November 22, 1963

Near as I can tell I was in the 7th Grade when President Kennedy was killed. It is a day I remember very well. I was in school at Gildford Public Schools, a very close community and school. At that time the grades from 1st thru High School went to the same building, so when we were all in the lunch room that day they said for no one to leave as they had an announcement for all of us.

It was like someone hit us with a sledge hammer. The whole room gave a little gasp and then the crying started, High Schoolers right down to us in Junior High and the younger ones too. It was unheard of and when you studied history you knew President Lincoln had been shot and killed, but that was another time and place, the kind of thing that happened in dusty history books not in your lunch room in a small school.

CC Image “John F. Kennedy, Time cover January 5, 1962, ‘Man of the Year’“, courtesy of Cliff via Flickr

I can remember looking around the room, girls and boys were all grieving, I could see some of the teachers holding back their own tears. There was nothing like school shrinks in that day and age to come around and comfort this room of young people who were in shock and disbelief. The comforting fell on the teachers themselves and the principal. The rest of the day was a blur and it isn’t remembered as clearly as that lunch scene a long time ago.

President Kennedy has been gone all these years, but this memory is very strong and the tears still come when I think of this scene many years ago. It is written very deep in my mind.