Amen, Carol. I’m not quite old enough to remember, and I wish I’d have talked to my parents more about it. I also wish more people would share their memories of that time. IMO, it’s why I am here - to learn!

Yes, people need to hear the stories. I still tear up at the memories. It was as though a huge blanket of grief fell over this nation. So profound was the sadness mixed with anger. People walking about in shock and dismay that someone would assassinate our beloved president and harm his young family in such a horrible way. Then came a unity and strength through the grief that still permeates the hearts of us who witnessed this evil event.

I was 15 and sitting in my World History class. My teacher had the TV on showing over and over what had happened. A normally noisy freshman class was dead silent watching the horror unfold repeatedly. I was too young and too much a teenager of that time to have been interested in politics, but the fact that I remember that moment, vividly, is obviously a testament to it being burned into my memory forever. Certain images like the car scene, Jackie Kennedy's pink suit blotched with her husband's blood and the shock and trauma of it all frozen on her grieving face, haunt me. The one that really continues to bring tears to my eyes is her two children standing beside their mother, no doubt barely comprehending the enormity of what had happened, while the toddler, John John, wearing his little coat, salutes his father's casket as it moved past. Wow! Just looked back at that image and realize now that both children were wearing a tiffany blue coat. There are no coincidences, right?