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BBHQ Boomer Essays: |
| Our Boomer-In-Charge here at BBHQ, Hershel Chicowitz, writes frequently about current events... from a boomer perspective. He is sometimes funny, sometimes provocative, sometimes a little of each. We hope you get a kick out of our Boomer Essays. |
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| We asked subscribers to our newsletter to tell us what they were doing on November 22, 1963, when they heard that President Kennedy had been assassinated. We received the largest number of responses to any inquiry we have ever made. That is particularly surprising, since nearly half the boomers -- those born after 1957 -- are too young to have any recollection of that day. Yes, we do remember... vividly! | 
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I was a 9th-grader at Byron Junior High School in Shaker Heights, Ohio. It was a Friday afternoon; there was a carnival scheduled for that evening. As a member of the booster club, I was in the girls' gym during study hall, helping to decorate the gym. I was standing on a ladder, hanging crepe paper, when one of the sponsoring teachers, Mr. Woodell, walked in and said, very stoically, "The carnival has been canceled; the president has been assassinated." I can still see him, standing at the entrance to the gym, talking to a stunned group of kids.
I donno why, but I immediately went to the school's broadcasting booth, where the morning announcements originated. I was a P.A. announcer and engineer. I guess I thought I might be able to listen to the radio there. I arrived just as Mr. Garner, the vice principal, flipped on the microphone and announced the tragedy to the school.
Like everyone, I remember a lot of events that took place that historic weekend. Mostly, I remember the nearly non-stop news coverage. The space launches and landings were watched by many people. But the coverage of the Kennedy assassination... well, it created the term "glued to the set."
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The Kennedy assassination moved television news ahead of newspapers. The
story evolved so fast that the newspapers could not keep up with it. And
people realized that they did not have to wait overnight to read the news
in the paper. They could get it on television. And in this case, they
could watch news as it happened. On Friday evening, we watched the president's coffin being unloaded from the plane in Washington; we watched interviews with hundreds of people. And on Sunday morning, we watched the first (and I believe, the only) real murder on live television when Jack Ruby stepped out of a small crowd and shot Lee Harvey Oswald as he was about to be transported to the county jail. With conspiracy theories already swirling, the death of Lee Harvey Oswald assured that they would be with us forever.
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On Monday, the country stood still, as we watched the funeral as it was broadcast live on television.
(Officer Tippit and Lee Harvey Oswald were also buried on that awful Monday.)
Then and Now
Naturally, many people compare the Kennedy assassination to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. Certainly every adult American will forever remember where he was when he heard that planes had crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania. But how can you really compare the two? I donno... we are forty years older now; we do not see things now as we did when we were teens. Certainly the residents of New York and Washington, and the thousands of friends and relatives of those murdered on September 11, 2001 see that date as something far more horrible. That is, of course, understandable.
I look back on November 22, 1963 mostly with great sadness. It was an isolated, freak occurrence. Though many boomers look at it much more personally. They saw John Kennedy as their president. Their president had been taken from them. I suspect it is those people who are more likely to embrace one of the conspiracy theories. And because of their personal feeling about it, they will never be convinced otherwise.
In my eyes, the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001 was an attack -- a battle in a war -- a battle of a war for which we were totally unprepared. There was little we could do after the assassination of President Kennedy. Eight seconds, and it was over. But there is much we can and must do following the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001. The recriminations from the terrorist attack will go on for many years. I believe that a comparison to December 7, 1941 is more appropriate.
The terrorist attack made -- and still makes -- me angry. Angry and determined. I was sad at the death of President Kennedy; I am angry at the terrorist attack.
The two events have some similarities; they both frooze the country. But, to me, the differences are more significant than the similarities.
I believe that one of the major differences between then and now is that emotions play a much larger role in our lives and decisions now than they did then. Less than 12 hours after the assassination, Johnny Carson walked on stage and entertained millions of people as he did every night. Though, being the great entertainer that he was, Carson skipped the normal monologue and skits, and instead invited people who had known President Kennedy to talk about their experiences with him. It was refreshing and extremely professional. It was just what we needed. Two days after the assassination of the president, the NFL played the scheduled Sunday games (at the urging of the Kennedy family). In 2001, the NFL was silent five days after the terrorist attack of September 11. In 1963, we wanted desperately to know what happened; in 2001, we focused on how people felt about what happened.
I also believe that it is emotion that drives those who believe in the conspiracy theories. Certainly it is not the facts. I was amused and slightly disturbed when I read that one in three Britons believe that President Bush is stupid. Why do they believe that? Well, because that is what they have been told by the press, that's why. Duh! Certainly it is not because most of them have done any research and analysis on their own. To most people under the age of 40, the story of the Kennedy assassination is as it was told by Oliver Stone in his fantasy movie, "JFK." Again, I am certain that few of them have read the Warren Commission report. All they know is what they see in the movies and what Rosie O'Donnell tells them.
Oh yes, and ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox news... on occasion. If Peter Jennings says it... it must be true. The TV news is not biased, is it? On the 40th anniversary of the assassination, the networks broadcast a flood of documentaries on the assassination. To be fair, ABC's program concluded that Oswald acted alone; Fox took the other view. The strange, the unbelievable, the unusual drives the news business -- not the normal, expected -- though there is hardly anything normal or expected about the assassination of a president.
But the prevailing consensus has been that there was a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy. The mob did it; the CIA did it; the Cubans did it; the KGB did it; Lyndon Johnson did it. Please! Today an astonishing 70% of Americans believe so. In the 70s, the conspiracy fever was so high that the House of Representatives held hearings and spent millions of dollars re-re-re-investigating the assassination. They investigated for two years, and were within five days of concluding that there was no conspiracy. Then, like the last minute of a Perry Mason trial, some experts concluded that there probably was a gunman in the grassy knoll. Their evidence hung totally on a scratchy recording supposedly picked up by a radio on a police motorcycle. Audio experts testified that, yes, a sound on the recording could have been a gunshot coming from the mysterious grassy knoll. How they could have determined that is beyond the comprehension of any rational person. But... the Congress had so much invested in this, they could not simply shrug their shoulders and drop it. So that was the way it was written... and broadcast on the news and front pages of newspapers around the world.
What was not on the front pages was that other, independent experts from the National Academy Sciencies (NAS) concluded that the sound on the recording was not from a gun, and that the recording was from a minute after the shooting in Dealey Plaza. The NAS committee also reported serious omssions and errors in House investigation.
All lies and jest
Still, a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest.
Beyond that, I think this is why that so many people believe in one or more of the conspiracy theories:
 Because they
have been told so. Oliver Stone, et. al. said so.
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Note that no one, not Oliver Stone, not Jim Garrison, not anybody has produced substantial, credible evidence that anyone other than Lee Harvey Oswald was involved in the assassination. Oh yes.... lots of evidence. But nothing that bears up under close scrutiny. (Please, please, please do not write me with your compelling evidence. I am not about to engage in that debate.)
"They" say that the Kennedy assassination marked the end of our innocence. I donno; maybe so. But it sure changed things. Would the U.S. have gotten involved in a winless war in Vietnam under President Kennedy? That is anybody's guess. Would the Great Society have been created under President Kennedy? Probably not. Would presidential motorcades have continued, and another president been assassinated? Probably so.
I believe that the Kennedy assassination, and a thousand small events that followed it, made us less willing to deal with facts, and more eager to embrace feelings. It is that sad shortcoming that explains so many of our social and personal problems today.
"They" say that the Kennedy assassination was the defining moment in the lives of most boomers; that it was the event that had the most profound effect on our young and impressionable lives. I donno. I can think of another event, one that occurred just three months later, that I believe had a much more profound and lasting effect on us; one that buried the Kennedy assassination deep in our subconscious:
The Beatles.
If you want to feed your emotions, rent the Oliver Stone's movie, "JFK." If you are looking for a fact-based, as-close-as-you're-going-to-get-to-definitive analysis of the assassination, read Gerald Posner's "Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK."
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If you like what we're doing here at BBHQ, please help us by buying stuff through our link to Amazon.com:
| The BBHQ Album of the Month is "Old Friends Live on Stage (Deluxe Edition) (2 CD/1 DVD)," by Simon & Garfunkel. If you were fortunate enough to see them in concert last year, I do not have to sell you. The concert was terrific! This album collection includes 55 songs, plus their new recording, "Citizen of the Planet," and one of the songs sung by the Everly Brothers during the concert. The DVD was recorded during their concert in Madison Square Garden in 2003. For any S&G fan, this is a must have! But then, you knew that already, didn't you? |
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The BBHQ Book of the Month is
"Vinyl Highway," by
Dee Dee Phelps. You remember her as Dee Dee, of Dick and Dee Dee.
Together, they took a decade long ride on the rock and roll roller
coaster. It was a heck of a ride! Dick Clark, Quincy Jones, the Beach
Boys, Glenn Campbell, Dionne Warwick, Bobby Vinton... Dick and Dee Dee
rubbed shoulders with all of them. This is her "behind the scenes" story.
It's pretty cool.
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