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CHRISTMAS EVE, traditionally a time for travelling home to loved ones. Train stations, bus depots, roads and airports hit peak traffic as people try to get on their way.
This photograph shows how the death of US president John F Kennedy in November 1963 added a moment of poignancy to the chaos at New York International Airport exactly fifty years ago today.
It pictures workmen changing the sign at the Van Wyck expressway entrance to the huge air hub just moments after it had been officially conferred with its new name: John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Those travelling through the airport that Christmas Eve fifty years ago would have been the first to pass under the new sign and been reminded of a tumultuous year for the US.
To all the Irish diaspora in the US and elsewhere tonight, even if you don’t get to travel home through JFK – or at all – have a safe and happy Christmas.
Images: PA Archive
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And a merry Christmas to all the journal readers
Cheers Mr Slave. Many happy returns!
Who gave this a thumbs down I’ll bate ye.
Happy Christmas to all
You wouldn’t bate snow off a rope !!!!
Hope to pass through it next month for only my second visit home in 7 years. Merry Christmas to all of you back home in Ireland.
Nice story.
What was it called before that?
Idlewild Airport
And apparently Major General Alexander E. Anderson Airport after Idlewild and before Kennedy!
Was that not a bit sh!tty on the major? Did they give him something else after? A train station or park bench perhaps?
Proud of my name and had the pleasure of meeting His sister
Named after a great man and the last real president who challenged this own military industrial complex. Happy Christmas Jack
Not a great place to arrive into prior to the Shannon Clearence days. Keeping an eye out to see if you could park ahead of all the other international flights that had just landed.
Dublin clearence is cool too. Over 100,000 people travelled to north america from england via Dublin in 2012.
I love the cars in the backround
Is the Journal working Christmas Day, now that’s dedication.
That airport needs a serious upgrade
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