What is the first convention you recall?

[WI_DEM]

For me it is the 1976 Democratic National Convention at Madison Square Garden which nominated Jimmy Carter. I was a big Carter fan. I still remember his triumphant walk among the delegates on his way to the podium to accept the nomination. I got to see it again last night on C-Span 2. It gave me goosebumps.

What is the first convention you recall?

[Walt Starr]

1. 1968

It was a tragedy.

[candy]

2. The whole year was a tragedy!!!!

[Neecy]

6. '68 was my first convention memory, too

My family lived in Chicago at the time, so not only did we see the gruesome scenes on the national news, we got an extra dose of it on the local news. A terrible year in every way.

[Cybergata]

14. 1968

Who alive at the time could ever forget! "THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!"



:hippie:

[Walt Starr]

24. I was five years old

and those words were burned into my memory forever that night.

[supernova]

32. I remember it too

WOW! Truly amazing. I was six.

[calico1]

45. I vaguely remember 1968

It was so sad though, because of RFK's death.

[wyldwolf]

3. I recall the the '72 convention though I don't recall anything about it

by '76 I was a little more aware...

[eleny]

4. Eisenhower/Stevenson

[ROC]

7. I remember Eisenhower/Stevenson too

[murielm99]

42. Me too. That was the year we got a television.

My parents were for Stevenson, but they were not all that upset when Ike won. They thought he was a pretty good President.

We moved in 1959, to a very Republican county. My parents became election judges, because Democratic judges were very badly needed.

In my community, it seemed like I was the only kid in seventh grade who was for Kennedy!

My parents are still election judges. They are now 75 and 78.

[Cybergata]

30. I don't remember...

the Eisenhower/Stevenson convention, but I do remember hearing for years after how much better off the country would have been if Stevenson won. I think my mother was in love with Stevenson.

:hippie:

[Hamlette]

54. I remember Eisenhower/Stevenson too

but better still the state dem convention in 1956 when I was six. My aunts were always delegates. We lived in the city where the convention was held, they didn't. So they'd set up our house as home base and take me with them to the convention. I spent my time trying to collect as much free stuff as I could and thinking politics was pretty cool.

They took me to see Kennedy when he was in town, must have been 1960, but not for the convention obviously. I remember we waited to see him outside a hotel. I got to shake his hand. (Tip: In those crowd scenes? Take a kid. The audience will part like the red sea so the child can get to the front to see the "star".)

[ashling]

5. 1960

I was too young to appreciate it like I do now. I was only 8yrs old

[Media_Lies_Daily]

8. 1960, also....I was 9 years old living in Florida....

...but I liked what I saw of JFK during the debates.

[ashling]

26. me too

I was in a cub scout troop in Houston, Texas. I remember lining up at the airport to salute him when he came to town when I was in 3rd grade.

[CO Liberal]

19. I Was Seven

I remember hearing the speeches while lying in bed, and how happy my mother and older sister were when Kennedy got the nomination.

[MaineDem]

43. 1960 for me as well

I was only 9.

A Democrat from New England. A Catholic. It was big news in my house.

I remember Huntley and Brinkley and Frank-now I can't remember his last name- from their booth.

And I've been wrapped up in each convention since.

I remember '68 (I had an invitation to go but parents wouldn't let me :( ) and how excited I was when Muskie was named VP. We became aware of it in the afternnon; I was ironing! How odd that I remember that.

[Dying Eagle]

9. 1992

Clinton speaking. Is was my first taste of the Democratic Party!

P.S. I am only 23, I didn't care too much before 1992.

[Bjornsdotter]

10. 1968 Chicago n/t

[ElsewheresDaughter]

11. 1960 "The Golden Girls" ....where's Madeline?

The Donkey Years...Conventions 1960 to 2000
http://www.time.com/time/daily/special/photo/dem60/5.html

Where's Madeline?: The Golden Girls, hostesses for the Democratic National Convention in LA


JFK with his mother Rose at the convention


Bobby works the floor at the convention

[Massacure]

12. This is the first one I recall

I'm 16 years old. I didn't pay attention to politics four years ago. :P

[Jackpine Radical]

13. I remember seeing Robert Taft in person in 1952

when he was campaigning for the Republoican nomination against Eisenhower & MacArthur. The speech was given at the local movie theater in Hayward, WI. & my whole family, rabid Republicans all, dragged me to hear him. What can I say? I didn't know any better. Hell, I was 17 and off at college before I even saw an avowed Democrat & wondered if he had had the horns amputated.

[lapislzi]

15. 1968

I was 7 yrs old. My parents bought me a little stuffed donkey to carry around (true!). They had a fit when a neighbor's kid handed out "Nixon's the One!" banners to all the neighborhood kids courtesy of his GOP dad.

You could kind of say I was bred in the bone.

[ronnykmarshall]

21. I remember 1968 a bit.

My parents were republicans at the time. I probably was in my room listening to my Supremes records. Once RFK died, I didn't care anymore.

[Throckmorton]

16. 1972,

"Four more years of baloney and bombs", actual quote from my Father upon Tricky Dick's re-election, I was 10.

Staunch Democrat my father, dispite his other faults.

[AngryAmish]

17. I remember the "Cross of Gold" speech

William Jennings Bryant in 1896. The nickles had bumbees on them. I was a young man of 32, and I had an onion tied to my belt, because that was the fashion at the time.

[ashling]

27. That would make you

144 yrs old. ?????

[AngryAmish]

29. Say that louder, sonny!

That's my bad ear.

[ashling]

33. I said

MY CAR IS SOLD !:evilgrin:

[AngryAmish]

48. heh heh heh

[dryan]

56. Did you vote for him when he ran again--

in I think it was '08?

Ha ha!

PS - Believe it or not, Bryan's daughter was the first woman elected to the Florida legislature.

[AngryAmish]

57. Had Yellow fever in Aught-8

Couldn't get to the poll. Plus I needed three-bits to pay the poll tax. Course I lost the leg in during the '12 election, but that's a different story.

[starroute]

18. 1956

I was nine, and my parents let me stay up past my bedtime to see Stevenson nominated. I was a big Stevenson fan.

1960 was the first convention I watched in detail, though -- Huntley/Brinkley and all that. And the Kennedy-Nixon debates, of course. I remember a school dance that fall where the whole dance just sort of adjourned in the middle and everyone went down the hall to a room with a tv so we could see the debate. Those were the days.

[King Coal]

46. My dad was a huge Stephenson fan too.

And who can forget Jack Kennedy laughing.

[gauguin57]

20. I remember watching the 1964 Johnson/Goldwater conventions

Don't remember much, but I remember my parents being very interested in these two TV shows, and I remember how scared my parents seemed of Barry Goldwater.

[ashling]

28. Goldwater was pretty scarry back then.

I first doorbelled for LBJ that year.

on edit: re the subject line - he was pretty scarey, too

[TaleWgnDg]

35. your parents were wise to look awry at . . .

Goldwater. He DID say some pretty damn off-the-wall things. Something about extremism is okay, nuking Vietnam was okay . . . and other scary stuff. Most folks agreed w/ your parents which is why Barry never made it. However, as Barry aged, he mellowed somewhat.

:dem:

[Zynx]

44. "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice"-Barry Goldwater

That's his quote on that.

[Laughing Mirror]

39. Watching Goldwater at that convention

(the silver hair and black horn-rim glasses) on black and white TV, was almost like watching one of those badly dubbed Japanese monster movies playing as you flipped the channel to channel 5.

My first convention memory is the Republican convention 1964. The Democratic convention held no interest for this 10-year old boy because I already knew what Johnson, his flaggy doggy ears, looked like and sounded like. And everybody where I lived (on a hilly part of town overlooking the Capitol dome and the Monument in the background) assumed the man with the Texas drawl occupying the White House (invisible from our hill) would stay the same for four more years. A lot of people didn't bother to vote, although this was the first year in the history of our Nation's Capitol (population about 800,000 at the time, more than some states) we could vote for president.

I did not watch the Republican convention of 1968, but I watched the Democratic convention and I'm glad I did. They used to call the TV set the "idiot box" at the time, but if it weren't for that box, this idiot would never witnessed the bizarre (to me) looking William Buckley call Gore Vidal a faggot. Quite an education for this gay 14-year old, just when gay rights was becoming a loud and vocal part of the protests at large.

[JayS]

22. Startrek, 1982!

Ooops. Wrong type of convention. :)

[Ravenseye]

23. 1980

Sue me, i'm not old enough to remmeber other ones. Actually I didn't really pay attention to the conventions until 88. Before that I just wasn't really interested. I remember 1980 though becuase I got into an argument with my dad because he was voting for Clark (not Wesley...Clark the Libertarian)...My first experience with third parties and I just didn't get it.

No dad who are you voting for.
Clark.
No Carter or Reagan.
Niether, I'm voting for Clark.
Dad you're weird.

[maveric]

25. 1960. I remember watching both conventions.

The dems were raucous and exuberant, and the repugs were just sitting there nodding their heads, clapping in an orderly fashion. I asked my Dad why this is. He said "Democrats have blood going through their veins, republicans dont".

[TaleWgnDg]

36. ROFL . . . n/t

:kick: :kick: :kick:

[69KV]

53. Ain't that the truth!

It's still true today. This one election night Democratic victory party I was at stands out, because the Repukes were having their victory party in another room in the same hotel. 1994 I think it was. The Democrats were real people, working people, retirees, union members, teachers, activists, people of color, joe-six-pack kind of people you could talk to and instantly like. People who knew their politics. Beer was served. The mood was downbeat because it was 1994 but people were still exuberant.

:toast: :dem:

I watched who was coming in and out of the Repuke room. Lily-white, not a person of color to be seen, all rich, expensive suits, expensive jewelry, expensive cars out in the parking lot. There were a few fundie Christians and militia types mixed in but mostly it was the prestige-and-snob set. Not friendly at all, wouldn't even acknowledge a nod or a "hi" from us riff-raff.

That was a good lesson in reality vs. Repuke propoganda. Which party is it again that is the party of brie-and-chardonay elitists? :)

Any real honest working people who have been fooled into thinking that the Repukes represent them and Dems are rich elitists should check out who is actually running that party sometime. Then they should check us out. The difference is pretty obvious.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

31. Sniff, sniff

I never paid attention to conventions before this year!!! I am sad about that!!

But I did pay attention to primaries, starting in about 88.

And I did tape the 93 Inauguration of Bill Clinton. I voted for Perot, but I was really happy and excited that Clinton won, so I taped the whole thing (including Maya Angelou reading her poem!) on my NEW VCR!!! Hee hee.

I still have that tape, btw. I watched, but didn't tape, Clinton's second inauguration.

Chucklenuts? I was WAY too disgusted to even watch ANY of it at that point. The whole "election" thing, ya know....

In the last two years I have become quite a huge political junkie, so I can't imagine I missed these things in the past!!!

[TaleWgnDg]

34. I remember very vaguely . . .

Harry Truman in 1948 while sitting on my father's lap listening to our old living room radio . . . years later when older, I recall my father telling me about Strom Thurmond and his "states rights" segregation walk-out of that DNC in 1948. As a strong segregationist, Thurmond had been damn upset by the DNC's civil rights plank . . . and as we all know, years later Thurmond jumped ship entirely as many Southern Dixiecrats (segregationists) did and joined the Republican Party.

I, also, recall "DEWEY WINS!" in large bold type as a headline of a Chicago newspaper in 1948 . . . when, in fact, we all know who won. It was Harry S Truman, the president who signed an executive order to desegregate America's military.

These were the beginning times when those folks who espoused segregation left the Democratic Party . . . 1954 Brown v. Board of Education, 1964 LBJ's Civil Rights Act, 1965 LBJ's Voting Rights Act, more and more segregationists left the Democratic Party, and more, still, when Nixon signed into law the Affirmative Action Act.

I recall Ike and Stevenson, Kennedy and Nixon and on to the present. Who recalls their first presidential election vote?

:kick: :kick: :kick:

[Gore1FL]

37. 1976

I was about to start the 5th grade.

[LSdemocrat]

38. 1988

I got hooked to politics that year, and I was only seven.

I campaigned for Dukakis in my second-grade class' mock election.

[Joe the Revelator]

40. 1992

I was 10.

"don't stop thinking about tomorrow" was my favorite song for a week.

[NoPasaran]

41. 1968

The first one I was passionate about watching though was the '72 Democratic Convention. I was a big McGovern fan and was disappointed I wasn't old enough to vote.

[dryan]

47. 1956 Democratic Convention

That's when we still had a lot of floor fights. All the networks carried the whole convention and not just stagemanaged speeches -- by both parties. Dorothy Cannon, the Secretary of the DNC for what seemed like a century would read the rollcall. The lady last night read the rollcall like she was commentating on a fashion show. Years later, Ms. Cannon moved to Clay County, Florida and I got to know her. She was a real character and a great lady! The 1960 convention was a real nailbiter. Johnson and Kennedy had a debate before the convention delegates.

[NoPasaran]

51. My father remembers hearing the 1924 convention on radio

With many of the hundred-plus ballots beginning "Mr Chairman, the Great State of Alabama casts its votes for Oscar W. Underwood."

[DemBones DemBones]

49. Vague memories of 1956. In 1952, I remember

being told we had a new president and this was important. We didn't have television then and the radio was for listening to Arthur Godfrey, Jack Benny and Amos 'n' Andy.
(Also Big John and Little Sparky, if you were a kid.)

The first convention I watched was 1960, which was cerrtainly an interesting one!

[dryan]

50. 1964 was really memorable....

I remember there being a lot of talk about Alabama and Mississippi walking out because they wanted to send 2 delegations, one black and one white. I noticed that the chair of the Alabama Democratic Party was a black man, they have come a long way! I think that there was a problem with California and the unit rule but that may have been 1960. I really enjoy the speeches at these conventions, but everything is so controlled (at the Republican one too) that there is no drama anymore. You don't even hear one time "will the delegates please clear the aisle.". My father used to buy maps of the United States and when the secretary would do the rollcall, we would have a game of finding the state and righting the delegate count on it. Those were the days!

[69KV]

52. 1976

I was a kid. Jimmy Carter and Mo Udall and some others were running. Parents were big Carter and Udall fans and would have gone with either. Carter had the delegates wrapped up but the convention was contested until he went over the top. Dad worked for a big public utility, and I mean public as in government run. Staunch New Dealers. Voting Democratic was a matter of keeping his job, because the Repukes wanted to cut jobs, cut spending, bust the union, privatize. Sure enough, Reagan did just that after 1980. I got my politics from my parents.

We watched the convention as a family. There were only 4 TV channels back then :) I don't remember if one of the networks had the convention, or all three. Different times, seemed like the networks were a lot more civic minded. Anything pertaining to government, like the Democratic Convention, meant regular programming was pre-empted for the evening. Today they consign such things to the "special interest" channels like C-SPAN. A shame.

I remember Carter brought a lot of excitement to the convention. The country had just gone through Nixon and Watergate, and here was an honest man who promised to restore integrity to the white house. He succeeded wildly, in my opinion. I still think Carter was one of the best presidents this country ever had. The Repukes are just plain scum for the way they attacked him and made fun of him.

[theHandpuppet]

55. 1960 Dem Convention

I was only a small child, but I recall the 1960 Dem convention because my parents were Kennedy supporters who were embroiled in heated political debates with other relatives who were solid Nixon Repugs. Ah, the behind-the-scenes machinations of the LBJ and Kennedy contingents! Now those were the good old days!

[TaleWgnDg]

58. oh, come on . . .

there's GOT to be somebody in here as old as I !!

:dem:

[dryan]

59. I'm 52...

the first convention I saw on TV was the 1956 convention because my parents bought a TV specifically to watch it. It was also the year my brother was born.

[TaleWgnDg]

61. oh, damn . . .

what can I say? am older than YOU too? sheesh and cripes.

:dem:

[catzies]

60. Republicans, Miami 1972. Lived close enough to hear fireworks

And Nixon had his Key Biscayne house then, and of course his good friend Bebe Rebozo was a well-known local.

I waterskied once too close to the Key Biscayne house and got chased away by Secret Service.

Oh, it was the summer I turned ten.