Momma dumped a clean load of laundry on the couch. She folded towels while watching her favorite soap opera. I played on the floor in front of the television then pulled up onto Daddy’s leather recliner and walked around his foot stool.
When CBS interrupted As The World Turns with the horrendous news, she stopped folding and watched. I was sixteen months old.
This was my first memory.
Ever.
Momma. Laundry. As The World Turns. President Kennedy’s assassination.
Is it possible to remember something at sixteen months of age? Most people say no. Most people say I’ve heard the story often enough I’ve made it my own.
Maybe, maybe not.
Momma says I’m thinking about Martin Luther King’s murder in Memphis five years later, but that couldn’t be the case. King was assassinated at 6:00 p.m. The world always turned just after lunch. And on that day, for a while, it stopped turning.
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| Dealey Plaza, School Book Depository, Grassy Knoll Dallas, Texas, November 2013 |
Things do not happen. Things are made to happen. – President John F. Kennedy
talya
Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life
CBS Interruption of As The World Turns
Talya — I was born in March, 1962, which would make me about 20 mos old, and I remember it as well! People think I am imagining things also, but I remember that I was at the grocery store with my mother, sitting in the front buggy section of the grocery cart, when everyone started talking about this thing that had happened, coming up to my mother, and so forth. Then my grandparents came over later that day and that was all they could talk about. I did not understand it really, just that it was a big event that involved images of JFK and crying. The reason I know it was not later when RFK and MLK were killed is because I have very specific memories of that, including watching it on the Memphis news and seeing the Commercial Appeal headlines. I remember Mom taking us to get RFK stuff at the local Democratic Party Office that year. Anyway, glad to know there is someone else out there. I wonder how many more might be able to remember. Maybe they should begin to study the impact of large emotional events on memories. Anyway, thanks for sharing you memory. I just wish I could write mine as well as you…lol!
Thank you Kevin! I don’t feel so crazy now:)) And I think you did just write your memory as well as I:))
What a neat clip with the familiar booming voice of Walter Cronkite announcing the tragic news of JFK’s assasination! The world certainly did stop turning that day. I was 3 at the time and living overseas in England. I have no memory of it but my parents remember that day.
When something so devastating as that happens, time stops and the memory etches in our mind forever.
That’s really something you can remember that far back. I, too, often wonder if my memories are a mixture of real memory with my parents’ stories attached to them, mixed into a new memory. We used to watch family slides a lot and my parents would tell the same stories about each slide until I couldn’t recall if it was my memory or theirs. Hard to know. I think memories themselves evolve over time. We weave them into our own story about what happened making them truly our own. It really is all a story after all.
Yes, pictures often become part of our memories. Thanks Cat!
AHA! Now I know how much older I am than you! Freshman year, Paschal High School,Fort Worth, TX. – Faking sick in the Nurse’s office, talking to friends who had just returned from Love Field where they saw him get off the plane. Bummer!
And I have memories from about 18 months, so you’re not crazy….well, not about that, anyway 🙂
Haha thanks!
How true. I bet you do remember this although you have probably heard about it also to reinforce your memories. What a day that must of been when Kennedy was shot. ♥
It’s astounding to think it has been fifty years since that horrific day. Great post! Very timely.
Thank you!
I get so tired of people telling us what we do and don’t remember. I still say I remember coming home from the hospital after being at Lebonheur in Memphis for a month. I recall we stopped at a little park and Gail swung on the swing and rocked me gently, holding me, Daddy told me he remembered that. But he’s gone. Gail has a vague memory of that. Anyhow – I was again, at Lebonheur on this day, 50 years ago. (I was very vitamin deficient and had to have check-ups frequently – not to mention spending my first month there as a result of the Rh factor in my blood and having a total transfusion, which back in the day was a MAJOR thing. My younger sister died (Yvonne) because the ambulance didn’t make it in time in the transport to Memphis. Anyhoo – that’s where I was. I love your story and where you were. (PS…and I believe you!)
As I typed this blog I remembered your story. I think this amazing memory must run in our family:) Or at least the two of us…
Awww…YES.I.Believe.It.DOES! 🙂
The funeral is my first memory and I was four. I think the events were so traumatic that we remember them despite our young age.
I think you’re right!
I was caring for my infant daughter and like your Momma I was watching As The World Turns.
Interesting how we were all doing the same thing at the time and connected years later.
Chinese proverb: “An invisible red thread connects those destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstances. The thread may stretch or tangle, but never break”.
I remember the funeral and John Jr’s salute! Weird how memory works ain’t it? Great one and topical too!
Good to know. We’re the same age!
I’m so tempted to do a piece on this, Talya. I wasn’t born when Kennedy died but I have heard of the impact this made even in India. I’m sure you do remember!
Let me know if you do a piece on it!
I was on a porch near the band hall at Kermit High School when Don Helms ran up to give a group of us kids the news. I went in to the office to call my mom. She was at home watching tv as the world stopped turning. She confirmed what I was hearing in the radio being played on the announcement system throughout the school in Kermit, TX. A new teacher to our school said Texans should be ashamed. As it turned out I think we are proud JFK was in Texas if he was to die. A Texan didn’t cause this. An entire nation suffered that day, but were proud of our President and Jackie.
Linda
You can remember a TV show from when you were 16 months old??? I can’t remember where I put my keys this morning. Not that it would matter, because I’d just drive to Wal-Mart and wander around the store trying to remember what it was I needed to buy. And the only way I’d even find my truck after I left the store is by pushing that little red truck-finder-horn button on my key. Sixteen months? Sheesh…
I remember the day well. I was at my mom’s. Gary was two months old. I may have been watching the same show. Can’t remember that but I do remember the disbelief and grief.
I’m older than you, but it’s a memory burned into my psyche. So much so that it pains me to watch the video, hear the stories, and recall the day “the world stopped turning.” My mother and all her family watched ATWT religiously, so that is what they, too, were doing as the news came. I believe your story that it mattered to you at 18mo. It mattered to us all.
I’m sure I left a comment earlier as I had read your post. Amazed at your memory. I was 3 years old in India so don’t remember that day at all but my mom tells me that the world was in a complete state of shock. My late aunt met JFK actually had lunch with him at the White House as she was on some exchange programme from India and she always said he was the most charismatic man she had ever met.
Ohh I’ve watched documentaries and read about that day and just thinking about it makes me want to know what really happened…and it was a event that the world certainly never forgot even years later for even our generation knows about and is surprised by it…