"Crossroads in Context: Civil Rights in Dallas and Beyond" Program

"John F. Kennedy, Dallas, and the Struggle for Civil Rights" Teacher Training Institute was a week-long summer educational workshop series hosted by The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza from July 29 to August 2, 2013. The series explored Dallas history and the Kennedy assassination within the broader context of the national Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s, emphasizing the use of oral histories, primary sources, and historical sites.

Five programs were recorded for the Oral History Collection as part of this week-long series. In addition to Dr. Dennis M. Simon, presenters included Jenny Sweeney, education specialist at the National Archives Southwest Region in Fort Worth; Dr. Max Krochmal, professor of history at Texas Christian University; Dr. Todd Moye, associate professor of history at the University of North Texas; and 1960s civil rights activist Clarence Broadnax, who participated in a Living History program that may be viewed here: Living History with Clarence Broadnax. - Stephen Fagin, Curator  

Dr. Dennis M. Simon was an Associate Professor of Political Science at Southern Methodist University in Dallas from 1986 until his untimely passing on February 12, 2017. An SMU obituary that details his academic career may be found here: SMU mourns the death of Professor Dennis Simon.

Dr. Simon was a longtime friend and supporter of The Sixth Floor Museum. In addition to this 2013 lecture on civil rights, he also gave a Museum lecture in 2011 on the cultural impact of the deaths of U.S. presidents while in office and took part in a 2011 panel discussion on the evolution of presidential legacies, which may be viewed here: JFK and LBJ: The Evolution Of Presidential Legacies - YouTube. Dr. Simon later moderated a 2012 conversation with political scientists Earl and Merle Black (The Vital South and Presidential Elections, 1960-2012).  

One of his books, Breaking the Political Glass Ceiling: Women and Congressional Elections (2008), co-authored with Barbara Palmer, may be found here in the Museum's Library Collection: Bibliovation | Details for Breaking the political glass ceiling. - Stephen Fagin, Curator    

This lecture by Dr. Dennis M. Simon accompanied a screening of the twenty-minute documentary, Dallas at the Crossroads, a 1961 public service film produced by the Bloom Advertising Agency in conjunction with the Dallas Citizens Council. Hosted by CBS broadcaster Walter Cronkite, the film urged Dallas citizens to embrace peaceful integration in the early 1960s and included comments by several prominent Dallas community leaders, including former mayor R. L. Thornton and Dallas police chief Jesse Curry (interviewed two years prior to the Kennedy assassination). More information, including a transcript of the film, may be accessed via the Texas Archive of the Moving Image: Dallas at the Crossroads (1961). A restored 2K transfer of the film from the G. William Jones Film and Video Collection at Southern Methodist University may be found here: Dallas At the Crossroads with Walter Cronkite from 1961 - New 2k Transfer.

For a number of years, prints of Dallas at the Crossroads were hard to find. Prior to this 2013 educational workshop with Dr. Dennis M. Simon, The Sixth Floor Museum hosted a public screening of the film on May 24, 2006, with commentary by SMU history professor Glenn M. Linden. - Stephen Fagin, Curator