The year 1999 was a pretty interesting time in history.

No(1) Drama(2) was a hit and Britney(3) was queen of the charts, the Simpsons(4) were still great, and Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh(5) were battling it out for top fad toon, and Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z were(6) just hitting the airwaves, and to top it off the world was bracing itself for Y2K(7). As a child growing up in this time, these were the things I was aware of. Just a month prior, John F. Kennedy Jr.(8) died in a plane accident off the coast of Massachusetts, and just before that, the Columbine(9) shootings happened. It was going to be a tough end to the 90s and start to the 2000s.<br><br>Then it got worse. On August 11, 1999, there was a solar eclipse so deep in totality that it was the first time it had been seen in Europe since May 31, 1597 when Shakespeare was merely a young man in the throes of forming his company. The eclipse was so significant that it seemed as if it was the moon’s way of foreshadowing a storm. Like the calm before a hurricane, the silence before a tornado rips through town, the stillness before a tsunami. <br><br>Nobody could have seen it coming. <br><br>They called it the storm of the century. It was known as the other 9/11. On August 11, 1999, the great John Henry Williams, son of the greatest baseball player ever, left his boat in the water to go swimming to get a closer look at a lighthouse. <br><br>He was(10) never seen or heard from again.<br><br>It was(11) like he vanished. <br><br>Bobby Shantz had been watching him on the shore as he swam away, but now he had lost sight of him. He panicked and swam out as fast and hard as his 67 year old body could handle, to no avail, and all he could find was John Henry’s water shoes. <br><br>It was as if he had just left us. <br><br>The investigation hit a brick wall. Fisherman and sailors from the waters had reported that the waters were rough that day, but there was no sign of John Henry, no sign of his body, no sign of life. <br><br>They say his life was a candle in the wind, a shooting star. <br><br>He had never left his father’s side, he batted against Randy Johnson in Game 3 of the 1999 All-Star Game, and 15 days later, he(12) was gone. <br><br>It was an(13) unfortunate accident. <br><br>Rest in Peace, John Henry Williams. The world will never forget you, and the other 9/11 will never be forgotten.<br><br>Edit: Lol downvotes. This post is meant to be a quirky/satirical take on the 90s and how a random event was sad. John Henry did go on to throw out the first pitch on opening day.