Photograph of WFAA-TV interview with Abraham Zapruder

Since all news photographers were out of the building covering breaking news stories, an unknown member of the station's promotions department took several behind-the-scenes pictures, including this one, of newsworthy events happening at WFAA. - Gary Mack, Curator

At the time of the Kennedy assassination in 1963, the WFAA Communications Center Studios was located at the corner of Young and Record Streets in downtown Dallas, approximately two blocks north of Dealey Plaza. As a result of their proximity, WFAA-TV/Channel 8 was the first local television station to break into programming with news of the shooting on November 22, 1963. Program director Jay Watson, himself an eyewitness to the assassination, interrupted the Julie Bennell Show, a local lifestyle and fashion program, approximately fifteen minutes after shots were fired in Dealey Plaza. In another first, Watson was the first to interview assassination eyewitnesses on the air after collecting the stunned Newman family in the plaza and rushing them to WFAA studios. The coverage that followed represents one of the most substantial archives of Kennedy assassination broadcast news footage in existence.  

Amazingly, this historic news footage was nearly lost forever in the early 1980s. During that era, it was common for television stations to dispose of or recycle outdated broadcast tapes in order to save space and reduce costs. Prior to the age of widespread digital archiving, expensive videotapes were frequently erased and reused. Nearly twenty years after the assassination, a young WFAA-TV employee named John Sparks noticed all of the station's Kennedy tapes were boxed up and marked for disposal. Sparks, who had been part of the high school band that performed for President and Mrs. Kennedy in Fort Worth that fateful date, instantly recognized the historic significance of the material, and he singlehandedly rescued the tapes from destruction. The full WFAA-TV archive of Kennedy assassination news coverage was later donated to The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza in 1998. Hear the inside story about how John Sparks saved this historic broadcast news footage in this 2025 Living History conversation: Living History from Fort Worth, November 22, 1963. - Stephen Fagin, Curator   

This object is featured in the Museum's special exhibit, "On Assignment: Dallas Times Herald 1963," which opened on April 29, 2026.