Who killed JFK?

I don’t remember exactly where I was when President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed. I don’t remember how I found out he had been shot. It had to be soon after the fact because the news was reporting he had been shot and not his death. All I remember is being in a long hallway. I had to be at school, yes it had to be at the high school but why do I remember a long hallway, our school was small and thus the hallways weren’t very long. I suppose it was the shock of the news, so much hope had been placed in this president. He was going to change things, he was Jim Crows nemesis and he had old Jim in rapid retreat. I could forget about getting off the sidewalk when whites approached, no more back of the bus, even though the bus hadn’t run for years and I never remember having to get off the sidewalk for anyone. Don’t look a white person in the eyes I had been told but I don’t remember from whom It didn’t come from my mother or step-dad, Grandpa or Grandma hadn’t told me this but it was the prevailing thought in the colored community. Yes I said colored, being called black without hitting someone in the mouth was a thing of the future. Negro was acceptable but “Black” dem were fighting words, but I digress.

I remember Jack Ruby killing Lee H. Oswald, I was watching the television screen as it happened. I remember the initial feeling of glee then at some point in the future the questions of the assassination wiped away this euphoria. It was not these two events that raised a political conscience within me, it was the caissons. Yes it was the funeral procession, it captivated me, I was no longer an innocent child shielded from the ways of the world by my mother, I was fully aware. I had not been oblivious to events of the day, I remember seeing a newspaper showing the newly killed body of Emmett Till and there was the brutal beating death of Mr. Greenwood by a white policeman in front of his kids who were my peers. Yes I was aware of the perils of being a black in the south, yes the unspoken terrors of being black in my beloved Texas, in my beloved hometown. But the veil of innocence was not lifted until those horse drawn caissons were rolling along carrying the lifeless body of President John F. Kennedy.

I watched all the news intently, I wanted to know the why of this event was it Lee Harvey Oswald and if he did it was he acting alone and why? They told me it was John Harvey Oswald with an old rifle and acting alone and they debunked all theories that suggested otherwise but to this day I remain unsatisfied as to the who, why, and what.

I remember that I had lofty visions of what he would have accomplished during  his presidency if he had lived. As we again revisit that time fifty years ago, I become uneasy as the time of Camelot is revisited. I hear the lofty expectations of his presidency again revisited as if they remain unchanged by history, but in retrospect history has shed a jaded light on my memories of what if.

John F. Kennedy’s life and legend changed the race relations in this country in many ways, mostly positive. President Lyndon B. Johnson saw to that. I think history has been greatly unfair in giving him his proper credit. Things had to change for the sake of this country and President Johnson did his part skillfully. However President Kennedy’s health and personal life raise questions about Camelot but I think for today we will suspend those thoughts for another day and celebrate the hopeful memories of a life ended far too soon. Oh I still can’t accept the official conclusion of what happened that day and why. Maybe some day I’ll tell you my theory.