POTTSVILLE — People from all over our area are remembering John F. Kennedy. That includes a man from Pottsville who was among a huge crowd who came out to support then-Senator Kennedy.
George Lord is still is a big fan of JFK 50 years after he was assassinated. Lord took pictures in 1960, when then-Senator Kennedy visited Garfield Square in Pottsville. Thousands of people turned out.
Lord wonders what the nation would be like if the president had not been killed.
“I don’t think we would have gotten into Vietnam. I think he would have pulled the troops out and I had a friend or two who were killed in Vietnam and it bothers me to this day.” Lord said.
Barbara Conage volunteers at the Historical Society of Schuylkill County. She was in high school when she got word of Kennedy’s assassination. 50 years later she thinks of the Kennedy family.
“Mostly his daughter, I am thinking how is she feeling watching all these broadcasts repeating how is she feeling about all of this,” Conage explained.
Dr. Peter Yasenchak is the executive director of the historical society. In 1963, Yasenchak said he was working as a high school guidance counselor in Pottsville.
“One of my former students just called me and said the president was just shot and I exclaimed ‘don’t talk like that!’ and she said ‘he was. Let me put the radio up to the phone .’”
Those who lived through the Kennedy assassination know they all witnessed an important and tragic part of our nation’s history.
