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Zapruder's WFAA-TV Transcript


Zapruder at WFAA-TV
WFAA-TV program director Jay Watson (l) and Abraham Zapruder.


Transcript prepared by Gary Mack, Archivist, The Sixth Floor Museum.


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This transcript is from video tape of the live broadcast seen nationwide on the ABC network at about 2:10pm CST, November 22, 1963. The interviewer, seated on the left, is WFAA-TV program director Jay Watson. On the right, with his hat on the desk, is Abraham Zapruder.

WATSON: A gentleman just walked in our studio that I am meeting for the first time as well as you, this is WFAA-TV in Dallas, Texas. May I have your name please, sir?

ZAPRUDER: My name is Abraham Zapruder.

WATSON: Mr. Zapruda?

ZAPRUDER: Zapruder, yes sir.

WATSON: Zapruda. And would you tell us your story please, sir?

ZAPRUDER: I got out in, uh, about a half-hour earlier to get a good spot to shoot some pictures. And I found a spot, one of these concrete blocks they have down near that park, near the underpass. And I got on top there, there was another girl from my office, she was right behind me. And as I was shooting, as the President was coming down from Houston Street making his turn, it was about a half-way down there, I heard a shot, and he slumped to the side, like this. Then I heard another shot or two, I couldn't say it was one or two, and I saw his head practically open up, all blood and everything, and I kept on shooting. That's about all, I'm just sick, I can't…

WATSON: I think that pretty well expresses the entire feelings of the whole world.

ZAPRUDER: Terrible, terrible.

WATSON: You have the film in your camera, we'll try to get…

ZAPRUDER: Yes, I brought it on the studio, now.

WATSON: …we'll try to get that processed and have it as soon as possible.

WFAA then shows a video tape of the hearse with Kennedy's body leaving the Parkland Hospital driveway. Watson next shows a photograph of the Texas School Book Depository and points to the sixth floor window.

WATSON: There is a picture of the window where the gun was allegedly fired from that killed President Kennedy…

ZAPRUDER: I must have been in the line of fire.

WATSON: … today. Excuse me, go ahead sir.

ZAPRUDER: I say I must have been in the line of fire where I seen that picture where it was. I was right on that, uh, concrete block, as I said. And as I explained before, is a sickening scene. At first I thought perhaps it's a, uh, it sounded like, uh, somebody make a joke, you hear a, a shot and somebody grabs their stomach.


What Other Photographs Were Taken in Dealey Plaza?

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Abraham Zapruder's testimony before the Warren Commission:

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