December 8, 1980 From This Day in History: Singer John Lennon is shot and killed by Mark David Chapman outside his apartment building in New York City. After committing the murder, Chapman waited calmly outside, reading a copy of The Catcher in the Rye. Chapman was a troubled individual who was obsessed with Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of J. D. Salingers novel about a disaffected youth, and with various celebrities. While working as a security guard in Hawaii, he decided that Lennon was a phony and, while listening to Beatles tapes, Chapman decided to plan his murder. Chapman purchased a gun in Hawaii and then traveled to New York. Although he called his wife to tell her that he was in New York to shoot Lennon, she ignored his threats. Unable to buy bullets in New York due to strict laws, Chapman flew to Atlanta and purchased hollow-nosed rounds to bring back. On the day of the murder, Chapman bought an extra copy of The Catcher in the Rye and joined fans waiting outside The Dakota, Lennons apartment building. That evening, as Lennon walked by on his way into the building, Chapman shot him in the back and then fired two additional bullets into his shoulder as the singer wrenched around in pain. ---------- In 1980 I was in an attic apartment downtown Sandusky ($125 per month including utilities -- and use a flashlight when you went out at night because the drunks came in and unscrewed the hall lights and slept on the stairs) and had a little 13 inch b&w TV which I kept in the closet, but got out on Sundays to watch football (and almost always but not every week some picture came in enough to see what was going on). That was the year of the Brian Sipe Cleveland Browns, the Kardiac Kids team -- and Monday Night Football was still a big deal with Howard Cosell and Dandy Don Meredith, so I almost always watched that game before putting the TV away until the next Sunday. So, I was watching like most people who got this news from Howard Cosell ... https://youtube/watch?v=5gcdz1IRVoM
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 18:02:08 +0000
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