The JFK Assassination: When Does Media Replace Memory?
I was four years old (almost five) when President John F. Kennedy was shot in Dallas 45 years ago today.
I remember Walter Cronkite interrupting my mother’s favorite soap opera, “As The World Turns” with a bulletin that President Kennedy had been shot.
But after that, I don’t know if what I have are my own memories or memories created later that I now attribute to that awful day.
Did I see Cronkite announce that Kennedy was dead, remove his glasses, and wipe a tear on November 22, 1963 or did I see that later?
I’m sure I saw Jack Ruby come up to assassin Lee Harvey Oswald in the parking garage and stick a gun in his gut on live TV a few days later. Or did I?
Like the circumstances of President Kennedy’s assassination—single gunman or triangulation of fire from the grassy knoll, it is hard to separate out what was real at the time and what has become a programmed memory from years of watching TV about the murder, like the replicant Rachel’s programmed childhood memories of inventor Tyrell’s niece playing the piano in Ridley Scott’s masterpiece, “Blade Runner.”
Or does it even matter?
The horror of seeing our young leader killed still saddens me, still gives me a feeling of loss, still makes me wonder what what could have been for our nation. Those feelings are all too real.
Photo: Jack and Jackie, just before the fateful, awful moment in Dallas.
Todd Epp
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Reader Comments (2)
I was old enough to know what was going on. The thing I remember the most...the drums from the funeral. They were more frightening than anything to me at the time. Their announcement meant doom...the doom of my childhood.
I was a senior in high school. After sitting around for an half hour our teachers let us go. Walking home I kept looking at the sky, waiting for the nuclear mushrooms. After I got home and could watch tv I felt better. The Russians weren't going to bomb us, we weren't going to die.
We let them get away with it because we were afraid and naive. We trusted the system too much. Now we are stuck with the cia and monsanto wreking havoc across the globe, and we are surrounded by waste and nuclear power plants and war and economic meltdown and ballot box hacking and media farce and the cfr and there is nothing we can do about it.