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Image of crowds at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth
Image of crowds at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth

Image of crowds at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth

Object number2014.087.0022.0001
Date11/21/1963
ClassificationsPhotographs
Photographer Gene Gordon
ObjectNegative (b&w)
Credit LineGene Gordon Collection/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza
MediumFilm
Dimensions15/16 × 1 7/16 in. (2.4 × 3.7 cm)
DescriptionOriginal 35mm black and white negative image taken by Fort Worth Press chief photographer Gene Gordon at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth, Texas on Thursday, November 21, 1963. The image shows a crowd of people behind a barricade as the presidential party approaches to greet onlookers. The man walking with the briefcase is Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson aide, Jack Valenti. The back of a car that the President and Mrs. Kennedy will ride in is in the foreground. Two men are standing next to the car. The negative is on Kodak Tri-X Pan Film. This image is number 13 on the negative strip (2014.087.0022).
Curatorial Commentary

The Kennedys arrived at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth a little after 11PM on Thursday, November 21, 1963, having already visited San Antonio and Houston earlier that day. Gene Gordon, chief photographer at the Fort Worth Press, arrived early--by his estimation between 9PM and 10PM--to cover the presidential party. Since Carswell was not usually open to civilian visitors, this was a special occasion as an estimated 5,500 people gathered to welcome President and Mrs. Kennedy in near darkness. As Air Force One approached Fort Worth, the president likely noticed more than sixty buildings downtown were illuminated by amber lights. That lit skyline is visible in a few of Gene Gordon's photos taken at Carswell. - Stephen Fagin, Curator

Gene Henderson Gordon (1929 - 2023) got his first job as a professional photographer at the age of 19 in 1948 at the Fort Worth Press, a Scripps-Howard newspaper launched in 1921. Less than five years later, Gordon was promoted to chief photographer, a position that he still held at the time of the Kennedy assassination in 1963. Gordon covered the Kennedys' arrival at Carswell Air Force Base on the night on November 21st and, a few hours later, President Kennedy's parking lot speech at the Hotel Texas and the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce breakfast in the hotel's ballroom. Following the assassination, he covered the funeral of Lee Harvey Oswald at Rose Hill Cemetery in Fort Worth on November 25th. Gene Gordon remained at the Fort Worth Press until the paper ceased publication in 1975, after which he became a staff photographer, later chief photographer, at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He retired in 1997 after half a century as a professional photographer in Fort Worth.

We were honored to record oral history interviews with Gene in 2003 and 2015. He also participated in two programs at The Sixth Floor Museum, including this Living History educational program in 2017: Living History with Gene Gordon (youtube.com). The Museum acquired his collection of Kennedy-related negatives and prints in 2014 and 2016. Gene Gordon passed away on March 16, 2023. - Stephen Fagin, Curator

The 1963 white Lincoln convertible with red leather interior used by the Kennedys in Fort Worth was loaned to the Secret Service by local resident Bill Poston, a member of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce. Poston, who owned a home improvement business, leased the car for business use from the Fort Worth National Bank. The car itself came from Golightly Auto Sales in Fort Worth.

The convertible has had an interesting history. Bill Golightly of Golightly Auto Sales sold the car in 1964 to a local resident, who used the car until he sold it to the Tragedy in U.S. History Museum in St. Augustine, Florida. When that museum closed in 1998, the car went on display at the Classic Car Gallery in Southport, Connecticut. That organization then sold the car via eBay in 2003.

The car can be seen outside the Hotel Texas, ready to transport President and Mrs. Kennedy back to Carswell Air Force Base, on the morning of November 22 in this series of color photographs taken by Fort Worth resident George Putnam: Search putnam (Objects) – Search – The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza (jfk.org). - Stephen Fagin, Curator

The man with the briefcase in this photo is the late Jack Valenti, special assistant to Vice President Lyndon Johnson at the time of the assassination (and later the longtime president of the Motion Picture Association of America from 1966-2004). Mr. Valenti, who passed away in 2007, recorded an oral history with the Museum in 2004 that may be viewed online here: https://emuseum.jfk.org/objects/26021. - Stephen Fagin, Curator