I was 10. It was a Friday.

[proud2BlibKansan]

We were out of school for teachers meetings. We bowled every Friday after school. A bus took us to Ward Parkway Lanes. On that Friday, since we didn't have school, we bowled in the morning. About noon, we were getting ready to go back to school, putting our shoes on, and a 7th grader named Steve who was always in trouble came running by us yelling "THE PRESIDENT IS DEAD!" We thought he was kidding. Steve was always cutting up, always joking around. My friend said to me "Now that really isn't funny." So we got back on the bus and some of the older boys told Steve to shut up, he wasn't funny, and the bus driver told us all to be quiet. So we rode back to school in silence. I didn't know what had really happened and that Steve wasn't joking until I got home and saw it on TV.

The rest of that weekend we just sat in front of the TV, which was unusual in 1963. Life seemed to stop. My mom cried. I had never seen her cry before. My grandma cried. My dad was just quiet. I remember at church on Sunday everyone was crying. Then we went back home and turned on the TV again. We saw Jack Ruby shoot Oswald. By that time, after 48 hours or so of grief, it all seemed so unreal. I didn't believe that had really happened, I hadn't just seen a man shoot another man live on TV.

At some point that weekend, my sister and I went outside to play. The neighbor lady who had already told us she didn't like JFK saw us and said "So, your hero is dead, girls. Are you sad?" We went back inside to watch TV. (And today I want to slap the woman for saying that to a 10 year old and 8 year old kid.)

I remember watching the entire funeral on TV, so we must have been out of school because our school only had one TV. Or maybe they just replayed it over and over. I remember crying when the TV cameras showed Caroline Kennedy standing there in her little dress. I couldn't imagine losing my dad. And I wondered why Jackie wasn't crying. My mom was crying. Caroline's mom needed to cry.

In September, just 2 months earlier, that church in Birmingham had been bombed and those little girls had died. Then someone killed the president. 1963 was such a sad year. It was long time before the sadness went away. And the world wasn't ever the same again.

[niyad]

1. I was in school--one of the kids(who had apparently been listening (not allowed) to his transistor

radio, told us that the president was dead, we all told him to stop being so horrible. then the announcement came over the loudspeaker. to this day, I can still remember looking at that box above the door, thinking some horrible, ugly prank was being played. then the endless loop of coverage over the weekend--the funeral. thinking something was seriously wrong with our world, thinking about how much hope and energy and enthusiasm there had been during the campaign--thinking about the missile crisis, and just basically wondering how things could go so wrong. little did I know how insane the world was going to look in just a few years, as we lost mlk, rfk, and the thousands dead or wounded from some far-away war.

[niyad]

2. thank you for that clip

[dflprincess]

3. I should probably be embarrassed to admit this,

but I've been singing the final song to myself all day

BTW I was also 10.

[proud2BlibKansan]

4. Hey me too.

[Brigid]

5. I was five.

I was in the morning kindergarten class. I think I remember coming home and my mother was talking about it.

[catrose]

6. 12, 6th grade

My teacher was crying. We didn't know why. As we walked home, my best friend Kathleen and I speculated. Maybe one of her family members, who had been ill, died. When I walked in the door of my house, my mother told me. Time stopped.

[ginnyinWI]

7. 11 1/2 years old, 6th grade.

I had just returned to school after having lunch at home (yes just think of that--walking three blocks home at noon for lunch) and one of my best friends asked me if I'd heard the news and she told me. The class sat very quietly listening to the teacher talk to us about it. I can still see her sitting on a chair in front of the class: gray hair, straight skirt and flats, blouse with a sweater over it. There were tears in her eyes. My mother remembers that we were let out of school early (she's 83 now) but I don't recall.

Even though we were a Republican household, my parents were shocked and saddened, because this happened to our whole country.

[HarveyDarkey]

8. 14, 8th grade Algebra class

I'm ashamed to admit that at first I was really disappointed at first that the first school dance of the year, scheduled that night, was cancelled. The magnitude of it didn't really strike home until I got home and started watching it on TV. The Oswald shooting (at what point does a murder turn into an assassination?)

[texanwitch]

9. Me to.

Just think about it.

We are the last people who will remember this in the future.

Those of us who were kids back then.

After us it will just be a page in history.