The passing of the torch

I was working on the day that the last of America’s naivete was stripped away.

I spent most of the day behind a microphone -- at WTVR TV, WMBG AM and WCOD FM -- on that Friday in late November when John F. Kennedy was assassinated. I was still working my way through college at the University of Richmond.

Everybody on duty at the stations’ studios under the tower on West Broad Street was pressed into service for the next four days.

I got a break on Sunday, and a group of my fraternity brothers and I decided to drive up to D.C. that morning for the lying in state at the Capitol. By the time we got there, thousands of people were in a line that stretched for blocks and blocks.

As we inched forward, word came from a transistor radio that Ruby had shot Oswald in Dallas. You could see the news flash ripple through the line like a stadium wave.

It grew dark, and we gave up. We never made it to the Capitol building.

I was back at work Monday when the non-stop broadcast coverage turned its focus to the funeral. Later, we all watched on the monitors in the WTVR control room as JFK was buried at Arlington.

It would be 45 years before I visited the Kennedy grave site in person.

What stuck with me from that visit was not the eternal flame but the inscriptions from JFK’s inaugural address that are carved into a low stone wall surrounding the site. I had watched that inaugural address on TV at the student commons at U.R. But I had forgotten much of the speech, which promised hope and unity and seemed to draw the nation together as a whole.

Here are a few excerpts from that speech from a new, young president who had inspired such optimism and high expectations for so many in my generation.

Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans -- born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage -- and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty. This much we pledge -- and more….

Let both sides seek to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors. Together let us explore the stars, conquer the deserts, eradicate disease, tap the ocean depths, and encourage the arts and commerce.

Let both sides unite to heed in all corners of the earth the command of Isaiah -- to "undo the heavy burdens ... and to let the oppressed go free."

And if a beachhead of cooperation may push back the jungle of suspicion, let both sides join in creating a new endeavor, not a new balance of power, but a new world of law, where the strong are just and the weak secure and the peace preserved.

All this will not be finished in the first 100 days. Nor will it be finished in the first 1,000 days, nor in the life of this administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But let us begin….

In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility -- I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it -- and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.

And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country.

My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.

Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own.

I was one of those listening to the new president’s summons on January 20, 1961.

And I believed.