The 6th Floor

On November 22, 1963 President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, TX.

This is the view from the 7th floor window of the book depository, just above the 6th floor window in which Lee Harvey Oswald pulled the trigger.

Photography is not permitted on the 6th floor, which is now a museum. The trees in this shot were much smaller in 1963

 

 

The book depository is now a city administration building, with the museum on the top two floors. Other than the trees, Dealey Plaza is basically unchanged from the day of the assassination.

Another change is the painted X marking the spot where the fatal bullet hit the President.

For anyone who remembers the assassination, seeing Dealey Plaza and the museum is a moving experience. There are very view artifacts from the killing – Jack Ruby’s hat, the Zapruder camera, and a few other things.

 

What the museum has is a photographic, video, and audio history of the Kennedy presidency from the 1960 campaign through the assassination, the killing of Oswald  and the multiple investigations that followed.

The exhibits cover the various conspiracy theories, the two-shooter scenario, and the possible bullet trajectories, and reaches no firm conclusion on what actually happened.

Outside the museum someone placed a giant sign identifying the “grassy knoll” from which the theoretical second shooter fired his weapon. I thought the sign was a bit tacky, but this is Texas.