Do you remember where you were?
I remember where I was for the following events:
Challenger explosion
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series
Start of the first Gulf War
OJ Simpson car chase
OJ Simpson verdict
Princess Di death
9/11
Since 9/11, I don’t remember any other big news events. Have big news events stopped happening, or have I stopped caring about them?
* * *
Perhaps, as we get older, things feel less intense, and make less of an impression. There’s a feeling of “no big deal, already seen that.”
* * *
Only other sporting event I remember is the Doug Flutie pass.
Lion of the Blogosphere 
I remember all those things but game 6 of 1986 World Series, but I’m not a big baseball fanatic.
GMR
September 19, 2018 at 4:37 PM
For people who were Mets fans at the time, the most exciting moment in sports of their lifetime.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 19, 2018 at 4:40 PM
Bill Fuckin’ Buckner!
E. Rekshun
September 19, 2018 at 5:52 PM
from what I hear it was a big deal
grey enlightenment
September 20, 2018 at 3:17 PM
The night Trump won.
Justice Duvall
September 19, 2018 at 4:38 PM
Presidential elections don’t count, they happen every 4 years on a Tuesday evening. At least it doesn’t feel to me like they should count, but others could say the same about sporting events.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 19, 2018 at 4:43 PM
An entire generation will remember the election of Obama for the rest of their lives. Whatever you think of his politics, it’s clear that to millions, his election was like V-J Day or the fall of the Berlin Wall.
njguy73
September 19, 2018 at 7:01 PM
I don’t generally remember presidential elections, but I do remember when Trump won. It was exhilarating, I pretty much laughed non-stop for hours.
M
September 19, 2018 at 7:32 PM
In 2004, Bush was not announced as the winner until shortly before noon the next day.
I was a college senior at the time. I was walking through the student union, on my way to class, when I saw on the big TV that Kerry had just conceded.
A guy I knew was sitting on one of the sofas, watching the news in disbelief. He was a typical young liberal.
“I can’t believe Americans are so f**king stupid,” he said. “We are so f**king screwed.”
Ever the wiseass, I said, “Well, it was a choice between the vampire and the monkey, and the voters picked the monkey. USA! USA!”
He shot me a dirty look, so I shut up and kept on walking.
When I got to class, my professor was discussing the election with a number of concerned students. She was saying, “Well, it’s still undecided, so all we can do is wait.”
“It’s not undecided anymore,” I said. “Kerry just conceded.”
My professor’s skin turned totally pale, and the light went out of her eyes. She looked as though I had just told her that her entire extended family had died in a plane crash. For a second, I thought she was going to faint. She was so distraught that she was almost catatonic. But finally she recovered enough to go through the motions of giving the lecture.
I was, like, “Meh.”
Stan Adams
September 19, 2018 at 11:13 PM
Trump might count as it was “traumatic” for a lot people. Enough people that it might qualify by sheer number of people who etch it in their heads. Sports can count too, but for the US, I think it’s more regional because despite how much we love sports, I can’t of anything that “enough” people care. As for something post-9/11, the closest thing is probably Bin Laden. But that said, how many events is on the scale like 9/11 that could etch into enough people’s memories to be a shared moment?
Dreamer
September 20, 2018 at 12:23 AM
Trump’s election was the most dramatic one of any other election in Canada or the US that I can recall. But one knows that there will be a winner. I was following it on NYT. I fully expected Hillary to win, so it only got interesting as time went on.
Frau Katze
September 20, 2018 at 12:31 AM
agree. they should not count
grey enlightenment
September 20, 2018 at 3:17 PM
I remember watching it and thinking it was close. I was drinking quite a bit. Then I looked at the prediction markets maybe around 11pm? Well before the news knew Trump was going to win, and I knew he would win and was shocked. It was glorious. My wife went to sleep early, she assumed hillary was going to win. The next morning I told her he won, she said shut up, she couldn’t believe it. She was quite upset mightve been on the verge of crying for a little while. Good day! Hillary Clintons concession the next day was priceless.
XVO
September 19, 2018 at 6:12 PM
Absolutely! Will never forget that night. I remember all of these except Game 6 and the OJ verdict. I do however remember where I was and what I was doing for game 3 of the 1989 world series.
Marck
September 19, 2018 at 8:10 PM
What about the night Trump was elected President? That was a yuge event.
Oswald Spengler
September 19, 2018 at 4:59 PM
the best thing about the nfl / nike boycott is that now i can admit to swpl chicks i like football without seeming like a dumb prole
gm
September 19, 2018 at 5:07 PM
Bin Laden getting whacked was a pretty big deal.
Tanturn
September 19, 2018 at 5:10 PM
Don’t remember where I was.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:08 AM
Challenger explosion: at a McJob in Connecticut, another worker said “the Space Shuttle blew up and everyone died,” but no one believed him at first because he wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed even by McJob standards.
Game 6 of 1986 World Series: not a sports fan, no idea.
Start of first Gulf War: driving home from dinner with a girl I had started dating a few weeks earlier. Hoped to score that night, no luck. Our relationship lasted about as long as Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.
OJ Simpson car chase: not much memory of that. I know I saw it on TV, but actually cannot remember whether I watched it live or from where.
OJ Simpson verdict: at work in Manhattan, I was rather dismayed that a couple co-workers were happy with the verdict.
Princess Di death: saw a news report online, back in the Prodigy days. IIRC the initial report said she had been severely injured, within a few minutes came the news that she was dead.
9/11: I could write a whole lot about this. I was working about a mile and a half north, near the intersection of W. Houston Street and Hudson Street. While walking the block to my workplace from the Houston Street 1 train station I saw a huge plume of smoke to the south but other buildings blocked my view of the WTC. Soon after getting into work I heard what had happened, and not long after Hudson Street and other north-south streets like Varick were filled with tens of thousands of people fleeing lower Manhattan on foot …. and one lunatic who actually was walking south toward the WTC to get a better view. Dunno who that could have been.
Peter
ironrailsironweights
September 19, 2018 at 5:18 PM
OT: Beta male rage…
Ft Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, 09/19/18 – Three wounded in shooting at Wisconsin software company; suspect killed by police
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/ct-madison-wisconsin-shooter-20180919-story.html#nt=oft12aH-1gp5
A shooter opened fire inside a Wisconsin software company on Wednesday, wounding three people before responding officers fatally shot the assailant as workers ran from the office building or hid inside, according to police and witnesses…WTS Paradigm makes software for the building products industry. A Wisconsin State Journal profile from 2014 listed company employment at about 145 employees, and noted the company was looking to move to a larger location at the time…Middleton is about 90 miles west of Milwaukee.
E. Rekshun
September 19, 2018 at 5:20 PM
Challenger explosion:
Don’t remember the explosion. Remember being in school the day after and the other kids were shouting over each other insisting that they knew what caused it. It was one of those times when the teacher has no real control over the class.
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series:
Didn’t know anything about it at the time, and still don’t know. I don’t even know who was playing.
Start of the first Gulf War:
Don’t remember where I was. Do remember that I turned into a total news junkie while it was going on.
OJ Simpson car chase:
Hanging out with my friend Dennis and my grandmother’s house. Someone told us to change the channel to the news. The chase was still going on when Dennis’s parents picked him up.
OJ Simpson verdict:
Don’t remember where I was.
Princess Di death:
Don’t remember where I was.
9/11:
I had a job with rotating 12 hour day shifts. The day it happened was on my day off. I was sleeping in on a couch in my downstairs den, and was probably asleep when it happened. I went out and ran errands, and noticed people acting funny, but had no idea why. On my way back home, latter in the afternoon, on a whim I stopped at some low end diner I’d never been to (food turned out to be bad and super over-priced).
The old people in the diner were talking about what happened. That’s how I learned the news. They were slightly smug because they could remember Pearl Harbor, and everyone too young to remember Pearl Harbor was much less composed than they were. One white haired old man said very confidently: “We’re at war.”
The night Trump won.:
Had been volunteering for Trump in one state, but was registered in another state that made absentee voting really hard. Drove to the town with my polling place the night before to make sure I didn’t miss voting. Noticed there was no one handing out Republican voter guides outside the polling place. Took a Democrat Voter Guide and voted the exact opposite on everything except one ballot initiative.
Driving back I was too nervous to listen to news about the election. Late at night as I was getting ready to pull off and eat, I turned on my phone. Lots of FaceBook notifications from Bernie Bros who did tune into the news and were having a meltdown. Started getting excited, and pulled into a truck stop with a Denny’s. Fist bumped a complete stranger on my way the counter, and was totally elated. Couldn’t sleep at all that night.
MoreSigmasThanYou
September 19, 2018 at 5:42 PM
Interesting observation, I am Romanian and I was born in 1986, and I clearly remember where I was on 9/11 and how shocking and surreal it seemed once I realized what was really happening. I didn’t know much at the time about the WTC, so at first I thought that it must have been some kind of impressive controlled demolition in order to build something else on that site.
I remember the news on Diana’s accident and death a bit more vaguely, but I found out when I was returning from a trip with my mom and we’ve just stopped to eat some desserts.
I also vividly remember finding out about the Bataclan massacre one morning nearly three years ago, since some people I knew had arrived in Paris the day after the attacks, when it was still unclear if any living terrorists were still in the city, and I was quite worried for them.
PrinzEugen
September 19, 2018 at 5:48 PM
I can remember the first moon landing. And JFK being shot.
Rosenmop
September 19, 2018 at 5:58 PM
Wow! I wasn’t born when JFK was shot.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:16 AM
Good point about the moon landing. A local paper, called The Sun, changed its name header to The Moon.
Frau Katze
September 20, 2018 at 11:08 AM
challenger explosion – in grade school where I was being viciously bullied
game 6… uh what?
start of first gulf war… in boarding school with a bunch of rich taiwanese kids
car chase… did not have tv
verdict… did not have tv
princess di death… at home with my now adult son who was an infant at the time
9/11… at home pregnant with #3
I too would include trump’s win on this list. Around 3am, I woke up and asked my son- who was still awake – who won. Was absolutely dumbfounded trump managed to pull it off.
toomanymice
September 19, 2018 at 6:39 PM
I remember everything except World Series and Princess Di. I was in Manhattan on 9/11, as I’ve lived in NYC since 88′.
Dave
September 19, 2018 at 6:41 PM
You don’t remember where you were when we heard Osama Bin Laden was killed? That’s way more up there past Princess Diana, OJ, or some baseball game. Not on the same level as 9/11, or the Challenger disaster, though…
Kosher Kowboy
September 19, 2018 at 6:46 PM
“You don’t remember where you were when we heard Osama Bin Laden was killed? T”
Nope.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:19 AM
The events we remember this way are clearly delineated ones that have an immediate visual impact. Big geopolitical events happen, but we don’t remember them so well because they lack that immediate visual punch. When the Iron Curtain came down, it was a process, with events unfolding over weeks, months, and years. I remember having a sense that it was the biggest event in my young life up to that point. But there was no “where were you?” associated with it.
The first Gulf War wasn’t a particularly unique war, it was just the first war to have such thorough TV coverage, so it was more visual. I followed the start of the second Gulf War more closely on TV, so it had a bigger impact on me.
Regarding OJ Simpson: there hasn’t been a “crime of the century” for a while, has there? No A or B-list celebrities have murdered or been murdered since OJ, that I can think of. I’m sure it will happen again in time.
The Columbia exploded, but nobody cared as much by then. When the Challenger exploded, the median American had memories of the moon landing and the height of the space program; when the Columbia exploded the median American was too young for those things but did remember the Challenger exploding, so it wasn’t so noteworthy.
Wency
September 19, 2018 at 7:09 PM
“The Columbia exploded, but nobody cared as much by then. ”
Yawn, deja vu. I have no idea where I was when that happened.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:21 AM
@ work
non event
@ work
@ work
@ work
@ work
running along the river
jz
September 19, 2018 at 7:25 PM
Challenger explosion – I had a dentist appointment that day, so I stayed home from school. I watched the news about it on TV.
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series – Don’t care.
Start of the first Gulf War – In Scotland, but beyond that, I don’t remember.
OJ Simpson car chase – Don’t know.
OJ Simpson verdict – I was in a critical race theory class. Someone was listening to the news and announced it in class.
Princess Di death – Don’t care. The less I know about the royal family, the more I like them, and she was over exposed.
9/11 – Heading back to my University to get my degree completed.
Half Canadian
September 19, 2018 at 7:29 PM
I’m shocked that I only remember two of them — 9/11 and the OJ verdict. I was at work when the jets flew into the buildings. And I was in a crowded room full of blacks when the OJ verdict was announced. They were all so happy and smiling and cheering that he got away with murdering two white people.
destructure
September 19, 2018 at 7:41 PM
When Jerry Garcia died?
p s c
September 19, 2018 at 8:16 PM
When who did what?
dingodonkey
September 20, 2018 at 12:03 PM
Trump getting elected was the most significant national event since 9/11. Events like that are pretty rare. When I was a kid, “where were you when Kennedy got shot” was the big one and that already 30 years old. Moon landing, Kennedy, Challenger Explosion, Princess Di, 9/11, and Trump are the big ones from the past half century.
PerezHBD
September 19, 2018 at 8:34 PM
Russia’s liberation of the Crimea. That was huge!
Yakov
September 19, 2018 at 8:46 PM
I remember where I was and what I was doing for all but Game 6 of the 1986 World Series (there was a game 6?) and Princess Di’s death. I guess they had no significance to me so it wasn’t stored in long term memory.
Challenger: I was in Basic Training and we were in formation when we were told by our Drill SGT’s. Almost immediately the Challenger jokes started. Basic was brutal man…
Gulf War: Again in uniform, but as a reservist attending a cush military language school. I was conducting PT and my girlfriend came up and told me.
OJ Car Chase: I had a buddy over for dinner and we got mesmerized by the slow motion “chase.”
OJ Verdict: Worse location ever. I was, at the time working in a Public Health Department. The collocated WIC office brought a TV into the office in anticipation of the verdict. When the verdict was announced, about 30 black and brown clients and employees screamed in joy, and white lil me was standing there with a WTF look on my face.
9/11: At work in another office, tapping away on the computer listening to Howard Stern on my walkman. I got Stern’s coverage and initial reaction.
Mike Street Station
September 19, 2018 at 9:05 PM
Howard Stern leaving terrestrial radio ought to be on the list too. End of an era in radio.
Curle
September 20, 2018 at 9:44 PM
The 2008 financial crisis is a big one, but it’s hard to tie that down to one particular moment. Maybe Trump’s election as well?
brave517
September 19, 2018 at 9:27 PM
Today there’s a relatively common belief that the fall of Lehman Brothers just over ten years ago (September 15, 2008) was the start of the financial crisis, but not many people recognized its significance at the time.
Peter
ironrailsironweights
September 20, 2018 at 3:54 PM
For the Simpson chase I was at Candlestick Park for Giants-Cubs. One of the concession vendors placed a 10-inch TV on the floor of the mezzanine and everyone gathered round to watch. I think the biggest event since might have been the Bush-Gore recount.
Marty
September 19, 2018 at 9:44 PM
To tell the truth, I forget where I was when the networks called Florida for Trump (meaning that Clinton would not be president, not ever). And that is not that long ago.
For most of us history, as it happens, is dullsville, compared to the interesting things going on in our own lives. I remember when Neil Armstrong was walking on the moon, and I remember thinkings, I should probably remember ‘today’, and I still remember thinking I should remember what I was wearing that day (boring corduroy pants, we were relatively poor) but I also remember thinking that if I would one day be the first man on Mars it would be worth remembering the day someone first walked on the moon, if I would never get to Mars, then it would not be worth remembering, it would just be one other thing some rich kid got to do and that I did not get to do (walking on the moon). I still kind of feel that way.
howitzer daniel
September 19, 2018 at 10:32 PM
First night of the Gulf War: I was only in elementary school, but I was glued to the TV. We watched Dan Rather. (My mother didn’t have cable, so Channel 6 – at that time, the CBS station – was the only channel that came in clearly on our crappy antenna.)
For some weird reason, Dan Rather was one of my childhood heroes. Stephen King once said he liked to watch Rather because he always looked like he was on the verge of a mental breakdown.
O.J. Simpson chase: A hotel room in Reno, Nevada, on a family trip with my grandmother, my aunt, my uncle, and my cousin. I recognized Simpson’s name from the Naked Gun movies.
O.J. Simpson verdict: In class. My ultra-liberal teacher (born and bred in Boston) prompted us to cheer his acquittal. She was practically shedding tears of joy.
Princess Diana: It was late on the Saturday night of Labor Day weekend, so I was … sitting at home, watching TV. My mother came in and said, “Princess Diana just died in a car crash.” I said, “Wow, that’s sad,” and went back to watching whatever it was that I was watching. I did wake up early to watch the funeral about one week later.
9/11: I was a college freshman sitting in class. The professor’s TA burst into the room and announced that two planes had crashed into the World Trade Center. There was a TV in the room that supposedly was hooked up to cable, but neither the professor nor the TA could figure out how to get it to CNN. Finally someone got it to CBS, so we watched … Dan Rather.
Right before I left class to go to lunch, Dan Rather was still reporting that only the top half of one of the towers had collapsed. (A time-stamped video on YouTube indicates that this was around 10:15 a.m. Eastern, less than fifteen minutes before the second tower came down.)
My daily lunch routine was pretty standard. Every day, I made a turkey-and-Swiss sandwich at home – yes, I still lived at home – and bought a can of Coke from a vending machine. Since I had a work-study assignment in the cataloging and acquisitions department of the library, I ate my lunch in the library break room, which at that hour was deserted. Then I went to report to my supervisor.
“The second tower just collapsed,” she told me as I walked up to her.
“What about the bottom half of the first tower?”
“Both towers have collapsed.”
“Yes, but the last I heard, only the top half of the first tower had collapsed.”
“Well, now they’re saying that both towers have fully collapsed.”
I was pretty shaken up when I heard that.
I had another class that day, but it was cancelled. So I went home in the mid-afternoon.
Incidentally, I was in New York over the Fourth of July in 2001. (The trip was a high-school-graduation present from my grandmother. She was fairly wealthy and hated to travel alone, so she took me on a number of trips over the years.)
On the Fourth – our last full day – we took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. We made it back to Lower Manhattan in the late afternoon.
As we got off the ferry, I mentioned to my grandmother that we were right near the World Trade Center, and asked if we could go up to the observation deck.
She said, “I’m exhausted. I need to go back to the hotel and lie down for a while. I promise you that we’ll come back next year, when you’re on Spring Break. We’ll see it then.”
We caught a bus and headed back to the hotel. As the bus started rolling, I distinctly remember looking through the window, gazing up at the twin towers with a sense of disappointment. Little did I realize that I would never get another opportunity to see them.
Stan Adams
September 19, 2018 at 11:02 PM
Those of us on West Coast were asleep for the start of 9/11. In my case (Victoria, BC), my son (it was his 25th birthday) woke me up because a friend had called him and sounded frantic, talking about planes crashing into buildings.
I rushed to get dressed and out to the car to listen to the radio (I didn’t have a TV or radio). By the time I got to car radio, they were saying both towers had collapsed.
It was unreal. The historical event most similar (although I hadn’t been born at the time) was Pearl Harbour. My mind went straight to that.
But I went to work as per usual. People at work weren’t saying much. It was just another work day in Western Canada.
Frau Katze
September 21, 2018 at 7:00 PM
I was working for a software company in western Canada on the day and it was pandemonium. The company had sales reps in NYC at the time and many customers in both towers. At one point during the day the company’s president sent an office wide email saying that our reps were okay and could we please stop using so much bandwidth checking the internet for updates on the unfolding tragedy. Definitely not just another day at work.
Marck
September 22, 2018 at 6:47 PM
@Marck I worked for the government of BC. As a single mother I wanted 9-5 with a pension. And that I got. It wasn’t as interesting as a private company would have been. But I went through a nightmare with them as teenagers.
Frau Katze
September 22, 2018 at 9:04 PM
How about:
– The fall of the Berlin Wall?
– Magic Johnson’s HIV+ announcement?
– The Rodney King riots in ’92?
I was:
– In Venezuela on a business trip, hardly able to grasp that an adversary so frightening just a few years before was being neutered. (And the media reported on it more or less honestly. Would that happen today?)
– At home watching on TV. Here in So Cal it was a big deal, and even though there were rumors about Magic’s sexual proclivities, the media hyped it as proof that HIV was about to explode into the heterosexual population, and of course my parents freaked out and insisted I get tested because I had a rather, um, active social life.
– At work, and as the riots spread to the Long Beach area, getting too close for comfort to my OC business I let all my employees go home early that day.
Sgt. Joe Friday
September 19, 2018 at 11:15 PM
By the Challenger explosion I was in grad school and had mostly given up TV. I first heard about it in school the day after it happened (I think).
I couldn’t have told you who won the ‘86 series if asked. I recall little about the Gulf War more about Desert Storm.
I recall watching the Simpson slo-mo chase on TV at home for a brief spell and spacing out on an appointment. I tried to ignore the rest of the OJ spectacle.
I first heard about 911 from morning radio at home, possibly Howard Stern, and turned on the TV just in time to see the second plane.
None of the above events affected me as much as the following Black riots and political prosecutions:
1) MLK riots 1968, the windows in our suburban DC home were shattered by roving gangs of black Youths;
2) Rodney King riots and following political prosecutions;
3) Clarence Thomas political rape accusations;
4) Bork being Borked;
5) Susan Smith case;
6) the Clinton health care fiasco and later sex drama;
7) AIDS;
8) Zimmerman political prosecution;
9) Political prosecution surrounding Michael Brown shooting.
Curle
September 19, 2018 at 11:23 PM
Mate, you notice important stuff.
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 8:03 AM
I remember where I was when I heard Michael Jackson died.
Jose Habib
September 20, 2018 at 12:11 AM
Anyone else remember the Kennedy assassination?
I also remember where I was when I heard about the start of Six Day War. Someone was giving me a ride and it was on the car radio. I didn’t know anything about but the radio announcer sounded fairly grim.
I remember where I was for Challenger and the start of the First Gulf war and of course 9/11. I can’t remember where I was for Princess Di.
And I wasn’t following OJ or any sports.
I remember where I was (at my desk blogging) when I read that ISIS was invading Iraq. I got this feeling, “Stop them someone, somebody has to something, this is a disaster.” And nobody stopped them and it was a disaster.
Frau Katze
September 20, 2018 at 12:20 AM
I don’t remember any presidential election except I remember sitting in a 40 year old tractor planting triticale in the dark and listening to the am radio as Trump won in 2016, the final game of the 2016 world series, watching tv at a motel in Willow Springs, MO when the gulf war started, the day JFK was shot and the crusty old school custodian with tears as he told our 4th grade clsss. Working on a 1957 Chevy truck and stopping to listen to the Challenger disaster on the radio.
G706
September 20, 2018 at 1:01 AM
“I remember sitting in a 40 year old tractor planting triticale ”
Sounds like the stuff from “The Trouble with Tribbles”
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:31 AM
There are two factors here :
you analyzed the first one, wich is the importance you give to non personal events in your life may decrease with time or there may be less of those since 17 years (iPhone in 2007, migrations in Germany in 2015 and Isis murderous videos …) both seems true.
The other factor wich is obvious is that starting at 35 yo, you begin to loose episodic memory wich affects the number of moments your able to recollect by not eecollecting many new events and by deleting the past one progressively. I am interested by this subject because I have no episodic memory myself wich is believed to be a quite rare (and unfortunate) invisible disability.
Bruno
September 20, 2018 at 1:10 AM
OT: Today there has been an explosion in the political Youtube world. An outfit called The Data Society, funded by a long list of the usual suspects, including Soros and NYT, has released a report slamming every single one of the anti-SJW channels.
Click to access DS_Alternative_Influence.pdf
Effectively, unless you’re an SJW you’re a Nazi according to the report (how surprising). The rogue Youtubers are called “alternate influencers.” The Guardian and Mother Jones had articles on it ready to go on the same day.
I wonder why print bloggers (even increasingly demented Ron Unz) are completely ignored. After giving it some thought, I decided it’s because Youtube has a young audience and it is likely a lot bigger.
Blog readers are likely older. The possibility that any fraction of the youth audience is being seduced by this content is highly alarming to the Establishment.
Some of the Youtube people really are white supremacists, notably Richard Spencer. But there are also Jews and blacks on the list. Jordan Peterson is included, but because he doesn’t much appear on other people’s channels he’s not prominent.
They’ve got two network diagrams, based on people appearing as guests on another channel. Thus Sargon is linked to Richard Spencer because he had moderated debate with him (I wouldn’t have bothered myself, those people are impervious. But Sargon is young too – younger than my kids – and doesn’t have enough life experience to know.)
Sargon of Akkad here in a short introductory vid (he includes links the to all three reports).
Frau Katze
September 20, 2018 at 1:17 AM
Death of Bin Laden is definitely a huge one in this category, For those on the older side I would also say the declaration of the dissolution of the Soviet Union back in 91. Maybe the financial crisis as well? (though for that it isn’t necessarily tied to one specific date,,)
Claudius
September 20, 2018 at 1:36 AM
I have memories associated with hearing about these events.:
Cuban missile crisis
First moon landing
Lennon getting killed
Reagan getting shot
Iraq invasion of Kuwait
OJ verdict
End of Super Bowl 42 (Manning Tyree pass)
End of Super Bowl 49 (Butler interception)
911
Trump election night
I don’t have memories associated with hearing about these events:
First shuttle disaster
Second shuttle disaster
OBL killed
I think there is a lot of chance involved. For example I remember the Iraq invasion of Kuwait because I heard about it on the car radio on the way to buy gas. I doubt I would remember it if I had just read about it in the paper the next day.
James B. Shearer
September 20, 2018 at 2:19 AM
I could add the Doug Flutie pass to my sports memories.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 7:35 AM
Agreed. And I remember Lennon getting shot and listening to “Watching the Wheels” play incessantly on FM radio for the next few days. I don’t remember the death of Elvis or Jim Morrison.
E. Rekshun
September 20, 2018 at 11:05 AM
‘Perhaps, as we get older, things feel less intense, and make less of an impression. There’s a feeling of “no big deal, already seen that.”’
As you get older, you should be getting ready to meet your Maker and thinking in that direction. I find myself thinking often:’ This is for the young, ain’t gonna spend time on it’. Have a day and a half left on my job and as a free 59 year old chap I gonna care about completely different things. I mean, the clock is ticking fast, if you know what I mean.
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 8:12 AM
death of Elvis
Hallie Scott Kline
September 20, 2018 at 9:02 AM
I remember they broke into daytime tv to announce that.
ttgy1
September 20, 2018 at 2:23 PM
Nixon’s resignation
Hallie Scott Kline
September 20, 2018 at 9:03 AM
Challenger explosion: I had the chicken pox and I was at home sick with my mom. We’d been hearing about the mission at school since the beginning of the year and I remember her crying when it blew up.
OJ Simpson car chase: I remember seeing it on cable news, but the memory is vague.
OJ Simpson verdict: They paused high school classes for this and brought in extra TVs. I was angry at the time, but I’ve since become a big fan of OJ and now realize that the verdict was just.
9/11: My girlfriend, who I was living with at the time, called me from work all freaked out but I had the day off and I was hung over, so I told her to calm down and went back to sleep for a few hours.
The only other big event that stands out since 2001 is the Sandy Hook massacre. I was listening to NPR in my car when the news broke and I vividly remember where I was and how I felt. I was on my lunch and sat in the car for a few minutes before going back to work.
Horace Pinker
September 20, 2018 at 9:10 AM
There is plausible theory OJ’s son was the killer; OJ hired a criminal attorney for his son 4 days after the murder even though he had not been named a suspect, and his son had previously nearly stabbed a woman to death.
toomanymice
September 20, 2018 at 10:42 AM
Challenger explosion – Elementary school. I remember the teacher telling us about it
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series – Don’t remember, I never followed baseball
Start of the first Gulf War – High school. Was a very apathetic teen and didn’t give a crap about anything at the time
OJ Simpson car chase – I remember watching it on TV at home, but I got bored and changed the channel
OJ Simpson verdict – I was driving, and actually pulled over to listen to the verdict. I clearly remember screaming to myself “What the f**k?”
Princess Di death – Found out almost a day later, when I called my mom and she casually mentioned it (“By the way Princess Di died”). I don’t remember where I was when it happened
9/11 – Buying breakfast in the cafeteria at work
markus
September 20, 2018 at 9:21 AM
Remember hearing the news that Gorbachev was ousted in a coup
That Rabin was assisinated
Biffcaj
September 20, 2018 at 10:02 AM
Yeah, Rabin, I remember that. I was with my son shopping in a Bangladeshi grocery (we make Indian food). So the shopkeeper, a nice guy, goes: ‘Sir, I’m so sorry that your prime minister got killed.’ We knew it had happened but couldn’t help smiling from ear to ear: ‘It’s ok, don’t worry.’ I said.
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 10:54 AM
I remember only where I was in 9/11, from the first gulf war I remember only sitting with a gas mask and hearing the falling missiles exploding but I don’t remember how it started. I do remember where I was when the Israeli prime minister was murdered and I also remember where I was when Manchester united won the Champions league against Bayern Munich. It’s funny how you remember the same type of events but localised to your own region of the world. Only 9/11 seems to be global enough.
Hashed
September 20, 2018 at 10:07 AM
Could you clarify the significance of the world series game? Nobody here seems to have any idea why it would be on this type of list.
J1
September 20, 2018 at 10:33 AM
Not only is life getting more boring, but so is this blog.
DataExplorer
September 20, 2018 at 10:39 AM
🦁 is a creative personality and as such has his ups and downs. He has been in the downward cycle for a while. I’m in a major up cycle now as I’m quitting my job. When you are impervious to criticism of your art or life changing decisions, you know that you are ascending. Best wishes to 🦁!
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 11:03 AM
When the OJ verdict was announced, I was having lunch in a Miami Bennigans with two professional, conservative black coworkers. They turned white, stonefaced, and looked embarrassed, especially at all the blacks (and Whites) joyfully celebrating in the restaurant and on the overhead TVs.
E. Rekshun
September 20, 2018 at 10:52 AM
Which Bennigans? The ones I remember were on U.S. 1/SW 136 St and Kendall Drive/SW 117 Ave. Both of them closed around 2008.
Stan Adams
September 20, 2018 at 2:07 PM
NE 163 St., east of I-95.
E. Rekshun
September 20, 2018 at 5:17 PM
Ah.
Up until a few years ago, there was still one near the airport. Someone told me that it went totally ghetto at the end.
That’s another topic for Lion: How many defunct stores/restaurants/malls can you name?
Stan Adams
September 21, 2018 at 5:12 PM
Challenger explosion: I believe I was in third grade, and I remember our teacher telling us. I guess the teachers found out at lunch, or someone from administration went around to every classroom telling them, I can’t remember. It seemed like it was a big deal to teachers because Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher astronaut, was on board. (Already the transformation of the Space Program from the crowning achievement of white male engineers and pilots into an affirmative action program to make women and NAMs feel good about themselves was well underway.)
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series: not particularly a sports fan nor a Mets fan, nor any association with New York, so no recollection.
Start of the first Gulf War: don’t remember
OJ Simpson car chase: don’t remember
OJ Simpson verdict: unlike many people I wasn’t particularly anticipating the verdict, but I do remember this one in a way precisely because I wasn’t anticipating it and everyone else was. I was in college and had a class at 1 p.m. It was well known that the verdict would be announced around that time, but because I wasn’t closely following the story at the time, I showed up for class at 12:55 as usual. I was the only one there, and as I kept looking at my watch and people weren’t showing up even after 1:00, including the professor, I started thinking to myself, “what the heck is going on?” Then after a few more minutes people started to file in, and when the professor got there he just had this puzzled look on his face and said “not guilty!” in a quizzical tone of voice. It was only then that I realized that the OJ Simpson verdict had been in announced and that’s why people weren’t showing up at 1 pm. I got the impression that the professor thought OJ should have been found guilty but was trying not to pass judgment. It was a philosophy class and he was a white man. I imagine that today, any philosophy professor, even a white man, wouldn’t express even morally neutral puzzlement, but rather would be jumping for joy at this victory over white privilege with the rest of the SJWs.
Princess Di death: I remember it being a big news event in general, but don’t remember any specific moment when I heard the news.
9/11: I was working in IT in a cubicle farm, so I didn’t hear about it right away. Eventually I started to overhear people in other cubes saying things like “did you hear what happened?” So I got up and walked around. They had set up a TV in the conference room to watch the news. When I first saw it, the towers were still burning but hadn’t fallen yet. Nobody got any work done that day; meetings were cancelled. Another interesting thing about that day for me was that I accidentally left my wallet at home so I couldn’t buy lunch in the cafeteria as I had been planning on. So I went home for lunch, and it was kind of surreal to be driving around in midday on this beautiful cool sunny day, knowing that all the other drivers were in a state of shock too.
Hermes
September 20, 2018 at 11:05 AM
Challenger explosion: in elementary school; a teacher came in to the classroom and told us. “The space shuttle blew up,” were her exact words. As a kid who was really interested in space, I couldn’t process it for a second. “Blew up”, as in “exploded”!?
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series: at home with my Mets-fan family; I was permitted to stay up and watch. I was (and am) actually a Chicago Cubs fan, so I couldn’t decide whether to be happy that anothe rteam’s curse would not be ending before my team’s, or be unhappy because all the Mets fans around me were giddy with joy.
Start of the first Gulf War: I remember January 15, 1991; is that the official start?
OJ Simpson car chase: I even remember watching ESPN’s SportsCenter, seeing Keith Olbermann and Dan Patrick mention the death of Nicole and saying that there was no word on whether OJ had any connection. Little did anyone know that that was going to be a lot more than a throwaway line on a sports wrap-up show.
OJ Simpson verdict: in college, and I got to see, live and in person, a disheartening scene just like the one that became famous when photographed: when the verdict was announced, the white and Asian students had fgrim or expressionless faces, and the black ones were jumping out of their seats with joy.
Princess Di death: Can’t remember.
9/11: Was on my way to work right across the river in Jersey City. People could see what looked like a fire in the WTC, but nobody thought much of it and I got on the PATH train. There was an announcement that we wouldn’t be going all the way to the WTC station and that Grove Street was the end of the line. I had to get to Exchange Place (the last stop before WTC) so I just walked there. On my way, everyone was streaming westward except for me. Got to the office and everybody was leaving. I found a bus ($1.40; how much is it now?) to my father’s office and I met him there. We drove home, worrying about my uncle who worked on a high floor in the WTC. Turns out my uncle got home safely, covered in ash, with no memory of having driven back. Everyone was so happy to see him back that an impromptu party began in his front yard, and a few passers-by, thinking us ignorant, stopped to ask us if we knew what was going on in the larger world. What a day.
Two more for me: Game 7 of the 2016 World Series (in my apartment, watching the game because it was a holiday so no work; sharing the drama with friends on Facebook and in a Cubs forum I’d been a part of for 16 years) and the 2016 Presidential election (at work, in a foreign country where hardly anybody even knew it was Election Day in the US, so I had no one to celebrate with).
Kyo
September 20, 2018 at 11:10 AM
The Gulf War began on the evening of Wednesday, January 16, 1991, in the United States. (It was early Thursday morning in Iraq.)
The famous CNN broadcast (“Clearly I’ve never been there, but this feels like we’re in the center of hell”) began shortly after 6:30 p.m. Eastern time:
CNN made a deal with the Iraqi government to use a special phone line, so it was the only news organization that was able to broadcast continuously throughout the first night of the war.
Stan Adams
September 20, 2018 at 2:29 PM
Mates, I don’t understand you. Are you Americans or not? If prosecution is incompetent in presenting the evidence, witnesses and choosing the jury, OJ should go free. This is the triumph of the American justice system.
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 11:11 AM
Prosecutor threw the game at the outset.
Curle
September 20, 2018 at 12:15 PM
There is an excellent dramatic series depicting the aftermath of the crime, and the trial, called “The People vs OJ SImpson: an American Crime Story.” It’s on netflix.
toomanymice
September 20, 2018 at 1:36 PM
I don’t feel like I need to watch a documentary about events I already remember from watching them in the 1990s.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 3:31 PM
It’s not a documentary. Cuba Gooding jr plays OJ- it’s surprisingly well done and interesting. As far as what went wrong with the trial, don’t forget Mark Fuhrman.
toomanymice
September 21, 2018 at 7:13 AM
As if that mostly black jury was ever going to convict him.
destructure
September 20, 2018 at 4:16 PM
He had the best defense team money could buy. Plus he was famous and people had an image of him as a wholesome guy with self-deprecating humor (based on his persona in movies and TV commercials).
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 4:24 PM
He had the best defense team money could buy. Plus he was famous and people had an image of him as a wholesome guy with self-deprecating humor (based on his persona in movies and TV commercials).
Yep, and the prosecutorial team was totally out-gunned.
E. Rekshun
September 20, 2018 at 5:19 PM
Firstly, agreeing to a change of venue and empaneling a mostly black jury was in itself a failure. Secondly, possibly yes. I was on a mostly black jury of 3 whites and 9 blacks on a murder case and we returned a guilty verdict. The initial vote was to acquit 9:3, but the lazy jurors didn’t want to be sequestered for a second day and I was able to wear them out. I don’t think there was one person that belonged on that jury. The white social worker girl could only talk about a run she was going to miss if we get sequestered again. That was a a pathetic bunch of people.
Yakov
September 20, 2018 at 5:30 PM
“That was a a pathetic bunch of people.”
That’s why I would never try to get out of jury duty. I wouldn’t want to leave justice up to a bunch of knuckleheads. Most defendants are guilty as hell. The reason is simple — prosecutors have limited time and resources and look bad when they lose. So they don’t take cases to trial unless it’s a slam dunk. That’s why the average prosecutor has an over 90% conviction rate. When a defendant walks, something went wrong.
Good job getting justice for the victim’s family.
destructure
September 20, 2018 at 10:06 PM
I remember where I was (driving to an airport) when Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders was forced to resign in December 1994.
She was canned because she discussed teaching about masturbation in Sex Ed classes.
That was only 24 years ago… a very different world…
WRB
September 20, 2018 at 11:28 AM
Nowadays the Surgeon General would be canned for suggesting that maybe we not teach about hot man-on-man butthex in sex ed.
Hermes
September 20, 2018 at 12:25 PM
I remember watching the 1980 USA team beat the Soviets in Hockey 4-3. But I remember more the text on the screen before the game announcing it, while jeopardy was on or something, because the game wasn’t live. I remember the “catch” the Dwight Clark pass from Joe Montana but didn’t think it was that big of a deal at the time. In 2015, I was watching football in the evening of the Packers and Lions, and Rodgers threw the hail mary pass to the other Rogers for a TD at the end of the game.
GMR
September 20, 2018 at 11:29 AM
If it could be distilled into a moment, the 2008 collapse was a 9/11-scale event that we all have vivid memories of.
Likewise I think the 2016 election might have to be an exception to the exception for elections. It was a huge deal for _everybody_, and shocking for almost everybody (let’s be honest here). Half the country believed Hitler 2.0 had taken over and the other half thought the messiah had come at last. It was surreal.
That said, I was born in 1985, so…
Challenger explosion – nope
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series – I wish
Start of the first Gulf War – who knows, but I do remember seeing video of tanks on CNN and asking my dad if we could watch cartoons and being upset when he ignored me
OJ Simpson car chase – I remember seeing it at home but it was probably replay
OJ Simpson verdict – on the school bus, we were all chanting “GUILTY!” the whole ride home
Princess Di death – watching my little 13″ tv with the volume really low late at night so I wouldn’t get caught
9/11 – just coming back from an early morning canoeing trip as part of high school gym class
2008 financial whatever – distinct memories of being amped day trading for hours in a coffee shop every day over long lunch breaks
2016 election – in my basement theater room drunkenly taunting CNN
dingodonkey
September 20, 2018 at 12:10 PM
The last few groups of my freshman/sophomore college students have not remembered 9/11. But next year will be the first time when some of my freshmen will not have even born on 9/11.
Seth Largo (@SethLargo)
September 20, 2018 at 2:02 PM
You were actually watching the Boston College -Miami game live? The Flutie pass is the most overrated play in college football history.
ttgy1
September 20, 2018 at 2:12 PM
“You were actually watching the Boston College -Miami game live?”
I was at my uncle’s house on Thanksgiving, and it was being watched live, although I personally was not a college football fan. But was glad someone there was, otherwise I would not have seen the biggest pass in the history of college football live.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 3:33 PM
I don’t know why that is the biggest pass in history. Miami had 5 losses and BC had 3 that year. This is fake news. A national championship was not at stake.
ttgy1
September 20, 2018 at 6:31 PM
Where were you when the lights went out, in New York City,
Don’t you know that I was making love
Jimmy Ellis
September 20, 2018 at 3:08 PM
I was a little kid so I was definitely not making love.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 20, 2018 at 3:34 PM
You weren’t a little kid in 2003. I was trying to order food in a restaurant. They apologized that they wouldn’t be able to cook it for me, and gave me a gift card. I remember what I was trying to order, but not what table I was sitting at (it was near the front door).
MoreSigmasThanYou
September 21, 2018 at 11:21 AM
“You weren’t a little kid in 2003”
I was thinking of the 1977 blackout. But yes, the 2003 blackout was a bigger deal, but I was not living in a blacked-out area at the time so I only vaguely remember it as a news story.
http://time.com/3949986/1977-blackout-new-york-history/
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 21, 2018 at 11:26 AM
After reading about Pearl Harbor in my 7th grade American History class I asked my grandfather what he remembered about the attack. He had been in his late 20’s at the time and was not the sort of person who would have been uninformed about world affairs, in fact he had been a delegate to the 1940 Republican National Convention in Philadelphia.
My grandfather replied that people were so puzzled about the nature of the attack that it was hard to get too angry, at least initially. It was the fact that it happened in Hawaii that was puzzling, as at the time most people in the US had very little knowledge of Hawaii. Statehood was still long off, and in those pre-jet days almost no one traveled there. It would be like today hearing about an attack on US forces on Kwajalein Atoll.
Peter
ironrailsironweights
September 20, 2018 at 4:06 PM
I hesitate bringing this up here, but I was discussing AJP Taylor’s 1962 book Origins of the Second World War with a 39 year old colleague (not one of the smart ones) and he asked me if the author explained how Hitler started the war by initiating the Holocaust. I looked at him for a second, surprized. He was completely unfamiliar with either Versailles, the German desire for Lebenstraum nor the failures of western diplomacy much less concerns over Russia.
Curle
September 21, 2018 at 12:07 PM
I thought the war started because Germany took over Poland.
Lion of the Blogosphere
September 21, 2018 at 12:27 PM
Poland was the last straw/bungle of a program of failed diplomacy, or so argues AJP Taylor. That the western Great Powers concluded that Versailles was a mistake and intended to grant him ‘some’ room but bungled the process. Special blame is assigned to French failure to grasp their lowered status, British lack of resolve and consistent strategy and American interference.
Curle
September 21, 2018 at 2:27 PM
I remember where I was and what I was doing when I learned that
1. Kurt Cobain had died (suicide)
2. Phil Hartman had been killed (by his wife, as it turned out)
3. Ronald Regan had been shot (by a nutjob)
I also remember my location for the Challenger explosion, Rodney King riots, Simpson car chase, and 9-11.
ice hole
September 21, 2018 at 5:26 AM