Today in 1963: JFK assassination leaves campus in shock

A bright blue cloudless sky welcomed the president to Dallas.

Cheering Texans lined the streets of downtown as his motorcade made its way to Dealey Plaza.

“Mr. President,” Nellie Connally, the governor’s wife, said to John F. Kennedy, “you can’t say Dallas doesn’t love you.”

Pop. Pop. Pop.

* * *

Plop. Plop. Plop.

Rain fell on umbrellas in Bloomington as students scurried across campus. Friday afternoon meant only hours till the Old Oaken Bucket game, only a few more days of class until Thanksgiving.

Along Third Street, as co-eds walked to class, the word began to spread. Women cried. Men shouted.

The president had been shot.

“You can miss class if you wish,” an economics professor told his students in Ballantine Hall. His hands shook as he collected exams. “I just can’t lecture today.”

Prayers and sobs echoed off the walls of Beck Chapel, full to the brim with students with stern faces and bewildered looks.

The Indiana Daily Student newsroom in Ernie Pyle Hall was flooded with crowds of students waiting to hear the latest over the radio. At 2:38 p.m., the news came from Dallas.

The president was dead.

* * *

Many classes were canceled that afternoon, and the Purdue game was postponed. Campus activities continued as plans were made in Washington, D.C., to bury the young president.

Churches in Bloomington were packed that Sunday, pews filled as Americans came to grips with the loss of a leader.

The day Kennedy was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery, IU President Elvis Stahr implored students to continue to strive for the ideals he had stood for, “to eliminate bigotry, hatred, prejudice and intolerance from our minds and hearts.”

The rain had passed, and the president’s killer was dead, too. The nation began to look to the future.

Follow reporter Charles Scudder on Twitter @cscudder.