December 14, 2012: The Sandy Hook Massacre

December 14, 2012: A mentally ill 20-year-old man named Adam Lanza shoots and kills his mother in Newtown, Connecticut. He then goes to Sandy Hook Elementary School, and shoots 20 children and 6 adult staff members. As the police close in, he kills himself.

Newtown, then as now a town of about 27,000 people, was home to rubber innovator Charles Goodyear, film director Elia Kazan, civil rights lawyer Burke Marshall, decathlete-turned-businessman-turned-businesswoman Bruce-turned-Caitlin Jenner, Blossom actress Jenna von Oÿ, and Suzanne Collins, author of the Hunger Games books. The school is about 76 miles northeast of Times Square. Violent crime was rare there: In the 10 years before the Sandy Hook Massacre, there had been only 1 homicide in the town.

At the time, I had a job connected to social media, and it forced me to watch television, going back and forth between the news channels. It was a Friday, when I was allowed to go home at 3:00. This time, I couldn't. I just couldn't. I just sat there, watching the coverage, until I realized how dark it was, first onscreen, figuratively; and then outside, literally; and remembered how I hated the commute home, and left at around 7:00.

It sounds like the story you hear about people, now old, glued to their TV sets after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. (That was also a Friday.) I had already joined the entire country in doing so after the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986 (a Tuesday -- not after the explosion of Columbia in 2003, though); during the O.J. Simpson freeway chase in 1994 (another Friday); after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 (a Tuesday); and after the hit on Osama bin Laden in 2011 (a Sunday night).

Lanza's main weapon was a Bushmaster XM-15, a model of AR-15 automatic rifle. This was hardly the only recent mass shooting in which it had been used. So, now, calls came for its banning, including from the President of the United States, Barack Obama.

But the Republican Party controlled Congress, and absolutely no action was taken.

And so, the war on guns was over, and the guns won. The American people had surrendered to the National Rifle Association. The voters had just re-elected Obama the month before, but had re-elected the Republican Congress as well. It was a message: "This is America. Here, we love our guns more than we love our children." British newspaper columnist Dan Hodges wrote this:

What's more, conspiracy theories blew up, some suggesting that the massacre never happened. And NRA spokesman Wayne LaPierre suggested that we should have more guns, not fewer. Leading to a rare agreement in front page headlines of the New York tabloids, the mostly-liberal Daily News and the archconservative New York Post.

There had been genuine wackos in American politics before, during the Red Scare of the late 1940s and early 1950s, to the John Birch Society in the 1960s, to the conspiracy flakes gunning for President Bill Clinton in the 1990s, to the Tea Party fanatics that had already been established in 2009, Obama's 1st year in office.

But this now seems, in hindsight, like the launch of the QAnon Era, where such dishonesty, stupidity and ignorance began to be shamelessly brought into the mainstream, and celebrated by people who should have known better.

At the time, I wrote, "The National Rifle Association executives are the homicide equivalent of the archbishops who, rather than turn in abusive priests, transfer them to other parishes."

On June 15, 2016, in the wake of the Pulse nightclub mass shooting in Orlando, Florida, Connecticut's Senator Chris Murphy launched a filibuster in the U.S. Senate, promising to hold the floor "for as long as I can" or until Congress acted on gun control legislation.

He eventually secured a commitment from Senate leadership to hold a vote on 2 measures he supported: Expanding background checks, and blocking suspected terrorists from purchasing weapons. He ended his filibuster after 14 hours and 50 minutes.

There appears to be no connection between the school being named "Sandy Hook" and an outcropping of land on the Atlantic Coast of Monmouth County, New Jersey having the same name, which had been hit hard by a hurricane a few weeks earlier, also named Sandy.

In the 2022-23 schoolyear, those children would be juniors in high school.

*

As I said, December 14, 2012 was a Friday. No college or pro football games were played. It was the off-season for baseball. The NHL team owners had locked the players out, so there were no games scheduled for the night. But there were 11 games played in the NBA, with the New York Knicks not being involved in any of them. Most had pregame moments of silence held for the victims:

* The Brooklyn Nets beat the Detroit Pistons, 107-105 in 2 overtimes at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Joe Johnson of the Nets led all scorers with 28 points.

* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Washington Wizards, 102-96 at the Verizon Center (now the Capital One Arena) in Washington. Kobe Bryant scores 30 points.

* The Toronto Raptors beat the Dallas Mavericks, 95-74 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 90-86 at the Quicken Loans Arena (now the Rocket Arena) in Cleveland. Monta Ellis scored 33 for the Bucks.

* The Indiana Pacers beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 95-85 at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse (now the Gainbridge Fieldhouse) in Indianapolis.

* The Orlando Magic beats the Golden State Warriors, 99-85 at the Amway Center (now the Kia Center) in Orlando.

* The Minnesota Timberwolves beat the New Orleans Pelicans, 113-102 at the New Orleans Arena (now the Smoothie King Center). Nikola Peković scored 31 for the T-Wolves.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Boston Celtics, 101-89 at the Toyota Center in Houston.

* The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Sacramento Kings, 113-103 at the Chesapeake Energy Arena (now the Paycom Center) in Oklahoma City.

* The Denver Nuggets beat the Memphis Grizzlies, 99-94 at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver.

* And the Phoenix Suns beat the Utah Jazz, 99-84 at the US Airways Center (now the Mortgage Matchup Center) in Phoenix.

December 8, 1980: John Lennon is Killed

Howard Cosell and John Lennon, December 9, 1974.

Six years later, John would be dead.

December 8, 1980: The New England Patriots are playing the Miami Dolphins at the Orange Bowl in Miami, a game being broadcast on ABC Monday Night Football. As John Smith of the Patriots comes onto the field to attempt a last-play game-winning field goal, Howard Cosell gives an announcement about another Englishman named John:

Cosell: But it's suddenly been placed in total perspective for us. I'll finish this. They're in the hurry-up offense.

Frank Gifford: Third down, four. Foreman. (Chuck Foreman is stopped on a run.) It'll be fourth down. (Quarterback Matt) Cavanaugh will let it run down for one final attempt. He'll let the seconds tick off to give Miami no opportunity whatsoever. (Whistle blows.) Timeout is called with three seconds remaining. John Smith is on the line. And I don't care what's on the line, Howard: You have got to say what we know in the booth.

Cosell: Yes, we have to say it. Remember: This is just a football game, no matter who wins or loses. An unspeakable tragedy confirmed to us by ABC News in New York City: John Lennon, outside of his apartment building on the West Side of New York City -- the most famous, perhaps, of all of The Beatles -- shot twice in the back, rushed to Roosevelt Hospital, dead on arrival. Hard to go back to the game after that newsflash, which, in duty bound, we have to take. Frank?

Gifford: Indeed, it is.

Lennon had been shot at 10:50 PM, Eastern Standard Time. Cosell had read an initial report, before the full facts were known: Five shots had been fired, four of them hit Lennon, and, according to the doctors who tried in vain to save him, any one of the four that hit him, had it been the only one, would have done enough damage to kill him. He was pronounced dead at 11:15. He was 40 years old.

Cosell made the announcement a few minutes later. On December 9, 1974, Monday Night Football had broadcast a game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Washington Redskins at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The Redskins won, 23-17. Lennon had attended, and Cosell interviewed him at halftime.

Cosell was already 43 years old when The Beatles first arrived in America, and hardly in their target group, but his journalistic instincts kicked in, and, surprising those of us who knew him only as a blowhard who tried to convince people he knew more about things than he did, he handled it like a complete professional.

Lennon had been living in America for a little over 3 years, and knew who Cosell was, and said of American football, "It makes rock concerts look like tea parties." The interview went very well, and, off-camera, Cosell even introduced Lennon to another attendee, the outgoing Governor of California, Ronald Reagan. (I was sure I had seen video footage of Lennon and Reagan talking and laughing together that night, but I can't find a still photo of it anywhere.)

Now, 6 years earlier, almost to the day, Lennon was dead, and Reagan was the President-elect, having defeated incumbent President Jimmy Carter a month earlier. Less than 4 months later, Reagan would be shot as well, but would barely survive.

When Cosell spoke the words, "dead on arrival," the camera caught Smith looking right into it, and nodding, as if he had heard what Cosell had said. Of course, none of the players knew anything about it until the game was over. Smith missed his game-winning field goal. The game went to overtime, and Uwe von Schamann, born in West Berlin, Germany but raised in Fort Worth, Texas, won it for the Dolphins with a field goal, 16-13.

This being a Monday, the Pats-'Phins game was the only NFL game scheduled. This being December, no MLB games were scheduled. Only one game was played in the NBA: The Seattle SuperSonics beat the San Antonio Spurs, 104-99 at the Seattle Center Coliseum.

Only one game was played in the NHL: The Calgary Flames beat the Los Angeles Kings, 4-2 at the Forum in the Los Angeles suburb of Inglewood, California.

December 7, 1993: The Long Island Rail Road Massacre

December 7, 1993: A crazed gunman shoots 25 passengers on a Long Island Rail Road commuter train, killing 6 of them. It was the worst crime ever committed on an American train, and remains so.

Armed with a Ruger P89 semi-automatic pistol, Colin Ferguson, a 35-year-old immigrant from Jamaica, boarded an eastbound train at New York's Jamaica, the neighborhood in Queens, heading for Hicksville, Nassau County. As the train pulled into Merillon Avenue station in Garden City Park, he pulled his weapon, and started firing. Several passengers managed to subdue him until an LIRR policeman was able to board the train and arrest him.

At first, Ferguson had a public defender, then fired him, and tried to represent himself. William Kunstler and Ron Kuby volunteered to represent him, but Ferguson fired them, too. Kunstler had previously represented the Chicago Seven at their conspiracy trial in 1969-70, and Doors singer Jim Morrison at his 1970 obscenity trial. Kuby, like Kunstler described as a "radical lawyer," was the left half of a politically-opposite talk show on radio station WABC, with Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa on the right.

When Ferguson was ruled competent to stand trial,  Kuby told the media, "Without a psychiatric defense, Ferguson has no defense. There was no doubt that he was there, that he fired the weapon, that he would have fired it more had he not been wrestled to the ground. There is no doubt that Colin Ferguson, if sane, was guilty."

He was convicted, on February 17, 1995. Like another infamous New York killer, David Berkowitz, the Son of Sam, he has been attacked by fellow inmates, including yet another New York murderer, serial killer Joel Rifkin. Allegedly, the fight started when Ferguson told Rifkin, "I wiped out six devils, and you only killed women." Rifkin responded, "Yeah, but I had more victims," and then, Ferguson punched Rifkin. Guards broke the fight up before a result could be determined.

One of Ferguson's victims was Dennis McCarthy. His widow, Carolyn McCarthy, ran for Congress the next year, on a gun control platform. In spite of a nationwide conservative tide, including the defeat of anti-gun Governor Mario Cuomo by George Pataki in New York State, she won, and served in Congress for 18 years.

A memorial to the victims was erected in Mineola, on Long Island. As of December 7, 2022, Ferguson is at Upstate Correctional Facility in Malone, Franklin County, New York, close to the Canadian border.

*

December 7, 1993 was a Tuesday. Baseball was out of season. Football was in midweek. There were 9 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 92-78 at The Forum outside Los Angeles  in Inglewood, California.

* The New Jersey Nets beat the Boston Celtics, 117-90 at the Brendan Byrne Arena at the Meadowlands.

* The Orlando Magic beat the Detroit Pistons, 91-89 at the Orlando Arena.

* The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Portland Trail Blazers, 109-100 at The Coliseum in the Cleveland suburb of Richfield, Ohio.

* The Indiana Pacers beat the Sacramento Kings, 105-87 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Los Angeles Clippers, 115-111 at the Chicago Stadium. The Clippers' Danny Manning led all scorers on the night with 43 points.

* The Miami Heat beat the Dallas Mavericks, 106-101 at the Reunion Arena in Dallas.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Charlotte Hornets, 121-102 at The Summit in Houston. Otis Thorpe scored 40 points. (The arena has since been converted into the Central Campus of the Lakewood Church, Dr. Joel Osteen's "megachurch.")

* The Golden State Warriors beat the Denver Nuggets, 95-90 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

And there were 6 games played in the NHL:

* The New York Islanders played the Edmonton Oilers to a tie, 4-4 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Calgary Flames played the Quebec Nordiques to a tie, 4-4 at the Colisée de Québec.

* The Hartford Whalers beat the Washington Capitals, 6-1 at the Capital Centre in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland.

* The St. Louis Blues beat their arch-rivals, the Chicago Blackhawks, 3-2 at the St. Louis Arena.

* The Florida Panthers beat the season's other expansion team, the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, 3-2 at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim (now the Honda Center).

* And the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the San Jose, 3-1 at the San Jose Arena (now the SAP Center).

December 6, 1989: The Montreal Massacre

December 6, 1989: Marc Lépine, a 25-year-old engineering student at École polytechnique de Montréal, shoots 28 women on the campus, 14 of whom die. Proclaiming himself an "anti-feminist" in his suicide note – today, we would call him an "incel" – he finished it by shooting and killing himself.

The Canadian government – then led by the Progressive Conservative Party, mind you – took this seriously, and, instead of merely offering "thoughts and prayers," passed new gun control laws. These did not eliminate mass shootings in Canada, but it did reduce them.

The anniversary of the massacre is commemorated annually in Canada as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, founded by a survivor of the shooting, Nathalie Provost.

École polytechnique de Montréal has since been absorbed by the Université de Montréal, and is known as Polytechnique Montréal.

*

December 6, 1989 was a Wednesday. Baseball was out of season. Football was in midweek. There were 6 games in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Boston Celtics, 113-98 at the Boston Garden.

* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Miami Heat, 121-98 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Atlanta Hawks beat the Orlando Magic, 118-110 at the Orlando Arena.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Washington Bullets, 115-107 at The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan.

* The Indiana Pacers beat the Denver Nuggets, 136-117 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.

* And the San Antonio Spurs beat the Golden State Warriors, 121-119 at the HemisFair Arena in San Antonio.

And there were 7 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers beat the New Jersey Devils, 5-3 at Madison Square Garden.

* The New York Islanders beat the Hartford Whalers, 4-3 at the Hartford Civic Center (now the PeoplesBank Arena).

* The Pittsburgh Penguins beat the Washington Capitals, 5-3 at the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh.

* In an "Original Six" matchup, the Chicago Blackhawks beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 6-4 at the Chicago Stadium.

* The Winnipeg Jets beat the Calgary Flames, 4-3 at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* And the Los Angeles Kings beat the Vancouver Canucks, 5-4 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California. Bernie Nicholls scored the winning goal with 2:09 left in overtime.

November 11, 1938: The Truth of the Nazis' Gun Control Law

November 11, 1938: You may have heard, from American "gun rights" advocates, that the Nazis passed a gun control law. That is a lie: Here is the truth of the law passed on this date:

The 1938 German Weapons Act superseded a 1928 law. As under the 1928 law, citizens were required to have a permit to carry a firearm and a separate permit to acquire a firearm. But under the new law:

* Gun restriction laws applied only to handguns, not to long guns or ammunition. The 1938 revisions completely deregulated the acquisition and transfer of rifles and shotguns, and the possession of ammunition.

* The legal age at which guns could be purchased was lowered from 20 to 18.

* Permits were valid for three years, rather than one year.

* Holders of annual hunting permits, government workers, and NSDAP members (the National Socialist German Workers' Party, or "Nazis") were no longer subject to gun ownership restrictions. Prior to the 1938 law, only officials of the central government, the states, and employees of the German Reichsbahn Railways were exempted.

* The manufacture of arms and ammunition continued to require a permit, with the proviso that such permits would no longer be issued to any company even partly owned by Jews. Jews could not manufacture or deal in firearms or ammunition.

In other words, this law made it easier to get guns -- and it didn't prohibit Jews from owning them.

Also, if the Jews of Germany – or any other country – had guns, they would not have defeated the Nazis, as we saw when they fought back in Berlin in 1938, in Prague in 1942, and in Warsaw in 1944.

*

November 11, 1938 was a Friday. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. The NHL season was underway, but no games were scheduled.

There were 9 college football games, but none was between 2 teams that would now be considered major. New York University (NYU) beat Colgate, 13-7 at Yankee Stadium. And Boston College beat Boston University, 21-14 at Fenway Park.

November 22, 1963: President John F. Kennedy Is Assassinated

November 22, 1963: President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson becomes President.

With the 1964 Presidential election coming up, and the 1960 election having been close, Kennedy wanted to be sure of as many States as he could. And, with a split in the Democratic Party in the State of Texas, a State then with 25 Electoral Votes, he knew that was a State he had to hang onto.

He visited San Antonio and Houston the day before, settled for the night in Fort Worth, and made the short flight to Dallas the next morning. He rode in an open car, a 1961 Lincoln Continental limousine, with the protective "bubble top" removed, so the crowds along the motorcade route could see him.

He was in the back seat, with his wife, Jacqueline Kennedy, who was wearing a pink suit, complete with a pillbox hat. In the middle seat were the Governor of Texas, John Connally, and his wife, Nellie. In the front seat were 2 Secret Service Agents: William Greer, the driver, and Clint Hill.

In the car behind them sat Vice President Johnson, his wife Claudia "Lady Bird" Johnson, and Senator Ralph Yarborough. (Yarborough's wife, Opal, was not there.) Yarborough, a liberal, and Connally, more conservative on some issues, were seen as the reason behind the intra-State Party split. The other Senate seat for Texas, which Johnson had held until the 1960 election, had been won in a special election by a Republican, John Tower. He was not present.

There was concern that there might be trouble in Dallas: A month earlier, Adlai Stevenson, America's Ambassador to the United Nations, was hit with picket signs on a visit to the city. JFK told Jackie it was "real nut country."

But the reception for the Kennedys seemed to be wonderful. There was at least one Confederate flag along the route, but it was mostly American flags and signs of support, including a few for Jackie.

At 12:30 PM, Central Standard Time -- 1:30 Eastern -- as the limo went down Elm Street into Dealey Plaza, about to head under a highway and railroad underpass near Union Station, on its way to the Trade Mart where JFK was to attend a luncheon and deliver a speech, Nellie Connally turned to JFK, and said, "You can't say Dallas hasn't been kind to you today." And he said, "No, I suppose you can't."

(For the number of shots, I'm sticking to the official story, even though, like millions of Americans, I am not entirely convinced of it.)

At that moment, the kindness stopped. A shot rang out. It missed the car completely, and struck a curb, breaking off a piece of concrete that cut a bystander, James Tague, on his face. Tague was a 27-year-old car salesman, originally from Indiana, and later claimed that it was the second shot that wounded him. He published a book, claiming that Johnson was involved in the conspiracy to assassinate JFK, so he could become President himself. He has not been the only person to suggest this, but it seems incredibly unlikely.

A second shot was fired. It hit Kennedy in the back, drilled through his body, and exited through his throat. Some witnesses said they heard him yell, "My God, I'm hit!" But the nature of his wounds calls his continued ability to speak into question. Connally, having turned around after hearing the first shot, was hit in the back by the same bullet. He yelled out, "My God, they're going to kill us all!"

This shot has been called "the magic bullet" by people who don't believe the lone-gunman theory that was later accepted by the Warren Commission. They have used "The Zapruder Film," a silent home movie recorded by Abraham Zapruder, a local clothing manufacturer, to back up their claim. But the wounds caused by that bullet can be accounted for by the varying positions, both horizontal and vertical, of the car's seats.

A third shot was fired. It struck Kennedy in the head, sending it back and to the left. This is the key for people who don't believe the lone-gunman theory: If the shot had come from behind, it would have caused Kennedy to fall forward. Therefore, it had to come from the front and to the right, probably fired from behind a white fence atop what became known as the "grassy knoll" at Dealey Plaza.

Dealey Plaza. The "grassy knoll" is roughly

in the center of the picture, with the white fence behind it.

(The Plaza was named for George Bannerman Dealey, the publisher of The Dallas Morning News from 1926 to his death in 1946.)

Greer sped off to the nearest hospital, which was Parkland Hospital, 4 miles to the northwest. There was nothing the doctors, led by Robert N. McClelland, could do. Father Oscar Huber, a priest at the hospital, gave him the last rites. It was the 4th time he had received them.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, was pronounced dead at 1:00 PM -- 2:00 Eastern. NBC was the first network to announce his death to the public, with Frank McGee saying so at 2:35. Walter Cronkite of CBS followed, 3 minutes later.

After being told of JFK's death, Johnson ordered that he be taken back to Air Force One, which was sitting on the tarmac at Love Field, Dallas' main airport at the time. Sarah T. Hughes, whom JFK had appointed a federal Judge on LBJ's recommendation, administered the Oath of Office at 2:39 (3:39 Eastern). She remains the only woman ever to swear a President into office.

Johnson insisted on having the swearing-in photographed, and that Jackie be by his side, to show the peaceful transfer of power. Cecil W. Stoughton, then the official White House photographer, would win the Pulitzer Prize for Photography for his picture. There is no film of it, although there is a very scratchy audio recording.

Most versions of this photo are in black & white.

This one is probably colorized.

At 1:50 (2:50), Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested at the Texas Theatre. He had been identified as the shooter from the nearby Texas School Book Depository, and had also killed a Dallas police officer, Patrolman J.D. Tippit.

Someone once wrote up a series of "Lincoln-Kennedy Coincidences," some of them erroneous or misleading. (Kennedy did have a secretary named Evelyn Lincoln, who did warn him not to go to Dallas, but Lincoln did not have a secretary named Kennedy, and no one warned him against going to Ford's Theatre.) To me, the most interesting one is that John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln in a theater, and was caught in a storehouse (for tobacco on a farm); while Oswald shot Kennedy from the window of a storehouse, and was arrested in a theater. And no one seems to bring up the fact that the car that Kennedy was riding in was a Lincoln.

The murder sent the world into mourning. Everything else, including sports, became secondary to laying the fallen President to rest, and bringing his killer to justice.

Within 48 hours of the assassination, Oswald, 24 years old -- born on October 18, 1939, the same day as Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Mike Ditka -- would be also be murdered. Those who believe he acted alone, and those who believe he couldn't have, each have evidence to back up their theory, but neither has enough information to make it conclusive. There was no trial. We may never know for sure whether he did it alone, or at all.

What we do know is that the assassination of John F. Kennedy still haunts this country. His generation, who grew up in the Great Depression and fought in World War II, never got over it. Their children, who were inspired to public service by JFK, were emotionally scarred for life as well.

The fact that all of Johnson's subsequent achievements as President have been clouded by his failure in the Vietnam War makes it all worse: There is the belief that Kennedy would have handled Vietnam better, and we would have been spared the worst of that war, and spared the Presidency of Richard Nixon, and Watergate, and so many other things.

But we'll never know. The events of November 22, 1963 insured that.

With the Vice Presidency vacant, the next man in the line of succession was the Speaker of the House of Representatives, John McCormack, like Kennedy a Bostonian. He was 73 years old, and looked older. Next was the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, Carl Hayden of Arizona. And he was 86. Next was the Secretary of State, Dean Rusk.

John W. McCormack

This potential succession situation led to the proposal, and by 1967 the ratification, of what became the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, allowing for the replacement of the Vice President for the remainder of the Presidential term, and also for a Presidential inability to serve short of death.

Jack Ruby, who shot Oswald, died in prison in 1967. Abraham Zapruder died in 1970. President Lyndon Johnson died in 1973. Father Oscar Huber died in 1975. Agent William Greer, the driver, died in 1985. So did Judge Sarah Hughes. Governor John Connally died in 1993. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy died in 1994. Senator Ralph Yarborough died in 1996. Nellie Connally died in 2006. Claudia "Lady Bird" Johnson, the new First Lady, died in 2007. Photographer Cecil Stoughton died in 2008. James Tague, the 3rd wounded man, died in 2014. Dr. Robert McClelland died in 2019. Clint Hill, the Secret Service Agent who kept Jackie in the car, was the last living person in the car. As of November 22, 2022, he is still alive. (UPDATE: He died in 2025.)

The Lincoln Continental limousine is now in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, outside Detroit. So is the chair in which Abraham Lincoln was sitting in, in Ford's Theatre in Washington, when he was assassinated.

Within 5 years, his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, would also be assassinated. These murders were mentioned as part of the actions claimed by the Devil, played by Mick Jagger, in The Rolling Stones' 1968 song "Sympathy for the Devil."

The last brother, Senator Edward M. "Ted" Kennedy, lived until 2009. All three brothers are now buried at Arlington National Cemetery, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. 

*

November 22, 1963 was a Friday. This was also the day that A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records, a.k.a. The Phil Spector Christmas Album, was released. I have a separate entry for that. Also that day, With the Beatles was released in Britain, later repackaged in the U.S. was Meet the Beatles.

In addition, the pilot episode of the TV series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. was being filmed, on the 31st birthday of its star, Robert Vaughn, when the cast and crew received word of the assassination, at which point they stopped, resuming on Tuesday the 26th, after the funeral. The show premiered on NBC on September 22, 1964.

British authors Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis also died on November 22, 1963. Hardly anyone in America noticed.

One more weird thing: Hugh Millen was born that day. Millen played 10 seasons in the NFL, mostly as a backup quarterback. In 1987, he played for the Los Angeles Rams, who represent the city where Kennedy was nominated for President, and where Bobby was assassinated in 1968.

In 1991 and 1992, Millen played for the New England Patriots, who represent the Kennedys' hometown, Boston. In 1993, he played for the Dallas Cowboys, who represent the city where Kennedy died. And the last team to cut him, in 1996, was the New Orleans Saints, who represent the city that was home to one of the major theories about a conspiracy as to Kennedy's assassination.

Also born that day: English soccer defender and manager Tony Mowbray; Brian Robbins, who played Eric Mardian on the ABC sitcom Head of the Class before becoming a major executive at Paramount Pictures; and Kennedy Polamalu, a Samoan whose parents named him for the President, and who went on to become a coach in both college and pro football -- including pulling off the rare feat of having been the offensive coordinator at both Los Angeles arch-rivals, USC (where he was a running back) and UCLA. He is the uncle of Pittsburgh Steelers Hall of Fame safety Troy Polamalu.

The memorials to Kennedy came quickly after his death. Many schools that had previously been named after towns, or other people, were renamed for him, including Central High School in Paterson, New Jersey. Also named for him in New Jersey were high schools in the Iselin section of Woodbridge and in Willingboro. (The latter has since been closed.)

John F. Kennedy High Schools also opened in the Marble Hill section of The Bronx, making him the most recent President to be honored with a high school named for him in New York City; Cheektowaga, New York, a suburb of Buffalo; Glenmont, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C.; Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Los Angeles, Fremont and La Palma, California; Burien, Washington.

Statues of him stand outside the Massachusetts State House in Boston, the Puerto Rico Capitol in San Juan. Memorials to him were dedicated in Montreal, Tegucigalpa (the capital of Honduras), London, Barcelona, Jerusalem, Melbourne, and West Berlin: The square in front of their City Hall, where he told a crowd of 500,000, "Ich bin ein Berliner," was named John-F-Kennedy-Platz.

In 1960, while his campaign motorcade came down Broad Street in Newark, New Jersey, my father, then 17 years old and having just started college, shook hands with Kennedy. Roughly across Broad Street from that spot, at the southern tip of Military Park, stands a column topped by a bust of Kennedy. Another bust was dedicated at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn. Both were dedicated in 1965.

The aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-67), a.k.a. the Big John, was in service from 1968 to 2007, in service longer than its namesake lived. A replacement carrier (CVN-79) was launched in 2019, but has not yet entered official service. (UPDATE: It is currently scheduled to do so in March 2027.)

Since 1964, his portrait has appeared on the U.S. half-dollar (50-cent) coin. Idlewild Airport in New York, Philadelphia Municipal Stadium, and the Delaware and Maryland sections of Interstate 95, which he had dedicated just a few days before his death, were renamed for him.

Interstate 190, connecting O'Hare International Airport to Chicago, is named the John F. Kennedy Expressway. A bridge of Interstate 65 over the Ohio River, connecting Louisville, Kentucky with Indiana, was named the John F. Kennedy Memorial Bridge. U.S. Route 75 in Omaha, Nebraska was named the Kennedy Freeway. And the Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was named for him. From 1964 to 1973, the cape itself was named Cape Kennedy. A bridge connecting Miami and Miami Beach was named the John F. Kennedy Causeway.

On October 22, 1979, his Presidential Library opened on the Boston campus of the University of Massachusetts, at Columbia Point. In 1982, the stop on Boston's subway Red Line, serving the campus and the Library, was renamed "JFK/UMass."

W. Willard Wirtz was the last surviving member of Kennedy's Cabinet, serving him and Johnson as Secretary of Labor from 1962 to 1969. He lived until 2010.

JFK remains the most recent President to represent Massachusetts, although Governor Michael Dukakis and Senator John Kerry have since been nominated for the office, and each has lost the general election.

*

On that Friday, for the 1st time in their 17-year history, the NBA's New York Knicks postponed a game. They were supposed to play the Detroit Pistons at the old Madison Square Garden. Indeed, there would be no games in the NBA that night, nor in the NHL. All were postponed. And, of course, it was after the baseball season, so there were no MLB games to postpone. The Los Angeles Dodgers had completed their 4-game World Series sweep over the Yankees on October 6 at Dodger Stadium.

The Knicks-Pistons game was pushed back to the following night, and the Knicks won, 108-99. Their next postponement would be on November 9, 1965, the day of the great blackout.

The 1963 Army-Navy Game had been scheduled for Saturday, November 23. It was postponed for 2 weeks, until December 7. With eventual Heisman Trophy winner, and eventual Dallas Cowboys quarterback, Roger Staubach leading them, Navy won, 21-15 at Municipal Stadium in Philadelphia. The following year, the huge 105,000-seat horseshoe in South Philadelphia was renamed John F. Kennedy Stadium.

Most college games were postponed. But 1 game, scheduled for that night, went ahead as planned. As you might guess, it was in the South: North Carolina State beat Wake Forest, 42-0 at Riddick Stadium in Raleigh, North Carolina. Attendance: 15,200, out of a capacity of 23,000. The Nebraska-Oklahoma rivalry, set for the 23rd, went on as scheduled at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln. Nebraska won 29-20.

JFK's alma mater, Harvard, was supposed to play arch-rival Yale at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut on November 23. It was postponed until the following week, and Yale won, 20-6.

You might expect the rivalry game between Texas and Texas A&M, the 2 biggest college football teams in the State where the assassination took place, to be postponed. In fact, neither team was scheduled for November 23. Each team's next game was against the other, and was already set for the 28th, Thanksgiving Day. Texas, then ranked Number 1 in the country, held off a great upset effort by the Aggies, scoring 12 points in the 4th quarter to win 15-13. The Longhorns went on to beat Number 2 Navy in the Cotton Bowl -- in Dallas, on January 1, 1964 -- and won the National Championship.

The Iron Bowl was also scheduled for November 30, not the 23rd. At Legion Field in Birmingham, Number 9 Auburn beat Number 6 Alabama, 10-8.

In my home State of New Jersey, Rutgers was supposed to play Columbia University of New York City on the 23rd, at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway. It was postponed to the 28th, and Columbia won, 35-28. Only 5,000 people came out to the 23,000-seat stadium. Not surprising: Not only was it a holiday, with pretty much anybody who wanted to see a football game that day watching their hometown high school team, but the country was still very depressed, and neither team was any good: Rutgers came in at 3-5, Columbia at 3-4-1.

The other big college team in New Jersey, Princeton, was supposed to host Dartmouth at Palmer Stadium, in a game that would decide the Ivy League title. That one was postponed to the 30th, and, before a crowd of 35,000, Dartmouth won, 22-21.

Notre Dame, with no official connection to the nation's 1st Catholic President, but unofficially accepted as the nation's leading Catholic university, was supposed to visit the University of Iowa on the 23rd. That game was canceled outright, and never played.

East Brunswick High School, my alma mater, was supposed to play football on the Saturday, against neighboring Sayreville. The game was postponed, and, for the 1st time in the then-new school's 3-year football history, a game was played on Thanksgiving. E.B. won, 13-12.

When the announcement that JFK was dead reached us at 2:35 PM Eastern Time on November 22, it was a Friday afternoon, and decisions had to be made to play or postpone the following Sunday's professional football games. The AFL chose to postpone their games until the week after the close of the regular season, while the NFL chose to play as scheduled. Since November 24 turned out to be another significant day, I have an entry for that day, including those games.

November 5, 2017: The Sutherland Springs Church Shooting

November 5, 2017: Devin Patrick Kelley walks into a service at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, a suburb of San Antonio, and shoots 46 people, 26 of whom die. He then led the police on a chase, but crashed, and, refusing to be taken alive, killed himself. He was 26, and his motive has never been established.

As of 2021, it is the deadliest mass shooting ever in Texas, and the 5th-deadliest in America. Kelly, of New Braunfels, Texas, did it with a Ruger AR-556 semi-automatic rifle, a weapon which would have fallen under the assault weapon ban of 1994-2004.

A friend from his school days said, "He wasn't always a psychopath," and, "Over the years, we all saw him change into something that he wasn't." He was convicted of domestic violence in a court-martial while he served in the U.S. Air Force, but the USAF failed to record the conviction with the FBI, meaning that he was not, officially, legally prohibited from obtaining a firearm. The system failed, due to negligence.

*

November 5, 2017 was a Sunday. The baseball season was over. But football was played:

* The New York Giants lost to the Los Angeles Rams, 51-17 at MetLife Stadium. It remains the worst defeat either New York team has suffered since moving into the new Meadowlands Stadium.

* The Tennessee Titans beat the Baltimore Ravens, 23-20 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Carolina Panthers beat the Atlanta Falcons, 20-17 at the new Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.

* The New Orleans Saints beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 30-10 at Raymond James Stadium in Atlanta.

* The Jacksonville Jaguars beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 23-7 at Paul Brown Stadium (now Paycor Stadium) in Cincinnati.

* The Indianapolis Colts beat the Houston Texans, 20-14 at NRG Stadium (as Reliant Stadium was then known) in Houston.

* The Philadelphia Eagles beat the Denver Broncos, 51-23 at Sports Authority Field at Mile High in Denver. (It's now named Empower Field at Mile High, but everyone just calls it Mile High Stadium like the predecessor stadium was named.)

* The Arizona Cardinals beat the San Francisco 49ers, 20-10 at Levi's Stadium in the San Francisco suburb of Santa Clara, California.

* The Washington Redskins beat the Seattle Seahawks, 17-14 at CenturyLink Field in Seattle. (It's now named Lumen Field.)

* The Dallas Cowboys beat the Kansas City Chiefs, 28-17 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Oakland Raiders beat the Miami Dolphins, 27-24 at Hard Rock Stadium in the Miami suburb of Miami Gardens, Florida.

* On the preceding Thursday, the New York Jets beat the Buffalo Bills, 34-21 at New Era Field (formerly Rich Stadium and Ralph Wilson Stadium) in the Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park, New York.

* The following day, on ESPN Monday Night Football, the Detroit Lions beat the Green Bay Packers, 30-17 at Lambeau Field in Green Bay.

* The Cleveland Browns, the Los Angeles Chargers, the New England Patriots and the Pittsburgh Steelers had a bye.

There were 10 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the Indiana Pacers, 108-101 at Madison Square Garden. Kristaps Porziņģis scored 40 points.

* The Washington Wizards beat the Toronto Raptors, 107-96 at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. (It's now named the Scotiabank Arena.) Bradley Beal scored 38 for the Wizards.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Orlando Magic, 104-88 at the Amway Center in Orlando. (It's now named the Kia Center.)

* The Atlanta Hawks beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 117-115 at the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse (now the Rocket Arena) in Cleveland.

* The Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Charlotte Hornets, 112-94 at the Target Center in Minneapolis.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Utah Jazz, 137-110 at the Toyota Center in Houston. James Harden scored 56 points.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Phoenix Suns, 112-95 at the AT&T Center in San Antonio. (It's now named the Frost Bank Center.)

* The Staples Center in Los Angeles hosted a doubleheader. In the afternoon, the Los Angeles Clippers lost to the Miami Heat, 104-101. At night, the Los Angeles Lakers, 107-102. (The building is now named the Crypto.com Arena.)

* And the Portland Trail Blazers, 103-99 at the Moda Center in Portland. Damian Lillard scored 36 for the Blazers.

There were 4 games played in the NHL:

* The New Jersey Devils lost to the Calgary Flames, 5-4 at the Saddledome in Calgary. The Devils blew leads of 1-0 and 2-1, but came back from deficits of 3-2 and 4-3, and then lost in a shootout, as they frequently have these last few years.

* The New York Islanders beat the Colorado Avalanche, 6-4 at the Barclays Center.

* The Montreal Canadiens beat the Chicago Blackhawks, 2-0 in an "Original Six" matchup at the United Center in Chicago.

* And the Detroit Red Wings beat the the Edmonton Oilers, 4-0 at Rogers Place in Edmonton.

Also, Arsenal lost to Manchester City, 3-1 at the Etihad Stadium in Manchester. 

October 27, 2018: The Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting

October 27, 2018: Shabbat morning services at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh are desecrated, as 17 people are shot, 11 of them dying. It was, and remains, the deadliest attack on Jewish people in American history.

Robert Bowers, a man with a history of online anti-Semitism, was shot and arrested by the police. He survived, and was charged with 63 federal crimes and 36 State crimes. As of this writing, his case has not yet gone to trial.

This shooting was part of a culture of bigotry drummed up by Donald Trump and his illegal, immoral Administration. It was reflective of the neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville, Virginia on August 12, 2017, chanting, "Jews will not replace us!"

The Pittsburgh metropolitan area did not stand for this act, perpetrated in Squirrel Hill, an inclusive place that was once the home of the Rev. Fred Rogers, the longtime host of the PBS children's program Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. This happened in Mr. Rogers' actual neighborhood, and it was treated like a desecration. One of those occasional "(City Name) Strong" movements began, with an accompanying logo, in this case based on the U.S. Steel Corporation's "Steelmark" logo that had been used by the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers since 1962.

*

October 27, 2018 was a Saturday. It was the end of the Major League Baseball season, and Game 4 of the World Series was played that night. The night before, we saw the longest game in World Series history, going 18 innings, before Max Muncy hit a home run to give the Los Angeles Dodgers a 3-2 win over the Boston Red Sox.

But that would be the only game won by the Dodgers in the Series. They took a 4-0 lead in the 6th inning of Game 4, only to see the Sox score 3 in the 7th, 1 in the 8th, and 5 in the 9th. The Dodgers came back with 2 runs in the bottom of the 9th, but it wasn't enough, and the Red Sox won, 9-6. The next day, the Sox wrapped the Series up, winning Game 5, 5-1.

There were 9 NBA games played that day. Neither the New York Knicks nor the Brooklyn Nets were scheduled:

* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Charlotte Hornets, 105-103 at the Wells Fargo Arena (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Atlanta Hawks, 97-85 at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta.

* The Miami Heat beat the Portland Trail Blazers, 120-111 at the American Airlines Arena (now the Kaseya Center) in Miami.

* The Indiana Pacers beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 119-107 at the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse (now the Rocket Arena) in Cleveland.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Detroit Pistons, 109-89 at the Little Caesars Arena in Detroit.

* The Memphis Grizzlies beat the Phoenix Suns, 117-96 at the FedEx Forum in Memphis.

* The Utah Jazz beat the New Orleans Pelicans, 132-111 at the Smoothie King Arena in New Orleans.

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Orlando Magic, 113-91 at the new Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee.

* And the San Antonio Spurs beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 110-106 at the AT&T Center (now the Frost Bank Center) in San Antonio.

There were 11 NHL games played that day:

* The New Jersey Devils beat the Florida Panthers, 3-2 at the Prudential Center in Newark.

* The New York Islanders beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 6-1 at the Wells Fargo Center, which had hosted the 76ers-Hornets game earlier in the day. (The New York Rangers were not scheduled.)

* The Montreal Canadiens beat the Boston bruins, 3-0 at the TD Garden in Boston.

* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Winnipeg Jets, 3-2 at what's now named the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto.

* The Columbus Blue Jackets beat the Buffalo Sabres, 5-4 in overtime at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus.

* The Edmonton Oilers beat the Nashville Predators, 5-3 at the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville.

* The St. Louis Blues beat the Chicago Blackhawks, 7-3 at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis.

* The Minnesota Wild beat the Colorado Avalanche, 3-2 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

* The Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, 7-1 at the Gila River Arena (now the Desert Diamond Arena) in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Calgary Flames, 4-3 in a shootout at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* And the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Vancouver Canucks, 5-0 at the Rogers Arena in Vancouver.

It was a Saturday, so no NFL games were scheduled. But there were some notable college football games played:

* As is traditional, the last Saturday in October saw "The World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party," played on "neutral ground" in Jacksonville. That's a laugh: Not only is TIAA Bank Field, home of the NFL's Jaguars, in Florida, but the University of Florida's Ben Hill Griffin Stadium is 81 miles away, while the University of Georgia's Sanford Stadium is a considerably farther 341 miles away.

Both teams came into the game highly ranked: Georgia was the Number 7 team in the country, Florida the Number 9. Georgia won, 36-17.

* Alabama was then ranked Number 1, but had the week off. Number 2 Clemson went to Tallahassee and beat Florida State, 59-10. Clemson would go on to defeat Alabama in the National Championship Game.

* Number 3 Notre Dame played Navy at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. Given that San Diego is a Navy city, it should have been a "home game" for the Naval Academy. But Notre Dame won, 44-22.

* In New Jersey, Rutgers had the week off, while Princeton walloped Cornell 66-0 at Powers Field in Princeton.

* And in New York City, Columbia beat Yale 17-10 at Wien Stadium in Upper Manhattan.

October 24, 2002: The Beltway Snipers Are Arrested

John Allen Muhammad (left) and Lee Malvo

October 24, 2002: The "Beltway Snipers," who killed 7 people in the Washington, D.C. area, are arrested.

John Allen Muhammad was 41 years old, and a native of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He joined the Nation of Islam, dropping his birth name of John Allen Williams. In 1999, he kidnapped his children and took them to the Caribbean island nation of Antigua, apparently engaging in credit card and immigration document fraud.

It was during this time that he became close with Lee Boyd Malvo, who was living on Antigua with his mother. Then 17 and a native of Jamaica, he fell into a Svengali relationship with Muhammad, being converted to Islam and moved to Bellingham, Washington. There, he shoplifted a Bushmaster XM-15, an AR-15 style semi-automatic rifle.

At first, Muhammad was making Malvo shoot people connected with his ex-wife, Mildred Williams. On February 16, 2002, 21-year-old Keenya Nicole Cook was shot and killed by Malvo at the front door of her aunt's home in Tacoma, Washington. The aunt, Isa Nichols, had been good friends with John Allen Muhammad's ex-wife Mildred and had encouraged her to seek a divorce. This was the 1st of 9 shootings that the FBI later classified as "preliminary attacks": 3 in Maryland, 2 in Louisiana, and 1 each in Washington State, Arizona, Atlanta and Alabama.

Then came the series of shootings that became known as the Beltway Sniper attacks. A hole was cut at the rear of a blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice driven by Muhammad and Malvo, as a firing port to be used during their attacks. This allowed them to remain hidden and escape the scene following their attacks.

On October 2, a shot was fired in Aspen Hill, Maryland, but it didn't hit anybody, and it was originally presumed to be random, before it was later compared to the other shootings. Just an hour later, in a supermarket parking lot in Wheaton, Maryland, James Martin was shot and killed.

The next morning, all within a span of 2 hours and 17 minutes, 4 people were killed in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, all in open areas where they were easy targets: A man at a car dealership in Rockville; a man at a gas station in Aspen Hill; a woman at in a shopping center parking lot in Norbeck; and a woman at a gas station in Kensington. That night, a man was killed outside a Target in the Shepherd Park neighborhood of Washington, D.C.

The next day, October 4, the pair of killers crossed the Potomac River into Virginia, and shot a woman in a mall parking lot in Spotsylvania. She survived. There were no shootings for 2 days, but on October 7, a 13-year-old boy was shot outside his school in Bowie, Maryland. He survived. On October 9, a man was shot and killed at a gas station in Manassas, Virginia. On October 11, a man was shot and killed at a gas station in Spotsylvania.

Charles Moose, Chief of the Montgomery County Department of Police, headed the investigation. Since more than one State was involved, he worked closely with the FBI even before one of their employees became a victim. On October 14, with the killers probably not realizing they were now messing with the wrong people, they shot a woman who was an FBI intelligence analyst in a shopping center parking lot in Falls Church, Virginia.

Just as a belief that the serial killer known as the Son of Sam was killing women with long blonde hair in New York in 1977, and women started tying their hair up or dying it, gas stations responded to these shootings by putting tarps up to conceal their customers, and some people crouched over while pumping their own gas.

It would take 5 more days before the shootings resumed. On October 19, a man was killed in a restaurant parking lot in Ashland, Virginia. At 90 miles, this was the furthest yet from downtown Washington. On October 22, a man was shot on his house steps in Aspen Hill.

Just after midnight on October 24, 2002, refrigerator mechanic Whitney Donahue called 911 at a rest stop off Interstate 70 near Myersville, Maryland. He said he saw a dark blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice with New Jersey license plates, which matched the description that law enforcement had said they were looking for. At 3:19 AM, Muhammad and Malvo were found sleeping in their car, and were arrested on federal weapons charges.

The stolen Bushmaster rifle was found, and ballistics tests later conclusively linked it to 11 of the 14 shootings, including one in which no one was hurt. The Caprice was later discovered to have formerly been used as an undercover police car in Bordentown, New Jersey.

In total, Muhammad and Malvo were responsible for 27 people being shot, 17 of them fatally. There were 12 attacks in Maryland, 5 in Virginia, 2 in Louisiana, and 1 each in the District of Columbia, Washington State, Arizona, Georgia and Alabama.

In 2003, both defendants were convicted. Muhammad was sentenced to death, and was executed by lethal injection at Greensville Correctional Center in Virginia on November 10, 2009. As Malvo was legally a juvenile at the time of the shootings, he received 6 life sentences in Maryland and 3 in Virginia.

Charles Moose died in 2021. As of October 24, 2022, Mildred Muhammad, John Allen's ex-wife, is a motivational speaker and counselor, counseling people affected by crime, including the victims and the families of the perpetrators. Lee Malvo is serving multiple life sentences at Keen Mountain Correctional Center in Virginia. He is unlikely ever to be released alive. 

*

October 24, 2002 was a Thursday. This was also the day that Gary Lineker, former star soccer player for Leciester City Football Club, led a consortium to buy the team and save it from bankruptcy. the I have a separate entry for that event.

Game 5 of the World Series was played. The San Francisco Giants beat the team then known as the Anaheim Angels, 16-4. Jeff Kent hit 2 home runs. The most well-known moment in this game occurred in the bottom of the 7th inning, when Giants 1st baseman J.T. Snow scored off a Kenny Lofton triple. Three-year-old batboy Darren Baker, son of Giants manager Dusty Baker, ran to home plate to collect Lofton's bat before the play was completed, and was quickly lifted by the jacket by Snow with one hand as he crossed the plate, with David Bell close on his heels. Had Snow not acted quickly, Darren could have been seriously injured in a play at home plate.

The Giants were now 1 win away from winning the World Series for the 1st time in 1954, when they were still in New York. They would have to wait. Darren Baker was later drafted by the Washington Nationals as a 2nd baseman.

(UPDATE: In 2024, he played 9 games for the Nationals. These were his only major league games through the 2025 season.)

The NFL was in midweek. Two games were played in college football. Number 12 North Carolina State beat Clemson, 38-6 at Memorial Stadium in Clemson, South Carolina. And Colorado State beat Brigham Young University, 37-10 at Hughes Stadium in Fort Collins, Colorado.

The NBA season started 5 days later. There were 9 games in the NHL:

* The New York Islanders beat the Florida Panthers, 5-3 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Boston Bruins and the Ottawa Senators played to a tie, 2-2 at the FleetCenter (now the TD Garden) in Boston.

* The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Montreal Canadiens, 6-2 at the First Union Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The San Jose Sharks beat the Nashville Predators, 2-1 at the Gaylord Entertainment Center (now the Bridgestone Arena) in Nashville.

* The Minnesota Wild beat the Chicago Blackhawks, 3-2 at the United Center in Chicago.

* The Colorado Avalanche beat the Phoenix Coyotes, 3-2 at the American West Arena (now the Mortgage Matchup Center) in Phoenix.

* The Dallas Stars and the Calgary Flames played to a tie, 3-3 at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* The St. Louis Blues beat the Edmonton Oilers, 2-1 at the Skyreach Center (as the Northlands Coliseum was then known) in Edmonton.

* And the Vancouver Canucks and the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim played to a tie, 2-2 at General Motors Place (now the Rogers Arena) in Vancouver.) 

October 1, 2017: The Las Vegas Massacre

October 1, 2017: The largest mass shooting in American history takes place on the Las Vegas Strip. Stephen Paddock, a 64-year-old real estate executive from nearby Mesquite, Nevada, who had previously been a law-abiding gun owner, took a room on the 32nd floor at the Mandalay Bay Hotel, opened the window, and opened fire with more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition. He shot 471 people, 60 of whom died, all of whom had been attending the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival. He then shot and killed himself.

The American federal government, then led by Donald Trump in the White House, Mitch McConnell in the U.S. Senate, and Paul Ryan in the U.S. House of Representatives: What did they do about this? Nothing. They were all Republicans, beholden to the National Rifle Association.

The day was a Sunday, before the start of the National Basketball Association and National Hockey League seasons The NHL's new expansion team, the Vegas Golden Knights, hung a banner in memory of the victims in their new arena, the T-Mobile Center.

It was the last day of Major League Baseball's regular season, and there was a full slate of games:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Toronto Blue Jays, 2-1 at the new Yankee Stadium. Jordan Montgomery was the starting pitcher for the Yankees, but it was Domingo German in relief who turned out to be the losing pitcher. The only Yankee run came on a home run to Matt Holliday.

* The New York Mets got clobbered by the Philadelphia Phillies, 11-0 at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.

* The Houston Astros beat the Boston Red Sox, 4-3 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Washington Nationals, 11-8 at Nationals Park in Washington.

* The Tampa Bay Rays beat the Baltimore Orioles, 6-0 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Miami Marlins, 8-5 at Marlins Park in Miami.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox, 3-1 at Progressive Field in Cleveland.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Detroit Tigers, 5-1 at Target Field in Minneapolis.

* The Milwaukee Brewers beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-1 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Kansas City Royals, 14-2 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Oakland Athletics beat the Texas Rangers, 5-2 at Globe Life Park (now Choctaw Stadium) in Arlington, Texas.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Colorado Rockies, 6-3 at Coors Field in Denver.

* The Los Angeles Angels beat the Seattle Mariners, 6-2 at Angel Stadium in the Los Angeles suburb of Anaheim, California.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the San Diego Padres, 5-4 at what's now named Oracle Park in San Francisco.

And, being a Sunday, there was a full slate of National Football League games:

* The New York Giants lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 25-23 at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa.

* The New York Jets beat the Jacksonville Jaguars, 23-20 at MetLife Stadium in the New York suburb of East Rutherford, Bergen County, New Jersey. Chandler Catanzaro kicked a 41-yard field goal in overtime.

* The New Orleans Saints beat the Miami Dolphins, 20-0 at Wembley Stadium in London.

* The Carolina Panthers beat the New England Patriots, 33-30 at Gillette Stadium in the Boston suburb of Foxborough, Massachusetts. Take that, Tom Brady and Bill Belichick.

* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Baltimore Ravens, 26-9 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Cincinnati Bengals beat the Cleveland Browns, 31-7 at FirstEnergy Stadium (now Huntington Bank Field) in Cleveland.

* The Buffalo Bills beat the Atlanta Falcons, 23-17 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.

* The Houston Texans beat the Tennessee Titans, the team that used to be the Houston Oilers, 57-14 at NRG Stadium (as Reliant Stadium was then known) in Houston. And the Titans weren't a bad team, either: They went 9-7, and not only ended up making the Playoffs, but winning a Playoff game, beating the Chiefs at Arrowhead.

* The Minnesota Vikings beat the Detroit Lions, 14-7 at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis.

* The Los Angeles Rams beat the Dallas Cowboys, 35-30 at AT&T Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.

* The Denver Broncos beat the Oakland Raiders, 16-10 at Sports Authority Field at Mile High in Denver.

* The Arizona Cardinals beat the San Francisco 49ers, 18-15 in overtime at what's now named State Farm Stadium in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona.

* The Philadelphia Eagles beat the Los Angeles Chargers, 26-24 at what's now named Dignity Sports Health Park in the Los Angeles suburb of Carson, California. Only 25,000 people can fit in the stadium, and most of them seemed to be rooting for the Eagles. I have a separate entry for this event.

* And the Seattle Seahawks beat the Indianapolis Colts, 46-18 at CenturyLink Field in Seattle.

The next night, on Monday Night Football, the Kansas City Chiefs beat the Washington Redskins, 29-20 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. The Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers had a bye.

Also on October 1, 2017, Arsenal beat Brighton & Hove Albion, 2-0 at the Emirates Stadium in North London.