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| Attraction Guide : Sixth Floor Museum Dallas will forever be known as the city where President John F Kennedy was shot, and the sites associated with his death are among Dallas' most visited attractions. If you have time to visit only one, make it the Sixth Floor Museum, a thoughtful, comprehensive tribute to the life, death and legacy of JFK. Located in the former Texas School Book Depository, this museum feels frozen in time, from the go-go days of 1960, when JFK proclaimed in his inaugural address, 'Let the word go forth ... that the torch has been passed to a new generation,' to the tempestuous times that followed. With that background in place, the museum explains in minute-by-minute detail the events of 22 November 1963. Artifacts include the original layout for the front page of that afternoon's Dallas Times Herald, stills from the famous home movie filmed by Abraham Zapruder, a teletype machine endlessly reprinting the first report of the murder and an FBI model of the assassination site. But the most evocative exhibit is the corner window overlooking Dealey Plaza, the grassy knoll and the triple underpass: the same vista suspected gunman Lee Harvey Oswald had on that fateful November day. Conspiracy Museum Polls have repeatedly shown that less than 15% of Americans believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, making the maverick Conspiracy Museum an intriguing foil to the Sixth Floor Museum. The Conspiracy Museum posits that Kennedy's assassination was a coup d'e'tat to shore up the military-industrial complex that had been gaining strength in the US since WWII, and that the same people and forces that killed Kennedy were later responsible for the deaths of Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Ted Kennedy's Chappaquiddick friend Mary Jo Kopechne (Ted himself was the real target) and the 269 people aboard Korean Airlines Flight 007, shot down in 1983. The museum also delves into other assassinations from history, including those of American presidents Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield and William McKinley. Dallas Arts District In the Dallas Arts District, a 60 acre (24 hectare) section north of downtown dedicated to the fine and performing arts, you'll find landmarks such as the dramatic IM Pei-designed Morton H Meyerson Symphony Center; the Trammel Crow Center Pavilion, with exhibition and performance spaces; and the Dallas Theater Center. Sometime early in the 21st century, the open space between DMA and the Meyerson Center will be transformed into a sculpture garden showcasing the world's greatest privately held sculpture collection, which will be the crowning touch of an arts district that puts Dallas in the big leagues among US art centers. The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA), anchor of the Arts District, is divided into five sections: the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, and Contemporary Art. The collection's highlights include Very Ugly by Frida Kahlo, Sleepy Baby by Mary Cassatt, The Icebergs by Frederic Edwin Church, Monet's 1908 Water Lilies and more pieces by Piet Mondrian than any other US museum. A special gallery recreates the French Riviera villa of art patrons Wendy and Emery Reves, originally built in 1927 by the Duke of Westminster for Coco Chanel. The Reves' collection on display includes works by Van Gogh, Ce'zanne, Toulouse-Lautrec and Manet, as well as by Winston Churchill, a good friend of the couple. Fair Park Southeast of downtown Dallas, Fair Park was created in 1936 when Dallas hosted the Texas Centennial Exposition. Today, more than 3 million people attend Fair Park's annual Texas State Fair, one of the largest in the US, in September and October. Aside from being a great place to party, picnic or stretch your legs, Fair Park has a couple of knockout museums: the hands-on Science Place bills itself as 'an amusement park for your brain.' Attractions include robotic dinosaurs, a medical gallery featuring a human brain and real beating heart, plus a planetarium and IMAX theater. The African-American Museum is one of the best museums of its kind, with exhibits richly detailing the art and history of blacks from pre-slavery Africa through today. Fair Park is full of superb 1930s art deco architecture, but nothing is quite as inspired as the Hall of State, a tribute to all things Texan. The Hall of Heroes pays homage to such luminaries as Stephen F Austin and Sam Houston, while the Great Hall of Texas features a 25ft (8m) state seal and murals depicting Texas history from the 16th century onward. Deep Ellum A renovated warehouse district just three blocks east of downtown, Deep Ellum has long been Dallas' headquarters for live music - first the blues and now rock, jazz, alternative, Latin and country, too. At the turn of the century, the district was the center of Dallas' black community. Leadbelly and Blind Lemon Jefferson are just two of the blues artists who made their mark in Deep Ellum during the 1920s and 1930s. Getting There & Away Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) is one of the world's busiest airports, with more than 2000 scheduled flights arriving or leaving daily from an airfield bigger than Manhattan island. Most flights are to other US cities, but there are also many Canadian, Mexican and European connections. Love Field (DAL), the area's secondary airport, is served almost exclusively by regional US carriers. Getting Around DFW is 16 miles (26km) northwest of Dallas; Love Field is 7 miles (11km) northwest of the city. Buses, shuttles and taxis run between the airports and the city, and car rentals are available. Dallas is at the convergence of about a dozen major highways, so it's easy to access from all points of the compass. If you're a masochist, you'll count rush-hour driving on Dallas's freeways among life's peak experiences. You can rent a car at one of many agencies in town and at the airports. Greyhound buses travel between Dallas and Fort Worth (1 hour), Austin (4-6 hours), Houston (5-6 hours), San Antonio (5-7 hours) and El Paso (11-14 hours). Union Station, in Dallas' west end, is the beacon for Amtrak trains. DART is the region's public transportation system, with both buses and light-rail trains serving downtown Dallas and the outlying areas. Cabs congregate at the airports, bus and train depots and hotels. |
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