ABSTRACT
This was an event which was filmed and photographed as it happened. The blanket media coverage took place in full consciousness of the historic nature of the moment. Thousands witnessed it on the spot and millions across the world watched it on live television, awed by the symbolism of the occasion. Yet, despite the fact that the subject was seemingly covered from every angle, and that such a detailed record was gathered, and remains available to journalists, commentators, historians, and the public, an extraordinarily selective and distorted image was quickly constructed, and remains embedded in popular memory. A wide range of materials and accounts exists in archives and marginal publications, and, particularly in Germany, personal, family and local memories and experiences influence perceptions, but the predominant spin on these events - and the core of what most people say happened, if asked - was and remains an amalgam of resonant media images and hegemonic media discourse, a story moulded in the interests of the West German and US power elites.
