6. “Mr. President…”
Lyndon Baines Johnson, who once said the vice presidency is not worth “a pitcher of warm p*ss”, was only two cars behind JFK. Despite rumors that Johnson was either injured or suffered a heart attack, the vice president was unharmed. Once they arrived at Parkland, agents hurried LBJ inside and settled in a windowless room.
There, LBJ, JFK aide Kenneth O’Donnell and Secret Service agent Thomas Johns discussed a plan of action in case the worst came to pass. Then, at some point, Malcolm Kilduff (who was at that time the Assistant Press Secretary) entered the room. “Mr. President…” were the first two words.
Johnson realized what had just happened. When asked if they should announce Kennedy’s death to the media, Kilduff remembers Johnson reacted promptly. “No”, he said, “I think I should get out of here and return to the plane before you announce it. Nobody knows whether they are after me as well or whether this is a global conspiracy”.
Just before the official announcement, Johnson left Parkland for Love Field Airport, where a plane awaited. His wife, Lady Bird noticed flags atop the hospital being lowered to half-mast as they were flying away.
6 Responses
It is so sad the first a Great President was assassinated , and that his would be killer killed, so that no one would really know who was responsible for this tragedy even after all these years
Regardless of circumstances these many years later, still the biggest travesty in our wonderful country’s history. Beyond sad…power politics greed and ultimately murder of one of the most caring and brilliant man in the world. Johnson really wanted that Presidency and look what he did. Despicable.
How can we believe any of this when you don’t even know the date that he was killed?
I was in class at St. Patrick elementary school when Sister Angela came in and told us of the horror!
Thank you for this information that i am pretty sure no one really knew That was a day that I REMEMBER WAS HORRIBLE. That was a day for History and it was History.
i REMEMBER THAT DAY LIKE IT WAS YESTERDAY. The next 3 days were like everyone in the world was surrounded by fog. The TV proceedings were in Black and White because the colored TVs were very expensive. I really truly believe that it was the first time in my life that the TV stations were on all night. Back then most stations were only broadcasting until 1:00 am. It had just been a few months earlier that we had all as families gathered to watch the intervention of the US and Russia deal in Cuba. Tensions were high, and almost everybody we knew had thought that the assassination was directly related to the Cuba incident. Tensions were high and everyone thought we were going to go into a nuclear war with Russian. I had read a story later in life that in fact it had almost happened, but there was a senator from I believe North Dakota that had a cooler prevailing thought, and he along had saved the earth from nuclear devastation. Trying times for a man who loved by many, many Americans and still to this day.