The most significant event ever witnessed?

[Tink]

My vote is for Neil Armstrong's footprint on the moon shown on the B&W TV we were watching. What???? We hava a guy standing on the moon?????Yup, JFK's promise was fulfilled, we sent a man to the moon and safely returned him home. That promise was made before his death.

 

[rags]

i was too young to understand the significance of the moon landing, but that certainly has to be tops in human history. my most searing memory was the explosion of the space shuttle challenger. certainly not the most significant thing in history, but for some reason, watching it, i could feel the horror. it just stays with me.

 

[Fratzog]

I lost my innocence as a kid when I first saw this. I've been a cynic ever since.

 

[patrick66]

1) Watching the second jet crash into the WTC.
2) Watching Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon
3) Watching the Challenger disaster
4) Watching Richard Nixon give his resignation speech
5) Watching President Reagan's funeral

 

[tbm3fan]

My vote is for Neil Armstrong's footprint on the moon shown on the B&W TV we were watching. What???? We hava a guy standing on the moon?????Yup, JFK's promise was fulfilled, we sent a man to the moon and safely returned him home. That promise was made before his death.

That would be #2 for me. The most significant and leaving the biggest imprint on my brain was the assassination of JFK and the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald in two days. That weekend of the 22nd-24th was hell. The funeral was the icing on the whole episode. I still cannot stay in a room when any video comes up on the TV regarding that day and never will.

 

[67-Fury]

Anyone who was in NY on 9/11 or Saw flight 175 actually hit. I dont think that could be topped. Ever.

 

[amazinblue82]

you all captured the biggies for me too -- especially 9/11 stuff.

kennedy and oswald, looking back was HUGE but I wasn't in school yet so it didnt get much attention obviously. I remember it was very SAD though -- adults crying all the time. also i remember seeing John Jr. salute his dad's casket and that REALLY upset me -- inconsolably per my mom -- on day of funeral.

I understood exactly what was going on with King and then RFK a couple of months later in 1968...make me numb and scared. in 1969 the moon landing..yes, I was old enough to know the significance. hooked on space to this day.

I will ADD one - related to Patrick66's No. 4. Watergate -- didn't understand it all but what I did get STUNK to high heaven. and NOW, with adult eyes AND the tapes releases? man oh man -- really changed my perspective on "politics" in American life.

 

[Fury440]

"most significant event ever witnessed"

By who?
I think there is a huge difference between viewing something on TV or in the press and actually being there and seeing it with your own two eyes.
Sure Kennedy, Nixon, Vietnam, 9/11 and the amazing space adventures are all significant, but only those who were there with their two eyes have a visceral memory burned into their brains. A mention of the event instantly transports them back in time to relive the whole experience again and again. So while not to diminish any of these events, I personally don't have that depth of memory for any except the TV breaking news announcement that Kennedy was shot and those sureal TV images of 9/11.
So my most significant event, witnessing the birth of each of my three kids, nothing can trump that.

 

[commando1]

Any combat vets here?

 

[1978 NYB]

I've been around since 1955. The Kennedy assassination was the first major event that I was cognizant of happening.

I was 25 miles away from the Pentagon and in the glide path of jet that crashed into the Pentagon. My friend Willie Q. Troy was killed in the Pentagon. He was a Vietnam Vet.

Willie Q. Troy | 9/11 Victims | washingtonpost.com

 

[tbm3fan]

my two cents.


I saw JFK's funeral on TV live, saw the moon landing live that July night in 1969, watched the impeachment hearings (i was in school) on TV. other things that made an impact, the coverage was so extensive I could "imagine" being there.

I saw the funeral in person. Catonsville MD is only 43 miles from D.C.

 

[Tink]

Any combat vets here?

Not me. I served stateside but witnessed (rode on the crash truck) when B-52's landed at Beale with battle damage from rockets. One had a hole you could have drove a pick-up through in the vertical stabilizer. We were amazed it flew from Guam like that. It is an enormous aircraft and airmen in Guam deemed it airworthy. We foamed the runway just in case.

 

[Wildaugust]

Yeah, I guess I would have to agree. The first humans to walk on the moon would be the most significant.

 

[Tink]

In my opinion which means absolutely nothing, witnessing something historical does not involve actually being there but being alive when it happened. I wasn't alive when the Hindenburg blew or when we bombed Hiroshima and those events are certainly historic. Had I been alive when the worlds loudest noise, Krakatoa happened, I would call that number 1. I watched the shuttle Challenger explode moments after liftoff. I stand by my assertion that nothing humans have ever done tops Neil Armstrong setting foot on the moon and returning to earth after doing so. I read Andy Weir's book' the Martian and watched the movie. Imagine the math involved in mounting an ascent vehicle and docking with an orbiting spacecraft. Just freaking amazing.

 

[1978 NYB]

And yet we can't get get cell phones to work properly in 2016.

 

[shooter65]

And yet we can't get get cell phones to work properly in 2016.

Sure you can...turn the f'n thing off. I miss the days when I had a few minutes of piece and quite and wasn't on call professionally or personally 24/7.

 

[70_NPORT]

Watching (and hearing) a 70' 4spd Hemi Cuda go through 3 gears at English town raceway. I will never forget the moment. Standing by the side of the track a bit past the bleachers I saw the car race by and I could see the shiny cover on the dana rear axle as it accelerated towards the clocks. I could see the axle shake just a bit after each shift the car made, and it sounded like a thunderous "clap" or "bang"...and boy, that Hemi motor was roaring too. It was a brown car with a black vinyl top I think, with "HEMI" hockey sticks along the sides. The other car seemed like it was just rolling down the track in neutral gear compared to that Cuda.

 

[amazinblue82]

In my opinion which means absolutely nothing, witnessing something historical does not involve actually being there but being alive when it happened. I wasn't alive when the Hindenburg blew or when we bombed Hiroshima and those events are certainly historic. Had I been alive when the worlds loudest noise, Krakatoa happened, I would call that number 1. I watched the shuttle Challenger explode moments after liftoff. I stand by my assertion that nothing humans have ever done tops Neil Armstrong setting foot on the moon and returning to earth after doing so. I read Andy Weir's book' the Martian and watched the movie. Imagine the math involved in mounting an ascent vehicle and docking with an orbiting spacecraft. Just freaking amazing.

great examples Tink

If interested one can google "10 Biggest Events in Human History" and the Reformation, printing press, lives and religions of Jesus and Muhammad, the World Wars, etc, start turning up. ALL big stuff, many of us were obviously NOT alive to see happen, but we can trace lines of influence from those events to the present that affect us ALL, profoundly, this second.

We can thank Isaac Newton for the mathematics of gravitation and planetary motion that allowed a moon landing 300 years later. Newton said (paraphrasing), when he was being lauded for his achievements, "if I could see further, its because I stood on the shoulders of giants". A humble acknowledgement of the contributions of others before him, and a clear prediction of how progress would occur in subsequent generations.

Something I am looking forward to is the launch of the James Webb telescope. Documentary recently about it, but I have been following it since it was announced several years ago though.

To me, its a bit like the anticipation of run up to the moon landing. We aren't physically putting the flag on a celestial body, but our technology is gonna take us to the beginning of time in the clearest way ever.

My prediction: What this thing can do -- and what we might learn - could change EVERYTHING. We are probably going to be able to really see new planets, check for signs of life as we know it ON such places. TONS of other stuff.

I will save the nerdy hyperbole that makes me giddy as a teenage girl at a Taylor Swift concert, but anyone interested in cosmic science might wanna check it out.

James Webb Space Telescope - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Xavi3r]

I think it is WTC. I wasn't there in person of course.
I was young and worked in vines during grapes harvesting times. They all called Us back to watch live TV.

After that it is ISIS and the genocide of a culture and christians in the middle east. that answers to the bullshit that politics tells us about what they would have done against nazis during WWII : nothing.

 

[CanCritter]

hood scoops on a formal....l leed a sheltered life