Dear Elders, What moment in history had the greatest impact on your life?
– Wondering
Roioli Schweiker
Dear Wondering,
Dec. 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor.
Being a teenager during a major war is very different from peacetime. Practically all commodities were in short supply, unlike now when there is plenty of stuff – people just can’t afford it. There was a shortage of workers, so everybody could get a job, and pay was good. There was a cap on wages, so companies had to offer bonuses like health insurance (which wasn’t counted as salary) to entice workers.
Even children were buying “defense stamps” at school banking day.
The older women who were not working in factories were rolling bandages, and the Girl Scouts were knitting mittens and scarfs for soldiers.
Since my mother was working, I took over some household chores, like cooking dinner. That was hard because so many ingredients were rationed.
Jan Stickler
Dear Wondering,
I would have to say 9/11 had the greatest impact upon my life than any other historical event. The almost instant media coverage brought that event into our homes and our lives like no other preceding moment. Watching the plane crash into the World Trade Tower and witnessing the fall of the towers made us all participants in the horror. There was no buffer. For me, it increased my sense of vulnerability, while in some strange way it also forged a deeper bond with those around me and even those I did not know. It has left an awareness of the preciousness of life and how quickly it can slip from your grasp.
Casper Kranenburg
Dear Wondering,
The greatest impact on my life was when I discovered how to tell the temperature without a thermometer: You count a cricket’s “chirps” for 15 seconds and add 40. This tell you the degrees in Fahrenheit.
Bill Twibill
Dear Puzzled,
The moment for me was 2000 B.C., but all began in 5000 B.C. in Macedonia when a smart grape grower named Vintage Wino of Macedonia came upon some sour grapes and mixed them all up, tossed them around in a bowl and stomped and danced on them to some Macedonian music. He was so tired that he slept for a few days and let the grapes ferment in a small vat. Later, this wino gave the new liquid to a very thirsty traveling princess who became quite tipsy and very giggly. She went on for days enjoying this grape mix at her palace (the first recorded binge) and then shared this new concoction with a few Italian visitors, who brought this idea to Rome. The Romans then shortly went on to invent the wine press in 2000 B.C. That was the magic moment for me – 2000 B.C. Thank you, Vintage Wino of Macedonia and the traveling Italians. Cheers to one and all.
Steve Leavenworth
Dear Wondering,
The moment that had the greatest impact on my life, obviously, was my being born. What could be more important TO ME than that? If you’re looking at history, there are many moments that affected the life of every human being, but to narrow it down to me, I’d say the arrival of the Pilgrims, the American Revolution, founding of our country, each of the wars and finally, the affect of World War II on me personally.
