DescriptionProgram titled "A Conversation with Jim Leavelle and Eddie Barker." The first in the Museum's 2007 Dallas Law Enforcement program series, this program was introduced by the son of the late Judge Joe B. Brown, who presided over the Jack Ruby trial. Eddie Barker, who was the news director of KRLD in 1963, engaged former Dallas police homicide detective Jim Leavelle in a conversation about the weekend of the Kennedy assassination and the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Leavelle was the Dallas police detective immortalized in Bob Jackson's Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald. Wearing a light-colored suit and a Resistol brand cowboy hat, Leavelle was handcuffed to Oswald and helped wrestle shooter Jack Ruby to the ground.
In 1963, Barker was news director and anchor for Dallas CBS affiliate KRLD-TV/Channel 4. He was heavily involved in the coverage of the Kennedy assassination.
Judge Joe B. Brown, Jr., the host of this program, was a Dallas justice of the peace in 1963. He held an inquest into the death of Officer Tippit and issued search warrants for several assassination-related locations. His father, the late Judge Joe B. Brown, Sr., presided over the Jack Ruby trial in 1964.
Program conducted at The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza on January 24, 2007. The program is one hour and five minutes long.
Curatorial Commentary
In planning our 2007 program series on Dallas Law Enforcement, Museum staff tried to identify a Dallas police officer and a local journalist who were both extensively involved in the weekend of the Kennedy assassination to be guest speakers for the first program in this series. When we learned that Mr. Barker and Mr. Leavelle had never before participated in a program together on the assassination, we jumped at the extraordinary opportunity to bring these two "living legends" together on stage for the first time. Judge Joe B. Brown, Jr., a donor, oral history participant, and friend of the Museum, graciously agreed to provide an introduction to the series.
Later programs in our 2007 Dallas Law Enforcement series touched on the arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald at the Texas Theatre, the holdings of the Dallas Municipal Archives, and women in Dallas law enforcement. All programs were recorded as part of the Museum's Oral History Project. - Stephen Fagin, Associate Curator
This program and others in the Dallas Law Enforcement series were inspired by the Museum's temporary exhibit, Dallas Law Enforcement: Voices from History (November 2006 - October 2007). http://www.jfk.org/go/exhibits/dallas/introduction - Sharron Conrad, Curator of Education
