Dealey Plaza Historic District
Roughly bounded by Pacific Ave., Market St., Jackson St. and right of way of Dallas Right of Way Management Company, Dallas, TXThe Dealey Plaza Historic District is significant for National Historic Landmarks criteria because an event--the assassination of the 35th President of the United States--that is identified with the broad national patterns of U.S. history; important associations with persons nationally significant in U.S. history--i.e., President John F. Kennedy and his successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson; and composed of integral parts of the environment that collectively compose an entity of exceptional national historical importance. These associations are so consequential in American history that, even though the event and associations are less than 50 years in the past, they are of extraordinary national importance, meeting criterion exceptions.
President John F. Kennedy's association with Dealey Plaza was momentary but eternal. The street approaching the Triple Underpass in what was then the main municipal plaza in downtown Dallas, a place hitherto an emblem of civic pride, where he was fatally shot on November 22, 1963--in front of his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, who was riding in the second car back; several hundred eyewitnesses; and the world--instantly became one of the most notorious sites in history. Hailed in 1936 as the "gateway to Dallas" and a place "that must surely play a great part in the future of this city," it has, since that fatal day, to the world outside Dallas, summoned all the emotions that only such a loathsome event can. In the United States, there is only one other such site that is intact--Ford's Theatre.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1993.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.