Photo of Dealey Plaza from the Texas School Book Depository building

Object number2003.006.0037

DateNovember 1963

ClassificationsPhotographs

Creator Federal Bureau of Investigation

ObjectPhotograph (b&w)

Credit LineNat Pinkston Collection/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza

MediumPaper

Dimensions3 1/2 x 5 in. (8.9 x 12.7 cm)

Terms

Collections

DescriptionBlack and white photographic print of Dealey Plaza and part of the triple underpass taken from the sixth floor southeast corner window, located in the sniper's perch, in the Texas School Book Depository building. The photo was taken in November 1963 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation as evidence in the days following the assassination of President Kennedy. The photograph shows the west end of Dealey Plaza with two of the tunnels of the triple underpass visible at the right side. Main and Commerce Streets run horizontally at the center of the image, and Elm Street curves towards the viewer in the right side of the photo. A small crowd of people are gathered on the sidewalk on the right side of Elm Street with another crowd gathered around some floral tributes in the middle of Dealey Plaza at the center of the photograph.

Curatorial Commentary

This FBI photographic print was in the personal collection of retired agent Nat A. Pinkston (1915-2011). Pinkston was a Dallas attorney prior to joining the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He retired from the Dallas FBI office in 1967 after twenty-eight years of service. Pinkston was involved in the local assassination investigation, notably tracing ownership of the Mannlicher-Carcano found in the Depository to employee Lee Harvey Oswald. He was also dispatched to the Texas School Book Depository on December 2, 1963, after Lee Harvey Oswald's clipboard was discovered in the northwest corner of the sixth floor near where the rifle had been found shortly after the assassination. -- Stephen Fagin, Curator