What History Have You Witnessed

[mhacdebhandia]

In the spirit of the local history thread . . . what historical or noteworthy event have you personally seen?

Ironically, I can't actually claim to have seen it, but . . . in the 1990s, the Prince of Wales came to Sydney. At one of his public appearances he was giving a speech when someone rushed forward through the crowd and fired a starter's pistol at him.

My best friend was, at the time, a teenager, dragged to the event by her mother. She was one of the people the pseudo-assassin knocked over as he rushed forward.

That's pretty good, but . . . another friend of mine told me a few years after I heard this story from my friend that the pseudo-assassin himself was actually an acquaintance of his brother's! Apparently he was someone they vaguely knew in Sydney gaming circles, or from university - he wasn't sure.

 

[jonesy]

In 95 a drugdealer, who was in jail at the time, arranged for a carbomb to go off right next to the police headquarters here in Helsinki.

As it happens, I was inside the building looking out of a window when it went off.

Luckily for everyone inside the blast radius the bomber overestimated its power and it only took out the cars on the parking lot (a very small parking lot) and every window of the police station.

It was still scary to experience the window you happen to be looking out of exploding into your face.

*Come visit Finland, the land where criminals can't seem to do anything right...or wrong.*

 

[Ice man]

Does a hole in one count?

I met a high placed politician (provincial premier) in a casino once. played blackjack with him and his handlers and gave him my opinion on a couple of issues. I then heard him parrot some of my thoughts about a week or so later to a news reporter. He didn't credit me though.

 

[Turanil]

I have met a simple woman whose 3 months old baby may well become the president of the world in 2053, if I am not mistaken.

 

[Hand of Evil]

I have seen the birth of the personal computer, I was one of those garage apple geeks.
I was in the 73 gas lines in the US.
I stood on the sidewalk and watch Pope John Paul on tour.
I knew Hottie and the Blowfish when they were a bar band.
Star Wars, nuff said.
Saw the Space shuttle fly overhead on the back of a 747 on its first trip back from space.
Knew a girl that would keep a man from being president.

 

[JamesDJarvis]

9-11

I drove to work without the radio on for a change that day and hadn't had cable news on the television that morning.

I got to work and the publications department where I work was empty, very strange since I'm one of the last ones in usually. I wandered about and noticed a large crowd of my coworkers standing in the rear breakroom watching the television and some of them were crying and every one look upset.

"what is going on?" I asked

"A plane has hit the World Trade center in New York" said my supervisor

"that is horrible do they know what caused it yet ?"

"No and another plane hit the pentagon"

So instantly like many other people i thought, we are under attack.

If i had worked somehwere else my story would have sounded like millions of other americans that day but as we stood there watching the second plane strike the towers, calls were coming into our compnay from different military services to get our robot search and recovery teams to DC and New York. I myself am a concept artist but it is also my job to process visual data for the company I work for and I got to see things i'd rather have never seen in the weeks that followed.

 

[diaglo]

i was living in Turkey when the first man, Neil Armstrong, walked on the moon.

 

[JoeBlank]

I missed the Olympic Park bomb in Atlanta in 1996 by a few hours.

My wife and I were in town for several differenct Olympic events. We saw Olympic Park during the day, and were told by many that we should come back after dark to see how beautiful it was. We then went to the stadium for track and field events. As we were about to leave, an American won the shot put (Randy Barnes, I think his name was). We were literally on our way out the front gates when we decided that we should stay for the medal ceremony. We had seen a few, but wanted to see one where they played our national anthem. This kept us too late to make it to the park, so we missed the bombing.

 

[francisca]

I was swimming on Cocoa Beach in 1973 when SkyLab was launched.

 

[der_kluge]

I met (governer) Bill Clinton, shook his hand.

Like I mentioned in the other thread, I knew someone who was killed by Arkansas' worst mass murderer, Ronald Gene Simmons.


That's about the extent of it, I think.