Featured The Life and Presidency of Herbert Hoover
The 2016 White House Christmas ornament honors the administration of the thirty-first president of the United States Herbert Hoover, who served...
John F. Kennedy Funeral
November 25, 1963
How Long? 2 minutes
John F. Kennedy was shot and killed by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. Shocked and saddened by that news bulletin, Americans that lived through the 1960s will never forget the day of Kennedy's death and the sorrow of that solemn funeral. Television brought those events immediately and continually into America's homes. The president had been pronounced dead at Parkland Hospital in Dallas at 1 p.m. (2 p.m. ET). Later that afternoon Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as President of the United States aboard Air Force One. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy stood and witnessed the ceremony in a bloodstained pink suit. The slain president's body in the back of the plane was carried back to Andrews Air Force base with the new president and the official entourage.
Mrs. Kennedy instructed chief usher J.B. West to follow the protocol and details of Lincoln's 1865 state funeral for her husband. Kennedy's remains were taken to the center of the East Room and set upon the same catafalque used at Lincoln's funeral. On the twenty-third various officials and heads of state were received and viewed the flag-draped coffin. The public was not admitted. The following day the coffin was taken to the Capitol rotunda. More than 250,000 people filed past Kennedy's flag-draped coffin. On November 25, the day of the funeral, a horse-drawn caisson carried the casket down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. There Mrs. Kennedy and the mourners, official and personal, waited. They walked with the procession—military escort, band, and the symbolic rider less horse with boots reversed in the stirrups—eight blocks to St. Matthew's Cathedral, where the funeral service was held. After the service, the caisson carried the president's remains to their final resting place in Arlington Memorial Cemetery.
President Kennedy's casket as seen through the East Room doorway, November 23, 1963.
You Might Also Like
-
-
Collection The Kennedy Rose Garden
It's hard to imagine that it was something as casual as a lunch conversation between a newly elected president and...
-
Collection Eleanor Roosevelt's "My Day"
The White House Historical Association and the Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project present this collaboration in an effort to open a...
-
Hoover Easter Egg Rolls
The annual White House Easter egg roll was a well-established tradition when President Herbert Hoover took office, and the Hoovers...
-
Sicilian Salvador Catalano
Few people today know the story of a Sicilian-born sailor named Salvadore Catalano who became an early American naval hero....
-
Monuments to the American Revolution in Lafayette Park
In 1853, Clark Mills’ statue of President Andrew Jackson on horseback is in the center of Lafayette Park. The park’s four...
-
Civil War Veterans Visit the White House
In May 1865, at the close of hostilities, a Grand Review throughout Washington, D.C., exhibited parading Union troops from the...
-
Abraham Lincoln's White House
On a hot summer day in August 1864, Abraham Lincoln strolled from his Second-Floor office to the lawn outside the Executive...
-
The Kennedys and Performing Arts
Although guest artists had been entertaining at the White House for more than a century, President and Mrs. John F....
-
Presidents' Day at the White House
Just how does the president celebrate Presidents’ Day? Throughout the more than 200-year history of the White House, presidents themselves ha...
-
Eleanor Roosevelt's "My Day": Ceremonies
Ceremony and ceremonial occasions played vital roles in the Roosevelt White House. Whether presiding over state receptions, entertaining heads of...
-
Fourth of July Celebrations at the White House in the 19th Century
The People's House: Thomas Jefferson began the tradition of a public reception to celebrate the Fourth of July in 1801. The...
