Memories of JFK assassination still vivid after 50 years

What were you doing 50 years ago today? It is a moment that most any citizen of Springfield over the age of 55 can tell you where they were, what they were doing and how they felt when they heard the news.

It is one of those moments that each generation seems to have — a moment when time stood still.

For people age 80 and older, that day could be the attack on Pearl Harbor. For the younger generation today, it most likely is 9/11.

But for many people, from seniors to baby boomers, what happened 50 years ago Friday, November 22, will always be a part of their psyches. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated that day while visiting Dallas, Texas. It happened about 1:30 p.m. our time, and news quickly spread across Vermont, the nation and the world.

Like that year, November 22 falls on a Friday again in 2013. Unlike 1963, when all commercials on television were suspended for four days straight, people will not be fixated on every word and picture they see on the television. All the preparations for the funeral, the long lines of people waiting to see the president’s casket, waiting to hear if the police caught the assassin, then two days later seeing the suspect get killed on live TV.

Only once in his brief three year presidency did John Kennedy have any direct connection with Springfield, Vermont. In 1960, Bryant Grinder Corporation received an order for 45 Centalign B grinders from the Soviet Union. A year later, after much work was completed, President Kennedy intervened and had the U.S. Commerce Department revoke the export license. The high precision machines produce miniature ball-bearings accurate to twenty-five millionths of an inch which are the type used in Intercontinental Ballistic Missile warheads. But twelve years later, the Soviets ordered 164 of these same machines from Bryant's, and this time, the export license was appproved by President Nixon. As a consequence, Soviet missile accuracy improved dramatically in the 1970s to the point where 90 percent of our land-based ICBM force could now be destroyed in a first strike.

Today at Dealy Plaza in Dallas, Texas where the assassination took place, the mayor of Dallas will lead a ceremony honoring the memory of President John F. Kennedy. The public is barred from attending, only invited ticket holders will be allowed within sight of Dealy Plaza. Of the more than 15,000 who applied for admission, 5,000 have been granted tickets. (Reportedly anyone known to question the government's official story of the assassination was rejected.) Security for the event is tight, roads will be blocked, all manhole covers have been welded shut and nearby buildings will be closed for the day.

Aerial photo of Dealy Plaza taken November 22, 1963

The public is being offered an alternative way to participate. Giant outdoor TV screens have been set up in the city at 3 other nearby locations. People around the world may view a live stream of the ceremony by going to http://50thhonoringjohnfkennedy.com/ or http://www.dallasnews.com/news/jfk50/

Shortly after Kennedy was slain, President Johnson appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to form a commission to investigate the assassination.  On September 10, 1964, the Warren Commission issued its final report concluding that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone to kill the president. But over the years, polls have shown as many as 90% of Americans have doubts about the official story.  Among the more notable doubters...

John Kerry,  Secretary of State:

"Regarding possible conspiracies, to this day I have serious doubts that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I certainly have doubts that he was motivated to do that by himself."

-- Article in Parade Magazine, November 13, 2013

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.,  nephew of President Kennedy

“I don’t know if it’s right or not, but a lot of the evidence, at this point, anyway, is very convincing, there was not a lone gunman.” 

-- Article in the Dallas Morning News Opinion Blog quoting what he said on the Charlie Rose program, January 12, 2013

President Lyndon Johnson

  "I can't honestly say that I've ever been completely relieved of the fact that there might have been international connections"

-- Television interview with Walter Cronkite, 1969,  now a YouTube clip

Jesse Curry, Dallas Police Chief in 1963

"I can't  say that I would swear there was one man and one man alone, I think there is a possibility there could have been another man.  

--  Interview clip on YouTube

Governor John Connally

“They talk about the one-bullet or two-bullet theory, but as far as I’m concerned, there is no ‘theory.’ There is my absolute knowledge, and Nellie’s too, that one bullet caused the president’s first wound, then an entirely separate shot struck me.” 

-- Quoted in Life magazine, 1966 

Richard Russell, Senator and former Warren Commissioner

"We have not been told the truth about Oswald."  

-- Whitewash IV,  by Harold Weisberg, p. 21.

Hale Boggs, Majority Leader and former Warren Commissioner:

"Hoover lied his eyes out to the Commission - on Oswald, on Ruby, on their friends, the bullets, the guns, you name it..." 

-- Coincidence or Conspiracy?, by Bernard Fensterwald Jr. and Michael Ewing, p. 96. The quote comes from an unnamed aide to Congressman Boggs

John Sherman Cooper, Senator and former Warren Commissioner:

"On what basis is it claimed that two shots caused all the wounds?.....It seemed to me that Governor Connally's statement negates such a conclusion. I could not agree with this statement." 

- The Zapruder Film, by David Wrone, p. 247. Cooper was commenting on a draft of the Warren Report. Wrone is citing the papers of J. Lee Rankin, wherein Cooper's written comments appeared.

H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, former Nixon chief of staff:

"After Kennedy was killed, the CIA launched a fantastic cover-up. Many of the facts about Oswald unavoidably pointed to a Cuban connection.....In a chilling parallel to their cover-up at Watergate, the CIA literally erased any connection between Kennedy's assassination and the CIA." 

-- The Ends of Power, by H.R. Haldeman with Joseph DiMona, p. 39.

Richard Schweiker, Senator and former Church Committee member:

"I think the [Warren] report, to those who have studied it closely, has collapsed like a house of cards.....the fatal mistake the Warren Commission made was not to use its own investigators, but instead to rely on the CIA and FBI personnel, which played directly into the hands of senior intelligence officials who directed the cover-up."

- speaking on Face the Nation on 27 Jun 1976

House Select Committee of Assassinations (HSCA)

"The committee believes, on the basis of the evidence available to it, that President John F. Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. The committee is unable to identify the other gunman or the extent of the conspiracy." —Final Report, House Select Committee of Assassinations (HSCA), 1979

G. Robert Blakey, former Chief Counsel of the HSCA:

"I now no longer believe anything the Agency [CIA] told the committee any further than I can obtain substantial corroboration for it from outside the Agency for its veracity.....We also now know that the Agency set up a process that could only have been designed to frustrate the ability of the committee in 1976-79 to obtain any information that might adversely affect the Agency. Many have told me that the culture of the Agency is one of prevarication and dissimulation and that you cannot trust it or its people. Period. End of story. I am now in that camp." 

- in an addendum to the web page for the Frontline episode "Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald?", after Blakey learned that CIA-HSCA liaison George Joannides had been case officer for the DRE in 1962-64.

On CNN's website:

One JFK conspiracy theory that could be true

November 18, 2013