2009-10-18By Tom and Joanne
O'Toole
We may never really know who shot President John Kennedy. Was
it Lee Harvey Oswald? Did he have an accomplice? Was he set up
to take the fall? Was Jack Ruby involved? Or was there some
unknown sharpshooter on that grassy knoll?
In an effort to learn all we could, we took a tour in Dallas
that was aptly named "The JFK Conspiracy Tour."
One thing we discovered is that Dealey Plaza in the city's
West End Historic District is much smaller than people imagine.
All of the sites connected with Kennedy's assassination are
closer together than we expected.
Traumatized Americans who followed live television coverage
back on Nov. 22, 1963, and those who later saw film clips
envisioned hundreds of people flooding the three-acre park,
spilling out into the roadway and being everywhere in front of
and around the grassy knoll. In reality, there were fewer than
50 people standing in the compact pocket now referred to as "the
killing zone" on that fateful day.
People who are old enough to remember the event have vivid
recollections of where they were when they first heard the news.
Visitors from that era are keen to be at the crime scene and
look at the evidence. Younger visitors and those from other
countries come to fit this pivotal event into today's changing
world.
While no one is able to solve the mystery, there is a lot of
information available, and perceptions often change after
spending time in the outdoor area and touring the Sixth Floor
Museum at the Texas School Book Depository. The city shunned the
murder site for many years, and the building from which Oswald
supposedly shot Kennedy was closed even longer. The Sixth Floor
Museum didn't open until 1989.
All of the outdoor locations that played a part in the
assassination are free and offer open access to visitors. Spots
are marked in the middle of Elm Street, which slopes down and
away from Oswald's alleged position, to show where Kennedy was
in the motorcade when the bullets hit.
According to "accepted" evidence, the first shot hit the
center of the roadway and ricocheted away. The second, farther
down the road, hit Kennedy, and he can be seen reacting as his
limousine emerges from behind a road sign in the Abraham
Zapruder film. The third and fatal bullet struck JFK in the head
and killed him.
Numerous home movies and many still photographs are on
display, showing the presidential motorcade before, during and
after the bullets were fired. In fact, 13 cameras in use at the
time of the shooting are displayed with corresponding pictures
at the museum.
But it is the Zapruder film that captured the assassination
for posterity. You can even stand in the same spot from where
Zapruder stood with his Bell & Howell movie camera, capturing
every moment on color film that was then sold to Time magazine
for $150,000.
The aptly named Sixth Floor Museum in the book depository
building takes visitors to the site where Oswald allegedly hid,
propped his mail-order rifle on cardboard boxes and fired three
times in a matter of seconds.
There is an admission charge to go through the metal
detectors and up the elevator to the sixth floor, which has
become a repository for the collection of items connected with
that day. Once there, visitors (400,000 each year) find
displays, recordings, film clips, press announcements,
chronicles of the Kennedy family, the legacy of the Kennedy
presidency and much more.
The displays are laid out in a sequential manner, using
hundreds of photographs, documentary videos, media documentation
of the first news of the assassination, audio broadcasts,
original interviews, artifacts, graphs, charts and an array of
interpretive materials. There are also areas that preserve
evidence associated with Kennedy's alleged assassin. The corner
where Oswald is said to have waited, aimed and fired his three
bullets is glassed off.
In addition, the exhibits include the 1964 Warren Commission
report, which maintains that Oswald acted alone, as well as a
later one that puts forth a conspiracy theory. The museums
creators leave it up to visitors to draw their own conclusions.
We visited on a Saturday, and the museum was packed. Yet the
people who swarmed out of the elevators on the sixth floor were
orderly and quiet. An air of respect was very much in evidence.
Most visitors come away still mystified as to what actually
happened. Back outside, vendors hawk books, magazines,
photographs and other items that further confuse the issue.
Literature published by the museum says that nearly 80
percent of the American public believes Kennedy's death was the
result of a conspiracy, but who really knows. Even after
studying all the evidence the museum had to offer, we certainly
don't.
IF YOU GO
Dealey Plaza and the building housing the Sixth Floor Museum
were dedicated as a National Historic Landmark District on Nov.
22, 1993. Each year more than 2 million visitors come to the
site. Two blocks from the plaza is a cenotaph memorial to
Kennedy. The county donated the city block, and the memorial was
a gift from the people of Dallas County.
The Texas School Book Depository that houses the Sixth Floor
Museum is at the northwest corner of Elm and Houston streets. It
is the second most visited site in Texas after the Alamo.
The museum and store are open every day except Christmas from
9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission is $10 for adults, $9 for seniors,
students and children between the ages of 6 and 18. Children
under 6 are free. Audio tours for the permanent exhibit are
available in seven languages for an additional charge.
For more information, write the museum at 411 Elm St.,
Dallas, TX, 75202-3308; call 888-485-4854 or 214-747-6660; or
visit www.jfk.org.
For more information about Dealey Plaza and other spots of
interest in the city, contact the Dallas Visitors Bureau, 325 N.
St. Paul St., Dallas, TX 75201; call 800-792-1029 or
214-571-1000; or visit www.visitdallas.com.
Tom and Joanne O'Toole are freelance travel writers. To read
features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists,
visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
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