JFK assassination Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

JFK assassination - Research Paper Example The sheer emotion and rawness of the coverage appealed to people’s senses that brought the people closer to the news. It was also by no means dismissible that at the heart of the breaking news were America’s affable and media-savvy president and the grief-stricken first family devastated by a tragedy. Overnight, the mostly newspaper-reading and radio-listening nation has turned their attention to their television sets to get a blow-by-blow update of the latest news. Merriman Smith, a United Press International (UPI) newsman, was riding in the presidential press pool car just behind JFK’s limousine on that fateful day in Dallas when they heard three loud shots. The second and third sound made it unmistakable that they came from gunshots. Smith immediately grabbed hold of the car’s radio phone and contacted the UPI headquarters to deliver the news update. Cronkite, inside the CBS studio in New York, was just informed of the president’s assassination coming across through the UPI teletype machine. As Cronkite’s news team breaks the station’s regular programming to deliver the assassination news unsure of the president’s condition, Smith was in Parkland Hospital with more breaking story. Smith informs UPI that President Kennedy has died at 1:00pm. Breaking the soap opera slot, Cronkite emotionally delivers the news.2 Smith rushed to the office and fed the whole world with the news through the five bells that rang on the recipient UPI machine to indicate the urgency and weight of the message. Walter Cronkite was a close confidant of Smith’s. He knew exactly what Smith meant by the message fed to the world in such a short span of time. Cronkite took to the television immediately, putting a break to the ongoing programs. He had to go on audio, as the available camera was slow at loading images. Cronkite became the most trusted person in America at that time.3 From the time of