Waiting to help his president

My father, the late Dr. Earl Franklin Craton, a renowned Enid chiropractor for almost 30 years, sat in his Fort Worth, Texas, living room watching TV on Nov. 22, 1963, wondering if he might be visited by a very notable guest.

Moving to Fort Worth in 1959, Dr. Craton blossomed into his greatest work as he undertook his own research and developed his own technique for adjusting the head and the hip, giving his patients better relief than he had ever accomplished in the past.

A satisfied patient of Dr. Craton's, who worked in government service in Washington, D.C., wrote a letter to the White House. He told how Dr. Craton helped him and suggested that before going on to Dallas, President Kennedy might stop in Fort Worth to see Dr. Craton to get relief from his well-known back problems.

TV coverage showed President Kennedy's stopover in Fort Worth, but instead of going to see Dr. Craton, he continued on to Dallas. Perhaps he did not receive the letter from the government service worker or did not have time to include this in his itinerary.

When the terrible news came over TV that President Kennedy had been killed, Daddy, along with the rest of our country, mourned his death. He had been waiting in the wings to help his president to better health at the same time another had marked him for an assassin's bullet.

Yvonne Craton Kennedy

Enid

A joyous day turns to sadness

Nov. 22, 1963, was my husband and my 16th wedding anniversary.

I was in the house watching TV when the program was interrupted for a news break. At first, I thought it was someone other than President Kennedy that was shot. I can still remember the broken voice of a male reporter who was almost crying while repeatedly saying "The president has been shot, the president has been shot."

For the next few minutes, I watched the news brief while in total disbelief and shock. Both Wayne and I are Republicans, but supported our president.

I ran outside to where Wayne was working in the machine shop to tell him what was being reported. He laid down his tools and hurriedly followed me to the house where we continued to watch the news.

By then, we knew the condition of President Kennedy was grave. We had planned an evening out, but our hearts were not in it. What was supposed to be a celebration for us that day turned into a sad day for us as well as the whole world, one I can never forget.

Lois Caywood Guffy

Byron

Witness to the assassination

Shots rang out!

A woman from Dallas fell to the ground on the grassy knoll near the presidential motorcade. The woman, a close personal friend of my fifth grade teacher Mrs. Harrison, witnessed the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Mrs. Harrision had been discussing President Kennedy's trip to Dallas and told us her close friend was calling from nearby after the motorcade passed. Instead of hearing delightful memories, Mrs. Harrison listened to the frightening experience her friend had witnessed.

She returned to our classroom at Harrison Elementary in tears and explained what had happened. I was stunned. Our classes were dismissed for several days as Americans paused to pay tribute to our fallen president. I was only 10, but I will never forget America's loss.

Bonnie Vculek

Enid

Sitting in classroom

I remember well where I was Nov. 22, 1963. I was sitting in my fourth grade classroom at Wakita when the speaker came on with the newscast of what had just taken place. Our teacher, Mrs. Martin, told us to be sure and remember where we were at this time and history was being made and we were finding out the news of President Kennedy's death.

I have always believed that the people of the U.S. never have found out the real story of what happened that day! And that is one of the many sad coverups of our true history.

To this day a copy of the Enid newspaper dated Nov. 23, 1963, is hanging on my wall along with other things to help me never forget that day! All of us need to remember our past because it is what makes us what we are today.

One headline on that paper I'll always remember first, "My God, he's dead." My mother, Ruth Parson of Wakita, saved a number of those newspapers of the days just after President Kennedy was killed and I still have them. Over the past years I have worked with youth and the subject of what happened has come up. When it has, I have gotten out those old newspapers and took them and showed them to the kids. The look on some of their faces was like they had found a part of living history. If we remember the ones in our lives that we have lost they always live on. John F. Kennedy was one of our true great leaders and should be remembered by all of us. We could use more like him!

Roger Parson

Enid

The president has been shot

I was in the fifth grade in Albuquerque and had walked home for lunch. My mom was watching TV when Walter Cronkite cut in with the first announcement, "The president has been shot in Dallas." By the time that I had walked back to school, it was official that the president was dead, and school was canceled for the remainder of the day.

The following Sunday I was not feeling well and had stayed home from Sunday school. I was watching when Lee Harvey Oswald was shot. I can still see him crumble like a paper doll surrounded by uniformed men that did nothing to protect him.

I think that JFK's legacy is that he was the last moderate Democrat president. Reading his speeches today sound more like Ronald Reagan than any of the seven dwarfs running for presidency today.

David Smith

Enid

News came over car radio

I was in a car with my family going to my grandmother's for the holiday.

At that time I was a senior in Canton High School. The news came over the radio in our car. It was a horrible feeling to know that he was assassinated. I feel he was a very good president and would have done great things if he had lived.

I am now a secretary for the OSU Extension Service at the court house in Fairview.

Kathey McDonald

Fairview

The memory remains fresh

I will never forget the day JFK was shot. It does not seem possible that it could have been 40 years ago because the memory remains fresh. I was in the 5th grade at Helena Elementary School. The superintendent, Scott Tuxhorn, came to tell my teacher, Mrs. King, that the president had been shot.

I remember how the color drained from her face and how her expression has ever been etched in my memory. That expression was one of horror and shock. I also remember when the superintendent came back to that 5th grade room to tell us that the president had died. My teacher cried. My teacher was a stoic woman who did not reveal her feelings very often. To see her cry was very impressionable to me.

I think about it now and realize that I did not truly understand what all of this was about due to my young age. I did not understand what it meant for a nation or why someone would want to kill anybody, especially the president of our country.

I was still too immature to understand prejudices or taking a stand against someone who was our leader. However, I will never forget that a few days later the entire school gathered together to watch the funeral procession on a small TV in the auditorium. I remember being touched by the grace of Jacqueline and the innocence of little John. I remember the compassion that I felt for the entire family. I remember one of JFK's sayings, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." How could someone squelch that spirit? How could someone put to death such charisma and vitality? A scary time - kind of like today.

Jeannette Redman (Crissup)

Goltry

Announcement over intercom

I was six years old and was in the classroom for Mrs. Matheson's first-grade class at Coolidge Elementary School. I remember our principal asking for everyone's attention on the school intercom and announcing that President Kennedy had been killed and that school was being dismissed early.

Although Mrs. Matheson cried and had a Kleenex or handkerchief to wipe the tears from her eyes, I don't remember her sobbing or ever losing her composure. She dismissed us and I walked home with a few classmates.

On the walk home I remember saying "Well, I guess we don't have a president anymore." Of course, this was the only thing on television for the next several days and I didn't understand why it was so important that it preempted my favorite show, "Superman" which was normally broadcast at 4 in the afternoon. It would be several years before I would have a substantive understanding of the assassination and what it meant to America.

The 1960 presidential election was the first election where television would have a major influence. The production techniques used in his televised debate with Nixon are an example of how the media can attempt to influence and manipulate opinion. Much credit is due to JFK for his handling of the Cuban missile crisis.

He boldly faced down the Soviet Union in a test of nerves at a pivotal and dangerous moment in world history. I don't believe he is given enough credit for cutting taxes to revive an ailing economy.

Richard Nightengale

Midland, Texas

'I found my mother sobbing'

I was a fourth-grader living with my folks in base housing at Bergstrom AFB in Austin, Texas. All the students at my grade school, I.W. Popham Elementary, were let out early because President Kennedy was scheduled to arrive at the base with Vice President Johnson after leaving Dallas.

Living on base, we often got to shake the hand of the president and vice president as they stopped over at the base to transfer from Air Force One to the helicopters that transported them to the Johnson ranch.

We were let out of school as planned and during the time that it took us to make the short walk across the highway and back into the base housing area, that fatal shot rang out. When I arrived at our unit, I found my mother sobbing and it was all she could do to sit me down and explain what had happened. I was devastated.

Our experiences during the Cuban missile crisis were sometimes terrifying. With Bergstrom being one of the main bases where the B-52s were located, we often witnessed a general alert and lockdown at the base, scrambles of the huge bombers, and overnight campouts in the dark of our living room (blackouts with candles burning, no electricity, and blankets covering our windows.)

I was sure that, with the loss of President John F. Kennedy, the free world would be overrun by the Communist Cubans. I was even more terrified that my father was surely going to war. These were real concerns for a young person who felt a definite connection to the President of the United States with whom I had shaken hands, and who now had been assassinated; this was someone I actually knew!

I can vividly remember funeral services and procession as it was broadcast on our little black and white TV. And the Kennedy children. I cried for days.

D.E. "Butch" Phillips

Enid

Bad for our country

All I really remember about that day is that I was pregnant with my first child. I was at my parent's house watching soap operas on TV when the news broke in and announced that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas.

I ran to the phone and called both my parents at work. It was truly a sad, sad day.

I thought a lot of President Kennedy at the time, and I just felt bad for our country because it seemed to be the beginning of the terrorism that has never come to an end and probably never will. I really fear for my grandchildren and great grandchildren. Their future seems so bleak, and I feel a lot of that started on the day Kennedy was shot.

Jean Walker

Enid

Overwhelming grief

We lived in Huntington Beach, Calif., in our newly purchased first home. It was my day off. My husband was at work. My 3-year-old son was watching cartoons in the den and I was drying my hair in a bonnet-type dryer while doing my nails in the dining room.

He came in and tried to tell me something, but I didn't understand so I went to see what it was, only to learn from the TV what he had tried to put into words. We spent the rest of the day glued to the TV, coming out only to answer the phone or make a call to someone who might not have heard the terrible news that our president had been shot.

When something triggers my memory of that tragic event, my mind's eye sees us in the same house in southern California and I again experience the overwhelming feelings of grief, helplessness and insecurity that something so horrific could happen in this country.

Dorothea McWilliams

Lamont

JFK was very charismatic

I was in fourth grade music class at Covington-Douglas Elementary when the news came over the intercom. School was immediately dismissed, and at home I found my mom watching the TV and crying. She later ordered the book "The Torch Is Passed," which contained a lot of photos of the assassination.

JFK was a very charismatic president; maybe not one of the best, but one of the most popular.

DeAnna (Fischer) Smith

New Braunfels, Texas