Apollo 11's 40th anniversary

[innerSpaceman]

No, but before I was alive, major moments in American History were both good and bad. I'm talking MAJOR moments.

So, post 1969, the only pivotal moments in American History that come to mind are the the first resignation of any American president and the foreign terrorist attacks on American soil in September 2001.

Am I missing something? Because 40 years without any good news in American History is unfortunate, though I'm not suicidal about it.

[Not Afraid]

I was in a church classroom with a bunch of other people watching it. It was riveting - which says a lot since I was a 7 year old with a limited attention span.

There are certain moments where you just can feel everything that was surrounding you when they happened.

The Columbia blowing up - I was ironing my shirt for work and was home alone.

9/11 - got to work early then heard the news.

Desert Storm - at the Nissan Dealer buying Chris a car.

Election 1972 - Marching around my living room with a hand-made Nixon for President sign attached to a wooden yardstick while my parents watched the news.

Kennedy's Funeral - my very first memory. I didn't understand what was really going on but was fascinated with JohnJohn on the TV.

[innerSpaceman]

Yep, I have all those same "remember exactly where I was and what was happening" effects for everything on N.A.'s list ... plus, the subject of this thread, the moon walk.

Of them all, the moon walk was the only happy one. The rest filled me with incredible sadness.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

Yep, I have all those same "remember exactly where I was and what was happening" effects for everything on N.A.'s list ... plus, the subject of this thread, the moon walk.

Of them all, the moon walk was the only happy one. The rest filled me with incredible sadness.

I'm trying to think of any other pre-moon landing one that would count as a "good" one. As far as I can come up with, the moon landing stands alone in ALL of US history, either pre or post-iSm, as the only positive "everyone remembers where they were" moment.

Fall of the Berlin Wall perhaps?

Lou Gehrig's speech (if that can be considered "good")?

I Have a Dream. Good, but only necessary for a bad reason, so that's kind of mixed.

Just not quite the same impact as, say, JFK getting shot.

iSm, care to provide some examples of these incredible good moments that everyone stopped in their collective tracks to witness that we youngin's had the temerity to be born to late for/

[innerSpaceman]

Well, I have no idea where or when I heard the of the Berlin Wall falling, so that wasn't a biggie to me. YMMV.

Lou Gehrig's speech. Um, what speech? If you think I have anything to do with any sports in my memory, you are much mistaken. I remember some Olympic moments, but not my surroundings or anything like that. Nothing in the sporting world has that kind of "imprint" effect on me.

I Have a Dream? That might have qualified ... If I'd been on the Washington Mall that day. As it was, I'm certain I saw it after-the-fact, and it didn't imprint on me at the time. I was 7 or 8 years old.

I suspect tragedies have the imprint effect more obviously. But the moon-landing (to be specific, the first step on the moon) were one of those rare good imprints.


So only the JFK assassination and the moon thing were events most people of "my" time remember where and what and everything about those moments they experienced.

From what I understand, going back, the next things were perhaps D-Day, and certainly the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.


Prior to that, I'm not even sure "everyone" remembers the 1929 stock market crash. Radio was around then, but perhaps not pervasive enough. I'm not sure.


But I'm pretty sure prior to that, there were no such shared imprints ... as there was no media to bring that kind of news to a large audience simultaneously.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by innerspaceman

I'm sorry young folks missed it. It was the last piece of American History that was good news instead of bad.

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

Am I missing something? Because 40 years without any good news in American History is unfortunate, though I'm not suicidal about it.

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

But I'm pretty sure prior to that, there were no such shared imprints ... as there was no media to bring that kind of news to a large audience simultaneously.

See, that's kinda my point though. You've defined "good news" as only news that happens to be the kind of shared imprint news that the moon landing was. But that happens to be the singular example in the whole of history that qualifies. Sure, that's largely due to the short window that the media has existed to allow for it (although radio and television existed before 1969). But with nearly 100 years of television under our belt and exactly 1 instance, I think that speaks to the fact that the media isn't particularly suited to instant good new imprinting rather than a lack of good news.

The moon landing was an anomaly uniquely suited among good news to simultaneous national attention, not some sort of good news high water mark.

[Not Afraid]

Clinton/Gore Election - and blasting Fleetwood Mac on the turntable.

The first day of MTV broadcast

Buying our first CD


Positives are more personal where tragedies are a collective conscious thing.

[Strangler Lewis]

I cried on October 20, 1964, the day we lost Herbert Hoover. (I was only two, so that's a fair assumption.)

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that my mother remembers the end of WWII with some measure of unalloyed happiness.

[JWBear]

Um... January 20th of this year springs to mind for some reason....

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Yup, I think electing America's first black president is a moment of pride for everyone. Even peole I know that weren't fans were saying how cool a moment in American history that was.

Otherwise, I agree, the uber-memorable moments are tragic ones.