DescriptionVideotaped oral history interview with Robert Richter. An Emmy Award-winning documentarian, Richter wrote, produced and directed the PBS documentary, "NOVA: Who Shot President Kennedy?" (1988). Decades earlier, while working for CBS News, he co-produced a four-part series, "A CBS News Inquiry, The Warren Report" (1967). During that project, Richter examined assassination evidence at the National Archives and spent several days with New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison.
Interview conducted via Zoom on July 11, 2022 by Stephen Fagin. The interview is one hour and twenty-seven minutes long.
Curatorial Commentary
The four-part series, A CBS News Inquiry, The Warren Report, co-produced by Robert Richter in 1967, may be viewed in full on C-SPAN's website.
The PBS documentary, NOVA: Who Shot President Kennedy?, first aired on November 15, 1988, one week prior to the 25th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination. Although released on VHS soon after broadcast, the documentary was never made commercially available on DVD or on streaming platforms. Multiple bootleg copies of the documentary are now online. I vividly remember watching this documentary during its original 1988 broadcast and being fascinated by it. More than thirty years later, it was a personal pleasure to interview the writer, producer and director of that landmark program. To bring the story full circle, the long-running PBS NOVA series has aired, to date, more than 1,000 episodes but only two of those episodes have specifically focused on the Kennedy assassination: Robert Richter's Who Shot President Kennedy? in 1988 and, at the 50th anniversary of the assassination, the episode Cold Case JFK in 2013. Having watched that original episode as an elementary school student in 1988, it was my honor to be interviewed - a quarter century later - as Curator of The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza in the 2013 episode. - Stephen Fagin, Curator
Filmmaker Robert Richter passed away at the age of 95 on February 16, 2025. - Stephen Fagin, Curator
