Newly discovered film footage of President John F. Kennedy’s motorcade in Dallas on the day of his assassination is set to go up for auction. The footage was captured by Dale Carpenter Sr. and shows the motorcade speeding towards the hospital after Kennedy was shot. The footage includes scenes of Secret Service Agent Clint Hill jumping onto the back of the limousine to protect the President and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. The footage, captured on I-35, provides a unique perspective on the events of that day.
The footage was stored with other family films in a milk crate and eventually passed on to Carpenter’s grandson, James Gates. When Gates projected the footage, he was shocked by what he saw and recognized the historical significance of the footage. In 2012, Gates contacted Clint Hill and his co-author, Lisa McCubbin, to share the footage with them. McCubbin Hill described the moment she saw the footage as stopping her heart, given the intensity of the events captured. The auction house has released still photos of the film but is not showing the portion depicting the motorcade racing down the interstate.
Historian Farris Rookstool III, who has seen the film, noted that it provides a more complete look at the rush to Parkland Memorial Hospital than other existing footage. He hopes that after the auction, the footage will be made available for filmmakers and historians to use. The discovery of this footage highlights the ongoing potential for new material related to historical events like the Kennedy assassination to surface, contributing to our understanding of the past.
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