At@6:30 a.m. Tuesday morning February 20th, 1962, my eldest sister Melba(13 at that time) and I( age 11 photo on left) sat in our tiny home in Beaumont Texas before preparing for another school day. As we awaited the picture tube to warm up on the households only Philco black and white TV set , I fumbled around with the rabbit ears to try and ensure a fair reception. The occasion? Well we were awaiting to hear Walter Cronkite's CBS news broadcast from Cape Canaveral, Florida of John Glenn's historic space flight aboard the Frinedship 7 space ship(as it was called in those days). The flight as well as the entire mission went off flawlessly and we headed off walking the 2 miles to school on that cold February morning. Shortly after I arrived at my classroom I overheard my teacher and another one talking about that spaceflight in the hallway,"man was he really moving" said my teacher. "yep, 17,000 miles an hour is flying for sure", said the other teacher. And I wondered, how awesome it was for a human being to be able to travel that fast, to go completely around our whole wide world in a matter of a few minutes...Faster than it took for me to walk halfway back home..
Now you may or may not be wondering why I began this blog with this little personal story. If the former, then I want to say that I've been watching the television coverage on the death of Walter Cronkite the past several hours and it's occured to me after hearing thoughts and feelings from his friends and fellow journalists, that many of us common folk has some as well..
From those early broadcasts on the American space flights through the civil rights years, and the landing of the first humans on the moon, he was as much a part of my life as was that little old black and white tv set. A year and a half later on a rainy Friday morning on November 22nd 1963, us kids again were present in front of that tv set hearing Mr. Cronkite speak those searing words that our beloved President Kennedy had been shot and was now dead. I can hear to this day , that moment of utter silence and shock that filled our home followed by tears from my grandmother and other siblings as well as by me.
It was that well-known voice of authority and honesty that will always be a part of my life and of those souls who were fortunate enough to have been alive to spend some time with this great man. I wish to extend my condolences to his family and friends around the world. And I would love to hear from you, the common person, of your thoughts and feelings about a very loved human being.
If you were not privileged enough to have been around during his time, maybe you can share some feelings given to you by a parent or grandparent.
AND THAT'S THE WAY IT IS, JULY 18TH, 2009.
REGINALD
Hi Reg,
ReplyDeleteThanks for following my blog. :-)
Oh, yes, how I do remember Walter Cronkite's report on Gemini, all the space flights, the Moon Landing, JFK assassination. I think the JFK report is most vivid in my mind with his reporting. So unbelievable. Cronkite was such a good reporter. The best of them all.