ADVANCE PREPARATIONS FOR THE DALLAS TRIP
Advance preparations for President Kennedy’s visit to Dallas were primarily the responsibility of two Secret Service agents: Special Agent Winston G. Lawson, a member of the White House detail who acted as the advance agent, and Forrest V. Sorrels, special agent in charge of the Dallas office.[C2-17] Both agents were advised of the trip on November 4.[C2-18] Lawson received a tentative schedule of the Texas trip on November 8 from Roy H. Kellerman, assistant special agent in charge of the White House detail, who was the Secret Service official responsible for the entire Texas journey.[C2-19] As advance agent working closely with Sorrels, Lawson had responsibility for arranging the timetable for the President’s visit to Dallas and coordinating local activities with the White House staff, the organizations directly concerned with the visit, and local law enforcement officials.[C2-20] Lawson’s most important responsibilities were to take preventive action against anyone in Dallas considered a threat to the President, to select the luncheon site and motorcade route, and to plan security measures for the luncheon and the motorcade.
Preventive Intelligence Activities
The Protective Research Section (PRS) of the Secret Service maintains records of people who have threatened the President or so conducted themselves as to be deemed a potential danger to him. On November 8, 1963, after undertaking the responsibility for advance preparations for the visit to Dallas, Agent Lawson went to the PRS offices in Washington. A check of the geographic indexes there revealed no listing for any individual deemed to be a potential danger to the President in the territory of the Secret Service regional office which includes Dallas and Fort Worth.[C2-21]
To supplement the PRS files, the Secret Service depends largely on local police departments and local offices of other Federal agencies which advise it of potential threats immediately before the visit of the President to their community. Upon his arrival in Dallas on November 12 Lawson conferred with the local police and the local office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation about potential dangers to the President. Although there was no mention in PRS files of the demonstration in Dallas against Ambassador Adlai Stevenson on October 24, 1963, Lawson inquired about the incident and obtained through the local police photographs of some of the persons involved.[C2-22] On November 22 a Secret Service agent stood at the entrance to the Trade Mart, where the President was scheduled to speak, with copies of these photographs. Dallas detectives in the lobby of the Trade Mart and in the luncheon area also had copies of these photographs. A number of people who resembled some of those in the photographs were placed under surveillance at the Trade Mart.[C2-23]
The FBI office in Dallas gave the local Secret Service representatives the name of a possibly dangerous individual in the Dallas area who was investigated. It also advised the Secret Service of the circulation on November 21 of a handbill sharply critical of President Kennedy,[C2-24] discussed in chapter VI of this report. Shortly before, the Dallas police had reported to the Secret Service that the handbill had appeared on the streets of Dallas. Neither the Dallas police nor the FBI had yet learned the source of the handbill.[C2-25] No one else was identified to the Secret Service through local inquiry as potentially dangerous, nor did PRS develop any additional information between November 12, when Lawson left Washington, and November 22. The adequacy of the intelligence system maintained by the Secret Service at the time of the assassination, including a detailed description of the available data on Lee Harvey Oswald and the reasons why his name had not been furnished to the Secret Service, is discussed in chapter VIII.
The Luncheon Site
An important purpose of the President’s visit to Dallas was to speak at a luncheon given by business and civic leaders. The White House staff informed the Secret Service that the President would arrive and depart from Dallas’ Love Field; that a motorcade through the downtown area of Dallas to the luncheon site should be arranged; and that following the luncheon the President would return to the airport by the most direct route. Accordingly, it was important to determine the luncheon site as quickly as possible, so that security could be established at the site and the motorcade route selected.
On November 4, Gerald A. Behn, agent in charge of the White House detail, asked Sorrels to examine three potential sites for the luncheon.[C2-26] One building, Market Hall, was unavailable for November 22. The second, the Women’s Building at the State Fair Grounds, was a one-story building with few entrances and easy to make secure, but it lacked necessary food-handling facilities and had certain unattractive features, including a low ceiling with exposed conduits and beams. The third possibility, the Trade Mart, a handsome new building with all the necessary facilities, presented security problems. It had numerous entrances, several tiers of balconies surrounding the central court where the luncheon would be held, and several catwalks crossing the court at each level. On November 4, Sorrels told Behn he believed security difficulties at the Trade Mart could be overcome by special precautions.[C2-27] Lawson also evaluated the security hazards at the Trade Mart on November 13.[C2-28] Kenneth O’Donnell made the final decision to hold the luncheon at the Trade Mart; Behn so notified Lawson on November 14.[C2-29]
Once the Trade Mart had been selected, Sorrels and Lawson worked out detailed arrangements for security at the building. In addition to the preventive measures already mentioned, they provided for controlling access to the building, closing off and policing areas around it, securing the roof and insuring the presence of numerous police officers inside and around the building. Ultimately more than 200 law enforcement officers, mainly Dallas police but including 8 Secret Service agents, were deployed in and around the Trade Mart.[C2-30]
The Motorcade Route
On November 8, when Lawson was briefed on the itinerary for the trip to Dallas, he was told that 45 minutes had been allotted for a motorcade procession from Love Field to the luncheon site.[C2-31] Lawson was not specifically instructed to select the parade route, but he understood that this was one of his functions.[C2-32] Even before the Trade Mart had been definitely selected, Lawson and Sorrels began to consider the best motorcade route from Love Field to the Trade Mart. On November 14, Lawson and Sorrels attended a meeting at Love Field and on their return to Dallas drove over the route which Sorrels believed best suited for the proposed motorcade.[C2-33] This route, eventually selected for the motorcade from the airport to the Trade Mart, measured 10 miles and could be driven easily within the allotted 45 minutes.[C2-34] From Love Field the route passed through a portion of suburban Dallas, through the downtown area along Main Street and then to the Trade Mart via Stemmons Freeway. For the President’s return to Love Field following the luncheon, the agents selected the most direct route, which was approximately 4 miles.[C2-35]
After the selection of the Trade Mart as the luncheon site, Lawson and Sorrels met with Dallas Chief of Police Jesse E. Curry, Assistant Chief Charles Batchelor, Deputy Chief N. T. Fisher, and several other command officers to discuss details of the motorcade and possible routes.[C2-36] The route was further reviewed by Lawson and Sorrels with Assistant Chief Batchelor and members of the local host committee on November 15. The police officials agreed that the route recommended by Sorrels was the proper one and did not express a belief that any other route might be better.[C2-37] On November 18, Sorrels and Lawson drove over the selected route with Batchelor and other police officers, verifying that it could be traversed within 45 minutes. Representatives of the local host committee and the White House staff were advised by the Secret Service of the actual route on the afternoon of November 18.[C2-38]
The route impressed the agents as a natural and desirable one. Sorrels, who had participated in Presidential protection assignments in Dallas since a visit by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936,[C2-39] testified that the traditional parade route in Dallas was along Main Street, since the tall buildings along the street gave more people an opportunity to participate.[C2-40] The route chosen from the airport to Main Street was the normal one, except where Harwood Street was selected as the means of access to Main Street in preference to a short stretch of the Central Expressway, which presented a minor safety hazard and could not accommodate spectators as conveniently as Harwood Street.[C2-41] According to Lawson, the chosen route seemed to be the best.
It afforded us wide streets most of the way, because of the buses that were in the motorcade. It afforded us a chance to have alternative routes if something happened on the motorcade route. It was the type of suburban area a good part of the way where the crowds would be able to be controlled for a great distance, and we figured that the largest crowds would be downtown, which they were, and that the wide streets that we would use downtown would be of sufficient width to keep the public out of our way.[C2-42]
Elm Street, parallel to Main Street and one block north, was not used for the main portion of the downtown part of the motorcade because Main Street offered better vantage points for spectators.
To reach the Trade Mart from Main Street the agents decided to use the Stemmons Freeway (Route No. 77), the most direct route. The only practical way for westbound traffic on Main Street to reach the northbound lanes of the Stemmons Freeway is via Elm Street, which Route No. 77 traffic is instructed to follow in this part of the city. (See Commission Exhibit No. 2113, [p. 34].) Elm Street was to be reached from Main by turning right at Houston, going one block north and then turning left onto Elm. On this last portion of the journey, only 5 minutes from the Trade Mart, the President’s motorcade would pass the Texas School Book Depository Building on the northwest corner of Houston and Elm Streets. The building overlooks Dealey Plaza, an attractively landscaped triangle of 3 acres. (See Commission Exhibit No. 876, [p. 33].) From Houston Street, which forms the base of the triangle, three streets—Commerce, Main, and Elm—trisect the plaza, converging at the apex of the triangle to form a triple underpass beneath a multiple railroad bridge almost 500 feet from Houston Street.[C2-43] Elm Street, the northernmost of the three, after intersecting Houston curves in a southwesterly arc through the underpass and leads into an access road, which branches off to the right and is used by traffic going to the Stemmons Freeway and the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike. (See Commission Exhibits Nos. 2113-2116, [pp. 34-37].)
Commission Exhibit No. 876
DEALEY PLAZA—DALLAS, TEXAS
1. TEXAS SCHOOL BOOK DEPOSITORY
2. DAL-TEX BUILDING
3. DALLAS COUNTY RECORDS BUILDING
4. DALLAS COUNTY CRIMINAL COURTS BUILDING
5. OLD COURT HOUSE
6. NEELEY BRYAN HOUSE
7. DALLAS COUNTY GOVERNMENT CENTER (UNDER CONSTRUCTION)
8. UNITED STATES POST OFFICE BUILDING
9. PERGOLAS
10. PERISTYLES AND REFLECTING POOLS
11. RAILROAD OVERPASS (TRIPLE UNDERPASS)
Commission Exhibit No. 2113
FREEWAY CONVERGENCE AT TRIPLE UNDERPASS
DALLAS, TEXAS
Commission Exhibit No. 2114
A. LOOKING TOWARD ENTRANCE TO DEALEY PLAZA FROM INTERSECTION OF HOUSTON AND ELM STS.
B. LOOKING WEST THROUGH DEALEY PLAZA ALONG ELM ST.
C. LOOKING WEST THROUGH TRIPLE UNDERPASS
D. LOOKING WEST TOWARD COMMERCE ST. FROM TRIPLE UNDERPASS
Commission Exhibit No. 2115
PLAN VIEW OF FREEWAY CONVERGENCE
WEST OF TRIPLE UNDERPASS
DALLAS, TEXAS
Commission Exhibit No. 2116
AERIAL VIEW (500 FT. ALTITUDE)
OF FREEWAY CONVERGENCE WEST OF
TRIPLE UNDERPASS, DALLAS, TEXAS
Commission Exhibit No. 2967
Traffic sign on Main Street which directs westbound traffic to turn right at Houston Street to gain access to the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike.
The Elm Street approach to the Stemmons Freeway is necessary in order to avoid the traffic hazards which would otherwise exist if right turns were permitted from both Main and Elm into the freeway. To create this traffic pattern, a concrete barrier between Main and Elm Streets presents an obstacle to a right turn from Main across Elm to the access road to Stemmons Freeway and the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike. This concrete barrier extends far enough beyond the access road to make it impracticable for vehicles to turn right from Main directly to the access road. A sign located on this barrier instructs Main Street traffic not to make any turns.[C2-45] (See Commission Exhibits Nos. 2114-2116, [pp. 35-37].) In conformity with these arrangements, traffic proceeding west on Main is directed to turn right at Houston in order to reach the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike, which has the same access road from Elm Street as does the Stemmons Freeway.[C2-46] (See Commission Exhibit No. 2967, [p. 38].)
The planning for the motorcade also included advance preparations for security arrangements along the route. Sorrels and Lawson reviewed the route in cooperation with Assistant Chief Batchelor and other Dallas police officials who took notes on the requirements for controlling the crowds and traffic, watching the overpasses, and providing motorcycle escort.[C2-47] To control traffic, arrangements were made for the deployment of foot patrolmen and motorcycle police at various positions along the route.[C2-48] Police were assigned to each overpass on the route and instructed to keep them clear of unauthorized persons.[C2-49] No arrangements were made for police or building custodians to inspect buildings along the motorcade route since the Secret Service did not normally request or make such a check.[C2-50] Under standard procedures, the responsibility for watching the windows of buildings was shared by local police stationed along the route and Secret Service agents riding in the motorcade.[C2-51]
As the date for the President’s visit approached, the two Dallas newspapers carried several reports of his motorcade route. The selection of the Trade Mart as the possible site for the luncheon first appeared in the Dallas Times-Herald on November 15, 1963.[C2-52] The following day, the newspaper reported that the Presidential party “apparently will loop through the downtown area, probably on Main Street, en route from Dallas Love Field” on its way to the Trade Mart.[C2-53] On November 19, the Times-Herald afternoon paper detailed the precise route:
From the airport, the President’s party will proceed to Mockingbird Lane to Lemmon and then to Turtle Creek, turning south to Cedar Springs.
The motorcade will then pass through downtown on Harwood and then west on Main, turning back to Elm at Houston and then out Stemmons Freeway to the Trade Mart.[C2-54]
Also on November 19, the Morning News reported that the President’s motorcade would travel from Love Field along specified streets, then “Harwood to Main, Main to Houston, Houston to Elm, Elm under the Triple Underpass to Stemmons Freeway, and on to the Trade Mart.”[C2-55] On November 20 a front page story reported that the streets on which the Presidential motorcade would travel included “Main and Stemmons Freeway.”[C2-56] On the morning of the President’s arrival, the Morning News noted that the motorcade would travel through downtown Dallas onto the Stemmons Freeway, and reported that “the motorcade will move slowly so that crowds can ‘get a good view’ of President Kennedy and his wife.”[C2-57]