Film of JFK killing valued at $16 million

Zapruder filmed the assassination of President Kennedy on his Bell & Howell movie camera VIDEO CNN's Tony Clark recounts the history of the Zapruder film of JFK's assassination Windows Media 28K 80K  MESSAGE BOARDS: Kennedy assassination revisited  ALSO: Putting a price on 26 seconds of history Transcript: How much is the Zapruder film worth?

Arbitrators decide what government must pay Zapruder heirs

August 3, 1999
Web posted at: 6:05 p.m. EDT (2205 GMT)

In this story: Reaction Split vote Why money is involved Witness to a killing RELATED STORIES, SITES

From staff and wire reports

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The heirs of Abraham Zapruder didn't get what they wanted and neither did the federal government, but both sides seemed satisfied. Arbitrators decided Tuesday the government must pay $16 million for Zapruder's home movie of President Kennedy's 1963 assassination.

The family sought $30 million. The government had offered $1 million.

In a 2-1 vote, a three-member arbitration panel decided to split the difference. Its decision to value the Zapruder film at $16 million cannot be appealed.

The arbitration board was established when lawyers on both sides failed to agree on the level of compensation for the 26-second film, now held in storage at a Maryland facility of the National Archives.

Reaction

"Today's decision by the arbitration panel secures the original Zapruder film for the public and guarantees that it will be preserved in the National Archives, where it belongs," David Ogden, acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's Civil Division, said in a statement.

"The resolution of these issues ensures that this evidence of one of the most tragic events in American history will be protected for scholarly and research uses," Ogden said.

The Zapruder family agreed with that assessment.

"We believe the result reached by the arbitration panel is fair and reasonable," the family said in a statement. "We are relieved that the Zapruder film is now permanently part of the United States archives."

Zapruder's family had said the film should be valued in the same class as Andy Warhol's or Vincent van Gogh's art

Split vote

The two arbitrators who reached the majority decision -- retired federal judge Arlin Adams and lawyer Kenneth Feinberg, representing the Zapruder family -- also agreed that the government would have to pay interest on the $16 million, dating back to last year when the government took custody of the original 8 mm film.

The government's representative on the panel, former solicitor general Walter Dellinger, said in dissent that $16 million "was simply too large an amount in light of the evidence in the record."

Dellinger argued that $3 million to $5 million would have been adequate payment to the Zapruder family, which retains the copyright.

Why money is involved

The government has to compensate the Zapruder family because the Assassination Records Review Board declared the film the permanent possession of the people of the United States.

The Zapruder family had said the film should be valued like the works of Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh or pop artist Andy Warhol, whose "Orange Marilyn" silk-screen of Marilyn Monroe sold for $17.3 million last year.

Government appraisers had said that without projection, the Zapruder film was a strip of celluloid wound around a plastic reel.

They said that when Sotheby's auction house in New York sold 1,200 items from the estate of former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in 1996, the highest amount paid for any one item was $1.4 million for an antique French desk where President Kennedy signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

Life Magazine paid $150,000 for Zapruder's home movie right after the assassination and published 31 stills, but later sold the film back to the family for $1.

Witness to a killing

Zapruder, a dress manufacturer, cried when he told investigators in July 1964 of how he filmed the assassination while standing on a concrete abutment along the route of the president's motorcade through Dallas.

Through the lens of his Bell & Howell movie camera, Zapruder said he heard a shot and saw Kennedy lean over and grab the left side of his chest.

"Before I had a chance to organize my mind, I heard a second shot and then I saw his head opened up and the blood and everything came out and I started -- I can hardly talk about it," Zapruder said, sobbing.

Later he added: "I was still shooting the pictures until he (Kennedy) got under the underpass. I don't even know how I did it. ... I was walking toward -- back toward my office and screaming, `They killed him! They killed him! They killed him!'"

Zapruder died in 1970.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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