but jesus, 28 YEARS AGO!

I was about to say, "I was on a Geography field trip in Wales", when I realized that I was on a Geography field trip in Wales when the attempt on Ronald Reagan's life was made. I actually have no recollection of Lennon's death at all, although I was a Beatles fan. I do remember listening to the Andy Peebles interviews a few days later, though.

I had just turned 18yo. I came home that afternoon from my first job. My mother told me what had happened. I couldn't believe it so I turned on the radio (and just like in the movies)there was a news report on that very subject. I was in time to hear the newsreader say very solemnly, "and repeating the main story John Lennon shot dead in New York."

He then "threw" to the DJ who said exactly, and only this, "John Lennon huh?" before he played "Another One Bites the Dust" which I think was current at the time. I never listened to that station ever again.

28 years. I was on a long weekend (79/80) at the time, but I still remember the stunned sense that something terrible had just irreversibly damaged one of the dimensions of my personal reality.

at school who then laughed at me and said 'One down, three to go' as he knew I loved the fabs. I was only twelve and quite shocked to say the least.

people were crying. At school someone told me John Lennon of the Beatles had been shot dead. It being still only a few years from the Punk / New Wave year zero, the Beatles were not cool for a 15 year old. Back home that evening I put on a long unplayed copy of Revolver from mine and my siblings' childhood. I was blown away (no pun etc), re found the Bealtes and have been an enormous fan ever since. Lennon's death periodically upsets me when there's an article or I re read a book and sometimes when I listen to his music. I wonder, if he hadn't died, how different modern rock might be - less of an all pervasive Beatles renaissance, less Beatles obsessed bands? Oh and less Beatles music magazine covers (stand up Mr Ellen at the back there, along with the other monthlies' editors)

At the age of four not really understanding what was going on - my sister explained to me that it was the nice Yellow Submarine man I think

I was ill in bed in the hall of residence at Oxford Poly and a tearful girl came to tell me. Even though I wasn't bothered about his music the shock of how stupid it was really hit me.

I was just turned 16 and working for the (southern hemisphere) summer in a "community" radio station. From memory the news came late in the day (or maybe overnight) and for me the world seemed to grind to a crawl for some weeks.

The DJs were all shocked and the station played Lennon tunes almost back to back for days. Jealous Guy was over played frankly and I still have trouble sitting still to listen to it. To my surprise I had trouble getting some people to recognise how shocking (I thought) it was. Someone had _assassinated_ a Beatle, for gods sake.

One of my tasks within a few days was to decorate the big Christmas tree in the foyer. That was a bitter-sweet job

My mum woke me up and told me, I then had to go to school, because nobody knew who had done it I remember someone was taking bets on who had killed him with Paul McCartney installed as favourite, a list of suspects were drawn up on the board all a bit sick really Lennonesque humour maybe, but I remember feeling very sad about it, I had just recently got into The Beatles and they had started to mean something to me.

It's only as the years passed that I began to realise the enormity of it all and the sense of loss.

I heard as I was stepping off the school bus, literally mid-step. I had missed the news on the radio that morning and had spent the 30 minute bus journey chatting with a friend who only then casually mentioned that John Lennon had been shot dead. He was 14 and it was no big deal. I was 16 and a Beatles obsessive.

It's hard now to explain just how badly I wanted The Beatles to get back together. And it seemed possible. It was only 10 years since the band had broken up and I suppose that, in that all consuming way only a teenager can, I had invested the Beatles with almost supernatural powers. They represented something fantastical and just out of reach.

I grew up, found new music. I stopped even listening to The Beatles that often. But years later, when 'Free As A Bird' was about to be released, I realised that part of me still half expected that the sun was going to come out and that everything would simply, suddenly be right.

but I remember going into assembly and us all being bawled at by our head of year for talking and joking he then played "Abraham, Martin & John" and gave us talk about how we should try to make the world a better place. This all in the light of regan, the pope and Lennon all beign shot at in short order if memory serves. I may have telecoped this if the orders wrong.

...aged 10, and saddened that there wouldn't be any more music from the Beatles, as I hadn't quite grasped that they'd split up, nor indeed what a "band" was or where the music on dad's C90s actually came from. I was cheered up again by the news that "Help" would be screened as a tribute.

I was 7 when Elvis died, and was camping in Cornwall. He was of no significance to me whatsoever, but my parents seemed pretty shocked which is why I suppose I can still remember it.

I worked with a guy who didn't even realise John Lennon was in the Beatles , and wondered why they were playing a lot of Beatle tracks this particular day.
Working in a motor dealership we soon heaped barreloads of scorn at his young head for the rest of the day!

Radio alarm went off at 6.15 for my morning paper round. DLT was on, in very sombre mood. Bedroom was dark and freezing. Still vivid today.

I remember it clearly - I was at the time doing a paper round (was 13 at the time) that happened to have my Grandmothers house on the route. I used to stop by for a cup of tea each morning and she told me (she had heard on the radio). Remember getting back home and waking up my parents to tell them....

If you lived in the UK it was actually 28 years ago today (9th December) - in the early hours of the morning - that John Lennon was shot, and you were waking up to the news...

... before heading off to school.

It didn't really hit me 'til the evening when Mike Read dedicated his whole evening Radio 1 show to Lennon & The Beatles with Paul Gambaccini and some long-forgotten other guests just chatting about their Lennon memories... sounds rather dull describing it like that, but I teared up a few times during it.

Then at 10 o'clock, John Peel's show came on and he began - "Well I met John Lennon a few times, and obviously this is a very tragic event, especially for his family, but as I'm sure he'd be the first to agree, 'The beat goes on' - here's The Undertones." Just right.

I wasn't born for another 13 months...

I can clearly remember coming into the front room and both my mum and dad were crying. My mum explained to me that John had been "really ill" to which I replied "how come the ambulance didn't get there in time?". Dad then had to explain to me that sometimes people are too ill even for an ambulance to save. It was my first experience of death basically. This story often gets told at Christmas by my tearful mother and often sets me off as well.

... I was 4 and my Dad came home from work early, visibly upset by the news. His utter hero, Mr. Presley, having only passed 3 year previously. I think it was - to him - at 24, with a new family and responsibilities, symbolic of his own growing up, and leaving his youth behind. I do know that's probably the first day I knowingly remember hearing the "Blue" and "Red" compilation albums.

Not exactly Oxbridge but I spent the day reading the papers in the Student Union office chatting morosely to a steady stream of visitors.

I was 14 and our music teacher who's classroom was one of those prefab huts on the side of the playground took it particularly badly.
He opened up all the windows, hitched up the speakers at the windows, and blared out Instant Karma, War is Over and Imagine all afternoon from the class record player *very* loudly.
Rather oddly nobody seemed to stop him and he didn't seem to, although perhaps by memory is affected, do any lessons all day apart from engineer this rather touching tribute.

No idea at all where I was when the news came through but I did take my 11-year old son to the Lennon garden in Central Park, NYC on a recent family holiday. He then made me take him to the Dakota Building and has been listening to the Fabs since we got home (falls asleep every night to the "Red Album" on his ipod). Torch well and truly passed on to another generation (but, like his old man, I think he actually marginally prefers the MaCartney songs).

From someone who, it seems, actually saw Lennon giving Mark Chapman his autograph on that fateful day:

http://adeepershadeofsoul.blogspot.com/2008/12/john-lennon-december-8-19...

On my way to school I bumped into my friend Paul, "you like The Beatles don't you?" he asked.
"Yes" I replied.
"Well it just said on the radio that Ringo Starr has been killed". When we got to the school, a glum faced primary school teacher asked us all to be quiet while she told us all that it was Lennon that had in fact been shot dead. She then gave us a potted biography of the Beatles, brought out a suitcase record player and played a 45RPM of She Loves You. I was the only pupil in the class that had ever heard of him.

When I got home, my Dad (always more of an Elvis man) was furious that so much of the news was taken up with it. "He hasn't had a hit in years" he kept on saying. I was quite upset by that, and recently I've only thought of a reply to it, "Dad, Churchill died twenty years after the war, should they have buried him in a bin bag?"

Woke up in a dingy, freezing hotel room, put the radio on (no breakfast telly then) and it was the only item on the news. My Beatlemania had waned somewhat but it still felt like a massive personal blow. I then had to sweat bullets for the whole day taking down my firm's stand at the Earl Court Agricultural Show working with two idiots - a teen who'd never heard of Lennon and a guy who 'didn't like music', saving all his love for Swedish farm equipment. I carried so much steel blood vessels in my arms burst but I was too distracted to care much. Arriving home my parents weren't too sympathetic either; Lennon had 'taken drugs' and thus deserved his bad end. It was only when I got together with my Fab-loving mates that evening that the emotion I felt could find some release. We got drunk, the whole pub sang Lennon songs & the landlord locked us in. Sounds corny but 28 years later I remember it as fresh as paint.