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Philly memories of 11/22/63? I want to hear from you!

The Philadelphia Daily News wants your story from 11/22/63

I still remember the first time I saw my mother cry. It was a Friday afternoon and I had been playing out in the yard of our house in Ossining, N.Y. (yes, THAT Ossining); I can picture walking in the kitchen door and my surprise at seeing the look on her face. The president was dead. I was only 4, going on 5, so I didn't fully understand everything, but I knew it was a big deal. Like a lot of latter-day Baby Boomers, it is my very first memory of something in the big outside world -- November 22, 1963.

Life would never quite be the same. If you're a regular reader of this blog, you know that the remarkable run of events that took place over the next 10-11 years -- the other assassinations, war, protest and riots, culminating in the Watergate scandal -- that started with the murder of President Kennedy would be what shaped my worldview, and what inspired me to be a journalist. Specifically, at this moment, 49 years and 11 months later, a journalist tasked with trying to make sense of the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination in a package for the Philadelphia Daily News.

I need your help to do that. Were you in the Philadelphia region that day? If so, where were you when heard that Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, or that he had died? Do you carry around a story from that dark day? If so, contact me, at bunchw@phillynews.com, or at 215-854-2957. I'd like to share your memories