Do you remember when you first realized you were experiencing what would be historical events?

2016-03-02T10:06:49-05:00

I enjoyed reading about history since I was a child. At the time I didn't realize I was living through history. I expect each of us comes to that realization when we are older that we have experienced or lived through historical events. People born before 1960 tend to remember what they were doing when JFK was shot. The dismantling of the Berlin Wall is another memorable event.

Response by SP5 Mark Kuzinski made Mar 2 at 2016 10:09 AM

2016-03-02T10:09:11-05:00

Can't get enough history!

Response by PO1 William "Chip" Nagel made Mar 2 at 2016 10:11 AM

2016-03-02T10:11:45-05:00

Probably the moment I handled the Executive Order for Prairie Fire/Operation El Dorado Canyon the Bombing of Libya in 86 and in Short Progression the Messages for Iran-Contra and the Debriefing of Sgt Clayton Lonetree.

Response by LTC Stephen F. made Mar 2 at 2016 10:18 AM

2016-03-02T10:18:32-05:00

Even though I remember living through the assassinations of JFK, Martin Luther King, and RFK, and the Vietnam War I did not realize that I was living through what would be history until later. So time in my late 20's when I was serving during the Cold War I realized that I was living through history. After that point I started keeping a journal and recorded significant events in my life. I realized that future historians and archaeologists will be interested in what average people did in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Response by PO3 Steven Sherrill made Mar 2 at 2016 10:50 AM

2016-03-02T10:50:09-05:00

I agree LTC Stephen F. that history is an awesome subject. I love history, my favorite being the viking age (I know go figure), I always think about history as happening to special people at special times. I never really thought about the average everyday folks that were just going through their daily grind when they were placed in the middle of a history altering event. Even sitting on my couch watching as the twin towers fell, I didn't think about that. I thought about the heroic actions of the first responders who rushed to the scene despite the danger and likelihood of death. Though our modern technology has changed history dramatically. I will preface my next by saying that anyone who has died in defense of this nation has my highest respect, and admiration. With Youtube, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other social media outlets, when a service member who has made the ultimate sacrifice comes home, they are honored (as they should be) by their communities. Inevitably there is someone with a camera filming the events, and now there are literally hundreds if not thousands of videos honoring the fallen. The same goes for homecomings. So as technology shrinks the world, we will find ourselves a lot more in touch with history changing events as they occur.

‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ -- George Santayana

http://bigthink.com/the-proverbial-skeptic/those-who-do-not-learn-history-doomed-to-repeat-it-really

"Those Who Do Not Learn History Are Doomed To Repeat It." Really?

History shows that both those who do not learn history and those who do learn history are doomed to repeat it.

Response by SFC Justin Scott made Mar 2 at 2016 11:49 AM

2016-03-02T11:49:36-05:00

I have always loved history (since childhood - had an excellent social studies teacher that really fostered my fascination of history), which is what led me to work to become a historian myself.

Response by Sgt Tom Cunnally made Mar 2 at 2016 12:22 PM

2016-03-02T12:22:22-05:00

I was 9 years old & was delivering newspapers when Japan surrendered in WWII. That afternoon we got special editions of the Boston Globe with the headlines "Japs Surrender"..and people were going crazy with horns blowing on Center St in Jamaica. And suddenly some people rushed to Blessed Sacrament Church to say a prayer that we finally had peace. But some were not too happy because they lost loved ones in this war. A man on our street lost three sons in WWII & every time I saw him going to mass I had no idea what to say to him..

Response by Cpl Tou Lee Yang made Mar 2 at 2016 1:15 PM

2016-03-02T13:15:45-05:00

9/11, I still remember that day as it was yesterday. Although I did not witness the actual plane crashed into the twin tower. I did witness an empty highway, all the way from Orange County, CA to San Diego, CA. I had an eerie feeling that I was caught in the twilight zone because at the start of 5:30am, rush hours begins to start and on that particular day, there was basically no cars on the freeway. And I encounter maybe a total of 10 cars all the way from OC to SD in either direction. Not until I reached the based did I realize something was drastically wrong when it took me 2 hours to get to the front gate just to be told about what happened to the US.

Response by SSgt Mark Lines made Mar 2 at 2016 1:45 PM

2016-03-02T13:45:21-05:00

I realized that I was living through history the day that the Berlin Wall came down. My cousin (23) and I (16) were in Berlin during school break. We had just got back from East Berlin when we heard loud noises outside of our hotel. When we asked someone what was happening, we were told that the Wall was no more. I will always remember the joy that I saw on Berliner's faces and the hope for the future I felt that day.

Response by SFC Wade W. made Mar 2 at 2016 2:46 PM

2016-03-02T14:46:37-05:00

I was stationed in Germany with the 3rd AD when the wall was coming down. That was when I realized that my little part in Germany was having a worldwide effect.

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Mar 2 at 2016 3:27 PM

2016-03-02T15:27:27-05:00

I remember being in Iraq during the first elections watching the infantry battalion I helped stand up providing security to the voters in the area. I thought, this is something I can tell my kids a out one day, I was there helping to make history happen.

Response by SGM David W. Carr LOM, DMSM MP SGT made Mar 2 at 2016 6:12 PM

2016-03-02T18:12:35-05:00

By my 13th birthday, JFK was assassinated while in Catholic grammar school nuns were crying
Watched the landing on the moon in my dad's rich friend's home theater.
Woodstock happened about 50 miles north in NY state
Race riots throughout the state of New Jersey

Response by MCPO Katrina Hutcherson made Mar 3 at 2016 2:36 AM

2016-03-03T02:36:06-05:00

I remember at eight years old watching Neil Armstrong step off the eagle onto the moon and then getting to see and touch their Apollo spacecraft when they returned. We lived in Hawaii and my father was a LCDR in the Navy at the time and was on the recovery team. My father was the Liason to the military sea lift command in Germany when the Berlin Wall came down. I have a video of my parents chipping away at the wall. They got an East German guard on the video handing my mother a big chunk of the East German side (no graffiti on it) through a hole in the wall. I'm the proud owner of a copy of the film and a graffiti covered piece from the west side that they collected for me.

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Mar 3 at 2016 3:05 PM

2016-03-03T15:05:02-05:00

1989: We took a bus trip to Berlin and I used a hammer to break pieces of concrete off the Brelin Wall.

Response by SGT Robert Hawks made Mar 4 at 2016 5:22 PM

2016-03-04T17:22:38-05:00

I was stationed in Germany when the wall came down and thru reunification process that's when I knew this was going to be taught in schools one day.