A November Day in 1963

 Thanksgiving Day came late in 1963. On the 22nd of November 60 years ago it was still six days away. In Oklahoma City, OK the 22nd, a Friday, started out mild and unseasonably warm. So much so all that was needed for the bicycle ride to Herbert Hoover Jr. High, located on the north edge of town, was a light jacket. Hoover was in the 2nd year of its existence that year and those of us in the 8th grade were proud we would be in the first class to attend there for a full three years. The school colors were green and gold and our mascot was a hawk. The entire student body as well as the faculty and staff were white. On paper Oklahoma City's public schools were integrated, but in reality integration was still over a half decade away.

I was so unaware of national affairs back then I had no idea, John F. Kennedy, the President of the United States had traveled to Ft. Worth the day before and would be in Dallas later in the day. On the other hand I was enamored with President Kennedy. It was mainly because my parents, especially my father, were admirers and there was a tenuous family connection to him. My Dad was a childhood friend of a guy who knew Kennedy and had some dealings with him. 

This was so long ago Oklahoma's entire House delegation and both U.S. Senators were democrats. However, even then democratic control of Oklahoma politics was starting to show cracks. An omen of things to come had played out the year before when the state elected Henry Bellman its first republican governor. 1964 would be the last time a democratic presidential candidate would carry the state.  

Since the assassination of Jack Kennedy there has been a lot of speculation about what he would have accomplished, or at least would have tried to accomplish in a second term. Domestically there was civil rights legislation in the works, but whether anything would have become law, was questionable at best. Anything at all to do with civil rights drove southerners into violent rages. They might still be democrats in name, but the idea of some Yankee president from Massachusetts forcing them to accept Black Americans as equals was anathema to them. And, to be honest, considering their overt racism, John F. Kennedy probably didn't have the ability, or the willingness to strike what was going to be the necessary bargains to get anything of the sort passed.      

When it came from foreign policy it is popular among progressives to believe Kennedy would have ended the U.S. presence--which was mainly advisory at the time---in South Vietnam. Of course we'll never truly know what he would have done about Vietnam, or Southeast Asia in general, but we all do know too well what happened there after he was gone. 

The truth is these days progressives like to portray Jack Kennedy as a shining example of liberalism. Perhaps, back in 1953 he was, but these days he would be considered barely center-left, Just as his projected opponent in 1964, Arizona Senator, Barry Goldwater would now be sneered at as a treasonous RINO by the MAGA crowd.

Some time between 12:30 pm and 1:00pm the students at Hoover Jr. High in Oklahoma City were told President Kennedy had been shot. TV's were rolled into classrooms that didn't already have one. Personally I heard a commotion at the front of the room, then a girl sitting next to me looked at me with a strange look of excitement--a sort of bizarre smile. "The president has been shot," she told me. My exact words to her were, "You're crazy."  

Around 2pm, maybe a little later, we found out the president was dead. For many of us there that day the news was too stunning to be real. I kept thinking this was all wrong, that something like this couldn't happen. That any minute it would turn out to be some sort of waking dream.

No one at Hoover was allowed to leave early. We all stayed to the final bell at 3:30 pm. By the time we got out what had started as a beautiful day had turned rotten. The temperature had fallen considerably, the sky was filled with battleship gray clouds and a cold, stiff, wind was howling out of the northwest. Yes, there was a metaphor there, or at least some heavy duty symbolism, but I was too cold to take notice of it. The ride home on my bicycle couldn't be over quick enough. 

By the time I entered our house I felt half frozen. As soon as I hit the living room I complained about the wind and cold. My father, who had come home early, glared at me. I immediately knew to shut up and went into my room. to listen to my radio. There wasn't any music though, just more bad news out of Dallas. 

Sometimes it seems like it hasn't stopped since.

All that happened on this day six decades ago. A teacher back then told us when we became old we wouldn't remember much about our 8th grade year at Hoover Jr. High. However, until the day we die, he said, we would remember exactly what we were doing and where we were on November 22, 1963.

He was right. Such is the nature of trauma.

11-22-23