On Thursday, June 11, 2009, President Barack Obama held a town hall meeting at Southwest High School
in Green Bay, Wisconsin (just 8 miles north of De Pere), where he discussed his plan for health care reform.
While all of the usual media outlets covered the event, ordinary citizens were even more
involved by sharing their thoughts via
Twitter,
Flickr,
YouTube
and other social media outlets.
The entries listed below are in no particular order, with the only exception being
the one from Pete Seroogy. I listed his first, as it's the perfect example of how
an ordinary citizen can take some extraordinary photos from his own yard and easily
share them with the world within minutes.
If you have your own photos/videos to share, please let me know via
Twitter or e-mail.
Also let me know if there are any corrections to the info below, or if you'd like me to remove your stuff.
Pete Seroogy shared these photos of Air Force One on Flickr and Twitter. He took them as Air Force One flew over his house in De Pere on its way to Austin Straubel International Airport in Green Bay. Pete's family owns the world famous Seroogy's Chocolates in De Pere and Ashwaubenon.
If you weren't in Green Bay or could not attend any of the town hall activities in person, the best way to follow the happenings of the day was via Twitter. Most users who tweeted about the event and their experiences included the #obamagb hash tag, which allows anyone in the world (you don't even have to have a twitter account) to follow all of the tweets in real time, no matter who wrote them. You can also view the same hash tag search using twitter's own search feature. All of the photos and videos below were found as a result of someone's tweet.
Camera Corner, a local technology company, posted photos on Flickr that were shared by local citizens. Camera Corner/Connecting Point, founded in 1953, is the oldest camera/computer store in Northeast Wisconsin.
Andy Aude posted a number of photos of the town hall meeting, the presidential motorcade and Air Force One.
Karen Buckoski posted several photos that she took while at the town hall meeting. In addition to her photos, she also posted numerous tweets about what she saw, what she heard and about her overall experience being there with the president. Karen is one of the fantastic women behind Red Shoes PR Inc.
When John Corpus of Green Bay asked a question of President Obama at the town hall meeting, he also mentioned that his 10-year-old daughter, Kennedy, was with him, missing her last day of school. President Obama then wrote a note for Kennedy to show her teacher to excuse her from school. The note reads, "To Kennedy's Teacher. Please excuse Kennedy's absence...she's with me. Barack Obama."
Jamie Zoch from DotWeekly.com captured this video of the presidential motorcade passing by on Packerland Dr on its way to the town hall meeting at Southwest High School.
Scott Crevier recorded this video of Air Force One taking off from Austin Straubel International Airport in Green Bay at 1:45pm.
C-SPAN has the complete video of the town hall meeting. President Obama focused the entire discussion on his plans for health care reforms. Running time: 1:03
