Following the assassination of
Robert F. Kennedy in Los Angeles on June 5, 1968, his body was taken to New
York City for a funeral mass in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. After the completion
of the mass, Kennedy’s coffin was transported by a private funeral train from
New York to Washington, D.C., to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery on
June 8. It was a Saturday, and mourners came out by the hundreds of thousands
to line the tracks along the 225-mile journey. A trip that would normally have
taken four hours ended up lasting more than eight hours. On board the train
that day, on assignment for LOOK magazine, was staff photographer Paul Fusco,
who ended up taking thousands of photographs of mourning faces, tributes, and
patriotic displays along the way. The collection of photographs ended up
becoming more than a document of Kennedy’s final journey; they became a
powerful collective portrait of America at a pivotal moment in history.
