April, 2019 -- In retrospect, it was a mistake not to devote an extra day to see Waco on this Texas trip. The day we spent exploring the ‘new face of Waco was pretty much a whirlwind tour – plenty to see and do to fill up a day, but one day is not enough time to get a real feel for this city. In fact, in hindsight, a lot more time was needed to see and get a feel for Texas as a whole. I would have liked to see New Braunfels and Grapevine; and, though it would have been way off our course, I would have liked to have seen Odessa for personal reasons but it was too far west. So, the last full day in Texas began with a drive back to Dallas where this trip began.
This expansive city is home to well over 1,000,000 people, and the Metroplex area of over 9,000 square miles is covered by a network of roads both big and small. Oddly enough, driving into Dallas was easy and signage was good.
thought was given to attending the game and Im sure I would have enjoyed going. However, the Globe Life Stadium is actually located in Arlington which is about 20+ miles away, and we had not tickets so unfortunately this idea was scrubbed. I would have liked to add the Globe Life Stadium to my list of visited major league ball parks.
Visiting the 561 ft. tall Reunion Tower which overlooks Dealey Plaza was also considered as a possibility, but that too slipped off the list. All that aside, I was most interested in seeing sites of national historical importance in Dallas – first, the former Texas School Book Depository, now home to the fabulous Sixth Floor Museum; and, secondly, I wanted to walk in Dealey Plaza which has been designated a National Historic Landmark. Both of these sites are located in the West End Historic District of Dallas.
Nearly 60 years ago on November 22, 1963, our 35th president, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, was assassinated while his motorcade made its way through Dealey Plaza, a park and the place where many people had gathered to watch the President and Mrs. Kennedy pass by that day. The event so
shocked the nation that many aspects of this tragedy still linger on the national conscience. Many feel it was the day when the ‘innocence of the nation was lost – a difficult term to explain not only to those who do not live in the US, but also to a much younger generation of Americans.
The event continues to be a subject for research and many issues related to it are still being debated today. Even now, documentaries about the assassination as well as movies about it are not In fact, Director Oliver Stone who made the 1991 movie JFK will be premiering his new documentary, JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass this year in Cannes.
For people of a certain age, this momentous event in American history still carries the question, ‘Do you remember where you were and what were you doing when you heard that President Kennedy was shot? I was in grammar school at the time and I still remember our teacher making the announcement to our class although we were too young to grasp the implications.
In fact, for anyone that is already familiar with some aspects of President Kennedys assassination, the
parking lot we used while visiting Dallas was bound on one side by the wooden fence at the top of the grassy knoll; this spot faces Dealey Plaza and was identified by several witnesses that claim to have heard a gunshot(s) emanate from (from behind the fence on the grassy knoll) on that fateful day in November, 1963. One witness claimed to have heard at least 3 shots. Its claims such as these and other evidence which lead to the speculation, as yet thought to be unproven, that there was a second shooter in addition to Lee Harvey Oswald, the man accused of the assassination.
For anyone who has yet to visit it and has an interest in the what happened that day in November, 1963, the Sixth Floor Museum is definitely a ‘must see. It is one of the most excellent museums I have ever visited, and frankly, I would visit it again in a heartbeat.
