The 1960 election is the first of my memory. I was only 5 so I understood very little of what it meant except someone was going to be in charge of us, that was the way my mom explained it to me. President Eisenhower had to stop being president and we needed to pick a new one. 
I also realized my dad and my Aunt Flora (his older sister) were going to vote differently. My dad was going to vote for this exciting Kennedy man & my aunt Flora was going to vote for the man who seemed so grumpy to me. I didn’t know his name but of course now realize was Nixon
Fast forward to when i was in high school, I lived with my aunt Flora my freshman year when my family moved to a Michigan for a year. That year while he was president, Nixon came to Mobile to preside over a opening ceremony for the Alabama State Docks. If we went to see him -
We got a pass to skip school that day so of course my Aunt Flora readily agreed and she and I went to downtown Mobile to stand on the sidewalk and wave to President Richard Nixon. I would have waved at Satan to skip a day at school. Uncle Trump came along, I thought I had.
But back to the 1960 campaign. Between the conventions and the campaign rallies, I became a a campaign junkie at age 5. And that was when I began to pay attention to differences, why certain people supported certain ideas and opposed others - my conscience was born.
Of course all of this was seen in black and white as we had no color TV in 1960 but even in B&W I can recall forming opinions based on visual expressions & voice tone even before I truly understood words and their rationale.
And when you did get explosions of color wow! It was so exciting and yes, the voting age in US was still 21 until I was a university student in the late 70s when I cast my first presidential vote for Jimmy Carter in 1976.
The life in the 1960s exhibit. My folks gave me their old record player & stack of 45s they had collected from the late 40s until late 50s. That was my first expose to music and I still love all those old 50s songs and artists. I can do a mean Rosemary Clooney on Karaoke night
My cousin Melissa had drawn my name for the family Christmas gift exchange in 1962 and I got a transistor radio like the small one in front. The first thing I head was the Queen of England giving her Christmas address over in GB & I was amazed. My grandmother had this clock radio
I loved coffee but I always found the percolatator challenging. I was so thrilled when I left for college in 1974 that my Aunt Eleanor gave me a Mr Coffee for high school graduation. I never had to learn to master the percolator.
To be continued. Flight to JFK leaving now and silly me left my wallet in my bag that is stowed overhead so I can’t buy WiFi. But at least I have a good read. I’m still catching up with last year’s books that must be read pile. 😱
Time to continue my story. I’m in JFK Sky Club and my flight to FLL is delayed but i have a delicious bowl of tomato basil soup to take the chill off. Now where was I. Oh yeah live in the 60s exhibit. The toys.
I got my etch a sketch Christmas of 1961 and I was fascinated with it. I was in kindergarten and I thought it was just too cool. I also got a bicycle that Christmas. A red huffy. I thought life couldn’t get any better.
I got my “Life” game for Christmas of 1965. My friends Mike, Cole, and I played so many rounds of it between 4-6 grades I can’t believe the spinner still worked. Either Life, Clue, or Monopoly we’re almost a daily after school activity until we discovered the TV show Dark Shadows
After Dark Shadows hit the air, games had to wait until that show & subsequent discussion were concluded. Then the games rolled.
One of my favorite moments at the museum yesterday was seeing the Freedom 7 exhibit. It’s one of my special memories of my father from my childhood. I wanted to watch my favorite cartoon Mighty Mouse, but my came in an old something very special was about to happen -
- and that if I didn’t watch it, one day I would really regret it. We were about to see the first American space ship go into space and splash down into the ocean. I sat side by side with my dad on the couch and watched Alan Shepard splash down into the ocean.
Of course I had no sense of the importance at that moment, it never occurred to me the president was also watching, but when I posed for a photo yesterday in front of that same capsule, I was thankful for those memories.
The Peace Corps - What an awesome legacy to leave our country. And of course The Special Olympics can also be traced back to the family. Without JFK it certainly would not exist as we know it today or have led to the programs it has inspired.
Some of the most respected people I know have spent time in service to The Peace Corps
The exhibit also took me back to a time in my life that recognize as the first time I ever felt real fear that I didn’t think my parents could protect me from. It’s like discovering the deep end of the pool really exist.
In Mobile, the Cuban Missle Crisis wasn’t abstract like it was for me many people. I was in 1st Grade. I could listen and understand the news. I understood only too well the anxiety being shared between the adults in my life as they tried to keep a facade in place for us kids.
But it was easy to see through if you paid attention, which I did. Our routines changed. As the rhetoric grew louder, maps of missiles pointed at the Air Base in Mobile & blockades in the paper, you felt the anxiety increase.
The weekend before my birthday Oct 22, 1962 was when I thought we might be in trouble. My teacher, Mrs Mabel Bradley, was an older lady, older than my grandmother’s (I thought) so I considered her wise. She made us sit very still told us she was giving us very important papers
And it was crucial we made our parents read them. But we were NOT to open the envelopes ourselves. We were not to see what was in them. Give them to our parents. Of course Jeff Jones and I opened the envelops as soon as we got to the school bus loading area. I think I regret it.
That photo in the pamphlet is etched in my brain for my whole life. I was bringing home instructions and directions for us to move underground because Russia was going to bomb us any day. The bigger kids were reading it to us on the bus. I was in a panic before I got home.
I ran all the way to the house yelling for my mom as soon as I got to the driveway. By the time I got the door open I was nearly hyperventilating. Mom told me dad would take care of us. But the Special bulletin on TV about civil defense alerts were terrifying.
Wheny dad got home I had the shovels already and asked him where we were digging our shelter. Mom would not let me start until he got home. She told me he would decide. Clearly she was punting. 😂. To my horror my dad told me we were not digging a shelter.
I was beside myself that he was defying the instructions of my all wise 1st grade teacher who had given me confidential and special information. How could I report back this failure to her? I was sure everyone else was digging shelters.
My dad took me for a walk around the block to show me no one else was. He was confident that President Kennedy and the other important men would keep us safe. I felt so reassured, but concerned he might fall short but my dad seemed convinced. At least until the next day.
Again a pattern change. Our routine was one weekend to my maternal grandparents over in Baldwin County, one weekend home, next weekend to paternal grandparents in Monroe County, next weekend home. I new on Saturday morning my dad was not convinced. We took a backroad route to-
Monroe County and spent the night with my grandparents. Much hushed talked amongst the adults, the goodbyes were different. Then we did something we never did, went from there to my other grandparents in Baldwin County & my grandmother greeted us like she was desperate. -
We spent the night then on Sunday night when we piled in the station wagon to leave my mom and grandmother tried hard not to let us realize they were crying. Pretense was just a thin shell. But Monday arrived,
It was my 7th birthday. When I came home from school my mom had baked me my birthday cake but she told me my party had been cancelled because all the other mothers were not able to come over that day. What had happened were they were too terrified to leave their homes.
I still blame Krushshev and Castro for ruining my 7th birthday party and for making me think for years everytime I heard a jet overhead “this is it.”
And I will always be grateful to JFK for ushering us though that crisis.
Thank God we had an intelligent and humane leader in our presidency at that time.
Like my twitter pal @roughtradeX I was watching live and saw Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald. My dad and I were watching together. I think he was to overwhelmed about the preceding days to even think about what I was seeing at that point. We were all numb by then.
I didn’t see the JFK assassination on TV, but I recall the afternoon vividly. My mom would usually be ironing in the afternoon watching her “stories” The Edge of Night and The Secret Storm. My Aunt Eleanor was over visiting and when Walter Cronkite broke in w special bulletin -
my mom told me my Aunt began screaming uncontrollably. I was just walking into the house from the school bus stop when Walter Cronkite interrupted again with another special bulletin telling us that it appears the president has been seriously wounded.
Each time Walter Cronkite broke in, the report grew more ominous until that dreaded announcement.
So much to be thankful for from the Kennedy Family and who knows how much more could have been achieved.
