Abraham Zapruder (May 15, 1905 – August 30, 1970) was a Ukrainian-born American clothing manufacturer who witnessed the
assassination of United States President John F. Kennedy in
Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
, Texas, on November 22, 1963. He unexpectedly captured the shooting in
a home movie while filming the
presidential limousine and
motorcade as it traveled through
Dealey Plaza. The
Zapruder film
The Zapruder film is a silent 8mm color motion picture sequence shot by Abraham Zapruder with a Bell & Howell home-movie camera, as United States President John F. Kennedy's motorcade passed through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas, on November ...
is regarded as the most complete footage of the assassination.
Early life
Zapruder was born into a
Ukrainian-Jewish
The history of the Jews in Ukraine dates back over a thousand years; Jewish communities have existed in the territory of Ukraine from the time of the Kievan Rus' (late 9th to mid-13th century). Some of the most important Jewish religious and ...
family in the city of
Kovel
Kovel (, ; pl, Kowel; yi, קאוולע / קאוולי ) is a city in Volyn Oblast (province), in northwestern Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Kovel Raion (district). Population:
Kovel gives its name to one of the oldest runi ...
, the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
(now
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
), the son of Israel Zapruder. He received only four years of formal education in Ukraine. In 1909, his father left for America. In 1918, Abraham Zapruder left Kovel for
Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
with his family. At some point, Zapruder's brother was pulled off a train and murdered in front of his family, apparently by
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe
* Polish language
* Poles
Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...
guards. In 1920, his family emigrated to the United States, settling in
Brooklyn
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
, New York where they were reunited with Israel Zapruder.
Studying English at night, he found work as a clothing pattern maker in
Manhattan's garment district. In 1933, he married Lillian Sapovnik (1913–1993), with whom he had two children. Zapruder was a
Freemason
Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...
and an Inspector-General (33rd degree) of the
Scottish Rite
The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction in the United States often omits the ''and'', while the English Constitution in the United Kingdom omits the ''Scottish''), commonly known as simply the Sco ...
.
In 1941, Zapruder moved to Dallas, Texas, to work for Nardis, a local sportswear company. In 1949, he co-founded Jennifer Juniors, Inc., producing the Chalet and Jennifer Juniors brands of dresses. From the summer of 1953 to April 1954, Zapruder worked at Nardis side by side with Jeanne LeGon.
His Jennifer Juniors offices were on the fourth floor of the
Dal-Tex Building
The Dal-Tex Building is a seven-story office building located at 501 Elm Street in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas, Texas, United States. The building is located on the northeast corner of Elm and North Houston Streets, across ...
, across the street from the
Texas School Book Depository
The Texas School Book Depository, now known as the Dallas County Administration Building, is a seven-floor building facing Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas. The building was Lee Harvey Oswald's vantage point during the assassination of United Sta ...
.
Witness to Kennedy assassination
Filming of assassination
At the time of the assassination, Zapruder was an admirer of President Kennedy and considered himself a
Democrat
Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to:
Politics
*A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people.
*A member of a Democratic Party:
**Democratic Party (United States) (D)
**Democratic ...
. Zapruder had originally planned to film the motorcade carrying President Kennedy through downtown Dallas on November 22, but he decided not to film the event because it had been raining that morning. When he arrived at work that morning without his camera, Zapruder's assistant insisted that he retrieve it from home before going to Dealey Plaza because the weather had cleared.
Zapruder's movie camera was an 8 mm
Bell & Howell
Bell and Howell LLC is a U.S.-based services organization and former manufacturer of cameras, lenses, and motion picture machinery, founded in 1907 by two projectionists, and originally headquartered in Wheeling, Illinois. The company is now ...
Zoomatic Director Series Model 414 PD—top-of-the-line when it was purchased in 1962. Zapruder had planned to film the motorcade from his office window but decided to choose a more optimal spot in Dealey Plaza where the motorcade would be passing.
He chose to film on top of a concrete abutment which extends from a retaining wall that was part of the
John Neely Bryan
John Neely Bryan (December 24, 1810 – September 8, 1877) was a Presbyterian farmer, lawyer, and tradesman in the United States and founder of the city of Dallas, Texas.
Early life
Bryan was born to James and Elizabeth (Neely) Bryan in Faye ...
concrete
pergola
A pergola is most commonly an outdoor garden feature forming a shaded walkway, passageway, or sitting area of vertical posts or pillars that usually support cross-beams and a sturdy open lattice, often upon which woody vines are trained. The ...
on the
grassy knoll
Dealey Plaza is a city park in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas, Texas. It is sometimes called the "birthplace of Dallas". It was also the location of the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963; 30 minutes after the shooting ...
north of Elm Street, in Dealey Plaza. Zapruder's secretary,
Marilyn Sitzman
Marilyn Sitzman (December 14, 1939 – August 11, 1993) was an American receptionist and a witness to the assassination of United States President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. She was with her boss, Abraham Zapruder, ...
, offered to assist Zapruder as he suffered from
vertigo
Vertigo is a condition where a person has the sensation of movement or of surrounding objects moving when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. This may be associated with nausea, vomiting, sweating, or difficulties w ...
and was apprehensive about standing on the abutment alone.
While Sitzman stood behind Zapruder and held his coat to steady him, he began filming the presidential motorcade as it turned from Houston Street onto Elm Street in front of the Book Depository. Zapruder's film captured 26.6 seconds of the traveling motorcade carrying President Kennedy on 486 frames of
Kodak
The Eastman Kodak Company (referred to simply as Kodak ) is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in analogue photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorpor ...
Kodachrome
Kodachrome is the brand name for a color reversal film introduced by Eastman Kodak in 1935. It was one of the first successful color materials and was used for both cinematography and still photography. For many years Kodachrome was widely used ...
II safety film. Zapruder's film captured the fatal head shot that struck President Kennedy as his limousine passed almost directly in front of Zapruder and Sitzman's position, from the center of Elm Street.
Zapruder later recalled that he immediately knew that President Kennedy's wound was fatal as he saw the president's head "...explode like a firecracker."
Walking back to his office amid the confusion following the shots, Zapruder encountered ''
The Dallas Morning News
''The Dallas Morning News'' is a daily newspaper serving the Dallas–Fort Worth area of Texas, with an average print circulation of 65,369. It was founded on October 1, 1885 by Alfred Horatio Belo as a satellite publication of the ''Galvesto ...
'' reporter Harry McCormick, who was standing near Zapruder and noticed he was filming the motorcade. McCormick was acquainted with Agent Forrest Sorrels of the
Secret Service
A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For ...
's Dallas office, and offered to bring Sorrels to Zapruder's office.
Zapruder agreed and returned to his office. McCormick later found Sorrels outside the Sheriff's office at Main and Houston, and together they went to Zapruder's office.
Zapruder agreed to give the film to Sorrels on the condition it would be used only for investigation of the assassination. The three then took the film to the television station
WFAA
WFAA (channel 8) is a television station licensed to Dallas, Texas, United States, serving the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex as an affiliate of ABC. It is owned by Tegna Inc. alongside Decatur-licensed Estrella TV affiliate KMPX (channel 29), ...
to be developed. After it was realized that WFAA was unable to develop Zapruder's footage, the film was taken to
Eastman Kodak
The Eastman Kodak Company (referred to simply as Kodak ) is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in analogue photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorpor ...
's Dallas processing plant later that afternoon where it was immediately developed. As the Kodachrome process requires different equipment for duplication than for simple development, Zapruder's film was not developed until around 6:30 p.m. The original developed film was taken to the
Jamieson Film Company, where three additional copies were exposed; these were returned to Kodak around 8 p.m. for processing. Zapruder kept the original, plus one copy, and gave the other two copies to Sorrels, who sent them to Secret Service headquarters in Washington.
Television interview
While at WFAA, Zapruder described on live television the assassination of President Kennedy:
Sale of rights
Late that evening, Zapruder was contacted at home by Richard Stolley, an editor at ''
Life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...
'' magazine (and first editor of the future ''
People
A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...
'' magazine). They arranged to meet the following morning to view the film, after which Zapruder sold the print rights to ''Life'' for $50,000. Stolley was representing Time/Life on behalf of publisher
Charles Douglas Jackson
General Charles Douglas (C. D.) Jackson (March 16, 1902 – September 18, 1964) was a United States government propagandist and senior executive of Time Inc. As an expert on psychological warfare he served in the Office of Strategic Services in W ...
.
The following day (November 24), ''Life'' purchased all rights to the film for a total of $150,000 (approximately $ today).
The night after the assassination, Zapruder said that he had a nightmare in which he saw a booth in
Times Square
Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and neighborhood in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway, Seventh Avenue, and 42nd Street. Together with adjacent ...
advertising "See the President's head explode!" He determined that, while he was willing to make money from the film, he did not want the public to see the full horror of what he had seen. Therefore, a condition of the sale to ''Life'' was that frame 313, showing the fatal shot, would be withheld. Although he made a profit from selling the film, he asked that the amount he was paid not be publicly disclosed. He later donated $25,000 (about $ today) of the money he was paid to the widow of Officer
J. D. Tippit
J. D. Tippit (September 18, 1924 – November 22, 1963) was an American World War II U.S Army veteran and police officer who served as an 11-year veteran with the Dallas Police Department. About 45 minutes after the assassination of John F. ...
, a Dallas police officer who was shot and killed by
Lee Harvey Oswald
Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963.
Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at the age of 12 fo ...
45 minutes after President Kennedy was killed.
[
In 1975, Time, Inc. (which owned ''Life'' magazine) sold the film back to the Zapruder family for $1. In 1978, the Zapruders allowed the film to be stored at the ]National Archives and Records Administration
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It i ...
where it remains. In 1999, the Zapruders donated the copyright of the film to the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza
The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza is a museum located on the sixth floor of the Dallas County Administration Building (formerly the Texas School Book Depository) in downtown Dallas, Texas, overlooking Dealey Plaza at the intersection of El ...
.[
]
Testimony
In his testimony to the Warren Commission
The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy, known unofficially as the Warren Commission, was established by President Lyndon B. Johnson through on November 29, 1963, to investigate the assassination of United States Pr ...
, Zapruder was asked for his impression regarding the direction of the shots:
Zapruder added that he had assumed the shots came from behind him because the President's head went backwards from the fatal shot, and also that the wound on the side of the President's head was facing that direction. He also said he believed it because police officers ran to the area behind him.
He broke down and wept as he recalled the assassination, and did so again at the 1969 trial of Clay Shaw
Clay LaVergne Shaw (March 17, 1913 – August 15, 1974) was an American businessman and military officer from New Orleans, Louisiana. Shaw is best known for being the only person brought to trial for involvement in the assassination of John F. ...
.
Death
Zapruder died of stomach cancer in Dallas on August 30, 1970, at Parkland Memorial Hospital
Parkland Memorial Hospital is a public hospital in Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the main hospital of the Parkland Health & Hospital System and serves as Dallas County's public hospital. It is located within the Southwestern Medical Di ...
, and is buried in the Emanu-El Cemetery in Dallas.
In popular culture
* Australian actor, comedian, presenter and film producer Andrew Denton co-founded a production company in 1989 named Zapruder's Other Films.
* '' Timequest'', a 2000 film in which Kennedy's assassination was prevented by a time traveler, had Zapruder (Andrew Dunn) instead aiming his camera at the fence behind the grassy knoll
Dealey Plaza is a city park in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas, Texas. It is sometimes called the "birthplace of Dallas". It was also the location of the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963; 30 minutes after the shooting ...
and filming Robert F. Kennedy
Robert Francis Kennedy (November 20, 1925June 6, 1968), also known by his initials RFK and by the nickname Bobby, was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 64th United States Attorney General from January 1961 to September 1964, ...
after a would be second gunman was killed by his men, then having his footage confiscated by a Secret Service agent, but eventually obtained by a movie director and shown on television several decades later.
* '' Arcanum'', a 2001 computer game, has a character named Isaac Zapruder who is deceased from the beginning of the game. His corpse contains his camera that provides proof that an inventors flying machines were able to fly, before they were destroyed by thieves in a kamikaze attack that crashed the blimp on which Isaac was a passenger. Isaac is the son of Abraham in chapter 22 of the Book of Genesis
The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning") ...
.
* Paul Giamatti
Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti (; born June 6, 1967) is an American actor and film producer. He first garnered attention for his breakout role in '' Private Parts'' as Kenny "Pig Vomit" Rushton, leading to supporting roles in ''Saving Private R ...
portrays Zapruder in the 2013 film '' Parkland'', which dramatizes Zapruder's life on the weekend of the assassination.
Notes
References
External links
*Warren Commission Hearings
Testimony of Abraham Zapruder
vol. 7, p. 569.
* ttp://www.jfkmurdersolved.com/film/Zapruderstable.mov Zapruder Film
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zapruder, Abraham
1905 births
1970 deaths
20th-century American businesspeople
American fashion businesspeople
American Freemasons
American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent
Businesspeople from Dallas
Businesspeople from New York City
Burials in Texas
Deaths from cancer in Texas
Deaths from stomach cancer
Jews from the Russian Empire
People from Kovel
People from Kovelsky Uyezd
Texas Democrats
Polish emigrants to the United States
Ukrainian Jews
Witnesses to the assassination of John F. Kennedy