and then a few months later:
86 was a big year
Easy, JFK’s assassination. I was 4, came in from the yard and found my mom and a neighbor were sitting at the kitchen table, crying. I asked what was wrong, and she said someone had shot the president.
After that, I remember being irritated that all my favorite TV shows were blocked by news coverage for days.
It was a weird childhood, I was 8 when Obama was installed as president. I remember people talking about George Bush Jr and the wars he started in Afghanistan and Al Qaeda. Big gap in between Obama’s presidency and then 2012 shooting of Sandy Hook. And abt every school shooting of the 2010s after that sadly. Also I really want to vote for Mitt Romney but I was 12 and brainwashed by my parents. Now that I’m on a form of obamacare I don’t remember any issues with him. I would re-elect for a third term
The Exxon Valdez oil spill.
The Collapse. All the news agencies were calling it the “Resentment” for some reason. They were arguing about if some of the lower order dimensions would survive or not when all the aerovets went dark.
I looked out to see it approaching our crecheworld.
Space collapsing in fifteen dimensions is terrifyingly beautiful in its own way.
Desert Storm, in small part because my dad was in the AF and deployed to Saudi Arabia. It was pretty much all the news for the short amount of time that actual hostilities were occurring.
Princess Diana’s death, for sure. I remember my mother being absolutely distraught, and I didn’t understand why. We’re not British and I’d literally never hear of her (from my mother or otherwise) before her passing and funeral were news. The funeral took place in the middle of the night and I remember her being up super early to watch (and I eventually woke up and joined her).
I’m surprised it was 1997, I would have figured it was '95ish. Can’t believe that’s the first news story I can remember. But we definitely were NOT a news household. Nobody reading the newspaper, no local news on at night or cable TV news on TV all day.
Mine was Desert Storm, but somehow this post unlocked a core memory for me. I remember exactly what I was doing when it was announced she died - I was playing Quake, E2M1 near the start of the level when my mum tapped me on the shoulder.
I wish I could remember other things this easily, lol
A lot of American women really admired her, my wife included. She was heartbroken at her death. We stayed up all night watching it.
Challenger exploding, closely followed by Chernobyl exploding. I’m sure inbetween there were parts of London exploding. And after that, Pan Am 103 exploding. The 80s were a wild time.
Challenger is my first, followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union
I only remember it because they wheeled out the TV’s in the middle of school to watch it. Why did they do that?
Because teacher Christa McAuliffe was onboard. I believe they previously broadcast earlier shuttle launches, but by 1986 they were no longer novel; putting a teacher onboard who was planning to teach some lessons in space made educators more interested and so many schools pulled out the TVs to show the launch live. Turned out to be a different kind of education than they expected.
l also had Chernobyl in mind at first. It was a big thing, as it affected life as a kid in Europe directly.
But then I remembered all the news stories surrounding the Anti-Pershing protests.
These were in 1983, the year in which humanity perhaps was closest to complete annihilation ever.Yes, the 80s were wild.
Oh, right the protests against nuclear rearmament in Europe. I was actually part of the “human chain” demo, somewhere between Ulm and Neu-Ulm. Together with my teddy, which got us photographed for the regional newspaper.
Wow, that is actually really cool!
So maybe I’ve seen you on TV 40 years ago, as I totally remember the human chain!
I think it was the first time I heard of “Neu-Ulm”, and since then the name has always been somehow connected with the helicopter images of the protests for me.
1986 was wild. Chernobyl, Challenger, Olaf Palme assassination and Jakomäki Bank Robbery/Mikkeli hostage crisis that ended up in big car explosion seen on tv.
Olof Palme getting killed or the USSR attack submarine getting stuck on a mititary beach whichever came first.
The first moon landing
I was born in 1991. For me, it’s gotta be 9/11. I can’t really specifically remember anything from before that, and I was only 9 when it happened, so I didn’t really pay much attention to the news.
There was a time I was on the news because my grandfather got asked about something at the airport. I have no idea what it was or if it was before. But it certainly wasn’t major and either way I don’t remember the actual story that happened. If I had to guess it was something about asking people about airline delays, but that’s genuinely just a guess.
The assassination of prime minister Olof Palme.
That’s what I was thinking as well but I looked it up and the Challenger explosion was shortly before that.
1986 was a strong news year for sure. I was 9 years old at the time.
edit: actually, it was the Pershing II protests of 1983, which my family joined.
That’s what I was thinking as well but I looked it up and the Challenger explosion was actually shortly before that.
While I too remember the Challenger explosion, that memory is much less clear in my mind and I wouldn’t have been able to tell that it happened before.
Reagan being shot
I don’t think I have a single clear memory of any news story ever. I have vague half-remembered snippets.
The best I can do is 9/11 but I was well into my teens at that point, and even then my memory of the news itself isn’t clear.
I remember what my local news anchor looked like. That’s absolute it.
Watched the Challenger explosion live in kindergarten.
yup. we were going to watch the teacher (McCaullif?) and they wheeled the TVs in for the launch. Then they didn’t know what to do until the principal went from class to class telling the teachers to unplug and we all got free time!
Wild choice for a rocket launchpad.
Core memory for a whole generation
