The Big D - Dallas

Tuesday we arrived at a campground north of Dallas about 1. We didn’t even put out the slides on the motorhome. Just hooked up the water and electric, unhooked the Jeep and headed back to downtown. We went right to the 6^th Floor Museum at the Texas Book Depository building at the corner of Elm and Houston, right across from Dealey Plaza and “the grassy knoll”. I’m not sure any of the younger people who read this blog can truly understand the emotional attachment those of my generation, and even more so, my parent’s generation have to these locations. The building ceased being a book storage facility in 1970 and the first 5 floors are now home to the Dallas County Administration offices. The sixth floor, from which Lee Harvey Oswald fired the shots that killed President Kennedy (if you believe the Warren Commission findings, and I do) is now a museum. You enter on the first floor, where the large color photo of a happy President and Mrs. Kennedy greeted us. We took an elevator up to the 6^th floor and did a self-guided audio tour, which includes displays (pictures and videos) and information about Kennedy’s presidency, the political issues of the early 1960’s (Civil Rights, the Cold War, space exploration and Vietnam). Two spots in the museum are in original condition and you can only view them through glass walls: the sixth floor window with the “sniper’s nest” made out of boxes of books, and the corner stairwell where the rifle was found that Oswald used. No photography was allowed on the 6^th floor. On the seventh floor, they had the original Texas Book Depository sign, and the two large photographs of JFK and Jackie. The really unique thing about these, they aren’t photographs at all – they are mosaics. His is all tiny pictures of her, and vice versa (as you can see from the close-up pics Mike took). The museum was interesting, informative and yes, emotional.

Outside we crossed the street to Dealey Plaza on one side and the grassy knoll on the other side. The orange fencing prevented us from walking on the grass or up to the top of it. But Mike did check it out from every angle. There are several X’s on Elm Street – one where the presidential limo was when the first shot was fired and one where the limo was when the fatal shot was fired.

After leaving the Museum, we traveled about 15 miles out to Arlington to see the new home of the Dallas Cowboys – Cowboy Stadium (an imaginative name, don’t you think?!) Actually, it is better than all the stadiums and arenas that sell the naming rights to corporations. (Quicken Loans Arena comes to mind). It took us a little longer than 15 miles because the first location we entered into the GPS was Texas Stadium, forgetting the name of the new stadium. When we got there, it was an empty space – they had torn it down. But we had a pleasant surprise when we got to Cowboy Stadium. It is right next to Ranger Ballpark – the home of the Texas Rangers. Two for the price of one!