Mayor Recalls JFK Assassination 50 Years Ago Today

Today, Nov. 22, is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy. By an eerie coincidence, Kennedy was assassinated on a sunny Friday afternoon in Dallas, TX. it has become something of a cliché to say that people who heard the news of the 1963 assassination tend to remember exactly where they were and what they were doing.

At Wednesday night’s South Pasadena City Council meeting, before the usual pledge of allegiance, Mayor Richard Schneider recalled that fateful moment when the nation came to a standstill.

“A week from tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I’m sure everybody is looking forward to it,” the mayor said. “But there have been a couple of tragedies that I want to discuss—one of the tragedies took place a long time ago and the other one took place just recently.”

Pointing out “the exact same arrangement of the days” regarding Kennedy’s Friday afternoon assassination and its 50th anniversary, Schneider went on to recall “the subsequent murder of Lee Harvey Oswald,” Kennedy’s assassin, by Jack Ruby.

“It was a brutally traumatic week leading up to Thanksgiving that year,” Schneider said. “I was reminded of that because we’ve had a recent tragedy also. Assemblymember Mike Gatto’s father, who lives in nearby Silver Lake, was murdered just a couple of weeks ago.”

Along with Assemblymember Chris Holden (D-Pasadena), Gatto (D-Burbank) co-authored SB 416, a bill crafted by Senator Carol Liu (D-La Cañada Flintridge) to streamline a process for Caltrans to sell as surplus property houses that it purchased in South Pasadena and neighboring communities more than 50 years ago in anticipation of constructing a surface extension route aimed at closing the gap between the 710 freeway and the 210 freeway.

His hope for Thanksgiving, Schneider said, is that “we have many fewer of these tragedies.” On behalf of the city council and the City of South Pasadena, the mayor added, he has sent a letter of condolence to Gatto, “expressing our sorrow at the horrible murder of his father."