Staff Writer
This
coming Friday marks the fiftieth anniversary of one of the most infamous and
controversial tragedies in American history, one which always begs the
question, “Where were you when it happened?”
On
November 22, 1963, three shots rang out from the sixth floor of the Texas
School Book Depository in Dallas’ Dealey Plaza where President John F.
Kennedy’s motorcade had just turned the corner. Kennedy was hit in the neck and
head and rushed to Parkland Hospital where he was pronounced dead an hour
later.
Lee
Harvey Oswald was arrested in a movie theater almost an hour later, charged with the murder of the president and Dallas police officer
J.D. Tippet. Many questions suddenly flooded the country, but were left never
to be answered just days later when Oswald met his own ironic fate, being shot
by nightclub owner Jack Ruby during Oswald’s prison transfer.
The
tremors left by the assassination were felt all around the country, and those
who were around to witness the event remember it vividly.
“It
was the first time an event was covered by the media 24/7,” said AP U.S. history
teacher and football coach Gregg Thomas. “I lived in a rural area and we always
took the bus home,” he said, “but everyone’s parents came to pick them up from
school that day, and that’s when we found out that Kennedy had been
assassinated.”
Social
studies teacher Randy Moncelle was a freshman in Bloomington, Illinois when the
news came in. “It was during lunch in the cafeteria when I saw our gym teacher,
Mr. Kruger, with a radio up to his ear, which was strange because nobody
usually used those radios at lunchtime. Then when we went back to class,
Principal Knight came over the intercom and announced that ‘the president has
been shot.’”
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| Jacqueline Kennedy and her two children on the day of the funeral. |
The
whiplash from this sudden turn of events left many questions unanswered,
leading to the development of many conspiracy theories. These ranged from
foreign or organizational involvement in killing the president, to the idea
that Oswald did not act alone and that there were two, maybe even several
gunmen. Even today, 70 percent of Americans believe Kennedy’s death was the
result of a larger conspiracy. “I’m usually a conspiracy theory type of
person,” said Thomas, “but I believe we will never know exactly what happened
that day.”
Kennedy’s
legacy continues to inspire to this day. “Kennedy gave us a different direction
which is why his loss, to me, hangs around,” Moncelle said about Kennedy. “He
was very well-loved,” said media center department chair Leila Moog. “He had a
different charm about him.”
“I
remember watching his inaugural address when I was in sixth grade,” Moncelle
reminisced. “I remember clearly his famous line, ‘Ask not what your country can
do for you, but ask what you can do for your country,’ and that’s what inspired
me to become a teacher.”
In
remembrance of the assassination on its fiftieth anniversary, the city of
Dallas will hold an observance on Friday. The Texas Theatre, the movie theatre
in which Lee Harvey Oswald was captured, will be screening the film that was
showing that day, War is Hell, at the
1963 ticket price of 90 cents. Elsewhere, CBS will air the news coverage of the
assassination in real time online at CBSNews.com starting at 1:40 ET.
