you and your forebears built our nation
now please help us rebuild it it was
supposed to be a completely ordinary day
the president had come to the Hilton
Hotel to deliver a routine speech to
members of the building and construction
Union Reagan arrived at precisely 1:50
in the afternoon his speech ended to
polite applause around 225 White House
correspondent Sam Donaldson was covering
for ABC News well I think most of us
when we covered a president decided it
if it was ever in public we were gonna
be there even though that speech didn’t
amount to a lot Donaldson was
accompanied by cameraman Hank brown seen
here with cameramen from CBS and NBC in
the unofficial press area near the
hotel’s VIP entrance
when the speech ended Donaldson and
brown positioned themselves in the press
line hoping the president might answer a
few questions as he walked to his
limousine I would start rolling on the
president coming out and that’s when Sam
started asked the president question at
the same time this lady was screaming
out mr. Regan mr. president
and his hand goes up he looks this way
Brady was coming across and then pow pow
pow pow pow
to my right about five feet away John
Hinckley shot six times and we all
watched the president at least I did I
didn’t think he’d been hit with all eyes
straining to see if the President had
been shot
the cameras were left to see everything
else Brady went down more or less in
front of me that’s something that you
know you’ll never forget you don’t
actually seem getting ahead but you see
the blood go across the lens Charlie
Wilson was covering for CBS I hear a
couple people cheering and then what
sounds like somebody had set off
firecrackers my initial thought well
that’s a very funny joke
and as I see people dropping off I
realized this is no joke Shelly fileman
was NBC’s cameraman when Hinckley went
down and started shooting I would say
that I was probably around a foot and a
half to two feet away from him and his
gun the exact sequence of shots is
difficult to determine but according to
a government report the first shot hits
James Brady in the forehead
the second takes down Washington DC
police officer Thomas Delahanty as he
turns to locate the president delehanty
is hit in the back of the neck the third
shot strikes agent Tim McCarthy in the
chest three bullets three wounded at
least one of them because no one was
wearing the customary bulletproof vest I
didn’t wear it the president didn’t wear
it McCarthy didn’t wear it I figured it
was such a routine visit that it wasn’t
necessary to wear it that day
[Music]
now please help us rebuild it it was
supposed to be a completely ordinary day
the president had come to the Hilton
Hotel to deliver a routine speech to
members of the building and construction
Union Reagan arrived at precisely 1:50
in the afternoon his speech ended to
polite applause around 225 White House
correspondent Sam Donaldson was covering
for ABC News well I think most of us
when we covered a president decided it
if it was ever in public we were gonna
be there even though that speech didn’t
amount to a lot Donaldson was
accompanied by cameraman Hank brown seen
here with cameramen from CBS and NBC in
the unofficial press area near the
hotel’s VIP entrance
when the speech ended Donaldson and
brown positioned themselves in the press
line hoping the president might answer a
few questions as he walked to his
limousine I would start rolling on the
president coming out and that’s when Sam
started asked the president question at
the same time this lady was screaming
out mr. Regan mr. president
and his hand goes up he looks this way
Brady was coming across and then pow pow
pow pow pow
to my right about five feet away John
Hinckley shot six times and we all
watched the president at least I did I
didn’t think he’d been hit with all eyes
straining to see if the President had
been shot
the cameras were left to see everything
else Brady went down more or less in
front of me that’s something that you
know you’ll never forget you don’t
actually seem getting ahead but you see
the blood go across the lens Charlie
Wilson was covering for CBS I hear a
couple people cheering and then what
sounds like somebody had set off
firecrackers my initial thought well
that’s a very funny joke
and as I see people dropping off I
realized this is no joke Shelly fileman
was NBC’s cameraman when Hinckley went
down and started shooting I would say
that I was probably around a foot and a
half to two feet away from him and his
gun the exact sequence of shots is
difficult to determine but according to
a government report the first shot hits
James Brady in the forehead
the second takes down Washington DC
police officer Thomas Delahanty as he
turns to locate the president delehanty
is hit in the back of the neck the third
shot strikes agent Tim McCarthy in the
chest three bullets three wounded at
least one of them because no one was
wearing the customary bulletproof vest I
didn’t wear it the president didn’t wear
it McCarthy didn’t wear it I figured it
was such a routine visit that it wasn’t
necessary to wear it that day
[Music]
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