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Where were you when…?
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Hawaii Lindbergh baby kidnapping Lindbergh baby kidnapping Marian Anderson at the Lincoln Memorial Survivors of Dachau Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., and the Enola Gay Atomic bomb at Nagasaki, Japan Breaking the color barrier Two Indian soldiers walk through rubble and debris of destroyed buildings in the Chowk Bijli Wala area of Amritsar during unrest after the Partition of India in August 1947. Israeli Defense Forces tank unit with soldiers atop several tanks lined up on a dirt road, preparing to advance during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.
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Hawaii
Hawaii U.S. battleships are burning and about to sink after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

Where were you when…?

A survey of events that defined generations
Written by
Tracy Grant
Tracy Grant is a senior editor at Encyclopaedia Britannica. She previously served as editor in chief, the first woman to hold that title. 
Tracy Grant
Fact-checked by
Britannica Editors
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....
Britannica Editors
History

It seems that every generation has its “I’ll always remember where I was when xxx happened” moment. Maybe grandparents shared the horror of Pearl Harbor or parents recounted their shock the day JFK was shot. 2026 marks the 25th anniversary of one such event—the September 11 attacks. The editors at Encyclopædia Britannica weighed in to create this list of one major event from roughly each generation of the last 100 years, along with a number...

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