never been the same since!’

-Diane C.


‘I remember I was in the 6th grade and we were coming back from lunch. Everyone was crying and my daddy was a switchman at SWBT company in Grand Prairie. He called my mom at home and asked her what was going on and she said that John f. Kennedy was killed. The switchroom was overheating so much from everyone calling each other that my daddy had to turn large blowing fans on to try to keep all of the equipment cool’

-Belinda F.


‘We were living in Hawaii, and it was only a few months since JFK had visited Honolulu. They had flown his convertible over there so he could ride down the main street in Waikiki. People ran up to the car and gave him leis. Suddenly he was dead, in that same convertible! We had to wait hours for the TV coverage to be flown to the islands from the mainland. That night, everyone just went to church in grief and shock!'

-W. and Charlotte Ware


‘I was in study hall in the 7th grade at Westerly Babcock Jr. Hight in Westerly, Rhode Island. The principal made the announcement over the loud speaker. Such a sad day for our nation. I can still hear the voice of the principal as it if happened just yesterday.’

-K. Aiello


‘I was taking my nap my mother told me, in Oak Cliff’

-Scott H.


‘I am Scott’s mom. I was ironing and watching AS THE WORLD TURNS. I watch ALL MY CHILDREN now and don’t iron anymore!!!’