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144-456: While walking in the woods near the small town of Haven, Maine, Roberta "Bobbi" Anderson, a writer of Wild West -themed fiction, stumbles upon a metal object that turns out to be a protrusion of a long-buried alien spacecraft. Once exposed, the spacecraft begins to release an invisible gas into the atmosphere that gradually transforms people into beings similar to the aliens who populated the ship. The transformation, or "becoming", provides them with

288-489: A pulmonary embolism , secondary to cancer. Like Oswald and Kennedy, Ruby was declared dead at Parkland Hospital. My god, I saw the whole thing. I saw the man's brains come out of his head. — Abraham Zapruder Standing on the pergola wall some 65 feet (20 m) from the road, tailor Abraham Zapruder recorded Kennedy's killing on 26 seconds of silent 8 mm film — known as the Zapruder film . Frame 313 captures

432-593: A child. In 1962, he returned to the United States with a repatriation loan from the U.S. Embassy. He settled in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, where he socialized with Russian émigrés—notably George de Mohrenschildt . In March 1963, a bullet narrowly missed General Edwin Walker at his Dallas residence; a witness observed two conspicuous men. Relying on Marina's testimony, a note left by Oswald, and ballistic evidence,

576-494: A crucial role in national expansion. It facilitated expansion into the West by creating an inexpensive, fast, convenient communication system. Letters from early settlers provided information and boosterism to encourage increased migration to the West, helped scattered families stay in touch and provide neutral help, assisted entrepreneurs to find business opportunities, and made possible regular commercial relationships between merchants and

720-534: A few thousand French migrated to Canada; these habitants settled in villages along the St. Lawrence River , building communities that remained stable for long stretches. Although French fur traders ranged widely through the Great Lakes and midwest region, they seldom settled down. French settlement was limited to a few very small villages such as Kaskaskia, Illinois as well as a larger settlement around New Orleans . In what

864-444: A few years, the pioneer added hogs, sheep, and cattle, and perhaps acquired a horse. Homespun clothing replaced the animal skins. The more restless pioneers grew dissatisfied with over civilized life and uprooted themselves again to move 50 or a hundred miles (80 or 160 km) further west. The land policy of the new nation was conservative, paying special attention to the needs of the settled East. The goals sought by both parties in

1008-421: A frontier of settlement, but at present the unsettled area has been so broken into by isolated bodies of settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line. In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, etc., it can not, therefore, any longer have a place in the census reports." Despite this, the later 1900 U.S. census continued to show the westward frontier line, and his successors continued

1152-453: A gun barrel emerge from a sixth floor Depository window. Bonnie Ray Williams, who was on the fifth floor of the Depository, stated that the rifle's report was so loud and near that ceiling plaster fell onto his head. When searching the sixth floor of the Depository, two deputies found an Italian Carcano M91/38 bolt-action rifle. Oswald had purchased the used rifle the previous March under

1296-473: A jacket and revolver. At 1:12 p.m., police officer J. D. Tippit spotted Oswald walking in the residential neighborhood of Oak Cliff and called him to his patrol car. After an exchange of words, Tippit exited his vehicle; Oswald then shot Tippit three times in the chest. As Tippit lay on the ground, Oswald fired a final shot into Tippit's right temple . Oswald then calmly walked away before running as witnesses emerged. As Dallas police officers conducted

1440-495: A large, "roughly ovular " [ sic ] hole on the rear, right side of the head, and spraying blood and fragments. His brain and blood spatter landed as far as the following Secret Service car and the motorcycle officers. Secret Service Agent Clint Hill was riding on the running board of the car immediately behind Kennedy's limousine. Hill testified to the Warren Commission that he heard one shot, jumped onto

1584-407: A limited form of genius which makes them very inventive but does not provide any philosophical or ethical insight into their inventions, and they often do not understand the principles of the inventions (one of them admits, "We're builders, not understanders"). The spacecraft also prevents those affected by it from leaving town, provokes psychotic violence in some people, and causes the disappearance of

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1728-506: A new miniseries based on The Tommyknockers . THR reported on March 29, 2018, that The Conjuring filmmaker James Wan and the 2017 It producer Roy Lee will join up with producer Larry Sanitsky to create a feature film version of The Tommyknockers . American frontier The American frontier , also known as the Old West , and popularly known as the Wild West , encompasses

1872-468: A one-room log cabin. The main food supply at first came from hunting deer, turkeys, and other abundant game. Clad in typical frontier garb, leather breeches, moccasins, fur cap, and hunting shirt, and girded by a belt from which hung a hunting knife and a shot pouch—all homemade—the pioneer presented a unique appearance. In a short time he opened in the woods a patch, or clearing, on which he grew corn, wheat, flax, tobacco, and other products, even fruit. In

2016-781: A party of 20 soldiers to find the headwaters of the Mississippi. He later explored the Red and Arkansas Rivers in Spanish territory, eventually reaching the Rio Grande . On his return, Pike sighted the peak in Colorado named after him . Major Stephen Harriman Long (1784–1864) led the Yellowstone and Missouri expeditions of 1819–1820, but his categorizing in 1823 of the Great Plains as arid and useless led to

2160-410: A police inspector to report seeing a shooter—a white man in khaki clothing—in the same window. Police broadcast Brennan's description of the man at 12:45 p.m. Brennan testified that, after the second shot, "This man   ... was aiming for his last shot ... and maybe paused for another second as though to assure himself that he had hit his mark." Witness James R. Worrell Jr. also reported seeing

2304-487: A press conference after midnight on November 23, and, early in the investigation, made many leaks to the media. Their conduct angered Johnson, who instructed the FBI to tell them to "stop talking about the assassination". Dallas Police, after the FBI expressed concerns that someone might try to kill Oswald, assured federal authorities that they would provide him adequate protection. The FBI immediately launched an investigation into

2448-470: A principal trading center for Mississippi River traffic and inland commerce but remained under Spanish control until 1803. Thomas Jefferson thought of himself as a man of the frontier and was keenly interested in expanding and exploring the West. Jefferson's Louisiana Purchase of 1803 doubled the size of the nation at the cost of $ 15 million, or about $ 0.04 per acre ($ 305 million in 2023 dollars, less than 42 cents per acre). Federalists opposed

2592-529: A profitable monopoly; he left the business as a multi-millionaire in 1834. As the frontier moved west, trappers and hunters moved ahead of settlers, searching out new supplies of beaver and other skins for shipment to Europe. The hunters were the first Europeans in much of the Old West and they formed the first working relationships with the Native Americans in the West. They added extensive knowledge of

2736-506: A roll call of Depository employees, Oswald's supervisor Roy Truly realized that Oswald was absent and notified the police. Based on a false identification of Oswald, Dallas police raided a library in Oak Cliff before realizing their mistake. At 1:36 p.m., the police were called after a conspicuous Oswald, tired from running, was seen sneaking into the Texas Theatre without paying. With

2880-402: A salutary restraint upon the tribes, who would feel that any foray by their warriors upon the white settlements would meet with prompt retaliation upon their own homes. There was a debate at the time about the best size for the forts with Jefferson Davis , Winfield Scott , and Thomas Jesup supporting forts that were larger but fewer in number than Floyd. Floyd's plan was more expensive but had

3024-564: A spirit of nationalism and providing a necessary infrastructure. The army early on assumed the mission of protecting settlers along with the Westward Expansion Trails , a policy that was described by U.S. Secretary of War John B. Floyd in 1857: A line of posts running parallel without frontier, but near to the Indians' usual habitations, placed at convenient distances and suitable positions, and occupied by infantry, would exercise

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3168-675: A storekeeper, a minister, and perhaps a doctor; and there were several landless laborers. All the rest were farmers. In the South, frontier areas that lacked transportation, such as the Appalachian Mountains region, remained based on subsistence farming and resembled the egalitarianism of their northern counterparts, although they had a larger upper-class of slaveowners. North Carolina was representative. However, frontier areas of 1700 that had good river connections were increasingly transformed into plantation agriculture. Rich men came in, bought up

3312-483: A vast majority of Americans believed there was a conspiracy. The assassination left a profound impact and was the first of four major assassinations during the 1960s in the United States , coming two years before the assassination of Malcolm X in 1965, and five years before the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Kennedy's brother Robert in 1968. Kennedy was the fourth U.S. president to be assassinated and

3456-457: A young boy, David Brown, whose older brother Hilly teleports him to the planet referred to as Altair 4 by the Havenites (a reference to Forbidden Planet ). The book's central character is James Eric Gardener, a poet and friend of Bobbi, who goes by the nickname "Gard". He is somewhat immune to the ship's effects because of the steel plate in his head, a souvenir of a teenage skiing accident. Gard

3600-411: Is also an alcoholic and is prone to binges that result in violent outbursts followed by lengthy blackouts. As Bobbi is almost totally overcome by the euphoria of "becoming" one with the spacecraft, Gard increasingly sees her health worsen and her sanity disappear. Gard feels he has little to live for aside from his friendship with Bobbi and decides to stay with her to try to halt her decline. He witnesses

3744-510: Is famous for classifying and painting in minute details 500 species of birds, published in Birds of America . The most famous of the explorers was John Charles Frémont (1813–1890), an Army officer in the Corps of Topographical Engineers. He displayed a talent for exploration and a genius at self-promotion that gave him the sobriquet of "Pathmarker of the West" and led him to the presidential nomination of

3888-523: Is now New York state the Dutch set up fur trading posts in the Hudson River valley, followed by large grants of land to rich landowning patroons who brought in tenant farmers who created compact, permanent villages. They created a dense rural settlement in upstate New York, but they did not push westward. Areas in the north that were in the frontier stage by 1700 generally had poor transportation facilities, so

4032-658: Is the most recent to have died in office . In 1960, John F. Kennedy, then a U.S. senator from Massachusetts , was elected the 35th president of the United States with Lyndon B. Johnson as his vice presidential running mate. Kennedy's tenure saw the height of the Cold War , and much of his foreign policy was dedicated to countering the Soviet Union and communism . As president, he authorized operations to overthrow Fidel Castro 's communist government in Cuba , which culminated in

4176-504: The Dallas Times Herald photographed the shooting which was titled, Jack Ruby Shoots Lee Harvey Oswald for which he was awarded the 1964 Pulitzer Prize for Photography . Drifting in and out of consciousness, Oswald was taken by ambulance to Parkland Memorial Hospital; he was treated by the same surgeons who had tried to save Kennedy. The bullet had entered his lower left chest but had not exited; major heart blood vessels such as

4320-641: The Louisiana Purchase , giving rise to the expansionist attitude known as " manifest destiny " and historians' " Frontier Thesis ". The legends, historical events and folklore of the American frontier, known as the frontier myth , have embedded themselves into United States culture so much so that the Old West, and the Western genre of media specifically, has become one of the defining features of American national identity. Historians have debated at length as to when

4464-701: The Midwest and American South , though no longer considered "western", have a frontier heritage along with the modern western states. Richard W. Slatta, in his view of the frontier, writes that "historians sometimes define the American West as lands west of the 98th meridian or 98° west longitude ," and that other definitions of the region "include all lands west of the Mississippi or Missouri rivers." Key:      States        Territories        Disputed areas        Other countries In

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4608-571: The National Archives . Conspiracy theorists often claim that the brain may have shown that the headshot entered from the front. Alternatively, the HSCA concluded that an assistant to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy , the president's brother, likely removed the footlocker holding the brain and other materials at his direction, and he "either destroyed these materials or otherwise rendered them inaccessible" to prevent "misuse" of said material or to hide

4752-543: The Warren Commission attributed this assassination attempt to Oswald. In April 1963, Oswald returned to his birthplace, New Orleans, and established an independent chapter of the pro-Castro Fair Play for Cuba Committee , of which he was the sole member. While passing out pro-Castro literature alongside unknown compatriots, Oswald was arrested after scuffling with anti-Castro Cuban exiles . In late September 1963, Oswald traveled to Mexico City , where, according to

4896-752: The West Coast . Enormous popular attention was focused on the Western United States (especially the Southwest ) in the second half of the 19th century and the early 20th century, from the 1850s to the 1910s. Such media typically exaggerated the romance, anarchy, and chaotic violence of the period for greater dramatic effect. This inspired the Western genre of film, along with television shows , novels , comic books , video games , children's toys, and costumes. As defined by Hine and Faragher, "frontier history tells

5040-434: The aorta and inferior vena cava were severed, and the spleen, kidney, and liver were hit. Despite surgical intervention and defibrillation , Oswald died at 1:07 p.m. Arrested immediately after the shooting, Ruby testified to the Warren Commission that he had been distraught by Kennedy's death and that killing Oswald would spare "Mrs. Kennedy the discomfiture of coming back to trial". He also stated he shot Oswald on

5184-621: The colonial era , before 1776, the west was of high priority for settlers and politicians. The American frontier began when Jamestown , Virginia, was settled by the English in 1607. In the earliest days of European settlement on the Atlantic coast, until about 1680, the frontier was essentially any part of the interior of the continent beyond the fringe of existing settlements along the Atlantic coast. English , French , Spanish , and Dutch patterns of expansion and settlement were quite different. Only

5328-445: The 1600s to the 1900s (decades) with occasional movements north into Maine and New Hampshire, south into Florida, and east from California into Nevada. Pockets of settlements would also appear far past the established frontier line, particularly on the West Coast and the deep interior, with settlements such as Los Angeles and Salt Lake City respectively. The " West " was the recently settled area near that boundary. Thus, parts of

5472-462: The 1790–1820 era were to grow the economy, avoid draining away the skilled workers needed in the East, distribute the land wisely, sell it at prices that were reasonable to settlers yet high enough to pay off the national debt, clear legal titles, and create a diversified Western economy that would be closely interconnected with the settled areas with minimal risk of a breakaway movement. By the 1830s, however,

5616-564: The 1840s called for low-cost land for free white farmers, a position enacted into law by the new Republican Party in 1862, offering free 160 acres (65 ha) homesteads to all adults, male and female, black and white, native-born or immigrant. After winning the Revolutionary War (1783), American settlers in large numbers poured into the west. In 1788, American pioneers to the Northwest Territory established Marietta, Ohio , as

5760-596: The Appalachian Mountains included the Connecticut River valley, and northern New England (which was a move to the north, not the west). Settlers on the frontier often connected isolated incidents to indicate Indian conspiracies to attack them, but these lacked a French diplomatic dimension after 1763, or a Spanish connection after 1820. Most of the frontiers experienced numerous conflicts. The French and Indian War broke out between Britain and France, with

5904-470: The British plan to set up a Native state in U.S. territory south of the Great Lakes. They explained the American policy toward the acquisition of Native lands: The United States, while intending never to acquire lands from the Indians otherwise than peaceably, and with their free consent, are fully determined, in that manner, progressively, and in proportion as their growing population may require, to reclaim from

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6048-596: The First Lady boarded a 1961 Lincoln Continental convertible limousine to travel to a luncheon at the Dallas Trade Mart . Other occupants of this vehicle—the second in the motorcade—were Secret Service Agent Bill Greer , who drove; Special Agent Roy Kellerman in the front passenger seat; and Governor Connally and his wife Nellie, who sat just forward of the Kennedys. Four Dallas police motorcycle officers accompanied

6192-544: The French making up for their small colonial population base by enlisting Native war parties as allies. The series of large wars spilling over from European wars ended in a complete victory for the British in the worldwide Seven Years' War . In the peace treaty of 1763 , France ceded practically everything, as the lands west of the Mississippi River, in addition to Florida and New Orleans, went to Spain. Otherwise, lands east of

6336-621: The Homestead Law of 1862, with a moderated pace that gave settlers 160 acres free after they worked on it for five years. The private profit motive dominated the movement westward, but the federal government played a supporting role in securing the land through treaties and setting up territorial governments, with governors appointed by the President. The federal government first acquired western territory through treaties with other nations or native tribes. Then it sent surveyors to map and document

6480-557: The Kennedy limousine. Vice President Johnson, his wife Lady Bird , and Senator Yarborough rode in another convertible. The motorcade's meandering 10-mile (16 km) route through Dallas was designed to give Kennedy maximum exposure to crowds by passing through a suburban section of Dallas, and Main Street in Downtown Dallas , before turning right on Houston Street. After another block,

6624-671: The Mississippi River and what is now Canada went to Britain. Regardless of wars, Americans were moving across the Appalachians into western Pennsylvania, what is now West Virginia, and areas of the Ohio Country , Kentucky, and Tennessee. In the southern settlements via the Cumberland Gap , their most famous leader was Daniel Boone . Young George Washington promoted settlements in West Virginia on lands awarded to him and his soldiers by

6768-703: The Missouri River, and such principal stream of it, as, by its course and communication with the waters of the Pacific Ocean; whether the Columbia, Oregon, Colorado, or any other river may offer the most direct and practicable communication across the continent for commerce". Jefferson also instructed the expedition to study the region's native tribes (including their morals, language, and culture), weather, soil, rivers, commercial trading, and animal and plant life. Entrepreneurs, most notably John Jacob Astor quickly seized

6912-590: The Northeast, there was little competition on the western frontier for Transylvania University , founded in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1780. It boasted of a law school in addition to its undergraduate and medical programs. Transylvania attracted politically ambitious young men from across the Southwest, including 50 who became United States senators, 101 representatives, 36 governors, and 34 ambassadors, as well as Jefferson Davis,

7056-456: The Northwest terrain, including the important South Pass through the central Rocky Mountains. Discovered about 1812, it later became a major route for settlers to Oregon and Washington. By 1820, however, a new "brigade-rendezvous" system sent company men in "brigades" cross-country on long expeditions, bypassing many tribes. It also encouraged "free trappers" to explore new regions on their own. At

7200-623: The Royal government in payment for their wartime service in Virginia's militia. Settlements west of the Appalachian Mountains were curtailed briefly by the Royal Proclamation of 1763 , forbidding settlement in this area. The Treaty of Fort Stanwix (1768) re-opened most of the western lands for frontiersmen to settle. The nation was at peace after 1783. The states gave Congress control of the western lands and an effective system for population expansion

7344-568: The Tommyknocker man. The writer and critic Kim Newman said of the novel that King had "more or less rewritten Quatermass and the Pit ", a television serial from the late 1950s in which an alien spacecraft excavated in London evokes latent psychic abilities in some of the people who come near it. King wrote The Tommyknockers at a time when substance abuse was a significant part of his life. Metaphors for

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7488-466: The Tommyknockers have no moral limits to keep them from using living beings as organic batteries. As they leave the ship and return to Bobbi's home, Gard plans to kill Bobbi as he can see she is no longer human. Using a gun, Bobbi forces Gard to swallow a lethal dose of Valium . As they talk, he shields his mind, pulls his own gun out, and shoots Bobbi. As Bobbi dies, she telepathically screams and alerts

7632-410: The Warren Commission and the HSCA, Kennedy was waving to the crowds on his right when a shot entered his upper back and exited his throat just beneath his larynx . He raised his elbows and clenched his fists in front of his face and neck, then leaned forward and leftward. Mrs. Kennedy, facing him, put her arms around him. Although a serious wound, it likely would have been survivable. According to

7776-537: The Warren Commission's single-bullet theory —derided as the "magic bullet theory" by conspiracy theorists—Governor Connally was injured by the same bullet that exited Kennedy's neck. The bullet created an oval-shaped entry wound near Connally's shoulder, struck and destroyed several inches of his right fifth rib, and exited his chest just below his right nipple, puncturing and collapsing his lung . That same bullet then entered his arm just above his right wrist and shattered his right radius bone . The bullet exited just below

7920-713: The Warren Commission, he visited the Soviet and Cuban embassies. On October 3, Oswald returned to Dallas and found work at the Texas School Book Depository on Dealey Plaza . During the workweek he lived separately from Marina at a Dallas rooming house . On the morning of the assassination, he carried a long package (which he told coworkers contained curtain rods) into the Depository; the Warren Commission concluded that this package contained Oswald's disassembled rifle. On November 22, Air Force One arrived at Dallas Love Field at 11:40 a.m. President Kennedy and

8064-519: The West and wholesalers and factories back east. The postal service likewise assisted the Army in expanding control over the vast western territories. The widespread circulation of important newspapers by mail, such as the New York Weekly Tribune , facilitated coordination among politicians in different states. The postal service helped to integrate already established areas with the frontier, creating

8208-517: The West was filling up with squatters who had no legal deed, although they may have paid money to previous settlers. The Jacksonian Democrats favored the squatters by promising rapid access to cheap land. By contrast, Henry Clay was alarmed at the "lawless rabble" heading West who were undermining the utopian concept of a law-abiding, stable middle-class republican community. Rich southerners, meanwhile, looked for opportunities to buy high-quality land to set up slave plantations. The Free Soil movement of

8352-469: The Wilderness Road. Kentucky at this time had been depopulated—it was "empty of Indian villages." However raiding parties sometimes came through. One of those intercepted was Abraham Lincoln 's grandfather, who was scalped in 1784 near Louisville. The War of 1812 marked the final confrontation involving major British and Native forces fighting to stop American expansion. The British war goal included

8496-430: The advance of American settlement westward, explain American development." Through treaties with foreign nations and native tribes , political compromise, military conquest, the establishment of law and order, the building of farms, ranches, and towns, the marking of trails and digging of mines, combined with successive waves of immigrants moving into the region, the United States expanded from coast to coast, fulfilling

8640-484: The alias "A. Hidell" and had it delivered to his Dallas P.O. box . The FBI found Oswald's partial palm print on the barrel, and fibers on the rifle were consistent with those of Oswald's shirt. A bullet found on Governor Connally's hospital gurney and two fragments found in the limousine were ballistically matched to the Carcano. Oswald left the Depository and traveled by bus to his boarding house, where he retrieved

8784-516: The archetypical Old West or "Wild West" such as violent conflict arising from encroaching settlement into frontier land, the removal and assimilation of natives, consolidation of property to large corporations and government, vigilantism, and the attempted enforcement of laws upon outlaws. In 1890, the Superintendent of the Census, William Rush Merriam stated: "Up to and including 1880 the country had

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8928-511: The assassination, Oswald returned home to retrieve a pistol; he shot and killed lone Dallas policeman J. D. Tippit shortly afterwards. Around 70 minutes after Kennedy and Connally were shot, Oswald was apprehended by the Dallas Police Department and charged under Texas state law with the murders of Kennedy and Tippit. Two days later, at 11:21 a.m. on November 24, 1963, as live television cameras covered Oswald's being moved through

9072-402: The assassination, but at farther distances than Zapruder. Of the three, only Nix — who filmed the assassination from the opposite side of Elm Street from Zapruder, capturing the grassy knoll — actually recorded the fatal shot. In 1966, Nix claimed that, after he gave the film to the FBI, the duplicate that they returned had frames "missing" or "ruined". Although lower-quality duplicates exist,

9216-499: The assassination; researchers have nicknamed her the Babushka Lady due to the shawl around her head. In 1978, Gordon Arnold came forward and claimed that he had filmed the assassination from the grassy knoll and that a police officer had confiscated his film. Arnold is not visible in any photographs taken of the area, which Vincent Bugliosi —author of Reclaiming History —called "conclusive photographic proof that Arnold's story

9360-651: The autopsy was "like sending a seven-year-old boy who has taken three lessons on the violin over to the New York Philharmonic and expecting him to perform a Tchaikovsky symphony". Following the autopsy, Kennedy lay in repose in the East Room of the White House for 24 hours. President Johnson issued Presidential Proclamation 3561 , declaring November 25 to be a national day of mourning , and that only essential emergency workers be at their posts. The coffin

9504-451: The basement of Dallas Police Headquarters , he was fatally shot by Dallas nightclub operator Jack Ruby . Like Kennedy, Oswald was taken to Parkland Memorial Hospital, where he soon died. Ruby was convicted of Oswald's murder, though the decision was overturned on appeal, and Ruby died in prison in 1967 while awaiting a new trial. After a 10-month investigation, the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald assassinated Kennedy, and that there

9648-556: The book include the dangers of unchecked technological advancement and the corrupting influence of power. Bobbi uses the threat of stupid people in charge ("the Dallas Police", referring to how poorly the Dallas police handled the JFK assassination ) to get Gardener to help her until Gardener realizes that also applied to the Tommyknockers themselves. Gardener obsesses over the subject of "the nukes",

9792-424: The coalition of hostile Native tribes. Meanwhile, General Andrew Jackson ended the Native military threat in the Southeast at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814 in Alabama. In general, the frontiersmen battled the Natives with little help from the U.S. Army or the federal government. To end the war, American diplomats negotiated the Treaty of Ghent , signed towards the end of 1814, with Britain. They rejected

9936-495: The complete film at $ 16 million (equivalent to $ 27.5 million in 2022). Zapruder was one of at least 32 people in Dealey Plaza known to have made film or still photographs at or around the time of the shooting. Most notably among the photographers, Mary Moorman took several photos of Kennedy with her Polaroid , including one of Kennedy less than one-sixth of a second after the headshot. In addition to Zapruder, Charles Bronson, Marie Muchmore , and Orville Nix filmed

10080-433: The creation of an Indian barrier state under British auspices in the Midwest which would halt American expansion westward. American frontier militiamen under General Andrew Jackson defeated the Creeks and opened the Southwest, while militia under Governor William Henry Harrison defeated the Native-British alliance at the Battle of the Thames in Canada in 1813. The death in battle of the Native leader Tecumseh dissolved

10224-417: The edge of a line of settlement. Theorist Frederick Jackson Turner went deeper, arguing that the frontier was the scene of a defining process of American civilization: "The frontier," he asserted, "promoted the formation of a composite nationality for the American people." He theorized it was a process of development: "This perennial rebirth, this fluidity of American life, this expansion westward...furnish[es]

10368-678: The end of the gathering season, the trappers would "rendezvous" and turn in their goods for pay at river ports along the Green River , Upper Missouri, and the Upper Mississippi. St. Louis was the largest of the rendezvous towns. By 1830, however, fashions changed and beaver hats were replaced by silk hats, ending the demand for expensive American furs. Thus ended the era of the mountain men , trappers, and scouts such as Jedediah Smith , Hugh Glass , Davy Crockett , Jack Omohundro , and others. The trade in beaver fur virtually ceased by 1845. There

10512-473: The established frontier line. The U.S. Census Bureau designated frontier territory as generally unoccupied land with a population density of fewer than 2 people per square mile (0.77 people per square kilometer). The frontier line was the outer boundary of European-American settlement into this land. Beginning with the first permanent European settlements on the East Coast , it has moved steadily westward from

10656-462: The eventual deaths of nearly all of the changed townspeople, but prevents the possibly disastrous consequences of the ship's influence spreading to the outside world. Very shortly afterward, agents from the FBI , CIA , and " The Shop " invade Haven and take as many of the Havenites as possible (killing nearly a quarter of the survivors), along with a few of the devices created by the altered people of Haven. In

10800-458: The exact moment at which Kennedy's head explodes. Life magazine published frame enlargements from the Zapruder film shortly after the assassination. The footage itself was first publicly shown at the 1969 trial of Clay Shaw , and on television in 1975 by Geraldo Rivera . In 1999, an arbitration panel ordered the federal government to pay $ 615,384 per second of film to Zapruder's heirs, valuing

10944-400: The expansion, but Jeffersonians hailed the opportunity to create millions of new farms to expand the domain of land-owning yeomen ; the ownership would strengthen the ideal republican society, based on agriculture (not commerce), governed lightly, and promoting self-reliance and virtue, as well as form the political base for Jeffersonian Democracy . France was paid for its sovereignty over

11088-430: The extent of the president's chronic illnesses and consequent medication. Some autopsy X-rays and photographs have also been lost. Most historians regard the autopsy as the "most botched" segment of the government's investigation. The HSCA forensic pathology panel concluded that the autopsy had "extensive failings", including failure to take sufficient photographs, failure to determine the exact exit or entry point of

11232-534: The failed Bay of Pigs Invasion in 1961, during which he declined to directly involve American troops. The following year, Kennedy deescalated the Cuban Missile Crisis , an incident widely regarded as the closest that humanity has come to nuclear holocaust . In 1963, Kennedy decided to travel to Texas to smooth over frictions in the state's Democratic Party between liberal U.S. Senator Ralph Yarborough and conservative Governor John Connally . The visit

11376-528: The film War Is Hell still playing, Dallas policemen arrested Oswald after a brief struggle in which Oswald drew his fully loaded gun. He denied shooting anyone and claimed he was being made a " patsy " because he had lived in the Soviet Union. At 12:38 p.m., Kennedy arrived in the emergency room of Parkland Memorial Hospital . Although Kennedy was still breathing after the shooting, his personal physician, George Burkley , immediately saw that survival

11520-769: The first permanent American settlement in the Northwest Territory . In 1775, Daniel Boone blazed a trail for the Transylvania Company from Virginia through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. It was later lengthened to reach the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville . The Wilderness Road was steep and rough, and it could only be traversed on foot or horseback, but it was the best route for thousands of settlers moving into Kentucky . In some areas they had to face Native attacks. In 1784 alone, Natives killed over 100 travelers on

11664-506: The first time. One of the largest and most famous camp meetings took place at Cane Ridge, Kentucky , in 1801. JFK assassination On November 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy , the 35th president of the United States , was assassinated while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza in Dallas , Texas. Kennedy was in the vehicle with his wife Jacqueline , Texas governor John Connally , and Connally's wife Nellie , when he

11808-527: The forces dominating American character." Turner's ideas since 1893 have inspired generations of historians (and critics) to explore multiple individual American frontiers, but the popular folk frontier concentrates on the conquest and settlement of Native American lands west of the Mississippi River , in what is now the Midwest , Texas , the Great Plains , the Rocky Mountains , the Southwest , and

11952-516: The frontier era began, when it ended, and which were its key sub-periods. For example, the Old West subperiod is sometimes used by historians regarding the time from the end of the American Civil War in 1865 to when the Superintendent of the Census, William Rush Merriam , stated the U.S. Census Bureau would stop recording western frontier settlement as part of its census categories after the 1890 U.S. Census . His successors however continued

12096-414: The geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial settlements in the early 17th century and ended with the admission of the last few contiguous western territories as states in 1912. This era of massive migration and settlement was particularly encouraged by President Thomas Jefferson following

12240-560: The good land, and worked it with slaves. The area was no longer "frontier". It had a stratified society comprising a powerful upper-class white landowning gentry, a small middle-class, a fairly large group of landless or tenant white farmers, and a growing slave population at the bottom of the social pyramid. Unlike the North, where small towns and even cities were common, the South was overwhelmingly rural. The seaboard colonial settlements gave priority to land ownership for individual farmers, and as

12384-421: The grassy knoll. No witness ever reported seeing anyone—with or without a gun—immediately behind the knoll's picket fence at the time of the shooting. Lee Bowers was in a two-story railroad switch tower 120 yards (110 m) behind the grassy knoll's picket fence; he was watching the motorcade and had an unobstructed view of the only route by which a shooter could flee the grassy knoll; he saw no one leaving

12528-405: The head bullet, not dissecting the back and neck, and neglecting to determine the angles of gunshot injuries relative to body axis . The panel further concluded that the two doctors were not qualified to have conducted a forensic autopsy. Panel member Milton Helpern— Chief Medical Examiner for New York City —said that selecting Humes (who had only taken a single course on forensic pathology) to lead

12672-507: The ideology of Manifest Destiny. In his "Frontier Thesis" (1893), Turner theorized that the frontier was a process that transformed Europeans into a new people, the Americans, whose values focused on equality, democracy, and optimism, as well as individualism , self-reliance, and even violence. The frontier is the margin of undeveloped territory that would comprise the United States beyond

12816-404: The interrogation. On the evening of November 22, Dallas Police performed paraffin tests on Oswald's hands and right cheek in an effort to establish whether or not he had recently fired a weapon. The results were positive for the hands and negative for the right cheek. Such tests were unreliable, and the Warren Commission did not rely on these results. The Dallas police forced Oswald to host

12960-745: The land. By the 20th century, Washington bureaucracies managed the federal lands such as the United States General Land Office in the Interior Department, and after 1891, the Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture. After 1900, dam building and flood control became major concerns. Transportation was a key issue and the Army (especially the Army Corps of Engineers) was given full responsibility for facilitating navigation on

13104-503: The last pages, David Brown is discovered safe in Hilly Brown's hospital room. In his autobiography On Writing , King attributes the basic premise to the short story " The Colour Out of Space " by H. P. Lovecraft . He also used a poem from his childhood for the book's preamble: Late last night and the night before Tommyknockers, Tommyknockers knocking at the door. I want to go out; don't know if I can, 'cause I'm so afraid of

13248-413: The limousine's bumper, and he clung to the car as it exited Dealey Plaza and sped to Parkland Memorial Hospital . After Mrs. Kennedy crawled back into her seat, both Governor and Mrs. Connally heard her repeatedly saying: "They have killed my husband. I have his brains in my hand." Bystander James Tague received a minor wound to the cheek—either from bullet or concrete curb fragments—while standing by

13392-470: The memory of President Kennedy". Kennedy's funeral service was held on November 25, at St. Matthew's Cathedral , with the Requiem Mass led by Cardinal Richard Cushing . About 1,200 guests, including representatives from over 90 countries, attended. Although there was no formal eulogy, Auxiliary Bishop Philip M. Hannan read excerpts from Kennedy's speeches and writings. After the service, Kennedy

13536-636: The motorcade was to turn left onto Elm Street, pass through Dealey Plaza, and travel a short segment of the Stemmons Freeway to the Trade Mart. The planned route had been reported in newspapers several days in advance. Despite concerns about hostile protestors—Kennedy's UN Ambassador Adlai Stevenson had been spat on in Dallas a month earlier—Kennedy was greeted warmly by enthusiastic crowds. Kennedy's limousine entered Dealey Plaza at 12:30 p.m. CST. Nellie Connally turned and commented to Kennedy, who

13680-465: The mountains for the proposed transcontinental railroad, but his expedition ended in near-disaster when it became lost and was trapped by heavy snow. His reports mixed narrative of exciting adventure with scientific data and detailed practical information for travelers. It caught the public imagination and inspired many to head west. Goetzman says it was "monumental in its breadth, a classic of exploring literature". While colleges were springing up across

13824-460: The new Republican Party in 1856. He led a series of expeditions in the 1840s which answered many of the outstanding geographic questions about the little-known region. He crossed through the Rocky Mountains by five different routes and mapped parts of Oregon and California. In 1846–1847, he played a role in conquering California. In 1848–1849, Frémont was assigned to locate a central route through

13968-435: The night of November 22. Jacqueline Kennedy had selected a naval hospital as the postmortem site as President Kennedy had been a naval officer during World War II . The autopsy was conducted by three physicians: naval commanders James Humes and J. Thornton Boswell, with assistance from ballistics wound expert Pierre A. Finck; Humes led the procedure. Under pressure from the Kennedy family and White House staffers to expedite

14112-679: The opportunity and expanded fur trading operations into the Pacific Northwest . Astor's " Fort Astoria " (later Fort George), at the mouth of the Columbia River, became the first permanent white settlement in that area, although it was not profitable for Astor. He set up the American Fur Company in an attempt to break the hold that the Hudson's Bay Company monopoly had over the region. By 1820, Astor had taken over independent traders to create

14256-432: The opportunity for commercial agriculture was low. These areas remained primarily in subsistence agriculture, and as a result, by the 1760s these societies were highly egalitarian , as explained by historian Jackson Turner Main: The typical frontier society, therefore, was one in which class distinctions were minimized. The wealthy speculator, if one was involved, usually remained at home, so that ordinarily no one of wealth

14400-402: The original film has been missing since 1978. Previously unknown footage filmed by George Jefferies was released in 2007. Recorded a few blocks before the shooting, the film captures Kennedy's bunched suit jacket, explaining the discrepancies between the location of the bullet hole in Kennedy's back and his jacket . Some films and photographs captured an unidentified woman apparently filming

14544-548: The population grew they pushed westward for fresh farmland. Unlike Britain, where a small number of landlords owned most of the land, ownership in America was cheap, easy and widespread. Land ownership brought a degree of independence as well as a vote for local and provincial offices. The typical New England settlements were quite compact and small, under a square mile. Conflict with the Native Americans arose out of political issues, namely who would rule. Early frontier areas east of

14688-414: The possession of lands more than they can cultivate, and more than adequate to their subsistence, comfort, and enjoyment, by cultivation. If this is a spirit of aggrandizement, the undersigned are prepared to admit, in that sense, its existence; but they must deny that it affords the slightest proof of an intention not to respect the boundaries between them and European nations, or of a desire to encroach upon

14832-450: The practice until the 1920 Census . Others, including the Library of Congress and University of Oxford , often cite differing points reaching into the early 1900s; typically within the first two decades before American entry into World War I . A period known as "The Western Civil War of Incorporation" lasted from the 1850s to 1919. This period includes historical events synonymous with

14976-401: The practice. By the 1910 U.S. census however, the frontier had shrunk into divided areas without a singular westward line of settlement. An influx of agricultural homesteaders in the first two decades of the 20th century, taking up more acreage than homestead grants in the entirety of the 19th century, is cited to have significantly reduced open land. A frontier is a zone of contact at

15120-571: The president of the Confederacy. Most frontiersmen showed little commitment to religion until traveling evangelists began to appear and to produce "revivals". The local pioneers responded enthusiastically to these events and, in effect, evolved their populist religions, especially during the Second Great Awakening (1790–1840), which featured outdoor camp meetings lasting a week or more and which introduced many people to organized religion for

15264-431: The president. Then when the population reached 100,000 the territory applied for statehood. Frontiersmen typically dropped the legalistic formalities and restrictive franchise favored by eastern upper classes and adopting more democracy and more egalitarianism. In 1810, the western frontier had reached the Mississippi River . St. Louis, Missouri , was the largest town on the frontier, the gateway for travel westward, and

15408-431: The procedure, the physicians conducted a "rushed" and incomplete autopsy. Kennedy's personal physician, Rear Admiral George Burkley, signed a death certificate on November 23 and recorded that the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the skull. Three years after the autopsy, Kennedy's brain—which had been removed and preserved for later analysis—was found to be missing when the Kennedy family transferred material to

15552-478: The questioning and kept only rudimentary notes. Days later, Fritz wrote a report of the interrogation from notes he made afterwards. There were no stenographic or tape recordings. Representatives of other law enforcement agencies were also present, including the FBI and the Secret Service, and occasionally participated in the questioning. Several of the FBI agents who were present wrote contemporaneous reports of

15696-556: The reckless use of atomic power and the dangerous mishandling of nuclear material. The physical transformation of the townspeople resembles the toxic effects of ionizing radiation . A two-part television miniseries based on the novel was shown in 1993 on ABC , starring Jimmy Smits as Jim Gardner and Marg Helgenberger as Bobbi Anderson. King has stated that he "didn't like it", commenting that "it felt kind of cheap and thrown together". NBC announced in July 2013 that they would be producing

15840-487: The region getting a bad reputation as the "Great American Desert", which discouraged settlement in that area for several decades. In 1811, naturalists Thomas Nuttall (1786–1859) and John Bradbury (1768–1823) traveled up the Missouri River documenting and drawing plant and animal life. Artist George Catlin (1796–1872) painted accurate paintings of Native American culture. Swiss artist Karl Bodmer made compelling landscapes and portraits. John James Audubon (1785–1851)

15984-603: The rivers. The steamboat, first used on the Ohio River in 1811, made possible inexpensive travel using the river systems, especially the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and their tributaries. Army expeditions up the Missouri River in 1818–1825 allowed engineers to improve the technology. For example, the Army's steamboat " Western Engineer " of 1819 combined a very shallow draft with one of the earliest stern wheels. In 1819–1825, Colonel Henry Atkinson developed keelboats with hand-powered paddle wheels. The federal postal system played

16128-440: The scene. Bowers testified to the Warren Commission that "one or two" men were between him and the fence during the assassination: one was a familiar parking lot attendant and the other wore a uniform like a county courthouse custodian. He testified seeing "some commotion" on the grassy knoll at the time of the assassination: "something out of the ordinary, a sort of milling around, but something occurred in this particular spot which

16272-428: The sound as that of a rifle and turned his head and torso rightward, noting nothing unusual behind him. He testified that he could not see Kennedy, so he started to turn forward again (turning from his right to his left), and that when his head was facing about 20 degrees left of center, he was struck in his upper right back by a shot he did not hear, then shouted, "My God. They're going to kill us all!" According to

16416-465: The spur of the moment when the opportunity presented itself, without considering any reason for doing so. Initially, Ruby wished to represent himself in his trial until his lawyer Melvin Belli dissuaded him: Belli argued that Ruby had an episode of psychomotor epilepsy and was thus not responsible. Ruby was convicted, but the decision was overturned on appeal . While awaiting retrial in 1967, Ruby died of

16560-421: The state of nature, and to bring into cultivation every portion of the territory contained within their acknowledged boundaries. In thus providing for the support of millions of civilized beings, they will not violate any dictate of justice or humanity; for they will not only give to the few thousand savages scattered over that territory an ample equivalent for any right they may surrender, but will always leave them

16704-505: The story of the creation and defense of communities, the use of the land, the development of crops and hotels, and the formation of states." They explain, "It is a tale of conquest, but also one of survival, persistence, and the merging of peoples and cultures that gave birth and continuing life to America." Turner himself repeatedly emphasized how the availability of "free land" to start new farms attracted pioneering Americans: "The existence of an area of free land, its continuous recession, and

16848-418: The stranglehold of addiction can be found throughout the book. In a 2014 interview with Rolling Stone , King acknowledged that the quality of his writing suffered during his period of drug use, saying " The Tommyknockers is an awful book. That was the last one I wrote before I cleaned up my act", adding he believes it could be a good book if it was rewritten to about half its original length. Other themes in

16992-472: The street, and ran forward to board the limousine and protect Kennedy. Hill stated that he heard the fatal headshot as he reached the Lincoln, "approximately five seconds" after the first shot that he heard. After the headshot, Mrs. Kennedy began climbing onto the limousine's trunk, but she later had no recollection of doing so. Hill believed she may have been reaching for a piece of Kennedy's skull. He jumped onto

17136-400: The support of settlers and the general public who preferred that the military remain as close as possible. The frontier area was vast and even Davis conceded that "concentration would have exposed portions of the frontier to Native hostilities without any protection." Government and private enterprise sent many explorers to the West. In 1805–1806, Army lieutenant Zebulon Pike (1779–1813) led

17280-406: The territories of Great Britain. [...] They will not suppose that that Government will avow, as the basis of their policy towards the United States a system of arresting their natural growth within their territories, for the sake of preserving a perpetual desert for savages. As settlers poured in, the frontier districts first became territories, with an elected legislature and a governor appointed by

17424-506: The territory in terms of international law. Between 1803 and the 1870s, the federal government purchased the land from the Native tribes then in possession of it. 20th-century accountants and courts have calculated the value of the payments made to the Natives, which included future payments of cash, food, horses, cattle, supplies, buildings, schooling, and medical care. In cash terms, the total paid to

17568-520: The time of Kennedy's assassination, the murder of a president was not under federal jurisdiction . Accordingly, Dallas County medical examiner Earl Rose insisted that Texas law required him to perform an autopsy. A heated exchange between Kennedy's aides and Dallas officials nearly erupted into a fistfight before the Texans yielded and allowed Kennedy's body to be transported to Air Force One. At 2:38 p.m., with Jacqueline Kennedy at his side, Johnson

17712-426: The townspeople, who then swarm to her home, intent on killing Gard for fear that he intends to harm the ship. Ev Hillman, David and Hilly's grandfather, helps Gard escape into the woods in exchange for saving David Brown from Altair 4. Gard enters the ship, near death after his struggle with the townspeople. With his last ounce of strength, he activates the ship and telepathically launches it into space. This results in

17856-430: The transformation of the townspeople, discovers the torture and mutilation of Bobbi's dog Peter, and people being killed or worse when they pry too deeply into the strange events. Over the course of several weeks, Gard, Bobbi, and others continue to unearth the ship. Bobbi and Gard eventually enter the ship; as they explore the ship, Gard realizes that the ship crashed because the crew was fighting with each other, and that

18000-504: The tribes in the area of the Louisiana Purchase amounted to about $ 2.6 billion, or nearly $ 9 billion in 2016 dollars. Additional sums were paid to the Natives living east of the Mississippi for their lands, as well as payments to Natives living in parts of the west outside the Louisiana Purchase. Even before the purchase, Jefferson was planning expeditions to explore and map the lands. He charged Lewis and Clark to "explore

18144-480: The triple underpass. Nine months later, the FBI removed the curb, and spectrographic analysis revealed metallic residue consistent with the lead core in Oswald's ammunition. Tague testified before the Warren Commission and initially stated that he was wounded by either the second or third shot of the three shots that he remembered hearing. When the commission counsel pressed him to be more specific, Tague testified that he

18288-554: The witnesses recalled hearing three shots. The Warren Commission concluded that three shots were fired and noted that most witnesses recalled that the second and third shots were bunched together. Shortly after Kennedy began waving, some witnesses heard the first gunshot, but few in the crowd or motorcade reacted, many interpreting the sound as a firecracker or backfire . Within one second of each other, Governor Connally and Mrs. Kennedy turned abruptly from their left to their right. Connally—an experienced hunter—immediately recognized

18432-499: The wrist at the inner side of his right palm and finally lodged in his left thigh. As the limousine passed the grassy knoll , Kennedy was struck a second time, by a fatal shot to the head. The Warren Commission made no finding as to whether this was the second or third bullet fired, and concluded—as did the HSCA—that the second shot to strike Kennedy entered the rear of his head. It then passed in fragments through his skull, creating

18576-432: Was a resident. The class of landless poor was small. The great majority were landowners, most of whom were also poor because they were starting with little property and had not yet cleared much land nor had they acquired the farm tools and animals which would one day make them prosperous. Few artisans settled on the frontier except for those who practiced a trade to supplement their primary occupation of farming. There might be

18720-566: Was administered the oath of office by federal judge Sarah Tilghman Hughes aboard Air Force One, shortly before departing for Washington with Kennedy's coffin. Where bungled autopsies are concerned, President Kennedy's is the exemplar. — Dr. Michael Baden , chairman of the forensic pathology panel of the House Select Committee on Assassinations President Kennedy's autopsy was performed at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland on

18864-421: Was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. An eternal flame was lit at his burial site in 1967. On Sunday, November 24, at 11:21 a.m., as Oswald was being escorted to a car in the basement of Dallas Police headquarters for the transfer from the city jail to the county jail, he was shot by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby . The shooting was broadcast live on television. Robert H. Jackson of

19008-556: Was court-martialed twice and demoted. In September 1959, he received a dependency discharge after claiming his mother was disabled. A 19-year-old Oswald sailed on a freighter from New Orleans to France and then traveled to Finland, where he was issued a Soviet visa. Oswald defected to the Soviet Union, and in January 1960 he was sent to work at a factory in Minsk , Belarus. In 1961, he met and married Marina Prusakova , with whom he had

19152-533: Was developed. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 abolished slavery in the area north of the Ohio River and promised statehood when a territory reached a threshold population, as Ohio did in 1803 . The first major movement west of the Appalachian mountains originated in Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina as soon as the Revolutionary War ended in 1781. Pioneers housed themselves in a rough lean-to or at most

19296-488: Was fabricated". At the Dallas Police headquarters, officers interrogated Oswald about the shootings of Kennedy and Tippit; these intermittent interviews lasted for approximately 12 hours between 2:30 p.m. on November 22 and 11 a.m. on November 24. Throughout, Oswald denied any involvement and resorted to statements that were found to be false. Captain J. W. Fritz of the Homicide and Robbery Bureau did most of

19440-451: Was fatally shot from the nearby Texas School Book Depository by Lee Harvey Oswald , a former U.S. Marine . The motorcade rushed to Parkland Memorial Hospital , where Kennedy was pronounced dead about 30 minutes after the shooting; Connally was also wounded in the attack but recovered. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was hastily sworn in as president two hours and eight minutes later aboard Air Force One at Dallas Love Field . After

19584-792: Was first agreed upon by Kennedy, Johnson, and Connally during a meeting in El Paso in June. The motorcade route was finalized on November 18 and announced soon thereafter. Kennedy also viewed the Texas trip as an informal launch of his 1964 reelection campaign . Lee Harvey Oswald (born 1939) was a former U.S. Marine who had served in Japan and the Philippines and had espoused communist beliefs since reading Karl Marx aged 14. After accidentally shooting his elbow with an unauthorized handgun and fighting an officer, Oswald

19728-940: Was impossible. After Parkland surgeons performed futile cardiac massage , Kennedy was pronounced dead at 1:00 p.m., 30 minutes after the shooting. CBS host Walter Cronkite broke the news on live television. The Secret Service was concerned about the possibility of a larger plot and urged Johnson to leave Dallas and return to the White House , but Johnson refused to do so without any proof of Kennedy's death. Johnson returned to Air Force One around 1:30   p.m., and shortly thereafter, he received telephone calls from advisors McGeorge Bundy and Walter Jenkins advising him to depart for Washington, D.C., immediately. He replied that he would not leave Dallas without Jacqueline Kennedy and that she would not leave without Kennedy's body. According to Esquire , Johnson did "not want to be remembered as an abandoner of beautiful widows". At

19872-475: Was likely " assassinated as a result of a conspiracy ". The HSCA did not identify possible conspirators, but concluded that there was "a high probability that two gunmen fired at [the] President". The HSCA's conclusions were largely based on a police Dictabelt recording later debunked by the U.S. Justice Department . Kennedy's assassination is still the subject of widespread debate and has spawned many conspiracy theories and alternative scenarios; polls found that

20016-623: Was no evidence that either Oswald or Ruby was part of a conspiracy. In 1967, New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison brought the only trial for Kennedy's murder , against businessman Clay Shaw ; Shaw was acquitted. Subsequent federal investigations—such as the Rockefeller Commission and Church Committee —agreed with the Warren Commission's general findings. In its 1979 report, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded that Kennedy

20160-444: Was out of the ordinary, which attracted my eye for some reason which I could not identify". At 12:36 p.m., teenager Amos Euins approached Dallas police Sergeant D.V. Harkness to report having seen a " colored man ... leaning out of the window [with] a rifle" on the sixth floor of the Depository during the assassination; in response, Harkness radioed that he was sealing off the Depository. Witness Howard Brennan then approached

20304-500: Was sitting behind her, "Mr. President, they can't make you believe now that there are not some in Dallas who love and appreciate you, can they?" Kennedy's reply – "No, they sure can't" – were his last words. From Houston Street, the limousine made the planned left turn onto Elm, passing the Texas School Book Depository. As it continued down Elm Street, multiple shots were fired: about 80% of

20448-542: Was then carried on a horse -drawn caisson to the Capitol to lie in state. Hundreds of thousands of mourners lined up to view the guarded casket, with a quarter million passing through the rotunda during the 18 hours of lying in state. Even in the Soviet Union—according to a memo by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover —news of the assassination "was greeted by great shock and consternation and church bells were tolled in

20592-425: Was wide agreement on the need to settle the new territories quickly, but the debate polarized over the price the government should charge. The conservatives and Whigs, typified by the president John Quincy Adams , wanted a moderated pace that charged the newcomers enough to pay the costs of the federal government. The Democrats, however, tolerated a wild scramble for land at very low prices. The final resolution came in

20736-417: Was wounded by the second shot. As the motorcade left Dealey Plaza, some witnesses sought cover, and others joined police officers to run up the grassy knoll in search of a shooter. No shooter was found behind the knoll's picket fence. Among the 178 witnesses who testified to the Warren Commission, 78 were unsure of the shots' origin, 49 believed they came from the Depository, and 21 thought they came from

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