I’ll never forget the sirens blaring at the Army base in Frankfurt, Germany, on the evening of Nov. 22, 1963 — 48 years ago today.

I was in the non-commissioned officers’ club, celebrating my promotion to specialist fifth class. The sirens ended the party as everyone rushed to tanks and Jeeps. The 3rd Armored Division had been put on alert.

Word quickly filtered down. This time the alert might be real, not practice.

President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. That might be the first shot in a new war, and the division was preparing for battle.

It didn’t take long for the alert to end. This wasn’t war. It was time for mourning.

I left the base that evening and took a bus to downtown Frankfurt. The city was in shock. Frankfurt newspapers had printed extra editions. Kennedy’s portrait, ringed in black, dominated the front pages. I spoke very little German — just enough to buy a beer and chat a bit in a gasthaus — but even with that limitation I understood the grief.

Nearly five decades have passed, but I remember that night in detail, and I am confident that my memories are correct. You never forget some things.

I have no doubt that those who were more than children that day have their own memories — where they were, what they were doing, how they learned, how they felt.

Certain dates — too often tragic — sear the memories of everyone old enough to understand. The Kennedy assassination, the attacks of 9/11 and the start of World War II are the three greatest examples of my lifetime.

Anyone older than 17 or 18 today — and many a year or two younger — remembers the national shock and horror of Sept. 11, 2001.

I was given proof of that in January when I asked a class of Colby College students — mostly 18 or 19 years old — what they remembered about the 9/11 attacks that took place when they were 9 or 10. Everyone remembered and had stories to tell about how schools, teachers and parents reacted. I’ll ask the same question when I teach next January and expect similar results. But 9/11 is history, not something remembered, to young high school students.

I was at home in Arlington, Va., on 9/11, but I did not see or hear the plane hit the Pentagon. A friend in Washington, D.C., called to tell us to turn on the TV.

Later that day we lined up at a nearby hospital to donate blood. We were told none was needed.

We went downtown to Washington two or three days later. It was shocking to see tanks and armored cars on the streets guarding the White House and the Capitol. Soldiers with machine guns patrolled the intersections. I’d seen things like that in South America and Europe but never in this country.

I was 2 months old when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. History has proved that President Franklin D. Roosevelt was right when he told Congress and the nation the next day that it was “a date which will live in infamy.”

I usually play a recording of Roosevelt’s speech to my Colby students to demonstrate the power of radio in those days before TV.

While obviously I don’t remember Pearl Harbor Day, the memories are clear as yesterday to my mother. She’s 92 and lives in Seattle. I asked her about it in a phone call last week.

“We were in the kitchen,” she told me, where she was feeding me when the radio broadcast news of the attack. “Your dad was at the golf course.” A friend from Montana was visiting.

No one knew if the next Japanese attack might be on the U.S. west coast. Mom said the radio advised people to cover their windows so light could not escape to help Japanese bombers find targets.

“We went to the basement and covered the windows,” Mom said.

I was 4 years old when the Japanese surrendered on Aug. 15, 1945, and I don’t remember that, either.

Mom said she in downtown Seattle having lunch with me and my younger brother.

“You were in your sailor suits. You were so cute. A man told you ‘Square your hat, sailor’ and you did. Everyone laughed.”

When she left the restaurant “everyone on the street was buzzing” about the end of the war, she said.

Dec. 7, 1941. Nov. 22, 1963. Sept. 11, 2001. All three are commemorated with memorials, in Washington, D.C., and ground zero in New York and at Arlington National Cemetery.

The memories and the memorials unite us.

David B. Offer is the retired executive editor of the Kennebec Journal and the Morning Sentinel. Email [email protected].