John F. Kennedy's asassination was a traumatizing event in American history. Ronald del Pino, then a young boy of nine, was attending Saint Mark's Avenue Elementary School in Bellmore, New York, the day of the assassination. His family listened to the radio and read newspapers to follow the JFK story until his father rented a television. Ronald tells the story of that day as he remembers it happening.
Linda delPino
School had just gotten out and we were on the bus waiting to go home when Mrs. Goldhaber, a second grade teacher, came on the bus and tried to get everyone to be quiet. All the guys were still fooling around, so the bus driver said to one of the boys, "Hey you with the shiner, shut up and sit down." The teacher then told us that the President was in Dallas, Texas and had been shot. After she made the announcement, it was so quiet, you could hear a pin drop. The bus was silent the rest of the way home. I remember walking home from the bus stop and finding my mother on the front porch. She was trying to hold back the tears as she told me the President was dead.
My parents were avid Kennedy supporters. He was always referred to in a very reverent way in my house. I didn't know any different so when Lee Harvey Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby I was happy because even if Oswald himself didn't kill Kennedy, I think he was involved. My parents were frustrated because we didn't own a television so we had to rely on the radio and the newspapers for a couple of days until my father rented a TV.
When Kennedy was shot I was scared. I didn't understand how something like this could happen or what would happen next. In the couple of years before the assassination we had the Cuban Missile Crisis and people were paranoid about nuclear war. I couldn't help thinking that by someone attacking the President, they were also attacking us. It was especially hard for me to understand how someone could kill Kennedy because he was the only President I had ever seen in person.
As a nine year old boy, I thought the death of the President was the end of the world. Now I know that although the President is an extremely important person, that's what he is, a person. There are rules and plans that if something like this happens again, the country can deal with it. It's a major set back to us but we will all keep on living each day as we had the one before, just with a new President.
Ronald del Pino
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