The Echo From Dealey Plaza

This is one of the most fascinating books I have read about the “Camelot” era in America. It is told by Abraham Bolden, the first African American on the Secret Service, appointed by President Eisenhower in 1959 after having served on the Illinois State Police. He met JFK during the President Elects visit to Chicago-the city where Mr Bolden was assigned by the Secret Service- a chance meeting with the newly elected President, while guarding a washroom on the lower level of McCormick Plaza, led him to be selected as the first African American to serve on the White House Detail.

What he observed- between 1961 and up to 6 months prior to the Presidents assassination in November of 1963 compelled Mr Bolden to approach his superiors with his concerns for the Presidents safety. After being removed from the White House Detail he was given routine counterfeiting cases to work out of Chicago. When the President was killed in Dallas Mr Bolden again approached his superiors. This act propelled Mr Bolden on a journey that took him through the courts for a bribery that never occurred. Convicted on the testimony of gangsters he went to prison and on to an Institution where he was given heavy doses of unspecified drugs and subjected to enormous psychological tortures. Newly married at the time of his ordeal- his faith in his God and family sustained him throughout. He emerges amazingly unscathed spiritually and in response to an e-mail by this author had the following to say-

“What we must come to understand is the unity of all peoples of the world in God's creative justice. We must cultivate the spirit of unity through love of the principles upon which our great Constitution of America was founded. We must come to understand that the reason that the Infinite Creative Consciousness gave us hands was so that we could reach out to one another in brotherhood and compassion and together solve the riddles of life.”

This is an interesting and thought provoking book about the “powers that be” both in the 1960’s as well as now. And the story of one mans faith and how it sustained him through 2 decades of struggle- and prison- here in America.