Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, we continue the oral history call-in series that we're doing on the most defining news event of your lifetime. We're taking these decade by decade. If you haven't heard one yet, we started Tuesday with callers 90 years old or above, and yesterday callers in your 80s. Today, if you're in your 70s, this call-in will be only for you on the most defining news event of your lifetime, local, national or global. 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. For some extra fun, and our lines are full. Okay, you were ready. People in your 70s, you were waiting your turn. For some extra fun, as maybe you know if you're already calling in, we'll invite you to name the most memorable concert you ever saw if you have one.

People so far have cited things like seeing Duke Ellington's Orchestra in Paris, Once Upon a Time, wow, and Leonard Cohen at Madison Square Garden. How about for you if you're in your 70s? Just as some points of reference, if you're 75 years old today, say, born in 1947, '48, you were 15 when Kennedy was killed. 15 or 16 when the Beatles debuted in this country. Anyone see the Beatles at Shea Stadium? You were also a teenager for the March on Washington, the Martin Luther King march, and the main civil rights laws being passed, and the Immigration Liberalization Act of 1965.

You were draft age during the Vietnam War, around 21 for the moon landing, in your 20s for Watergate and the feminist movement of the '70s breaking out, environmental movement of the '70s, too. Just as a few things that might come up, but you tell us. It can be something less obvious, too. Very simply, if you are in your 70s, we're inviting you to call in and say what the most defining news event of your lifetime might have been. For a little bit of fun, but it's optional, we'll invite you to name the most memorable concert you ever saw if you have one, too. 212-433-WNYC. We'll take your calls after this.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, to more of your calls on the most defining news event of your lifetime and your most memorable concert if you want to throw that in. When we did it for people in their 90s on Tuesday, there were many things but the most common thing that many people mentioned was Pearl Harbor. When we did it yesterday for people in their 80s, the most common thing that got mentioned was the JFK assassination. Let's see what comes up for people in your 70s. Gregory in Harlem, you're on WNYC. Hi, Gregory. Thanks for calling in.

Gregory: Good morning, Brian. Thank you very much. It's a very pleasure to speak with you. Listen, you've mentioned it right away and it was my best experience. My mother and father, my four sisters, we all went down to Washington for the March on Washington. That was a very, very explosive experience for my teenage self. I'm 76, so I'm like one of the original boomers, born in '46. I have to say, concerts. I was an A&R producer for RCA and CBS records for a long time. Music has been my life, but the most important thing in my musical life was attending the Young People's Concerts by Leonard Bernstein. It just changed my life as an 11, 12-year-old, back in-- it was in 1958.

Brian Lehrer: Was that at Lincoln Center? Did you go in-person or see it on television?

Gregory: Saw it on television and then got tickets. We actually got to go there for three of the shows. Peter and the Wolves, it was awesome [laughs].

Brian Lehrer: That is great. I was lucky enough to see a next generation one with Wynton Marsalis at Lincoln Center doing the Young People's Concerts presentation. I'm curious if you think the things you came of age with as an early baby boomer, as you say, left you a different kind of person, personally or politically, than those who might be a generation above you who were maybe more defined by Pearl Harbor or the Depression or V-E Day to cite three that came up that were just a little before your time.

Gregory: It's hard to say because I spent my formative years, literally my wonder years until about 10 years old in Europe with my parents. My mom was a JAG lawyer. My pop worked in the embassies overseas. I got a different experience, especially as a young Black person coming back to America and seeing how it was at that time. We've always been Democrats and because I grew up with a mother who was very, very smart and, as I said, four sisters, I probably was woke before woke was woke. I'm ostensibly a liberal.

Brian Lehrer: You were woke before woke was a good thing, which was before it was a bad thing.

Gregory: Exactly.

Brian Lehrer: Gregory, thank you very much. We really appreciate it. If he cited the March on Washington, what did it lead to? I think what we're going to hear from Howard in Great Neck, our next caller. Hi, Howard. You're on WNYC.

Howard: Good morning, Brian. Thank you very much. I was calling about one of the major outcomes, if not the major outcome of that march, which was the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which we now take for granted and most of us in our 70s really don't remember all that well what life was like in this country before that, other than by watching documentaries or reading books or seeing old movies. It changed the lives of millions of Americans, if not every American, and set a standard for how we would write laws protecting the rights of various folks in this country for the decades to come.

Brian Lehrer: We're actually planning a segment. We might do it on King Day on what the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has actually changed over time and what it hasn't actually changed over time. Do you have a concert?

Howard: Yes. That was an easy one for me. My second date with the woman that I've now been married to for 52 years was a concert of The Lovin' Spoonful, their last concert together, and Judy Collins at the Tennis Stadium at Forest Hills in the summer of 1967.

Brian Lehrer: That's a good one. Thank you very much. I've heard that at that same Tennis Stadium in 1966. That was not a Strange Bedfellows concert that he just mentioned, but there was The Monkees which I guess if he remembers The Lovin' Spoonful he would remember The Monkees who had a TV show and the opening act, little-known opening act was somebody named Jimi Hendrix at Forest Hills opening for The Monkees. That's a little music trivia. David in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, David.

David: Hi Brian. I've been thinking about this for two days since you mentioned it. Just tangentially, you talk about D-Day and the Depression, and even though I was born right after the war, I'm an early baby boomer. Those things, just hearing about them all through my youth I didn't experience them but in a way I did. It drives me nuts when people on't remember what D-Day is or Pearl Harbor day.

Brian Lehrer: Even though you were born after.

David: '45.

Brian Lehrer: Because that was a complaint of the so-called Greatest Generation, the Depression era generation, about the baby boomers is that, "Look what we went through, the Depression, World War II, and they're protesting, they're rebelling against us like we're the oppressive establishment."

David: You know what? I would be in that camp because I didn't appreciate it until I grew a bit older. I'll say that. In terms of my event, I'd say, again, after Kennedy got assassinated I don't know if history would've changed, but the war escalated under Johnson and-

Brian Lehrer: Vietnam war.

David: -McNamara and Bundy. I was a college dropout and I was ripe hanging fruit for getting drafted in 1965.

Brian Lehrer: You were drafted and--?

David: I did not go to Vietnam. I was in Europe. I was in West Germany.

Brian Lehrer: How do you think your military experience in that era shaped you?

David: Well, I certainly learned how to make a bed, but besides that--

Brian Lehrer: [chuckles] Four corners?

David: Yes. When I got back and I went to Brooklyn College, it was like, I felt a distance between me and the students that were there just to stay out of the draft, but it was also the Hippie era, and I was definitely ensconced in certain parts of that, just to say that.

Brian Lehrer: You have a concert?

David: I have so many that it was hard to whittle down. I'll say one thing. My late brother took me in the late '50s to Brooklyn Paramount to see one of these Alan Freed rock and roll shows with like 20 different acts, Doo-wop acts, Rockabilly, Frankie Lymon, for me personally. There was a million Fillmore concerts that I went to, but I got my number one is 1972. I was traveling for a year in Europe and Asia, and I came back specifically to see this. It was Rolling Stones with Stevie Wonder opening at the Garden. That's a pretty good show.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, which might be two largely different audiences or maybe they weren't. I don't know.

David: Not so much. Not so much.

Brian Lehrer: Rolling Stones and Stevie Wonder. Thank you very much. David, thank you so much. It's interesting to me that some callers in your 70s are mentioning some things not so much that might have been formative in their teens or 20s, but that are much recent, more recent. I'm going to take a couple of those next. Here's Teen in Highland Park. Hi, Teen. Am I saying your name right, Teen like teenager?

Jean: It's Jean.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, Jean. I apologize.

Jean: My most memorable event in my lifetime, I think, would be the fall of the Berlin Wall. It went up around 1961. I must have been 10 when I was first becoming aware of what people were talking about on the news, on television, or what it said in the newspaper.

Brian Lehrer: You remember it going up as well as it coming down?

Jean: Yes, definitely. Because we would hear about when people who were trying to escape would get shot. It was so amazing when it came down in, I think, 1989 because it started-- the first things I heard about it were that some trains in the area were being allowed to go on ahead and exit that part of Berlin without the soldiers checking everybody's papers. Then, the next thing you knew, there were people gathering up against the wall and painting pictures on it, and they were not being chased away. Then, pretty soon, the wall was being torn down.

Brian Lehrer: Even today, people were flooding across.

Jean: Yes. They're raising flags on top of it, and having picnics and dancing on top of it. It seems so impossible that this huge impasse could ever be solved, and it was just solved in a peaceful way.

Brian Lehrer: I didn't say this in the intro with some of the historical touch points that I mentioned, but sure, anybody in your 70s today would have grown up with the Cold War as a defining backdrop from day one, and it brings you to tears to this day. I hear you, thinking about the fall of the Berlin Wall. You have a concert?

Jean: It would be a Dylan concert, for sure. I'd say 1973 in St. Louis.

Brian Lehrer: What did he play? Do you remember a song that stands out?

Jean: Like a Rolling Stone.

Brian Lehrer: Jean, thank you so much. Thank you so much. Coming even more toward the present with one, I think, is Patricia in Greenwich. Patricia, you're on WNYC. Hey there.

Patricia: Oh, hello, Brian. Thank you for taking my call. My most memorable moment I reviewed, and like that banned earlier for two days, all the possibilities because there were a lot of mental things happening in our 70 years, but the one is January 6, 2021. That's when I realized what could happen, that we could lose our democracy in this country. I never ever thought that was a possibility. I protested against the Vietnam War, and I'm very involved in the women's movement, but never did I dream that we could lose our democracy in this country.

Brian Lehrer: With all the other things that we've talked about that would have happened in your lifetime, the whole Cold War, the Kennedy assassination, the Vietnam War, 9-11, we have a couple of callers saying 9-11, for you, it's January 6th. It's the most recent thing. The most recent big, big, big thing.

Patricia: Yes, really big.

Brian Lehrer: Patricia, thank you. Thank you. You have a concert, by the way?

Patricia: Oh, well, I do, but it's a funny one. In 1966, we lived on Cape Cod, and I had a friend that offered my two sisters and I free tickets to see the Beatles in Boston.

Brian Lehrer: You saw the Beatles?

Patricia: I refused the tickets so I could hear Eric Andersen live in a cafe. It's monumental to me because I missed the Beatles.

Brian Lehrer: I hope Eric Andersen was great, but I hear the regret to this day. You know what? We just have 30 seconds left, but I want to sneak in Vanessa in Westchester. Patricia was going to be our last one, but Vanessa is bringing up something that nobody else mentions, and it's important. Vanessa, we've got like 25 seconds for you. They're all yours.

Vanessa: Thank you. I just want to say that we need to be able to look back and try to see something positive. We've been through, as you say, so much. I would take Bush v. Gore and the attack on our democracy as the event, but something is not an event. It's this phenomenon that in my lifetime, it's starting with a young lawyer in the 70s, but until now, I've seen recognition and acknowledgment of the phenomenon of domestic violence.

Brian Lehrer: That has to be the last word, the recognition of domestic violence. We'll continue this series on Monday with callers in your 60s.

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