November 22, 1963 had started out as a typical day at Amity Junior High School in Orange, CT for me – and an exciting and scary one for me since I was schedule to do something at the end of the school day that I had never done before. I was running for Vice President of the student council, which meant I had to do a speech. . I really had zero chance: I was not well-known, I have moved to Woodbridge, CT from New Haven CT one year ago. My sister Nona gave me this bit: “Many of you don’t know me. I’m just an ordinary kid. I like girls, elephant jokes, pizza pies.”
The only time I had been onstage before people had been in a play at a synagogue where I had one line that I had practiced over and over for hours. “Mmmmm these latkes are good!” And then, the summer before, in a big role at a play at Camp Laurel, which triggered a passion for performing.
But when it came my turn to give my speech before a packed auditorium it felt like I was before a firing squad. So I did the speech, got modest applause, and sat down still totally into my stressed-out feelings. I was totally into my thoughts for the duration of the program.
A teacher got up to the microphone at the end and said something. There was a short collective gasp. I hadn’t heard what the teacher said I was too bogged down with doing a short speech.
I then saw kids and teachers walking out of the auditorium, unusually quiet. Everyone looked stressed and grief stricken or shocked.
I went up to my math teacher Mr. Doyle.
“Did something happen? I didn’t hear what the teacher said.”
“Yes. The President has been shot.”
“Did he die?”
He looked at me and sadly and said “Yes. He’s dead.”
I was floored. I was in a state of disbelief. Like many young people at the time I absolutely adored JFK and my parents both voted for him. I had watched the most famous Kennedy-Nixon debate live.
The school bus usually played local rock stations but this afternoon, it was all news.
I was going to stay over for the night at a friend’s house. We sat and watched news coverage live. I watched the coffin being taken out of Air Force One. Now-President Lyndon Johnson. I watched all of the coverage for hours.
Watching the coverage changed my life. I because enormously interested in politics. I became almost obsessed with it with it. I watched the news. I watched the Sunday morning interview shows. I read every magazine, book and newspaper I could find.
And on every November 30 I think of the President I idolized so much and relive seeing the teachers and students in shock leaving the auditorium.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.