KITCHEN PIETA: Busboy Juan
Romero tries to comfort Kennedy
June 5, 1968
A Final Blow to Camelot
By Daren Fonda
He was a
latecomer to the race, and Democratic elders, already reeling from
L.B.J.'s waning popularity and from Eugene McCarthy's antiwar campaign,
had urged him not to run. But Robert F. Kennedy proved a formidable
sprinter. For 80 days he campaigned relentlessly, and by the day of the
California primary, a must-win for Kennedy to seriously challenge Hubert
Humphrey, his body was cracking. The night before, he had been too weary
to finish a speech in San Diego, and by the time he reached Los Angeles,
he appeared to be running on fumes.
On primary night, however, the
old Kennedy vigor returned. His suite at the Ambassador Hotel filled
with well-wishers, and as the results turned his way, campaign workers
began "laughing and dancing and hugging one another," recalled his aide,
former pro-football player Roosevelt Grier. Around midnight Kennedy went
downstairs and delivered a rousing speech to 1,800 supporters in the
ballroom. He then exited through the hotel's pantry, where at 12:16
a.m., a slight, dark-haired Palestinian named Sirhan Sirhan pulled out a
.22 cal. revolver, fired eight shots and fatally wounded the candidate.
For a stricken America, it revived memories of the killings of Kennedy's
brother John and of Martin Luther King Jr. and shattered the dreams of
those yearning for a return to Camelot.
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