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What was the first major news story you remember as a child?

JFK's assassination. We were in school when our music teacher got the news. She had all of us crying and very upset, and it took our librarians in our study period to calm us all down.
 
pearlsngems said:
JFK funeral. It was on every TV channel (and didn't interest me, at my young age), and I wasn't even allowed to go to my friend's house to play that day.
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I recall this too! I think it’s my first memory of a major news story!
 
I vaguely remember when Ford became president in 1974. Though I'm sure I didn't understand the events leading up to it.

I also remember when the Mets lost to the As in the 73 World Series. Not sure that would be considered major, if you weren't a baseball fan from NY or CA. I just remember watching the last inning and being so sad for the Mets
 
Hi,

I remember the headlines referring to "Truman fires McArthur." Paper boys shouted. the headlines out, barbershops were community gathering places and while going back to school from lunch break, people wee taking about this event. I remember it quite clearly.

Annette
 
July 20, 1969 - Neil Armstrong being the first person to walk on the moon. It was fascinating.
 
The Challenger explosion. Followed closely by the murders committed by Daniel LaPlante, and Baby Jessica falling down the well.
 
missy said:
Oh you’re so young! I was already old by the time OJ was big news. Lol



I remember that. So tragic. :(
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In all fairness my Dad normally had NOTHING on TV but sports the OJ trial was the first thing I remember seeing on TV that wasn't a game of some sort. I was 9 when it started.
 
The death of JFK. I was 7 and the older girls were crying and wailing, "He's dead". Scotty, the janitor, was out sick and I thought he had died.
 
Ford losing to Carter. Also, a few years later, the death of Pope John Paul I.
 
The Iran hostages being released. I remember my mother calling us out of the bedroom and saying "Watch this; this is history."
 
When Nixon went to China in 1972.
 
missy said:
That was haunting. I remember watching it in our graduate school lounge area. We were all glued to the set and then uncomprehendingly saw the explosion. We were stunned. Had to process what happened. :(
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it was the end of the school holidays
my dad and i had always followed the space program
he came to say good buy as he went off to work and said Challenger had exsploded
i was momentarily confussed because the round the world yatch race was going on at that time and had been in the news alot and i was groggy with sleep
a very sad day
 
i was going to say President Reagen getting elected but im ahead of myself
there was an Air NZ DC-10 crash in Antarctica in Nov 1979 that killed all on board - one of 3 planned site seeing flights (my mum had thought about taking us on one)
all souls were lost as it crashed into Mt Erebus

but then i remembered earlier that year there had been a landslide at Abertsford in Dunedin where almost an entire suburb had slid down a bank in the middle of the night - very lucky no one had died that night

then i remembered Lord Louis Mountbatten had been assassinated in 1979 and i remember his state funeral on tv
 
JFK funeral procession. I had no idea what was going on but I remember the casket being led by a riderless horse. I was 4.
 
Hurricane Gloria in 1985, it pales in comparison to events other posters remember but it was a significant event in CT when I was six years old.

I wasn't a child when Princess Diana, Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston died but I can tell you exactly where I was for each of those. Whitney Houston was a shock, they all were but "How Will I Know" was my favorite song growing up, I adored Whitney.
 
I am feeling nostalgic walking back through these events with you all. What a good topic @missy !
Some of these stories are indelibly etched into our minds like bookmarks in life...
 
JFK - I was 6 and in the first grade. We were not told at school but I remember my parents watching tv all day, every day. That was so strange to me.
 
I actually don't remember the very first one. I do recall Elvis dying in 1977 being a "big" news event. And the first "test tube baby" as she was named ie first IVF baby in 1978 being a big deal too....
 
I vaguely remember Nixon’s resignation. I remember feeling sad and telling my mom how mean they were being not letting him be president anymore
 
arkieb1 said:
I actually don't remember the very first one. I do recall Elvis dying in 1977 being a "big" news event. And the first "test tube baby" as she was named ie first IVF baby in 1978 being a big deal too....
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oh i forgot about Elvis and the test tube baby
 
OJ is pretty vivid. I was in elementary school and the PE teacher had the trial on the radio during class one day. (Maybe 2nd grade?)

Princess Diana is very clear, but that was when I was a bit older.

I remember Desert Storm. That is fuzzier. I don't know how much was from the news and how much was family talking as a second cousin was there.

My grandparents let me stay up late (I was somewhere around 5-7) to watch the election results come in. George HW Bush won the election that year.

Oklahoma City bombing, Green River Killer, the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, and various other things stand out too.
 
Actually, Arkie made me remember that I recall hearing that Elvis was dead. I was at my paternal grandmother's kitchen table and it came across the radio. That was 4 years earlier than the Iran hostage release. I guess I'm not good at chronological recall! :cheeky:
 
Lindy Chamberlain accused of killing her nine-week-old daughter, Azaria at Uluru.
Was huge news here in Aus.
 
I very vaguely remember the Korean "conflict" being a big deal when I was five or six. My father and at least one of my uncles used to chatter about it when Saturday cookouts came to the back yard during the summer. Oh and a year or two later when Ike won the election for president in 1953, that was a very big deal in our household.

Wink
 
My grandparents had I like Ike Buttons all over the house. I wish I still had one!
 
I remember the Mt St. Helens erupting being major news in 1980, we were living in Seattle at the time, and I was 7 and really worried about being burned by ash.
 
The Challenger tragedy. I was in kindergarten, I believe, and we watched it live.
 
The JFK assassination. I was in fourth grade and the announcement came over the PA system at school. Our teacher, Mr. Anderson, started crying and that's when we knew it was really bad.

And then watching the funeral on TV with Jackie in her black veil and John John saluting as his father's casket went by. The whole family was crying.
 
HI:

Like many others, the JFK assassination. While I was very young, I still recall wondering "why is my Mother crying"?

cheers--Sharon
 
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