Living History with Bill Mercer 

Steven Fagin does a very nice job with these interviews. Great preparation before the interviews provides a great flow to telling the story and asking insightful questions.

55 years ago Bill Mercer was my instructor in the sports announcing curriculum in the broadcasting school I attended. I learned a lot from him and later did football, basketball and baseball play-by-play for both college and high school using most of what Bill had taught me. I'd guess he was in his 30s then, and probably in his 90s now.

Bill had a most pleasant voice as I remember from back in the 60's. He was one of my favorite broadcast personalities.

Well, I was in Third grade in TEXAS and I remember vividly the announcement over the intercom. There was no cheering or applauding period. I remember we were SHOCKED and couldn't believe what had happened. Of course we knew little about politics back then but everyone I knew liked JFK and Jacqueline. They let us out of school, but there was no cheering about that. Then a couple of days later we watched Oswald get shot. Once again a young third grader is shocked by events in his world. It was unbelievable, and the main emotion I remember was thinking it was the end of the world. Of course it was, the world as WE knew it. I was also ashamed that these things were happening in my beloved State. So yeah there was no cheering in any class room I am aware of.

Bill is looking and sounding great at his age, he tuned 94 a few weeks ago

Bill was the first radio voice of the Dallas Cowboys. I still remember listening to his call of the game. "And here comes the Cowboys" as they came on the field, always pumped m we up. He called the games by himself. He added a lot of interest..

This guy is amazing. Sharp as a tack.

It never ceases to amaze me how lucid these people are after all this time .

Enjoyable interview. Good to put a face to the voice that was speaking to Oswald.

One of my favorites, of all the interviews on SixthFloor. Thank you Mr. Mercer.

What is so fascinating about these is you are brought back to that time in a very real way with these people who were actually there. Important work. Everything so stylish back then--even the cool hats worn by the cops. I love how this reporter just played it straight--just the facts. I wish we still had that professionalism today. Dan Rather falsely reporting? Impossible!

Thanks again for a great interview.

You have to keep in mind that the House Select Committee in the late 1970’s determined that there was more than 1 shooter in Dealey Plaza. So if there was 2 or maybe 3 or 4 different people shooting then Lee Oswald probably wasn’t shooting at all. He said he was a Patsy, and it makes sense

Very interesting interview and good clips of the packed hallway, incredible to hear and tremendous clear memories. A moment in history that we will never forget.

"Handing out sandwiches" How considerate of Ruby. He actually catered the assassination. geezus, these cops were either complicit or completely incompetent., or both.

Love these stories, I was born in 1963, love watching JFK.

Thank you from Quebec

I can still remember his voice at the Dallas Sportatorium during the black & white days of wrestling on channel 11. I wrote him when he was announcing Round Rock minor league baseball, goodness I would have loved to have seen & heard one of those games, they suppose to have been an excellent team. A man with a very distinguished voice. Wow, those great days of Fritz Von Eric, the Spoilers & 'Bulldog' Danny Plechas, today I don't know anything about their wrestling, it's not my time.

First time in history for live live TV and good quality too.

Crazy....Bill Mercer is apart of my childhood via the WCCW tv show aired on ESPN...All the stuff I studied about this event and I had no idea Bill was tied to it

I really like these

enjoyed Bill with World Class wrestling. Seems like a great down to earth guy and turns 96 today

Good program

When Bill Mercer and the Dallas cop laugh at the end of the old film clip, if ya read Bills lips it looks like he said: "Knock Knock? (who's there?) "Hutch." (Hutch who?) "GaZoont-hyke!"

I remember Bill Mercer on tv when I was a kid in Dallas. If not mistaken he MC’d some of the old wrestling matches on Saturdays on channel 4.

Bill Mercer I liked him when he was an announcer for World Class Championship Wrestling.

It was definitely a different time. Crazy to let all those people into the hallway, and walking Oswald right thru the crowd. And absolutely no women there!

Funny how they wanted to transport Oswald for his safety. Yet, gave the time, date and location of his moving

11:53 The way they used to give everyone's address on TV, Radio and in Newspapers back then seems odd today.

32:52 The Zapruder film did not show conclusively that Kennedy was shot from behind.

He must have watched a completely different Zapruder film than everyone else on the planet

For him to say the Zapruder film confirmed Kennedy was shot only from the back is ludicrous.

I used to watch Bill on wrestling as kid when I visited my grandparents in Big D. Good Stuff

Bill was great with WCCW!

I feel for Marina.

Oswald keep saying he didn't do it

News media Help convect Oswald, "the bigger the lie the most people will believe it"

That school teacher was only 24 , wow smh.

He said the network news mostly tell the truth?? Wow hard to respect his opinion with that disconnect from reality.

The voice of World Class wrestling

If I got plowed from behind every time there was a conspiracy theory... wait, I think I do.:)

Alright, I promised myself I'd stop adding comments, but the story about the kids in school applauding when they heard that JFK had been shot (39:16) I actually recall in my 2nd grade class (Mrs Burckhardt) when the class heard that MLK Jr had been assassinated, one of the kids in class said "my parents said that's the best thing anyone's done for America". I thought that maybe it was RFK's assassination that had occurred, but if I look at the timeline, it was unlikely it was RFK, because that was during the summer vacation. And it was definitely in 2nd grade. I think two other kids in the class were also, let's say, not upset about the assassination of MLK Jr. I was really baffled because why would anyone be happy about anyone getting killed. But political leaders were getting wiped out all over the world, and now it seems horrifyingly obvious, but we were children, what did we know? And as little kids during that insane time period, we were all like "What, me worry?" as Alfred E Neumann was fond of saying on the cover of MAD magazine every month. I never got what that meant until I was in my late 30's. I'm still not sure. Probably just as the kids who are 4 now will always wonder what "Let's go Brandon!" meant....

There was 13 people which saw how LHO shoot Tippit ?!

Oswald is very calm, considering the circumstances. He also seems to have an underlying seething anger and sense of injustice. It is always so ironic when people who reject our country’s principles are the first to scream ‘civil rights’ and that they want representation. (Not that I believe he didn’t deserve representation. He did, like anyone else. It’s just amusing because he would get no such privileges in Russia or Cuba).

Oswald paid for his ticket. He had the money on him. The woman in the ticket booth admitted that he did. And conveniently, the bullets taken from Tippit did not match Oswald's gun. oops. But luckily, Capt Westbrook found a 2nd gun. But then he found the jacket and a 2nd wallet too.

Journalists are like wild vultures .....the lowest of the low

Common Sense IS sorely,sorely lacking in this interview with this news reporter.Jack Ruby,was involved with organize crime since the age of 17, running" errands" for Al Capone in Chicago,and he definitely,like J.Edgar Hoover,was" affiliated" with organized crime.The more I heard,the organized crime heads state Ruby had No connections to them,the more I realized,Ruby,probably was connected to organized crime!!

32:58, um not really , not sure how a shot from the top and behind can come out side front top of head

"failed at everything he did"?? the guy became a marine then promoted t o became a radar operator at a top secret U2 spy plane base in Japan and learned russian quite fluently - an extremely hard language to learn - all by age of what? 21? how many 21 year olds do you know who t each themselves russian fluently and are radar operators on a top secret air force base overseas?????

Did he say the zapruder film “ conclusively proved “ the president had been shot from behind ?!!!!

I ABSOLUTELY adore how they treat this whole thing like a joke!! This was a VERY Dark time in this country!!

Typical Rather false reporting.

LHO shot 2 ( two !! ) people, dead, that is why he said he didn't shoot anyone !!!!

How is it that Oswald could be in police custody for a day at least and never be informed that he was under investigation for killing JFK much less having to find out from a news reporter that he was charged in killing JFk??! How is it that he was never allowed legal representation and has to ask for that in a sham of a news conference? How could Ruby just walk into a police building a hour and half after when Oswald's scheduled transfer was to have happened at the exact precise moment to shoot him? Obviously Ruby was informed of when to show up to shoot Oswald. Sorry i trust Oswald more than the Dallas police or the FBI on this whole event!

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The first announcer who did it by himself.. Way before Joey styles

Gun powder tests were negative. Palm pr int found on gun only after Oswald was killed and due to a police visit to the morgue where oswalds body was. The fact that Dallas police claimed to have kept no records of their interviews with Oswald due to interrogation room being too small for someone to record those interviews is beyond outrageous and insulting to the intelligence of the public. Is there not one person with the Dallas police with the integrity who was there that day to come forth and tell us what happened during those interrogations?

Fool

This clown makes absolutely no sense, which is, in his own head the logic he uses to create a cheesy confirmation bias on the lone nut theory.

It's disappointing and off-putting (to say the least) to see clips of a reporter (Mercer) and at least one officer laughing it up at police HQ within hours of the President being gunned down, a local police officer being murdered and the killer of both being a few feet from them in custody. Did Mercer not understand -- even on the day of the assassination -- the horror and nearly unprecedented enormity of the events that were occurring around him? That it was perhaps the single, worst day in American history (at least of the 20th century) and he was reporting right in the middle of it? This video even has a segment of him whining on a hot mic at police HQ on the date of the assassination that he's "starving" and wants a sandwich and, I suppose, we are all to laugh whimsically at this along with a now aged Mercer (who, based on his incongruous laughter while the clips are being played for the audience, seems to have not obtained any further self-awareness of his behavior nor the import of the events of that day). Mercer's behavior in clips of him when he was not reporting live at police HQ on 11/22/63 ring of some local, virtually unknown reporter covering a ribbon cutting ceremony for a small business or something of equal, minor significance. Just callous in every way, both by Mercer and, frankly, the Museum.