November 22, 1963: WHERE WERE YOU, AND WHAT WERE YOU DOING WHEN YOU HEARD THAT JFK HAD BEEN ASSASSINATED?

[Valentine Mark Herman]

On November 22, 1963, I went to the Globe Theatre, Stockton, to see the Beatles. It was the only time I got to see them.

I went to the gig with 2 girls I was in love with -- Diane and Jenny (for the purposes of this Blog, I will not use their real names -- Jenny and Diane).

It was a great concert, although you couldn't hear much of the music because of all the screaming.

We took the bus back to Darlington, and snuggled up all cosy and warm together on the back seat, and I had an arm around each of my soon-to-be, I hoped, sweethearts. Diane and Jenny were -- as you will no doubt imagine -- enamoured by my charms....or perhaps it was the afterglow of the Beatles.

Anyway, I realised I had to make a very difficult decision - which of the two lovely ladies was I going to walk home?

I hadn't decided when we got back to the bus station in Darlington (where we lived).

And then we heard the news -- JFK had been shot, and was not expected to live.

Everyone who we saw was in a state of shock -- after all JFK had just saved us from the Cuban Missile Crisis and had faced-off Khruschev.

For the three of us, that was the end of a magic evening. Diane took the last bus home to the west of the town. Jernny took the last bus eastwards. And I waalked home, beacuse I had spent all of my money on a concert programme, and pop corn and cokes for the girls in the interval.

It took me another two years before Diane and I started going out together. I never went out with Jenny again.

There is a sort of Mail -- if not Mail Art -- part to this story. I had a pen-pal at the time who lived in Windsor (about 250 miles/400 kms from Darlington) who was called Liz. (She was not Her Royal Highness Queen Elizaabeth 11 who also lived in Windsor). I remember writing to Liz the next day about the concert and the assassination.

THE END

[borderlinegrafix]

Who said it is important to remember the past so you do not repeat the same old mistakes?  Great story, Val.  I was in first grade and went home early.  I didn't understand the importance on that day, but the TV was on and everyone was in shock.