The Assassination

A Shattering Afternoon in Dallas

Assassination was impossible. John Kennedy, with Jackie beside him in her raspberry pink suit, was too young, too exuberant to fall. The Secret Service, snooping beneath manhole covers, scanning for hostile eyes, was invincible. There would be no darkness on this bright day in Dallas.

How fragile our myths, how fleeting certainty.

Perhaps we knew when the first sound reached the press bus behind Kennedy's limousine. A distant crack, another. A pause, and another crack. Something was dangerously off-key.

Bob Pierpoint of CBS stood up, and our eyes met for ever so tiny an instant. We knew but did not want...

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