The 1960s was a decade filled with events that were memorable for how deeply moving they were.  It was a time marked by political violence, from which the nation has not yet recovered.  Starting with intense domestic strugggles involving race relations and culminating in a war that polarized the nation, assassinations were interspersed with events which divided the nation beyond the usual points of recognition.

 

 

Perhaps the most recognized footage ever filmed are the 30 or so seconds filmed by Abraham Zapruder who, with a newly purchased camera incorrectly switched to indoor filtering, stood upon a pillar at Dealey Plaza in Dallas at precisely the fateful moment when President Kennedy was assassinated.  This footage has been pored over, yet we are still unsure of the facts of this tragedy.  This is because the conclusions of the Warren Report state that this was the act of a lone gunman and this runs against counterarguments bolstered by the 1979 House Assassinations Committee Report which seemed to indicate that 4 shots were fired that day, not three.  If this is true, a Mannlicher-Carcano rifle could not be responsible as it is impossible for such a rifle to be fired 4 times in 7.1 seconds.  To many, the report raises as many questions as it attempts to answer. The person identified as the single shooter was former Marine Lee Harvey Oswald.  Unfortunately, Oswald was not able to tell his side of the story because just days after being taken into custody, and in the middle of President Kennedy's televised funeral, Mr. Oswald was gunned down while in custody of the Dallas Police by a known figure in Dallas, a club owner named Jack Ruby.  How Ruby appeared on the ramp at the precise moment of Oswald's movement from one set of custodial officials to another pushes the limits of plausibility as does Ruby's plea that he did it to spare Mrs, Kennedy the trauma of a trial.  The nature of this crime seeks a better explanation, that is, what is the reason someone would want the President dead and who would be in a position to silence the alleged killer?  Every apparent explanation strains credulity. Yet, the Warren Commission stands.  For those who are bothered by the bloody nature of this killing, Frame 313 on the Zapruder footage is to be avoided as it is the moment when the fatal shot hits the President.

 

On April 4th, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, perhaps the most surveilled figure of the Civil Rights period, was killed.  Somehow, his alleged killer managed to leave the country.  Many questions still exist involving this tragedy.  David Garrow's Pulitzer Prize winning book Bearing The Cross is a valuable source to study Dr. King's story. 

 

 

 

In the above scene from the CBS Evening News from April, 1968, legendary broadcaster Walter Cronkite shares the news with the nation that "the apostle of non-violence," Dr. Martin Luther King has been shot to death. 

 

CBS' Dan Rather, also an interviewee of Finding Sources, interviewed James Earl Ray in 1977 and grilled him with a series of questions about the uncertainty involving his reversal of his admission that he killed Dr. King.  There are still many questions about how Ray got from Memphis to England and was captured two months later.  This short excerpt from a longer interview raises many unanswered questions.

 
On the night of Dr., King's death, Robert Kennedy, then a candidate for president, was campaigning in Indianapolis, Indiana.  There, he told a large gathering of Dr. King's murder and comforted the disturbed crowd. His extemporaneous remarks are so powerful that they may be among the finest words he ever spoke in public.  A statue at that location commemorates his remarks. He would be felled himself by an assassin (or assassins) just two months later.



Robert Kennedy's assassination on June 5, 1968, set the country on a course from which it has never quite rebounded.

Click for more info on RFK and an interview with Juan Romero, the young busboy who came to his aid.

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