[usa5] dallas

On Elm Street there are two X's painted in the middle of the road. These X's signify the points at which bullets entered then president John F. Kennedy in 1963. Currently a succession of tourists are playing impromtu games of chicken with the midday Dallas traffic to get there pictures taken with an X. Watching one couple pose arm in arm on X number one I have to say its a tourist attraction I'm not totally comfortable with. Had JFK instead met his end falling from the 6th floor of the Texas Book Depository I expect these people would now be lying spreadeagled and grinning for the camera in a chalk outline.

This area of Dallas, cornered by skyscrapers and a freeway is sold as the city's 'Historic Center'. The city itself is only 150 years old; when you are that short on what can be deemed history I suppose you have to make the most of what did happen here. A hundred yards away from the Xs sits a plaque marking the spot where Dallas was founded. No-one is looking at it; I walked past it. The attempted toppling of a government is more tourist friendly and marketable than the foundation of a city.