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George W Bush is known as the US president who experienced an assassination attempt. Photo/List Verse
WASHINGTON – Many people know all about the successful assassination of the president of the United States (US). In fact, people probably know a lot about the conspiracies and conjectures surrounding John F. Kennedy’s death.
One might even know about some assassination attempts, but there were far more credible attempts to take the life of the “leader of the Free World” than one could ever imagine.
Here are 10 forgotten US presidential assassination attempts.
1. John F. Kennedy Was Nearly Shot Weeks Before His Assassination
Photo/List Verses
According to List Verse, Richard Pavlick tried to blow up President-elect John F. Kennedy in December 1960. Kennedy was lucky because Pavlick changed his mind at the last second, but that was only the first attempt in his efforts.
There were two other worthy attempts before that fateful afternoon in Dallas, and both occurred, amazingly, in the same city on the same afternoon. President Kennedy scheduled a trip to Chicago for November 2, 1963.
Stops in the Windy City had a double whammy. his goals—holding a political meeting with influential Mayor Richard Daley and watching an Army-Navy football game at Soldier Field.
According to former Secret Serviceman Abraham Bolden, a group of four Cuban exiles, led by Homer Echevarria, planned to assassinate Kennedy in Chicago. Echevarria and his team planned to fire automatic weapons at Kennedy’s motorcade as it maneuvered around the Jackson Street corner of what was then the Northwest Expressway. (It has since been renamed the Kennedy Expressway.)
A local landlady reported to police on October 31 that four men in one of her bedrooms had automatic weapons. Surveillance follows the men, and after poor driving decisions by Secret Service agents, their cover is blown.
Two of the four men were arrested, but a search of the dorm room turned up no weapons, so both were released—and never seen again. Once the crisis was averted, the Secret Service soon found another weapon in their hands.
At the same intersection, a paranoid ex-marine named Thomas Vallee plans his own venture. Vallee was a member of the right-wing John Birch Society and had a very strong negative opinion of Kennedy.
Based on information obtained, the Secret Service observed that Vallee had a high-powered weapon and 2,500 rounds of ammunition in his hotel room. On November 2, the same day as Kennedy’s scheduled appearance, police trailed Vallee as he headed toward the spot where Kennedy would make a slow turn onto Jackson, and they stopped Vallee when he failed to signal the turn.
2. Harry Truman Receives a Bomb Letter
Photo/List Verse