4 OctOber 19 - 25, 2023 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents He Didn’t Stay Long What’s with the ‘JFK Was Here’ banners downtown? BY SIMONE CARTER D allas is, for better or worse, inextrica- bly linked with an event that’s been permanently seared into America’s collective consciousness: the assassination of John F. Kennedy. This year marks the 60th anniversary of the former president’s killing at Dealey Plaza. Conspiracy theories about the day abound, but most everyone can agree that on Nov. 22, 1963, Kennedy was fatally shot as his motorcade drove through Dallas. If you’ve been downtown recently, you may have noticed some bold commemora- tive banners hanging from street lights. On one side are photos from that fateful 1963 motorcade, including snaps of JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy. But it’s the other side of the banner that’s making waves, al- beit unintended ones. White text on a dark background screams in all capital letters: “JFK WAS HERE.” Yep. He sure was. It makes sense that we’d see memorial markers ahead of such a significant anniver- sary, of course. But some users on X (for- merly Twitter) have noted the wording is a bit unfortunate. “These ‘JFK was here’ signs all over downtown Dallas………… well yes!” someone captioned a picture of one of the banners, later adding in a comment: “And then what happened.” A different X user posted a photo of a sign that seems to show the back of the first lady’s head as she rode in the rear of the open-air presidential limo, likely minutes before her husband was slain while sitting beside her. “Something about this idea is a little weird,” the person wrote. Another social media user further re- marked on the morbid nature of the cam- paign. “These ads in downtown Dallas are cracking me up. ‘Yeah JFK got lit up here,’” the person said in the post. The signs also display the URL “jfk. org/60,” which takes you to a page on The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza’s web- site. The museum explains that it’s “plan- ning a compelling series of programs and events” and a “special exhibition” to honor Kennedy’s life, legacy and the anniversary of his assassination. So what is it about the signs, exactly, that’s rubbing folks the wrong way? Dallas has long wrestled with how to cope with Kennedy’s assassination, said Mi- chael Phillips, a historian at Texas A&M Commerce. “I think what happens when we think about the significance of Kennedy in terms of Dallas, it’s hard to come up with an accu- rate, convincing lesson — and certainly to make it a slogan is difficult,” said Phillips, author of White Metropolis: Race, Ethnicity, and Religion in Dallas, 1841–2001. Don’t get us wrong: Creating a succinct slogan to observe the anniversary of such a gruesome occurrence was probably tough. But certain alternative phrases likely wouldn’t have been as controversial. The signs could have argued, “The world changed here,” Phillips said — though ex- perts may diverge on the extent to which Kennedy’s assassination shaped future na- tional and international events. Or the ban- ners could have just displayed the date of death: “Nov. 22, 1963.” Looking at pictures of the Kennedy fam- ily during that era elicits emotional reac- tions even today, Phillips said. There’s 3-year-old John F. Kennedy Jr. saluting his late dad’s casket. There’s a shell- shocked Jackie in her blood-splattered pink suit. There’s Kennedy’s relative youth and attractiveness: a U.S. president snuffed out during what was arguably his prime. As to why some Dallasites have delivered less-than-positive reviews of the banners’ slogan, Phillips has a theory: “It’s emotion- ally dead.” Based on the reactions gleaned from so- cial media, the “JFK was here” message reads murky at best and flippant at worst. We reached out to The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza for help understanding the meaning. Chief Philanthropy Officer Kim Bryan didn’t answer our question concerning the social media blowback but did emphasize that the museum had hoped to spread awareness of the site’s historic significance. “The banners are placed along President Kennedy’s motorcade route and use historic images from the Museum’s collections,” she wrote to the Observer in part. “Each of the banner images is placed as close as possible to the location where the images were taken, nearly 60 years ago.” Ohhh, OK — that makes sense. Too bad the signs couldn’t squeeze in that 40-word expla- nation, or convey that message more clearly and less lightheartedly, accidental or not. Meanwhile, certain past leaders have tried to distance Dallas from the assassination. Phillips noted that former Mayor R.L. Thornton, for instance, didn’t want the city to host a Kennedy memorial. Thornton re- portedly would have rather forgotten that the terrible incident happened here. Traces of that sentiment have lingered in the years since. Nearly a decade ago, The Dallas Morning News ran an article excoriating Dallas for struggling to devise a decent way to pay Ken- nedy tribute. It had been half a century, after all. Architecture critic Mark Lamster wrote that the installation of a plaque at Dealey Plaza betrayed the city’s ambivalence. “It’s been 50 years, and Dallas still hasn’t figured out an appropriate way to memorial- ize John F. Kennedy, even as the tragedy of his murder has served as the impetus for the city’s reinvention,” Lamster began in the story’s lead. The way Phillips sees it, today’s banners further mirror Dallas’ complicated relation- ship with Kennedy’s killing: “The emptiness and the meaninglessness of this slogan is a reflection that, even 60 years later, Dallas hasn’t come to terms with the meaning of that event.” ▼ EDUCATION ‘VOUCHER SCAMS’ ABBOTT’S EDUCATION SAVINGS ACCOUNTS THREATEN ANOTHER REPUBLICAN CIVIL WAR. BY KELLY DEARMORE W hen Texas Gov. Greg Abbott fi- nally called another special leg- islative session, he followed through on a promise, or a threat, depending on your view, to bring state lawmakers back to battle on a hill he’s clearly willing to die on: school vouchers (read: not teacher pay raises). In true GOP fashion, Abbott has used his trusty Republican talent for branding when touting his voucher-like plan around the state over the past many months. It’s “paren- tal choice,” or “school choice.” He says he’s looking to give families “educational savings accounts,” not school vouchers. It’s likely not a stretch to say the differ- ence is because “educational savings ac- count” hasn’t become a political lightning rod term the way “school vouchers” has over the years. Unlike so many other bills debated in the House, this one isn’t terribly complicated. Abbott wants state money to be made avail- able for private education. As each year of Abbott’s lengthy gubernatorial term has passed, he’s grown more vocal in his support of school vouchers and more critical of pub- lic schools for what he sees as a growing lib- eral influence over students. Although teacher raises were discussed during the 88th session, one with a histori- cally large surplus, raises did not come to fruition, although a small, one-time bonus was OK’d for all teachers. It’s also notewor- thy that Abbott has had to scratch and claw his way through an entire session and now a special session for a program that many Re- publicans are in favor of, at least in some form. Given how the GOP has had a strangle- hold on Texas politics for a generation now, the population has grown accustomed to the pet causes of Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Pat- rick being passed relatively easily, while items they’re not fond of, such as anything relating to cannabis, gambling or LGBTQ rights, rarely makes it beyond the basic filing stage. Complicating things for Abbott, how- ever, is the increasingly bitter Republican civil war in Texas. Even before the nation got a look at the battle between House Republicans who wanted to expel Attorney Gen. Ken Paxton and Senate Republicans who, almost unani- mously, chose not to, Abbott and Patrick waged a more contentious battle than we had previously seen when they endorsed dueling property tax reduction plans. On top of that, state Republican lawmak- ers in rural districts have expressed their re- sistance to voucher programs for quite some time. Public schools are the beating hearts in small towns — where the population is only in the three, four or five digits — thanks as much to the number of people those schools employ as anything else. Take money away from those entities, and it doesn’t take much for an elected official to see their days could be numbered. There’s no such conflict in the Demo- cratic party regarding school vouchers. Voucher programs have always been off the table, and Abbott’s education savings Kelly Dearmore Banners commemorating the 60th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination have some Dallas residents scratching their heads. | UNFAIR PARK | >> p6
