Teletype printout of one of the most momentous day’s in American History. (Appr.) 100 ft. of original news copy from that day. The very first report reads:
(DALLAS)1—AN UNKNOWN SNIPER FIRED THREE SHOTS AT POOUBN / FLASH / KENNEEY / FLASH / KENNEDY SERIOUSLY WOUNDED ---- HR1238PCS
The misspelling of Kennedy was by Henry Renwald, the teletype operator who was in charge at that machine that fateful day. 10 bells had sounded at newsrooms all across the country that day. Wire operators knew that what would be coming would be news that would stun the world. After that initial message, bureaus were sending in from all over. The next message tells of the urgency:
STAY OFF ALL OF YOU SAY OFF AND KEEP OFF GET OFF
After numerous attempts the interference is ended:
UPR 74 B U L L E T I N (DALLAS)---A SNIPER SERIOUSLY WOUNDED LDJVBUNET KENNEDY IN DOWNTOWN DALLAS TODAY...PERHAPS FATALLY
In 1997, A major Auction House made national news when an AP (Associated Press) teletype report of the day Kennedy was killed was offered for sale. That report was only 7 feet long. It fetched a record price and was placed on display in a portion of Macy’s in New York.
There is a significant difference between the two news outlets however, and their reporting of it. UPI was the first to break the news, and in fact Merriman Smith would go on to win a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting. "Smith was in the press car...When he heard shots, he called in to the Dallas office and sent a flash bulletin," Richard Harnett, veteran UPI reporter says. "The AP reporter started pounding on his shoulder to get to the phone, but Merriman kept it from him." (Quoted - Brill's Content, April 2001)
"What a story," said Charlie. "I was in our office hanging over the wire machines. There was the first bulletin on the UPI machine. Nothing on the AP. Then there is a flash on UPI. Nothing on the AP. Then there is another bulletin on UPI. Still nothing from the AP."
This incredible archive of original UPI teletypes chronicle November 22, 1963, the entire day of the Kennedy assassination. Consisting of eight rolls and 12 individual “tear off” sheets, used in the hurried rush by the newsreaders.
The most stunning is: UPR94
FLASH
PRESIDENT DEAD
;/3&.))”- JD135PCS
The garbled text surely captured in that moment the fluster the teletype operator experienced as he typed those words -the ones that would fix in our collective memories forever one of the darkest days in American history.
It is followed by UPR95
BULLETIN (DALLAS) ---- PRESIDENT KENNEDY IS DEAD. A136PCD11/22
Like Sept. 11, 2001 would later become - Nov. 22, 1963, became a day that all of us old enough would forever remember where we were and what we were doing at the moment we heard that the president had been shot.
Although nearly everyone today is fully aware of the events following Kennedy's assassination, reading about them here in these wire transmissions, a record created as they unfolded, leaves one with both a unique and sobering historical perspective on the tragic event. In generally VG/Fine condition. 
$5,000. up.
