began to surveil him, but then he calmed down and he pressed his brother to give a speech that june about the moral meaning of civil rights. the people in that room said to him it s not just enough to talk about the political consequences of race, use your bully pulpit to galvanize america for its better angels. and from there he went on to really commit himself to the most poor people in this country. to the most vulnerable people. and to those who were african-american. mike, michael beschloss, there was so much in robert kennedy s life post november 22nd, 1963, that formed the man who was killed in california in june 6, 1968. and its origin, after the initial wave of grief had subsided, when robert kennedy was in the senate.
we see november 22nd, 1963 as a date the president was killed. but it was also a date when the president was created. is there any doubt in your mind chief that oswald is the man that killed the president? i think this is the man that killed the president, yes, sir. is there any evidence any one else may have been linked with oswald in this shooting. at this time we don t believe so. i don t know what this is all about. did you kill the president? no, sir, i didn t. sir? did you shoot the president? i work in that building. were you in that building at the time? naturally if i work in that building, yes, sir. back up, man. they re taking me in because of the fact that i lived in the did you shoot the president? i m just a patsy. this is room 317, homicide
politics. it began of course in 1967 and continues into 1968. 2001 will be for most americans the year of their greatest greeting. 9/11 brought america together, if only for a time. 1968 divided us in ways so deep and profound they are still evidenced. what do you make that 9/11 brought us together but 1968 was our most divisive year. absolutely, hugh. it was coming toward the end of a decade where we had all been brought together by tragedy on november 22nd, 1963 when president kennedy was assassinated. it is a very, very similar feel to 9/11. but 1968, which saw two assassinations, martin luther king jr. followed by bobby kennedy, was completely divisive all the way through from start to finish. those assassinations, hugh, as you recall, did not have a kind
picture of hoover. he loved hoover. he was a tough, tough son of a bitch. you phrased it right. and yet, the most remarkable thing about him, talk about the evolution from november 22nd, 1963, through june the end a couple changes. people do go through changes. they don t change completely but in different ways. when he was a kid, he was sensitive. a friend of the family said he s so generous, the old man who is not a nice guy, joe kennedy said, i don t know where he got that from, generosity. he played on varsity football at harvard. a tough guy. got his brother elected to senate. against mccarthy. wrote a resolution against mccarthy. something changed from the guy that was going after january connor and taunting him in the hearings. this is a killer.
on november 22nd, 1963, dress manufacturer abraham zapruder used his 8 mill meet erts camera to film the kennedy motorcade as it passed through deally, texas. those 26 seconds of footage were an important part of the warrant commission hearings and all subsequent investigations and are among the most analyzed pieces of film in our history. zapruder s granddaughter, alexandra, investigated her family s role in that footage and published a book. 26 seconds, a personal history of the zapruder film. alexandra, tell me about your grandfather. why was he in the plaza that day? i was there because he loved the president. he was a russian immigrant who came to this country at age 15 in 1920 and made good, like so many others did. and he was an absolutely devoted fan of president kennedy and, of course, he was also a home movie enthusiast. so he had a new camera.