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Press Conference Clips Regarding the UT Tower Shooting (1966)
Gordon Wilkison
Sound
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1966
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B/W
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English
  • Map
  • Highlights
    Governor Connally gives commendations to Police department, DPS, student and medical rescue workers
    Connally broaches the subject of gun control in response to preventing mass shootings
    Connally describes the Police response in pinning down Charles Whitman
    Connally addresses new legislation that will respond to those who commit murder and claim insanity thereafter
    Robert Miles describes the event of the mass shooting from the police department's perspective
    Early autopsy report on Whitman's brain tumor
    Ramiro Martinez and Miles describe the tactics involved in surrounding Whitman
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This compilation reel contains clips of several interviews given in the aftermath of the University of Texas tower shooting on August 1, 1966. First, Governor John Connally expresses condolences and commends the response by the Austin Police Department, University students and ambulance drivers. Connally then suggests new legislation in response to mass murderers. The next interview cuts to Chief of Police Robert Miles describing the Austin Police Department's tactical response in pinning down Whitman during the shooting. The following interview describes the mental illness and brain tumor that afflicted Whitman, followed by another joint interview given by Ramiro "Ray" Martinez and Robert Miles.
  • UT Tower Shooting
    On the morning on August 1, 1966, 25-year-old former student Charles Whitman ascended to the observation deck of the University of Texas at Austin Main Building with multiple weapons and 700 rounds of ammunition and began shooting indiscriminately on persons below. The rampage ended 96 minutes later, when Austin police officers Ramiro Martinez and Houston McCoy, alongside University Co-op employee Allen Crum, reached the observation deck and shot Whitman dead. Whitman, a former Marine sharpshooter, killed 14 people and injured 31 on campus. He had earlier murdered his mother, Margaret Elizabeth Whitman, and wife, Kathleen.
  • John Connally
    The 38th Governor of Texas, John Bowden Connally Jr. was born on a farm near Floresville, Texas, on February 27, 1917. Connally graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1941 with a law degree and was subsequently admitted to the State Bar of Texas. He began his political career as a legislative assistant to Representative Lyndon B. Johnson in 1939. The two retained a close but often torrid friendship until LBJ's death. After returning from U.S. Naval combat in the Pacific Theater, Connally joined an influential Austin law firm, served as LBJ's campaign manager and aide, and became oil tycoon Sid W. Richardson's legal counsel. Connally's reputation as a political mastermind was solidified after managing five of LBJ's major political campaigns, including the 1964 presidential election. In 1961, Connally served as Secretary of the Navy under President John F. Kennedy.   Wealthy financiers like Sid Richardson and a strong grassroots network of supporters helped Connally win his first gubernatorial election in 1962. The three-term governor fought to expand higher education by increasing teachers' salaries, creating new doctoral programs, and establishing the Texas Commission on the Arts and the Texas Historical Commission. In 1969, President Richard Nixon appointed Connally to the foreign-intelligence advisory board. He was named the 61st Secretary of the Treasury in 1971. Connally became one of the President's principal advisors and headed the Democrats for Nixon organization, finally switching to the Republican Party in 1973. Connally is also remembered nationally for being in the car with President Kennedy during his assassination in Dallas in 1963, when Connally received wounds in his chest, wrist, and thigh.    The former Texas governor announced in January 1979 that he would seek the Republican presidential nomination. His campaign was abandoned after media attacks over a controversial public speech and bank partnership. Financial troubles befell Connally by the mid-1980s after a real estate development partnership with former Texas Representative Ben Barnes collapsed. John Connally died on June 15, 1993, and is interred at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin. 
  • Gordon Wilkison
    Gordon Wilkison began work as a cameraman at the local Austin television station KTBC (now FOX 7) during 1952, its first year of operation.  At the time the station was owned by the Texas Broadcasting Company, which was owned by Senator Lyndon B. and Lady Bird Johnson. This relationship would continue to shape Wilkison's career well into the next decades - during the Johnson administration, Wilkison covered the president's visits to Texas, preparing material for national and international news correspondents.    A particularly notable moment in his career occurred on August 1, 1966, when Wilkison and KTBC reporter Neal Spelce risked their lives to capture footage of the Tower shooting at the University of Texas.    Wilkison was also the General Manager of Photo Processors at the LBJ Broadcasting Corporation, which he later took over and renamed Cenetex Film Labs. In addition to his camera work and film processing, his work at the station also included direction of a number of television film productions.   Outside of KTBC, Wilkison shot, edited, and processed Longhorn football game footage for the University of Texas, a partnership that lasted nearly 30 years.       Recognizing the historical value of film and news footage, Wilkison kept the material, later contributing hundreds of reels to the Texas Archive of the Moving Image's collection.
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