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The 57th Anniversary of the Assassination of President Kennedy
I was in third grade when President Kennedy was murdered. They let us out of school early but didn’t tell us why. I walked home with my sister Joan, who was in fifth grade. My mom was watching the TV and told us what happened. I now have an apartment just over a mile from Dealey Plaza where it happened. We walked there yesterday and took pictures.
One of the first things you notice is how small of a space the plaza is. The pictures make it look much bigger. The man in the road is next to the X marking where the third fatal shot hit. In the picture below I’m next to where Zapruder was when he filmed the assassination.
I attended a discussion about it three years ago by Zapruder’s granddaughter.
At the base of the Texas Book Depository, there is a sign which reflects the controversy over the assassination; note the word alleged in it.
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Is that the “mortal error”{ (SS agent accidental discharge) that we discussed earlier?
There is a book titled Mortal Error. author Bonar Menninger.
It is the story of. Maryland ballistics and firearms expert – Howard Donahue and his investigation into the shooting. The Secret Service agent in the car behind JFK had an M16 with frangible ammunition. And there is a witness on the overpass who testified that after he heard the first shot, that Secret Service agent stood up and turned around with the rile in his hands. But when JFKs car slowed the Secret Service car jerked to a stop and the agent fell down. Theory … JFK got shot by accident by the Secret Service. Oswald was shooting, and hit JFK in the back/throat. But the headshot was from the Secret Service weapon. Here’s a pic showing the rifle.
it explains lots of the government’s hinky behavior after the assassination.
I appreciate the response. Without getting into a huge debate about this, my answer would be to urge caution when basing a conclusion on an author’s ability to advance a convincing theory in (unchallenged) book form. I’m not familiar with Mortal Error, but am familiar with other books/videos that make enough reasonably convincing cases that one would assume that there were numerous shots fired that day from a variety of angles.
I’m a believer in ‘Oswald did it’. The only bit I don’t like is that the headshot bullet fragmented. That’s not what FMJ bullets are supposed to do. The headshot bullet sure behaved like the kind of bullets bodyguards load when anticipating having to fire in a crowded environment. That’s what intrigues me about the mortal error thing.
Eight presidents died in office. WH Harrison in 1841, Taylor in 1850, Harding in 1923 and FDR in 1945 all died of natural causes. Four were assassinated – Lincoln in 1865, Garfield in 1881 (and he actually held on for a few weeks before passing away), McKinley in 1901 and JFK in 1963. JFK is the last to die in office. I think you can call him the first “media” presidential death. I’m reading a book on McKinley’s assassination that was published in 1902 and it’s night and day as far as how different the event was treated. It wasn’t a “crises of the century” or a step towards Armageddon. It was sad that he died, but it wasn’t something that had a great effect on day to day life, nor should it be.
I was born two decades after Kennedy was shot. Even at a young age, I was under the impression that this event was right up there with the Civil War, WWII and the Moon Landing as the most important event in US history. Every year there’s a Kennedy Collector’s Edition magazine at the grocery checkout. It’s given multiple pages in school textbooks. Kennedy often ranks in the top 10, or even top 5, of Schlesinger-type “Greatest Presidents” lists. The JFK assassination is a good example of how powerful the media narrative can be.
That was 60 years ago. I often wonder how something like this would be treated today with how fast information travels, and how the media is more desperate than ever to censor and control the narrative.
He nearly lost Berlin, and was almost ready to give it up, and the dithering he showed there gave Krushchev the idea that if he escalated in Cuba, he might be able to trade Cuba for Berlin.
And domestically, he weaponized the central government against the steel industry.
In a class with Massad Ayoob we talked about the assassination. He pointed out that Kennedy supposedly made efforts to make sure his protective detail wa equipped with the latest great rifle, the M-16. Mas is anti-conspiracy, by the way.
Same here. Though the political machine is more old Joe’s (“run rabbit run” Joe) work than Jack’s.
I confess I do not understand your rabbit reference.
When Joe Kennedy was Ambassador to the UK during the Battle of Britain, he’d run to a country house every night because he was afraid of the bombing. The Brits called him “Jittery Joe” and “run rabbit, run” behind his back because of his cowardly behavior.
I looked out that window and thought it was much closer than I had expected. I did not think it was that difficult a shot. Oswald did miss with one.
I was a medical student and walked into the autopsy room at LA County hospital to hear the radio talking about “shots fired.” My wife was teaching 3rd grade at a predominantly Hispanic school in east LA. She had to explain to the kids what had happened.
He was also a fierce Anglophobe – arguably one of the most hostile of people FDR could have picked as a UK ambassador.
FDR wanted Bootlegger Joe (as he’s sometimes known in the Boston area) out of the country–anywhere.
I was a sophomore in high school in Verdigre, Nebraska, sitting in the last row in a Social Studies class. The principal came into the room and announced that the President had been shot. We didn’t yet know that it was fatal.
Being the callous, calculating jerk that I am, I turned to the kid next to me and said that if he lived, Kennedy would now win re-election for sure. The other kid didn’t say anything.
It seems like it wasn’t another minute before the principal was back, telling us that the President was dead. School was let out early, and as we were boarding the school buses I saw that some girls were crying, which was my first real inkling of what kind of effect this was going to have.
We kind of watched the events on television at home the whole weekend. I still have the felt-lined box for chess pieces that I was building at the time. It’s no work of great craftsmanship.
Wow, I’ve been to some of the smallest, out-of-the-way-places in my home state but I’ve never even heard of Verdigre. I must have missed class the day they watched the Dr. Manley material (pre-VCR, I believe they were film strips with cassette recordings) on that part of Nebraska.
Worst infantry rifle of WW2.
Bolt action rifle. He supposedly got off 3 rounds in 8.5 seconds.
And my understanding is the FBI found the scope was not aligned correctly.
That was no easy shot.
I was in 5th grade in a Catholic School in Washington DC. They let us out early and I watched TV all weekend. I saw Jack Ruby shoot Oswald live. As I recall, the news media all but had Oswald convicted as the lone gunman. In retrospect it was very similar to how they over-emphasize certain things that they can’t possibly know, like today’s assertions that Biden is “President Elect” which is always a tip-off.
But I remember Oswald saying very sincerely that he didn’t shoot anyone. I intuitively believed him. I was 10 and innocent, but even though I was told he did it, his words sounded sincere. (And the way they portrayed him, why wouldn’t he proudly proclaim he was the guy who killed Kennedy? Or at least make no statement?)
Then he was shot. Those two events happening back-to-back made me rather skeptical. I’ve heard most of the theories and many of the “debunkings”, but I’m proud to say, I do not believe what the government tells me. I do not believe Oswald was the “lone gunman” that’s for sure. I strongly believe he was set up as the fall guy. I don’t pretend to know who did it, or why, but the Lee Harvey Oswald lone gunman thing is pure crap.
I do not believe our intel agencies and FBI have any credibility whatsoever. I came to this conclusion gradually and with much sadness through these last 57 years, with just too much evidence to deny.
All that does is tell us a gun appeared coming out of one of the windows. If you consider that Oswald was set up as a patsy, then it really doesn’t mean much at all.
It for sure doesn’t mean that A) he was the lone gunman or B) that he fired the gun or C) if he did fire, that he hit the target.
I’m going with inexpensive, not cheap. Most think he used the sites on the rifle, not the scope, and, as noted above, he was a decent shot in the Marines, maybe better at 88 yards..
I’m clearly not going to persuade you otherwise, and don’t really want to. But the multiple gunmen theories are pure crap–many of which are hatched by leftists :)
Now I’m trying to figure out where you went to grammar school. Blessed Sacrament?
So, single-bullet theory, lone gunman, and all the other evidence, the sloppy and corrupt Warren Commission …OK…
And, while I’m always skeptical of leftists, they don’t always have to lie to get their points across. I trust our government less, unfortunately.
Annunciation NW. I only went there for a year. Lived in McLean Garden apartments nearby.
Well, you are part of a long line of distinguished people who have lived in McClean Gardens, including me. It’s still there–nice location just off Wisconsin.
Actually, 11 seconds, which time starts with after aiming and preparing for the first shot. It’s quite a long time.
There is no reason to think that he used the scope. That’s plenty close enough for young eyes to use iron sights.
As for it being a lousy weapon, Gun Jesus (a.k.a., Ian McCollum of “Forgotten Weapons) says it was one of the best bolt action rifles of WWII.
Gun Jesus also really likes the French Chauchat machine gun, so sometimes he is quirky, but at the very least the rifle isn’t a rattle trap like many conspiracists would have you believe.
Verdigre was/is mostly a Czech (Bohemian) Catholic town. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kennedy did well there in the 1960 election, on account of the Catholic vote. My father was the pastor of a small Lutheran church there, but it was not his main parish. There were some Czech names in the congregation; I’ve recently wondered if they were the lapsed Catholics or outcasts. Some of them stayed in touch with Dad and Mom (and vice versa) for many years after we moved away.
I went to Center high school my freshman year. (You probably never heard of Center, either, but it’s the county seat.) It’s on the edge of the Santee Sioux reservation. But that was a really small school, with 7-8 students in each class, and it closed after my freshman year, even though our basketball team had been good enough to go to the state tournament (in Class D). The white kids then mostly went to Verdigre, and the Indians to Niobrara. I think there now many be a school right on the reservation.
I was sorry that Center High School closed, but one good thing about Verdigre: It then had a reputation for the highest concentration of pretty girls of any town around. I had observed that myself long before the guys would get to talking about it. When my parents talked to the superintendent about the possibility of my going to Verdigre, Dad mentioned that he wished I would have the opportunity to learn foreign languages. The superintendent noted that Mrs Best (the algebra/math teacher) used to teach Latin, and maybe they could start up a Latin class. So as an awkward sophomore boy I ended up taking Latin along with 7-8 of the most glamorous junior and senior girls. They tolerated me.
But we moved to Minnesota in the middle of the school year, so that was the end of that. Dad had somehow gotten on the church’s “call” lists, and that fall had “calls” to come and be the pastor at a number of churches around the midwest. But there was one that he had under serious consideration for a long time – to Cleburne TX, near Dallas-Fort Worth. At that point in my life my preference would have been to stay right where we were in Nebraska, even though Texas sounded interesting and exciting. But I didn’t have a say in the matter. My mother did inquire as to what I thought about the possibility, but it was made clear that my preferences wouldn’t play a role. But Dad finally turned that one down, not too long before the assassination in Dallas. And then we ended up moving anyway – to Minnesota. That had its attractions, too, as it was near my grandparents and and various relatives, though still, I would have preferred to stay in Nebraska. There was one girl I liked (not at Verdigre) and she had at least become aware of my existence.
But forever after, to those of us who were old enough to remember, the seven years we lived in Nebraska were sort of the Golden Age for our family.
BTW, I’ve never forgiven the news media for spending the next ten years blaming conservatives for Kennedy’s assassination. The “Spirit of Dallas” they called it.
Thanks for that. You had me at “Czech (Bohemian)”. My roots and early years trace back to the Bohemian band from Prague to Stromsburg. I remember several local Czech (or similar) grandparents back in the 70s and 80s that still didn’t speak any English. (My mother still uses the term “bohunk ” quite liberally…usually referring to distant relatives.) I suspect that a few camping trips up in Yankton is as close as I ever got to Verdigre. Thanks again.
I was in 6th grade at Hopi Elementary School, part of the Scottsdale School District, in the Arcadia part of Phoenix. We were at lunch. We cheered when we heard that Kennedy had been shot. (In 3rd grade, a clear majority of us sang “Nixon, Nixon, he’s our man, Kennedy, Kennedy in the trash can.)
Our Art Teacher stood up in the lunch room and ripped our throats out, telling us that President Kennedy was the president of all of us. We immediately went into a stunned silence, and felt an immense shame for cheering.
School buses were called and we were sent home. Our parents were waiting for us when we arrived.
That’s bizarre behavior for sixth graders.
Yeah. Sounds like a fantasy in retrospect.
If it were a scene in a screenplay, I’d cut it completely for being unrealistic and too on the nose.
But maybe Arizona kidz are just weird….