Boulder City woman who saw JFK moments before assassination shares memories

By Ana Ley

Friday, Nov. 22, 2013 | 2 a.m.

The convertible rolled past Sally Anderson and her schoolmates, offering a prized glimpse of Jacqueline Kennedy’s strawberry pink Chez Ninon suit and matching pillbox hat.

“We were a lot more excited about her,” said Anderson, a Boulder City resident who saw President John F. Kennedy accompanied by the first lady minutes before he was fatally shot in downtown Dallas. “All I can remember was Jackie in her pink suit. There were red, long stemmed roses going across her lap, and she was waving with her right hand.”

The first lady’s iconic ensemble has since become a symbol of Kennedy’s assassination, and one of Anderson’s most enduring memories of that day.

Then an eighth grader at Thomas Rusk Middle School in Dallas, Anderson (who moved to Boulder City in 1961) was among thousands of spectators lining the motorcade’s route that morning. Anderson’s school was near the intersection of Lemmon Avenue and Inwood Road, a short walk from the president’s path.

She and her friends chanted the first lady’s name until the president turned and tapped his wife’s shoulder, pointing at them.

Fifty years later, Anderson remembers the moment vividly — even the smell of hamburgers that wafted from a nearby restaurant, rousing her appetite.

“She kind of moves around him with her beautiful pink dress on,” said Anderson, now 64. “And we’re going, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so exciting.’”

Minutes after students and teachers returned to campus, an announcement came over the intercom:

The president had been shot dead.

Police blocked streets for hours after the shooting, and an eerie silence fell over the stunned city for days.

“It was a long week afterward. Everybody was moving in slow motion,” Anderson said. “I just couldn’t believe it.”