Download This Paper34 Zapruder Film
A History of Intellectual Property in 50 Objects, Cambridge University Press, Forthcoming
6 Pages Posted: 29 May 2017 Last revised: 18 Apr 2019
Date Written: May 29, 2017
Abstract
The Zapruder film is not only the most important home movie ever made, but also the most thoroughly analyzed 26 seconds of film in existence. Shortly after noon on Friday, November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. At least 32 people filmed or photographed some aspect of the event, but Abraham Zapruder captured the assassination itself more clearly and completely than anyone else. His film was a key item of evidence in the government’s investigation of the assassination, and the subject of lasting controversy, at least in part because copyright made it largely unavailable to the public until 1998.
Keywords: Zapruder, copyright, intellectual property, 8mm film, home movie
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