Publish Date: Oct. 2, 1964
Cover Story: The Warren Commission Report
How TIME Covered the News: Just a week after President Kennedy’s assassination in a Dallas motorcade, President Lyndon B. Johnson organized the Warren Commission to investigate every last detail of Lee Harvey Oswald’s assassination plot. Headed by Chief Justice Earl Warren, the commission’s exhaustive 888-page report rounded up hundreds of witnesses and sorted thousands of pieces of evidence, and was released to the public in late September of 1964. Most crucial for readers of the publicly-released document was the comprehensive biography of Oswald, the shooter, who himself was shot and killed two days after Kennedy’s assassination.
“But Oswald was not satisfied with his menial state in life, and 18 months after his defection he decided he wanted to go home. Says the Warren Commission: “His attempt to renounce his citizenship had been an open expression of hostility against the U.S. and a profound rejection of his early life. The dramatic break with society in America now had to be undone. His return to the U.S. publicly testified to the utter failure of what had been the most important act of his life.””