This Friday (Nov. 22)
marks the 50th anniversary of the darkest day in this nation’s history – at
least in my 61-year lifetime (and yes, even darker than Sept. 11, 2001). And now
living in the Dallas area makes it especially more sensitive as the city gears
up to produce a “non-celebration” of the singular event that continues … 50
years later … to define it.
When President John
F. Kennedy was assassinated in downtown Dallas while riding in a motorcade
through its streets, everything changed in America; innocence, it was said, was
totally lost, crushed and destroyed. Exactly who did it, why it was done and
what it subsequently meant has been the subject of more literature, talk and
cinematic conjecture than perhaps any single historical moment in American
history. Landing a man on the moon in 1969 marked the biggest achievement in
man’s earthly history, but the JFK murder was the bleakest episode I have ever
imagined.
It scarred all
Americans (alive at that moment) for life and it scarred a city (Dallas) for
all time; both groups live with the consequences to this day. When my wife and
I would travel to other cities, and mentioned being from “out-of-town” and
disclosing our location as being Dallas, the constant response was one of three
things – the Cowboys, J.R. Ewing, or … “that’s where Kennedy was killed.”
Actually, it often
came out of a stranger’s mouth as being “that’s the city that killed Kennedy.”
It is impossible to locate enough stain remover to wipe away those scars.
---
I was 11 years old
when Kennedy was killed and I can remember most of that weekend with surprising
clarity (it seems to have become the norm). You remember those traumatic
moments the most and all too often forget the times we really hope to cherish.
I was sitting in
fifth grade class (at Hampton Elementary in northern Detroit) and it was around
3:15 on that Friday afternoon (on Michigan time). Our teacher, Mrs. Gail Fuerhrig,
left the room and moments later, returned crying. She began stuttering something
about “the President has been shot” and disappeared again to hide her tears.
At 11, growing up in
a rather naive “Ozzie-and-Harriet” society, the concept of death was never
clearly defined to children as it is today. No child in that classroom had seen
the Abraham Zapruder film, or wondered about the grassy knoll behind Dealey
Plaza. “Shot” could have just meant, “Bang, bang, you’re dead!” in a playground
manner.
For the next three
days, no one watched anything else, talked about anything else and breathed
anything else until the funeral was completed the following Monday. And you
could do little else since the entire nation shut down for that 72-hour period.
Well, not exactly ALL
the nation. Of all things, Americans still went to sporting events – the NFL
schedule went on as usual on that Sunday, under some ridiculous guise of “The
President would have wanted to us to …”
The Michigan-Ohio
State game was not played on Nov. 23, but was held the next week, November 30 (Thanksgiving
weekend) in Michigan Stadium (according to official U-M record). The Wolverines
lost 14-10, en route to a miserable 3-4-2 record in front of just 36,424 fans –
the lowest crowd for any football game at Michigan from Sept. 22, 1945 (when a
mere 26,076 showed up to see Michigan play Great Lakes Naval Station).
For the record, in
the 50 years since, 1963 was the smallest home crowd ever in Michigan Stadium.
I remember the
solemnness and emotion of the funeral, with the horse-drawn caisson carrying
the casket and the rider-less horse, nervously walking up Pennsylvania Ave.
But the day before,
on the Sunday afternoon, live television broke new ground and crossed a line
that we, as a society, have never returned. I (and millions others) sat and
watched suspect Lee Harvey Oswald gunned down and murdered by Jack Ruby in the
basement of the Dallas Police headquarters … on live television.
For the first time in
that medium’s history, stark, raw, naked violence entered the American home.
And it came in connection with the worst crime in U.S. history. It WAS ground
zero for reality television!
Since that day, our
history has been earmarked by violence as a collective unit (warfare, riots, the
shooting of unarmed students at Kent State University, the 1968 Democratic
convention) or individual acts (the shooting deaths of Robert F. Kennedy and
Martin Luther King).
We will never know
what would have happened if Kennedy lived through that moment ... if there was
no gunfire the Texas Book Depository above Dealey Plaza. This much is true –
nothing changed the course of modern American history as much as that day.
There probably would have been an earlier end to the Vietnam War, Richard Nixon
probably would never have been president, Watergate would not have taken place
and Lord knows what else would NOT have come to pass.
That “what if” parlor
game can last forever.
---
I am like millions of
other people, who drive past the Texas Book Depository (now a county facility
and home to The Sixth Floor Museum), and get a creepy sensation when I look at
the, window, the plaza and the grassy knoll. When I drive under the Commerce
Street trestle (totally unchanged since 1963), I seen visions of the motorcade
headed to Parkland Hospital, and it makes my skin crawl; no matter how I try to
fight it, the feeling is everlasting.
“Down Elm Street,
turn right at Houston and left onto Commerce” remains, to this day one of the
best routes to leave downtown Dallas, on the same trek the motorcade, going
through an estimated 150,000 onlookers in Dallas to catch a glimpse of the
Kennedy (including Jackie, making her first campaign trip west of Virginia).
And you remember the
words of Nellie Connally, wife of then-Texas Gov. John Connally, sitting in the
front seat of the Lincoln Continental, carrying the President, as she turned
toward JFK and said, “See Mr. President! You can’t say Dallas doesn’t love
you!” The double-negative was almost immediately followed by the three shots.
Thus, the skin
crawls, the hairs stand to attention and you glimpse at the sixth floor and
simply wonder why…
When Oliver Stone’s
brilliantly-constructed movie, “JFK,” was released, the nation reinitiated the
debate about what happened on Nov. 22, 1963. The flaws which may have existed
in that effort can be debated, but the movie certainly was a breathtaking
examination of a retained popular point of view among many people. It asked
questions that needed to be raised and, in the end, sought truthful answers –
no matter what the truth revealed.
I first viewed the
movie in Dallas at the now-defunct North Park Cinema, with a large audience in
the house. The three hours rushed by in what seemed to be only a few minutes;
at the end, there was some applause, but mostly, people sat there stunned, a
little dazed and ... ashamed (the best word to describe the feelings of others
(saw).
I heard many people
crying, not for the memories of that day, but for how they felt about living in
Dallas.
“It makes me so
ashamed that it happened here,” said one woman. “WE killed him.”
Not true! But
perception has been that particular reality for the last 50 years. And that is
a tragedy in itself – which should be acknowledged (and attempted to erase)
after all this time. One cable documentary aired as background to the 50th
anniversary has been entitled, “Dallas: City of Hate;” a harsh but probably
accurate description of 1963, but NOT 2013.
What that 1963
incident did to Dallas is also a tragedy. For time infinitum, Dallas, Texas
became known worldwide as the city “where JFK was killed” or “the city that
killed Kennedy.” No amount of success by any sports franchise, or trying to
turn Dallas into a fashion capital, has erased that mental chalk outline.
Dallas didn’t deserve its fate; it’s just a fact of its life.
This is a city of
excellent restaurants, a growing fine arts district, strong multi-cultural
music scene, its own set of athletic champions (notably downtown-based Dallas
Mavericks and Stars) and ever-increasing attempts to better itself on a daily
basis.
Until a new signature
national brand or emblem takes root with the public, Nov. 22, 1963, will remain
Dallas’ (and America’s) darkest, indelible day ... when everything … and
everyone ... everywhere … changed.
Elm to Houston to
Commerce…
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