generation felt john f. kennedy s assassination so profoundly, and then as a young journalist, i was covering and experiencing dr. martin luther king jr. s slaying and bobby kennedy, but it was the loss of innocence, wasn t it, of this first horrific day in dallas reck electing it was an ordinary day for you. you, in fact, have acknowledged on that press bus in from lovefield you had dozed off. this was another campaign trip. well, for me, actually, it was the first big presidential campaign trip. i was the number two guy at the white house. because so many top officials all went off to hawaii for a conference on vietnam, which also has portentous echoes now when some of the speculation about what the kennedy legacy might have been had he not been
when they arrived at lovefield, as jim said. glorious summer day. they looked radiant. mrs. kennedy in that strawberry ice cream colored suit, a big bunch of blood red roses held next to her. crowd rapturous to see them. then into the motorcade through the outskirts of dallas, into downtown dallas where the crowds were so thick that looking from the first press bus where i was over the heads of the cars in betwe between, they were seven cars away, you wondered how the motorcade could get through the crowd when it surged out into the street. then we turned on to the plaza. i was just thinking, i ve got nbc radio news on the hour piece to do soon. then there was a bang. we all said, what was that? was that a shot? then there were two bangs closer to together. i said, those are shots, stop the bus. i saw people running up the grassy knoll, as it became known, including policemen. so i run up there too, thinking