The day the future died.

That's probably it right now.

and made it my wallpaper. It was the Bill of Right with "VOID AFTER 9/11/01" stamped on it in red.

The Kennedy Assassination, as well. Everyone I've ever spoken to remembers exactly where they were that day.

When Bush beat Gore, I remember being at work. I was totally shocked.
I can't remember where I was when Kerry lost four years later. In that election I was expecting it. By then I was getting used to Bush beating Democrats.

Assassination of Robert Kennedy
Assassination of Martin Luther King
The end of the Vietnam War
The first of 47 times that I saw Star Wars.

Allied occupation troops leaving Vienna in 1955
Hungarian revolution
JFK election and assassination
MLK and Bobby assassinations
LBJ announcing he wasn't running
Goddamn Nixon getting elected
Watergate

lots of history there. It's why the Spielberg movie "Bridge of Spies' ws so important. Gotta see that movie to understand the film...and the whole ting is great...

In 1956 my mother worked as a translator for the Red Cross at the border with Hungary. You could hear the artillery in the distance.

I remember Nixon resigning on TV. That was one happy day.

The invasion of Iraq - I was working at the local retail store when it came across he radio. And 9/11. I was in the law school library when I saw the story about a "small" plane hitting the first tower. One of the ladies sitting at my table had a boyfriend working in the tower. Her reaction really drove it home.

And reading the other posts (on edit), the Challenger disaster and the Berlin Wall falling.

I was in study hall and an announcement came over the loudspeaker. We were sent home from school.

And most of the others that you listed.

And my parents told me where I was when Pearl Harbor happened. I was to young to remember it myself.

Watched most of the news reports all day.
Challenger - at work, heard on the radio
Same with OK City bombing
9/11 - driving to work, heard initial news broadcast on NPR, got to work and watched the rest on TV.

Murrah Building bombing

Carter defeat by Reagan 1980

9/11

OJ acquittal

Challenger: high school social studies final exam
9/11: at work in NJ, trying desparately trying to get ahold of my husband who had a sales call in the towers that day (he missed it and is fine)
Sandyhook : getting my father in law to turn off the TV so my 1st grade daughter wouldn't be upset.

Changed me forever.

I remember the Apollo 11 moon landing
Nixon's resignation
MLK and RFK assasinations
Kent State
Reagan winning the 1980 election
John Lennon's murder
Rumors about a strange new disease striking gay men.

I remember 9/11 because I was working in DC. I don't remember JFK's assassination, but I remember his funeral, I was young and we were traveling cross country. I remember where I was when they shot Reagan, my response was "damn, they missed". Not a very good thought. I remember the 2000 election very well, stayed up late enough for them to start saying "wait" on Florida and of course, I was up very late after that.

My wife swears she remembers the death of FDR, but I have my doubts since she was barely 4 years old. I'm the same age and I have no recollection of it.

ML King assasination
RFK assassination
Elvis's death
Reagan's 1st election
John Lennon murder
Reagan shooting
Challenger explosion
Oklahoma City bombing
9/11
Obama's 2 elections
Bin Laden death
Sandy Hook
Boston Marathon
Paris ISIS attack
San Bernardino

But still what I remember, the announcement that Len Bias had died from a drug overdose and Kurt Cobain's suicide. As a 40-something thinking back on the news, I remember a lot of unhappy occurrences - Rwanda, Serbia, Stevie Vaughn, Columbine, Sandy Hook, Oklahoma City, Waco, Paris, Mumbai. Too much death.

OJ Bronco chase
OJ verdict
Obama's elections
Challenger explosion (I even remember the joke I heard about it 2 days after it happened in the Port Authority)
Columbine
Nixon's resignation (the oldest event that I can remember)
2000 election
12/31/99-1/1/00- I was at home because I didn't want to go out...enjoyed watching some of the festivities on MSNBC

Richard Nixon's second election.

And of course shooting of John Lennon.

The only one of these events that actually had people talking to each other in the grocery store in extreme disgust, loathing, and excitement was the Iran Contra thing. I have never seen people so pissed off and angry in public outside of an actual demonstration. Of course all that seething anger came to nothing and everybody went back to sleep very quickly. No lessons were learned and all the same people continued to direct events.

But I must say, I was on the train from Philadelphia to NYC the morning after Nixon's second election, and there was a pall of silence all over everything and everyone that had a certain atmosphere I've never experienced before or since. Again, the mood of the populace had no effect on anything.

I think that's my first. My teacher announced "the space shuttle just blew up", then we tried to get news on the TV in the classroom. No antenna so it didn't work.

The Voyager 2 flyby of Neptune... I stayed up until 4 am watching it live on PBS.

Iraq invading Kuwait... I was visiting my grandparents in Illinois at the time and I kept reading about it in "US News& World Report". My grandfather Xeroxed a map in one issue so I could draw my battle plans.

The beginning of the air offensive in January 1991; it started on my brother's birthday and interrupted "Star Trek: The Next Generation".

Oklahoma City. I was getting lunch at the UConn-Stamford cafeteria and it was on the TV there.

The Election 2000 recount. We had recently gotten cable internet at work and we all watched the news and stuff.

9/11.

Saddam's capture.

Obama's election. I still have all the screenshots I took and saved as PDFs.

Columbia's loss.

The Deepwater Horizons accident.

Fukishima.

Sandy Hook.

That Norwegian terrorist that shot up a summer camp.

Apollo 11
The Manson Murders
Nixon's resignation
the '78 Red Sox/Yankees one game playoff (fucking Bobby Dent! )
Mount St. Helen's (okay, technically I was hiking on the Appalachian Trail that week)
Lennon's murder
Beirut barracks bombing
Challenger
OJ's white Bronco pursuit
Columbine
9/11

Nixon resigns.
John Lennon murdered.
Hungary opens borders to the West, ending Cold War.
Montreal Massacre.
Death of Princess Di.
9/11.

But how the hell did I miss the Montreal Massacre?

WTF?

911
Challenger - was in the car and remember exactly where I was!
Obama's election and inauguration - was at home but I recall
Elvis' death - just remembering hearing it on the radio in my room for some reason
John Lennon's death - happened someone yelled it out the college dorm window and that's how it became memorable

One of our family friends was on it.

The capture of Richard Ramirez (the Night Stalker serial killer). Living in LA when he was loose was crazy. They announced his capture over the intercom at Ralph's.

9/11 another big one

In clear weather, Space Shuttle launches were visible for 100+ miles. Being familiar with them, I
didn't need a radio or TV to know something had gone horribly wrong...

9/11- I was making a cup of tea for my ex when she called me into the living room with
'a plane just hit the World Trade Center'

I was walking to get my second cup of coffee that morning and watched the second plane hit live. Sat down and had my boss walk in 2 hours later just to say 'go home, nobody is getting anything done today"

JFK
Chicago police riots and Chicago 8 Trial
Kent State
Me Lai
Napalm girl
Opening of McChimp's war to free the Iraqui people from the evil dictator
Obama's election
Sandy Hook

... the building Oklahoma.

I was connecting in Dallas, and headed to Raleigh.

Dallas had bad weather, so we circled for hours. I think we flew to San Antonio for fuel. Then back to Dallas.

So I missed my connection. It was so late, I spent the night in the Dallas airport. And I spent that night watching the CNN coverage of the blast.

I had just returned to graduate school in Texas when Shuttle Challenger blew up.

I was on a biz trip to London when the Tiananmen Square protests occurred.

I was at a conference in Denver when the CA earth quake in 89 occurred.

On vacation in PA when Princess Di, was killed in a car accident (ok, not like the others).

On vacation in the Mt of Tennessee when the shuttle Columbia burned up.

I'm forgetting a few.

Apollo 11
Kent State
Reagan assassination attempt
Sadat assassination
Rabin assassination
Challenger blow up
Columbia disintegration
John Lennon shot
Princess Di accident
OJ verdict
TWA 800 disaster

Obviously I'm heavy on assassinations.

Sally Ride I was one of the kids watching
The Berlin Wall falling
The Gulf War starting
WTC 1st bombing
Oklahoma City Bombing
OJ Verdict
9/11
Obama's win

JFK's assassination - 7th grade (5th period)
RFK's assassination - 11th grade (asleep with the transistor radio under my pillow. It was 1968)
Challenger - was flying from ATL to St Louis and rental car counter lady told me what happened.
9/11 - Rehearsing our 2002 biz plan presentation in executive conf room in NY.

Oddly enough I missed flying on 9/11 by one day and I was scheduled to fly to Japan with personnel from 6 of our suppliers the day after the quake/tsunami which caused the Fukushima meltdown - we were fortunate that we found out how bad things were before we got on the plane.


Peace

9-11, first World Trade Center bombing, Bush stealing the presidency, Virginia Tech, Germany reuniting, Japanese tsunami, Columbia shuttle exploding.

That was a bizarrely memorable moment in history.

Also Reagan getting shot.

My kids were little and were hooked on the "TGIF" shows (Family Matters, etc) which kept getting interrupted for the white Bronco chase. "Why isn't our show on Mommy?"
I was here on DU when I heard about Robin Williams last summer.

Bobby's assassination
Helen Keller's death announcement
Game 7 of the 1968 World Series
Apollo 8 Christmas Eve broadcast
Apollo 11 moon landing
Cuyahoga River catching on fire
Nixon's election and re-election
Nixon's resignation
Viking landing on Mars
Challenger
Fall of the Berlin Wall
Luby's Cafeteria massacre
9/11
Japanese megadisaster

Rest is just news.

Sometimes my personal life intersects with "historic" events, but that's rare.

The Apollo moon landing was an event in my life because one of my grandfathers was among the many engineers who made it happen.

My wife and I both knew people working on the Galileo spacecraft. A trip to JPL was among our first dates.

I was in the room when The Second Berkeley Software Distribution was released into the wild.

Honestly, I'm the dog barking at another dog on the sidewalk as the city begins to burn, the mushroom clouds of nuclear Armageddon rising in the distance.

Walking through the old student union at LSU. It came on TV.

MLK assassination. Canvassing for McCarthy with some students in upstate New York.

9/11. Returned to my hotel room in Vienna after a day in the botanical garden.

Challenger (I was a news reader on my college radio station and read the news as it was coming over the wire)
Berlin Wall
Princess Diana
2000 election (I sang at Bush's inaugural in the morning - as part of my regular gig - and at a protest concert in the afternoon)
9/11
Obama's election

and, oddly, Elvis's death

MLK assassination, RFK assassination, first moon landing, Kent State Massacre, John Lennon murder, Challenger explosion, the start of Gulf War I, McVeigh, Columbine, 9/11, Obama election. I'm sure there are more, but these are off the top of my head.

I was in Europe at the time, and had to rely on local news coverage for much of the detail, which was incomplete at best for quite some time.

Years ago went on a five week trip to Europe. First stop Heathrow in London. Got off plane and saw newspaper with Frank Sinatra's death. Not a fan, but still weird.

of the paper just over a year earlier, in the same town, and was shocked when I drew close and realized they were reporting her death.

I was sick that day so not at school. Laying on the couch, my mom watching her "storys" (soap..."As the world Turns&quot When Walter Cronkite interrupted. His voice shook as he made the announcement. Back then newscasters were totally professional. They never let on their own opinions or showed emotion so it was quite shocking.

I don't know why that seemed worse than others. I think it's because there was a kind of innocence back then. Now we are used to this kind of crap happening.

Also some of my birthdays.

I'd been asked to improve my reading. I liked biographies so I read them about famous people. I got to wondering what a hero looked like. All the heroes I read about were dead - often with a painting of them rather than a picture. My Dad told me JFK got a war medal so he was a hero. So I followed him and tried to read my Dad's books on him. When I heard JFJ say in a TV clip "ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country", at dinner one night, I asked my family what I could do for my country. I was 7 years old. They nearly fell out of their chairs laughing at me. They stopped laughing when I volunteered for a political campaign and started delivering flyers to peoples door. My candidate won that election when I was 8 years old. In my Grade 4 class, our teacher suddenly stopped it and brought in a radio to listen to the reports. Taking the bus home from school, I saw the headlines "KENNEDY DEAD". The "hero" I picked to follow was dead.

JFK's assassination was a profound, life altering wound to this little kid. I supported RFK, MLK, gay rights in the 70s, protested the Vietnam war and Nixon's "I've got nothing to hide", student housing, all kinds of politicians through to Obama and now Bernie, etc. To this day, I feel JFK inspired me to be an activist, got me started and I've never stopped.

RFK assassination - at home during exams
MLK assassination - at home in the evening via the news
John Lennon assassination - I was watching Monday Might Football with friends at home
Challenger - at a client's
9/11 - arriving home from an early doctors appointment I watch it unfold live


Nicer memories:
Moon landing in '69 - at a camp that set up a TV outside so we could watch it
Nixon resigning - at home
Obama's 2008 election & inauguration - at home for every delightful second of it

When I was little,my mother coming into my bedroom and saying We are at war

Korea

The Cuban Missile Crisis (three days in a home bomb shelter makes it memorable)
The JFK assassination (I was at school),
Oswald being killed on TV (I was in my 'jammies, sitting in front of the TV, alone)
Pope John XXIII dying (I was in a Catholic grade school)
The '68 convention in Chicago
The Moon Landing (the newspaper gave directions for taking a photo of your TV)
RFK's assassination (I was in my room, glued to a transistor radio)
Apollo 1 burning up on the launch pad (I was at home)
Kent State (I was in college)
Nixon Resigning (I watched his address on TV)
The Challenger blow-up (I was a teacher by then, and had a friend who was in line to go up next)
9/11 (I was in a classroom with 5th graders; we only had a TV in the library at the time)
Obama's First Election (I was drunk-dialing any and everyone)

Nixon's resignation. (First TV memory.)
Bicentennial celebration in NYC.
The failed rescue of the hostages in Iran.
Reagan being shot.
Challenger explosion.
1989 San Francisco earthquake.
The Berlin Wall coming down.
Tiananmen Square.
Clinton winning in '92.
Waco siege.
Oklahoma City Bombing.
Death of Diana. (In Seattle, looking at the paper on Sunday morning. Not sure why it sticks.)
9/11.
Shoe Bomber. (We were in Paris, and about to leave to go back to the US, so...)
Invasion of Iraq.
2004 Election. (We went to the movies to watch Dawn of the Dead. Perfect.)
Hurricane Katrina. (We were in Prague, and it was sad to see our country fail its own citizens so horrifically.)
Saddam Hussein's Execution. (We were in Paris, and it was interesting to see local shops posting the news in hand-written notes on their doors.)
Obama wins.
Sandy Hook. (One of the most emotional days of my life. My kid was in 1st grade at the time, too, and we had just had a mass killing at a mall in Portland, earlier that week. Later that school year, my kid's school went into lockdown over a mysterious box left on the steps. It turned out to be filled with soap. Still, that day is also a big time memory.)
Boston Marathon.


I know there are more, and this list would be different on a day-by-day basis.

I was six or so.

I was 8. Others:

Seeing Jaws 1st time
Challenger
9/11
Tiennamen Square tank guy
Katrina's landfall and then the aftermath
2004 Christmas Tsunami
Obama's 2008 election.
2011 Southeast Tornado outbreak.