MANITOU SPRINGS, Colo. — Most people of a certain age remember where they were when they found out President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. Bob Jackson of Manitou Springs certainly does.
Jackson was riding in the motorcade, a few cars behind the President’s car in Dallas.
It was Nov. 22, 1963, and he was a 29 year old photographer with the "Dallas Times Herald."
He had just taken pictures of the President and First Lady greeting people at the airport Love Field.
The motorcade was winding its way through downtown, and Jackson had just unloaded his camera to give the film to a reporter along route.
He had an empty camera when he heard three shots ring out. He looked up to where he thought the shots were coming from, the Dallas Book Depository Building.
He saw two people in a window on the 5th floor looking up to the 6th floor window above them.
“Then I of course saw the window ledge above them, and there was a rifle resting on the ledge and he drew it in,” Jackson said.
Jackson never saw who drew the rifle in, but to this day he says there were only three shots, and they came from that rifle in that window.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t have pictures to prove it because his camera was empty. Jackson knew he missed the chance to get pictures of one of the most famous moments in time. Little did he know, he would get another chance two days later.
Jackson was scheduled to be at Police Headquarters to take pictures of the suspect in the Kennedy assassination, Lee Harvey Oswald.
Oswald was going to be put in a car and transferred to the County Jail. There were many photographers there, including network photographers to capture the scene on live TV.
Jackson said he checked the wind lever on his camera a dozen times to make sure he was ready. When Oswald was led out by police, someone stepped out in front of him.
That person had a gun and fired it. Jackson said the gun fired, and immediately he fired, pressing the shutter. In those days before digital photography, you didn’t know what you got until the film was developed.
Back at the newspaper he saw his picture and knew immediately he got it, he captured what had happened perfectly.
Jack Ruby, the shooter, holding up the gun. Oswald, impacted by the bullet, screaming in pain. And Dallas Police Detective Jim Leavelle, reacting to it all.
An iconic photo that would, a few months later, win the Pulitzer Prize.
Bob Jackson went on to have a long and successful career, including at the "Denver Post" and "Colorado Springs Gazette." He took thousands of great pictures.
He started out photographing car races, and that’s how he honed his craft. He shot pictures of the Beatles performing, and emotional pictures of news events all over the world.
But one picture he took stands out, and still has special meaning 60 years after it was taken: Oswald and Ruby.
For a news photographer, there may be no better feeling than knowing you captured a big moment in history.
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