After watching the movie Taxi Driver at least 15 times in the late 1970’s, John Hinkley Jr. began to have an obsession with one of the characters from the movie, Jodie Foster, called erotomania. (Which means a person believes that another person, usually a stranger or a famous person, is in love with her/him.) He would write to her, call her, and followed her around the country, trying to get her attention. (What a CREEP!) He was so obsessed with her, he decided to “impress” her, by attempting to shoot the president of the United States.
The froot loop that shot President Reagan -
John Hinkley arrived in Washington on Sunday March 29. The next morning he read Reagan’s schedule in Washington Star newspaper and knew it was time to impress his love. He decided to write a letter to Jodie, thinking he might not make it out alive during this event that was going down in two hours. He did not send the letter to her, but it stated “he would abandon the ideas of getting Reagan in a second if I could only win your heart and live out the rest of my life with you”.
While waving to a crowd of people Reagan entered the Washington Hilton Hotel around 1:45 pm. He gave a luncheon address to AFL-CIO representatives. At the time, Reagan wasn’t wearing a bulletproof vest, because the only time he’d be exposed publicly is when he would be walking from the building to his limousine, when usually he wears one. Ronald Reagan exited the hotel at 2:27 pm, Eastern Time. Hinkley waited with the crowd, and Reagan passed in front of him unexpectedly. Hinkley knew he wouldn’t get a better chance, so he fired his Rohm RG-14 .22 cal. Blue steel revolver six times in 1.7 seconds, missing President Reagan. The first bullet his White House Press Secretary James Brady in the head and the second bullet hit District of Columbia police officer Thomas Delahanty in the back of his neck as he tried to protect the president. Brady was permanently disabled. Hinkley shot again, and as the president is getting into the limo, the bullet bounces off armored side of the limousine, and hits the president. The bullet grazed against a rib, and lodged into his left lung, just an inch away from his heart. After getting into the limo, Reagan realizes he was shot, and they rush to the George Washington University Hospital. After the shooting, Alfred Antenucci was the first to respond because he was standing next to John Hinkley. Antenucci hit Hinkley in the head and pulled the shooter to the ground. Agent Dennis McCarthy jumped on top of Hinkley, trying to prevent what happened to Lee Harvey Oswald. John Hinkley Jr. was taken to the District of Columbia jail.
12 days after the shooting, Reagan was released from the hospital. He was recovering quickly, but he remained seriously weakened for months.
On March 21, 1981, a little over a week before the attempt assassination, President Ronald Reagan visited Ford’s Theatre for a fundraising event with his wife, Nancy, in Washington D.C. Reagan recalls “I looked up at the presidential box above the stage where Abraham Lincoln had been sitting the night he was shot and felt a curious sensation… I thought that even with all the Secret Service protection we now had, it was probably still possible for someone who had enough determination to get close enough to a president and shoot him.” Ironic, huh?
I didn’t know that Ronald Reagan was shot during his presidency. I’m really glad though that he didn’t die from the shooting and that he remained President after it. I thought it was awesome learning about this, kind of. But the guy who shot Reagan was a real freak show.
Comments