Legacies: A History Journal for Dallas and North Central Texas, Volume 27, Number 2, Fall 2015 Page: 24 of 67
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History in Conflict
Kennedy Assassination Memorialization
in Dallas 1963-1989
BY STEPHEN FAGIN2n the first anniversary of the Kennedy
assassination, November 22, 1964, United Press
International estimated that hundreds of John F
Kennedy memorial tributes had been established
around the world. By the time that news story
was revisited exactly one year later, Kennedy me-
morials around the globe numbered well into
the thousands.Within a week of the assassination,
Cape Canaveral became Cape Kennedy. Idlewild
Airport in NewYork became John F Kennedy In-
ternational. Within two months, Congress voted
to name the National Cultural Center in Wash-
ington, D.C., the John F Kennedy Center for the
Performing Arts. In Massachusetts, the President's
home state, there were so many memorial pro-
posals "that a special commission was created to
choose among them." Around the world, in ad-
dition to newly-created statues and memorials,
a number of schools, bridges, civic centers, golf
courses, theaters, streets and avenues-even a for-
est and a mountain-were renamed in memory
of President Kennedy.'
But what about Dallas? Burdened with the
stigma "city of hate" and unfairly characterized
as a toxic environment dominated by right-wingextremism, Dallas was identified around the world
as the place where the President was shot. With
Dealey Plaza as the city's most visited site, and
with the Texas School Book Depository "one of
the world's most photographed structures," Presi-
dent Kennedy's murder was a painful memory for
local residents, and few were eager to perpetuate
the tragedy with some permanent installation.2
While detailing grand memorials elsewhere
in the United States, the UPI story from the sec-
ond anniversary in November 1965 briefly men-
tioned that Dallasites would, within a year, un-
veil a bronze plaque in Dealey Plaza and that a
memorial structure designed by architect Philip
Johnson would follow a few blocks away-and
it would, nearly five years later, in 1970. Overall,
however, the Dallas response seemed lackluster by
comparison. In a city so tormented by a global
tragedy, one might well ask: how do you com-
memorate such an emotionally charged site?3
More than twenty-five years after the assas-
sination, the sixth floor of the Texas School Book
Depository became an exhibition on the life,
death, and legacy of President Kennedy. Upon its
opening, The Sixth Floor, later The Sixth Floor22 LEGACIES Fall 2015
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Hazel, Michael V. Legacies: A History Journal for Dallas and North Central Texas, Volume 27, Number 2, Fall 2015, periodical, Autumn 2015; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth712400/m1/24/?q=wax: accessed June 5, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Dallas Historical Society.