Dealey Plaza

Dealey Plaza /ˈdiːliː/ 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. The Dealey Plaza Historic District was named a National Historic Landmark on the 30th anniversary of the assassination, to preserve Dealey Plaza, street rights-of-way, buildings, and structures by the plaza visible from the assassination site, that have been identified as witness locations or as possible locations for the assassin.

The Dealey Plaza Historic District was added to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) in 1993 and designated a National Historic Landmark the same year. The former county courthouse is individually listed on the National Register and is also designated a State Antiquities Landmark (SAL) and a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark (RTHL). Additional properties within the district are also RTHLs. The following are contributing properties and other significant buildings within the historic district.:

Dealey Plaza and all of the contributing buildings are part of the Westend Historic District (NRHP #78002918, 1978; Dallas Landmark Historic District #H/2, 1975) with the single exception of the U.S. Post Office Terminal Annex which is outside of the boundaries of that district. The Kennedy Memorial and Plaza is the only contributing property not in existence at the time of the assassination nor in view of its site.

Dealey Plaza was built on land donated by early Dallas philanthropist and businesswoman Sarah Horton Cockrell. It was the location of the first home built in Dallas, which also became the first courthouse and post office, the first store, and the first fraternal lodge. It is sometimes called the "birthplace of Dallas".

The plaza was completed in 1940 as a WPA project on the west edge of downtown Dallas, where three streets converge, Main Street, Elm Street, and Commerce Street, to pass under a railroad bridge known locally as the "triple underpass."

The plaza is named for George Bannerman Dealey (1859–1946), a civic leader and early publisher of The Dallas Morning News, who had campaigned for the area's revitalization. Monuments outlining the plaza honor previous prominent Dallas residents, and predate President John F. Kennedy's visit by many years. The monument honoring President Kennedy, in the form of a cenotaph, is one block away.

Dealey Plaza is bounded on the south, east, and north sides by buildings at least 100 feet (30 m) tall. One of those buildings is the former Texas School Book Depository building, from which, both the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded, Lee Harvey Oswald fired a rifle that killed President Kennedy. 30 minutes after the shooting, Kennedy died at Parkland Memorial Hospital. There is also a grassy knoll on the northwest side of the plaza. At the plaza's west perimeter is a triple underpass beneath a railroad bridge, under which the motorcade raced after the shots were fired.

Today, the plaza is typically visited daily by tourists. The Sixth Floor Museum now occupies the top two floors of the seven-story former Book Depository. Since 1989, more than six million people have visited the museum.