John Lennon was killed when I was in sixth grade. My Spanish teacher kept a memorial for him up on the chalkboard for the rest of the year. She was cool.
What were you doing when you heard John was dead?
I feel old.
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BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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Sitting in class, hearing my homeroom teacher tell us that she was glad he was dead because he was a godless communist.
that is messed up.
watching something when, of course, the “We interrupt this program,” message came on.
I was in shock. Then, it was different. You didn’t have a 24-hour news cycle. You had to wait and wait and try to process stunning news like this until the next news show, which occurred at 10 p.m. with KTVU-2 in Oakland, CA.
…and then I knew The Beatles would never have a reunion concert.
Watching Monday Night Football — I think.
I hope the Bears can hold Brady down enough for me to hold on and beat you in fantasy this week.
I got screwed by Brady last week who gave the Jets defense negative points and cost me a five game winning streak and a chance to go to .500 after a brutal 1-7 start.
I have more points than the guy in first place even though my second (Ryan Grant) and third (Joseph Addai) draft picks haven’t played for me in months.
Miami Dolphins versus New England Patriots, played in Miami.
Probably trying to escape my crib.
1980: I did a lot of driving with a six-yr-old and an almost 2 yr old, to kindergarten, nursery school, play dates, kinder-gym… so the news broke over my favorite rock radio station. I had to pull over to the side of the road, my eyes blurred by sudden tears. I let out a primal, Yoko Ono-like banshee wail of grief and startled my toddler into wailing along with me. The DJ played “Imagine” and I still can’t hear that song without getting choked up.
The Beatles played a ridiculously important role in my life. I was an isolated loner in high school, a straight-A, intellectual weirdo the other kids loved to hate-on. But, I was the first girl to “discover” the Beatles and suddenly I had friends–a spontaneously formed, squealing, heavy-sighing fan club.
They were the sound-track of my coming of age. I found cannabis slightly before the Sgt. Pepper album came out. My circle of friends expanded again. So it went…
Walking home from a local bar in Tribeca, late at night, no street lights. No one on the street at all, but three people far ahead. When they reach our corner they give us the news. We head up the long staircase into our loft.
I’m involved in the NYC post-punk club scene; I’m disengaged from the former Beatles’ music. Can’t recall my reaction.
One of my loft-mates, a guitarist, shuts himself away in his room to weep. He weeps all night.
When I was in sixth grade, Lennon released ‘Imagine’.
I was about ten, so i really don’t remember.
Probably playing with my Stretch Armstrong or something.
My folks were really upset and that led to a lot of impulse buys of Beatles and post-Beatles records, including “Season of Glass”, with that messed up cover.
I don’t remember where I was when I got the news that he had been killed. I didn’t have a TV then, most likely heard on Morning Edition or All Things Considered the next day. Sad to say, it was just another assassination. Having experienced the coverage of the assassinations in the 1960s, it was just one more good person struck down. And because it did not get the multi-day news coverage that the assassination of JFK, MLK, and RFK did, it made less of an impression on me.
But I remember exactly where I was when the Beatles first appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. I was 17 and church was still de rigeur in our community. So I went to the church youth group as usual, and the youth group adult leader sent us all home with instructions to watch the Beatles.
You don’t know what old is, BooMan.
Yep, since I was 13 when they did their first American tour (at least I was in Junior high). I do remember a teacher asking a bunch of kids in the gym what we thought of the Beatles. ALL the girls thought they were great, but none of the guys did. There was a huge split in interest. They were a boy band at that point from a PR standpoint.
When John was killed, I was in grad school.
I heard about it the following morning listening to Morning Edition in my girlfriend’s bed, four days shy of graduating from college. It was well below zero outside and there was ice on the windows.
Lennon had just come out with a new album (for the Christmas sales season) and he was back in the public eye after a long time.
It was a weird time for me. Hostages were still in Tehran. Carter had tried so many important things, especially around energy but Reagan had just been elected and that looked scary. I was about to graduate with no real plan except to work real hard to stay cool.
Lennon getting shot seemed weird too. Why would anyone want to shoot a musician? This was before Seles getting stabbed and rap stars began shooting each other. We were just learning to live with weird but Son of Sam a couple summers earlier gave us a preview. In three months Reagan would get shot. Two months after that the Pope got shot. Who would want to shoot a Pope? That takes balls. And then the Pope forgave him. How weird was that?
Lennon was never my favorite Beatle but this just seemed messed up.
that’s funny. I can’t imagine someone having a different “favorite Beatle” than John Lennon. I mean, surely not Ringo. And George Harrison was nearly invisible. So, okay, you liked Paul? Paul is awesome and I love his plodding happy bass lines. But he’s no Lennon. There’s only one person in rock history that I can put in Lennon territory, and that’s Dylan.
When Beatlemania hit the US my favorite Beatle was indeed Ringo. I was 4 years old & probably responding to his childlike persona.
There’s pre break up and post break up Beatles. Pre break up, John’s songs were the best, Paul’s almost as so. But as people Ringo was more likable and George more who I admired.
Post break up, I generally hated anything Wings. Lennon and Yoko were “interesting” but too self indulged/absorbed for my tastes and his music not enough “fun”. I won’t defend that opinion of John’s music but it was mine as a teenager.
Ringo and George’s solo stuff was closer to what we always knew and expected from them. They also seemed to be living their solo life with the most grounding and balance and honesty IMO.
There’s pre break up and post break up Beatles. Pre break up, John’s songs were the best, Paul’s almost as so. But as people Ringo was more likable and George more who I admired.
Post break up, I generally hated anything Wings. Lennon and Yoko were “interesting” but too self indulged/absorbed for my tastes and his music not enough “fun”. I won’t defend that opinion of John’s music but it was mine as a teenager.
Ringo and George’s solo stuff was closer to what we always knew and expected from them. They also seemed to be living their solo life with the most grounding and balance and honesty IMO.
It was my senior year of college. I was getting ready to go to a morning class and listening to the radio when they interrupted for the message. I simply burst into tears. I had grown up with the Beatles.
Keep in mind that prior to his death, there were always rumors that the Beatles would get back together, and some were calling for a Saturday Night Live reunion. When I heard that he died, I immediately thought, “Now they can never play together again. The Beatles are done” and that made me sadder still.
Not long before he died he had released his newest song, Just Like Starting Over. He still had many great things to offer, I’m certain.
I was seeing Bruce Springsteen in Philly (probably at the Spectrum, I guess). I got back to campus and I overheard some folks talking about what I thought was Lennin. Got back to the dorm and found the kids snapping bongs in wonderment and sadness.
getting ready for school that morning, and it came on the news.
On that Monday night I was a graduate student, working in a university library, and had just night read the article on John Lennon in Esquire; the issue with him standing with folded arms in a denim jacket wearing circular dark shades.
After reading about how Yoko had been the partner that managed their investments, including owning a herd of milk cows, while John baked food and played with his son, I felt relieved and a bit of joy that likely he had beaten the curse of rock stars like Elvis, Hendrix, Keith Moon, and Joplin. As if his current life reaffirmed both his music and perspective on life and he that had dodged the pitfalls of fame.
When I got home at 11pm and turned on the TV to watch the end of Monday night football I had the shocking news told to me by Howard Cosell.
Childhood’s End.
I had a friend over that Monday evening and, as chance would have it, my radio was tuned to the Los Angeles rock station KLOS. At one point, after a song had ended, the DJ said, “I have some very bad news. John Lennon has died”. I don’t think they went to Lennon-only songs at that point, but they did later.
The next day I tuned to a different rock station, KROQ, which had a pretty funny morning guy, Frazier Smith. One of the first things he said was, “No jokes.” It was just music during his shift.
I was at work. It was long before the days of e-mail or the internet. Word went round the office floor – I guess someone had received a phone call or been listening to the radio…
There’s been too many assassinations…