Today started out as a typical Friday -- lots of loose ends to tie up. Being the start of the winter sports season there are always rosters to chase down, coaches to talk to, players to interview.
It wasn't until I sat down with a latte late in the morning that it occured to me that it was November 22nd.
I can now understand what the generation before me went through every December 7th, remembering their shock and horror at the news that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. We can all project through the years at what our reactions to September 11th will be.
November 22, 1963 is the first day in my life that I remember in specific detail. I was six years old and, for whatever reason, I was home from school that day. The television was on with a daytime rerun of the show Pete and Gladys starring Harry Morgan. I can still remember Walter Cronkite's voice coming on, interrupting the program, to announce that three shots had been fired at President John F. Kennedy's motorcade. At six years old, the President wasn't exactly a big deal to me -- I remember listening to the funny way he had of talking -- at least to my young ears. I remember the pictures of Caroline and John-John, and being envious of Macaroni the Pony.
For reasons I didn't understand then, Walter's news bulletin struck me as something extremely serious and I tore off to find my mother. I found her in the bathroom and told her, breathlessly, that President Kennedy had been shot. That was my first news report.
I was on her heels as she raced back to the black-and-white set in time to see Walter Cronkite, in shirt sleeves, begin to piece together details of what had happen, up to and including the tragic announcement that President Kennedy was dead.
Walter Cronkite was the voice of authority in our household. Not only was he the voice of CBS News, he was the voice of the Sunday staple, The 20th Century. I knew this -- whatever this man had to say, it was always important. So when I saw Walter Cronkite stop -- take a moment to get his emotions under control -- it was something completely out of character. It was that moment that I knew something serious had happened. Something tragic.
I remember my mother crying. I remember people in the neighborhood crying -- something I had not seen before.
Everything stopped after that. It felt to me as if the world had come to a complete stop as we watched the aftermath on television. I remember hearing from a young Texan report from Dallas named Dan Rather. I remember the usually somber Eric Sevaried sounding extra somber.
On Saturday morning, there were a few minutes when I didn't quite grasp why my favorite cartoons were preempted. Didn't everyone need a good laugh? Couldn't Sky King and Roy Rogers come to the rescue?
There were stark moments that are as fresh in my mind today as they were then. Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. The riding boots backwards in the stirrups of the funeral cortege. John-John saluting as his father's casket passed.
That was the day I stopped feeling invulnerable. There was a knowledge of mortality after that. The night Martin Luther King was shot only deepened that knowledge. The day Bobby Kennedy was killed twisted the knife.
I've reported on death in my career. I wrote the story for the 11 o'clock news the night John Lennon was gunned down. I delivered the morning news break the day Anwar Sadat was gunned down by his own troops. I remember standing at the teletype machine and reading about Natalie Wood's body being found in the waters off Catalina Island.
But that first news report, that President Kennedy had been shot, was the pivitol point in my consciousness. I was still a child after that day, of course, but the was a deep understanding on the importance of delivering the news.
There are days now when I am embarrassed to be a reporter. I cringe when I remember hearing another reporter ask Washington quarterback Doug Williams if he had always been a black quarterback. What was he expecting for an answer? No, I started out as a Jewish halfback? I want to throw a brick through the television when I see what passes for news coverage today.
Because I know what journalism is supposed to be. I know, because I saw it that morning in November.
More soon.
It wasn't until I sat down with a latte late in the morning that it occured to me that it was November 22nd.
I can now understand what the generation before me went through every December 7th, remembering their shock and horror at the news that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. We can all project through the years at what our reactions to September 11th will be.
November 22, 1963 is the first day in my life that I remember in specific detail. I was six years old and, for whatever reason, I was home from school that day. The television was on with a daytime rerun of the show Pete and Gladys starring Harry Morgan. I can still remember Walter Cronkite's voice coming on, interrupting the program, to announce that three shots had been fired at President John F. Kennedy's motorcade. At six years old, the President wasn't exactly a big deal to me -- I remember listening to the funny way he had of talking -- at least to my young ears. I remember the pictures of Caroline and John-John, and being envious of Macaroni the Pony.
For reasons I didn't understand then, Walter's news bulletin struck me as something extremely serious and I tore off to find my mother. I found her in the bathroom and told her, breathlessly, that President Kennedy had been shot. That was my first news report.
I was on her heels as she raced back to the black-and-white set in time to see Walter Cronkite, in shirt sleeves, begin to piece together details of what had happen, up to and including the tragic announcement that President Kennedy was dead.
Walter Cronkite was the voice of authority in our household. Not only was he the voice of CBS News, he was the voice of the Sunday staple, The 20th Century. I knew this -- whatever this man had to say, it was always important. So when I saw Walter Cronkite stop -- take a moment to get his emotions under control -- it was something completely out of character. It was that moment that I knew something serious had happened. Something tragic.
I remember my mother crying. I remember people in the neighborhood crying -- something I had not seen before.
Everything stopped after that. It felt to me as if the world had come to a complete stop as we watched the aftermath on television. I remember hearing from a young Texan report from Dallas named Dan Rather. I remember the usually somber Eric Sevaried sounding extra somber.
On Saturday morning, there were a few minutes when I didn't quite grasp why my favorite cartoons were preempted. Didn't everyone need a good laugh? Couldn't Sky King and Roy Rogers come to the rescue?
There were stark moments that are as fresh in my mind today as they were then. Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. The riding boots backwards in the stirrups of the funeral cortege. John-John saluting as his father's casket passed.
That was the day I stopped feeling invulnerable. There was a knowledge of mortality after that. The night Martin Luther King was shot only deepened that knowledge. The day Bobby Kennedy was killed twisted the knife.
I've reported on death in my career. I wrote the story for the 11 o'clock news the night John Lennon was gunned down. I delivered the morning news break the day Anwar Sadat was gunned down by his own troops. I remember standing at the teletype machine and reading about Natalie Wood's body being found in the waters off Catalina Island.
But that first news report, that President Kennedy had been shot, was the pivitol point in my consciousness. I was still a child after that day, of course, but the was a deep understanding on the importance of delivering the news.
There are days now when I am embarrassed to be a reporter. I cringe when I remember hearing another reporter ask Washington quarterback Doug Williams if he had always been a black quarterback. What was he expecting for an answer? No, I started out as a Jewish halfback? I want to throw a brick through the television when I see what passes for news coverage today.
Because I know what journalism is supposed to be. I know, because I saw it that morning in November.
More soon.
posted by wurdsmith at
12:12 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home