Monday 24 February 2025

The University of the Third Age meeting report

The Assassination of President Kennedy

Speaker: Pete Mellor

The guest speaker at the u3a Todmorden February members meeting was Pete Mellor, who described the events of 22nd November 1963 in Dallas, Texas and the assassination of President Kennedy.

He began with an overview of politics and events leading up to this date. In 1962, Kennedy had played a large part in dealing with the Cuban Missile Crisis – an event which might well have sparked a nuclear war with Russia. His actions prompted a huge amount of praise and goodwill from the American public. Despite this, his presidency had not been popular with everyone, particularly in Texas.

Vice president Lyndon Johnson, along with state senator John Connally, lobbied for a presidential visit to Texas. Kennedy agreed, but insisted that the two men accompany him. There had been a dispute between democrat politicians in that state, and the visit was partly to bring them together prior to the election the following year.

The president and his wife Jackie arrived in Houston on 21st November and then to Dallas the following day. Pete showed an image of Kennedy speaking from a rostrum, showing the audience and dignitaries alongside the president, applauding what he said or was saying– with just the one exception - Lyndon Johnson. A Texas morning paper had a full page advertisement denouncing the president after a number of liberal reforms, such as those championed by Dr Martin Luther King, for equal rights for all Americans.

President Kennedy arrived at Love Field Airport, Dallas after a flight of around two to three minutes and the cavalcade of vehicles set off to tour the city. Pete showed us images showing that the presidential limousine had less protection by police motorcyclists than the other cities visited, and that the press photographers were almost at the back of the seventeen vehicles that took part. This meant that there was little, if any, chance of professionals being near enough to take pictures when the shooting started. In many other such events, there would have been a flatbed truck with photographers and news cameras in front of the limousine, but not in Dallas.

The lead car was around a quarter of a mile in front of the presidential limo. One of its passengers was Bill Decker, the Chief Sheriff of Dallas County, who was part of the posse that shot and killed Bonnie and Clyde in 1934.

Along with the president, first lady and the Governor of Texas and his wife, two secret agents were in the limousine. One was Roy Kellerman, the agent in charge of the event. Pete mentioned that Kellerman had been involved in suspicious events involving the secret service in his career and, presumably, perhaps involved in which vehicle went where.

Unlike some other vehicles that day, no secret agents stood on the running boards and, Pete added, the vehicles were travelling far too slowly. Pete said that when the first shots were heard the driver, secret agent William Greer, should have accelerated away from danger – but in fact the vehicle came to a halt before other agents jumped on board.
The Warren Commission of 1964 found that Lee Harvey Oswald shot President Kennedy from the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository. But this has never been accepted by many people worldwide, and numerous films and documentaries offer other evidence and scenarios.

The shooting started around 12.30. Pete said the first shot missed, the second hit the president in the back, and the third hit him in the head. A witness said that they had seen Oswald eating his lunch on either the first or second floor of the Book Depository at 1215 but, as we know, Oswald didn't appear before a judge or jury.

Oswald was arrested later that day at the Texas Theatre in Dallas. He was caught in the balcony of the theatre, and was thought to have murdered Dallas police officer J.D. Tippit. Again, many of the audience will have seen how Oswald himself was killed two days later.

Abraham Zapruder was a dress manufacturer who worked in the area and had very recently bought a new cine camera, intending to film the visit of the president. The morning of the 22nd of November was dull, wet and cold, so he left it at home. But the weather improved, into a warm and sunny day late morning, and his employees persuaded him to collect the camera from home and record the occasion. Pete showed a picture of himself standing on top of a concrete plinth – the one that Zapruder stood on to record the events that followed. He suffered from vertigo so he persuaded his secretary, Marylin Sitzman, to join him and hold him steady while he filmed. The movie ultimately made Mr Zapruder a multi-millionaire after he sold it to Life Magazine, but it wasn't seen by the general public until the 1970s. A bootleg copy was shown which eventually persuaded the authorities to reexamine the events of 1964.

The events during, before and after the Zapruder file have been discussed and disputed for six decades now. Pete mentioned some of the accounts from the large number of people present on that day – they included seeing someone with a rifle under their coat in the crowd and the smell of gunpowder around the time some distance from the Book Depository.

We heard about the 'magic bullet', as named by doubters and cynics of this sequence of events, which wounded Senator Connolly. The bullet on the second shot mentioned was said to have enough energy to pass through Kennedy and still injure the senator.

The final shot was said to have hit the back of Kennedy's head, but the footage seems to disprove this. A number of medical staff thought that he had been shot from another direction, not the book depository. Zapruders' film shows the president's head going back, rather than forward. Medical staff agreed, after finding the exit wound had blown part of the back of Kennedy's Skull away.

An autopsy should, according to Texas law at this time, have been conducted at Parkland Hospital, Dallas, but this did not happen. Secret Service Agents took the body to Love Field airport, to be taken back to Washington.

Members might have remembered film of Lyndon Johnson being sworn in as the new President of America before the plane took off. Alongside him was Jackie Kennedy, who had refused to change out of her bloodied pink Chanel suit.

JFK's body had been put in a distinctive polished mahogany coffin for the journey. Pete mentioned an account in 2003 from an US Navy ex cadet who took Kennedy's body, which was in a black body bag, out of a plain grey shipping casket and took it into a ward. One of his colleagues took photographic plates of the body to another department, and on the way saw a vehicle arrive. Robert Kennedy and Jackie got out, and a mahogany coffin was removed from this vehicle.

Pete is one of many people who dispute the events on the day when JFK was murdered and, to say the least, suggests that there might well have been political, or other enemies, involved.

His absorbing and detailed presentation fully deserved our applause.

Not yet a member? We're always delighted to welcome new members. Contact details: website at www.u3atod.org.uk or email at info@u3atod.org.uk.

Many thanks to Colin Sanson for this report

 

Previous U3A reports on the HebWeb - click here