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. . . John Lennon was assassinated. I figure I can't possibly be the only fan he has around here, so I thought it might be appropriate to commemorate the tragic event on this, the day that marks a quarter-century since his death.
I'm wearing all black today, and I'll be listening to John Lennon CDs at work.
I was less than five months old when it happened, so I've never really known a world that had John Lennon in it. By the time I was old enough to know who he was, he was already long gone. I know some of you are old enough to remember a time when people spoke of him in the present tense, and I'm slightly awed by that. I hope some of you will share your stories. Where were you when you heard the news?
December 8, 1980 -- I read the news today, oh boy. . . .Posts: 1814 | Registered: Jul 2004
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I actually remember Lennon's death, although it's one of my earliest memories. My dad played Beatles albums for something like a month.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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I remember it, too. I was in Jr. High. I woke my dad to tell him. I remember his gasp and stunned silence when I told him. And the radio station playing tons of Beattle tunes . . .
Posts: 5609 | Registered: Jan 2003
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I was only 11 at the time, and my friend's Dad was pretty sad about it. We didn't know why so we asked and that is when I first heard the Beatles and learned a lot more about them
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
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I remember hearing about it in the news, but I don't have any specific memories. I was most likely at work that day. I am sure my co-workers and I must have discussed it. It was sad, especially the violence of it, but not sadder than the deaths of other well-known figures that I have heard of.
In the course of my life, I was more affected by the deaths of John F.Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
Posts: 5771 | Registered: Nov 2000
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I was 17, and a senior in high school. I remember making fun of the way everyone was acting as though it was a repeat of the Kennedy assassination, but in a way, it really was.
My most vivid memory of the event was the following Sunday, when Yoko called for 10 minutes of silence in John's memory. I was at my Dad's office, typing a report for my little sister (on a typewriter <grin>) and listening to the radio. They did complete dead air for one minute, and then filled the rest of the 10 minutes with "Give Peace a Chance".
It's hard to believe that it's been 25 years.
Posts: 12266 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I wasn't alive for it, but I had marked my calendars for today. I privately celebrated his birthday a couple of months ago. Thanks, John.
Posts: 9754 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Shame on you Scott. Would you walk into a funeral just to say that you didn't really care for the deceased? Posts: 6394 | Registered: Dec 1999
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I remember hearing about it (I must have been 8 at the time), and being surprised - thinking he must have been dead already. I mean I had always heard about the Beatles as in the past, so I had no idea he was still alive until then.
(Apparently anything that took place before I was born happened so long ago that the people who did it must have been dead by the time I was 8. )
Posts: 1522 | Registered: Nov 2005
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I learned in Spanish class that they put up a statue of him in Cuba. I heard it used to be illegal to listen to him/the beatles back in the day (In Cuba that is).
Posts: 113 | Registered: Sep 2005
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I've never really been one big on mourning... we come we go, life goes on as I figure it. I heard about it today on the radio and did for him what I do for all dead folk, figures of the past and friends I actually knew: I tipped my hat to his memory and moved on.
Posts: 3295 | Registered: Jun 2004
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I'm a pretty big John Lennon fan, but for some reason I usually need to be reminded that this is the anniversary of his death. I'm far more likely to remember his birthday, and celebrate with a day of his music on that occasion.
The major drag is that he was just getting back into music after a 5 year hiatus. He was writing great songs, a lot of which can be found Double Fantasy. Who knows what he would have come up with in the 80s.
The other really sad thing, if you listen to some of his interviews from 1980, is how optimistic he was about the future:
quote: When I was singing and writing this and working with her, I was visualizing all the people of my age group. I’m singing to them. I’m saying, "Here I am now. How are you? How’s your relationship going? Did you get through it all? Wasn’t the ‘70s a drag, you know? Here we are. Well, let’s try and make the ‘80s good, you know."
It’s not out of our control. I still believe in love, peace. I still believe in positive thinking. While there’s life, there’s hope. Because I always consider my work one piece and I consider that my work won’t be finished until I’m dead and buried. And I hope that’s a long, long time.
His last interview.
Posts: 1855 | Registered: Mar 2003
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Spider Robinson has a book where a time traveller from the future comes to our time by mistake. He was trying to get to the night that Lorne Michaels offered the Beatles $2,000 to do a reunion on Saturday Night Live (after they'd just turned down some umpteen million dollar offer).
The story has been going around for some years that Paul was visiting John in his apartment and that they were watching TV when this came on. They looked at one another and slowly said... "Why not?" And called a taxi to get to the NBC studios.
But the cab never showed, and it came to nothing in the end.
In this story, the time traveller was trying to go back in time to drive that cab and change history. There's a lot of talk in that scene about what the world might have been like had the Beatles (and particularly John) gone on working together.
Btw, if anyone else here has read Safehouse, don't spoil it for those who haven't. It's a fun read.
Posts: 12266 | Registered: Jul 2005
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Thanks, John.
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