Image of Secret Service agents beside limousine at Parkland Hospital

The shooting in Dealey Plaza turned the president’s limousine into a crime scene.  Had it been left intact, evidence collected from it may have eventually answered some questions about the assassination.  In order to prevent onlookers from seeing inside the car, Secret Service agents installed the hard-shell top – already in place in this picture – which was usually kept in the trunk when the convertible was being used without a cover.  Some agents also used buckets and sponges to begin cleaning the interior of the car.

After the assassination, the limousine (also known as X-100) was stripped down, rebuilt and put back into presidential service, where it was used occasionally by Presidents Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter.  Although other presidential parade cars were built in 1968 and 1972, the limousine used in Dallas stayed in service until 1977.  Upon its retirement, it was sent to the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, where it is today exhibited as the “Kennedy” limousine even though very little remains of the car that was in Dallas on November 22, 1963. – Stephen Fagin, Curator