CASPER, Wyo. — Preparations for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s scheduled speech on the Natrona County Courthouse steps started days in advance.
According to newspaper accounts, Johnson would fly to Casper at 3 p.m. on Oct. 12, 1964, after a stop in Butte, Montana, on SAM 26000, the same Boeing aircraft in which he took the oath of office after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination just 10 months earlier.
A motorcade would escort the president to Casper’s downtown for a 30-minute speech, after which he would be whisked back to Air Force One for a quick stop in Denver before returning to Washington, D.C.
Less than a year after President Kennedy’s death shocked the world, security measures would be in sharp contrast to any other presidential visit in the state’s history.
According to an article in the Tuesday, Oct. 13 edition of the Casper Tribune, police presence was heavy, with officers carrying “side arms and high powered rifles with telescope sights.” They were on sidewalks, rooftops and surrounding the courthouse.
Rooftops on surrounding buildings were secured and sealed off, Secret Service flanked the area, and a low-flying Air Force helicopter followed the motorcade.
Hunters and their weapons were escorted from the area, said the Tribune. Secret Service visited a man who advertised a rifle and ammunition for sale in the newspaper.
The previous day, two Casper boys, ages 16 and 17, were arrested after a Casper police officer overheard the two remarking about killing the President.
During his speech to a crowd estimated to be 14,000 strong, President Johnson spoke highly of Wyoming Democratic Sen. Gale McGee and Congressional candidate Teno Roncalio. The Texas-born president touched on subjects he related to, including concerns of falling beef prices and the state’s booming oil industry.
“I have been to Wyoming a number of times,” he said. “I like your white-faced Herefords. I like your cowmen. I know your oilmen. I know something about the economy of this State and the problems of this State.”
“I think I have been your friend and I just want to repeat to you today what I said that awesome afternoon when tragedy befell us and our great President was taken from us, and on a moment’s notice I had to assume the awesome responsibilities of the Presidency.”
There were no such security accounts when Johnson visited Casper as Vice President in Oct. 1962 in support of Joe Hickey’s run for the U.S. Senator’s office.
Johnson was driven from the airport to the courthouse steps, where he was greeted by a crowd as he exited his vehicle. A municipal band played “Deep in the Heart of Texas” as he casually walked and shook hands before climbing the courthouse steps to the podium.
Later in the day he had lunch with some 500 supporters at the Casper VFW, where he again spoke highly of Wyoming’s delegation, and was pleased that Washington had “two men who understand something about cattle and oil.”
He then left for an engagement in Riverton.
Sen. McGee, a Democrat, served Wyoming from 1958 until he lost a reelection bid to Republican Malcolm Wollop in 1976. Rep. Teno Roncalio served from 1965 to 1968, after he decided to run for the U.S. Senate but lost in the general election to Clifford P. Hansen.
A full transcript of President Johnson’s Oct. 12, 1964 speech in Casper can be found here.
