Ask Not...

01/21/11 - posted by Frank Dunnigan

Hard to believe that JFK's famous inaugural address was delivered exactly 50 years ago today. As a 3rd grader at St. Cecilia's, I was among those fortunate enough to see the inauguration, hear the speech, and watch the parade on live television. Our beloved principal, Sister Michaelene Mary, now retired and in her 80s (forgive me for that one, Sister), was forward-thinking enough to allow portable TVs to be brought into the classrooms that day. Early that morning, classmate Cathy Straub's father delivered a cube-shaped GE portable set in a green-and-white cabinet with a large carry-handle on the top so that we could all watch "history being made".

I guess the real shock was Katie Couric's comment tonight that 70% of today's U.S. population was not even alive in January of 1961 and that millions of others were far too young to have any recollection of the event at all. I know that I always looked at Grandma strangely when she talked about her memoiries of President McKinley's assassination in 1901, as I thought, "How can she possibly remember something that far back?"

Time is most definitely moving along...