”Grassy knoll” fence set for sale

NEW YORK – Conspiracy theorists and collectors, take note: A section of fencing from the infamous grassy knoll in Dallas’ Dealey Plaza is going up for auction.

The weather-beaten picket fence, along with its metal posts, goes up for bid Sunday at the Lelands.com online auction house. Bidding on the fence from the scene of President Kennedy’s Nov. 22, 1963, assassination runs through June 16.

“It’s an iconic item, in a macabre sort of way,” said Simeon Lipman, director of Americana at the auction house.

The fence was rescued from the junk heap five years ago by Dealey Plaza tour guide Ronald D. Rice. When a construction crew began dismantling the fence to replace it in January 2000, Rice grabbed four sections – each nearly 6 feet long and 4 1/2 feet high – and put them into storage.

When the storage payments were not made, the fence was sold at public auction to Daniel Moses, who approached Lelands last year about selling it off, Lipman said.

Although the section of fence is indisputably from the Dallas location, there are questions about whether it’s the fence that was standing on Nov. 22, 1963. The curator at the Sixth Floor Museum overlooking Dealey Plaza says many of the fence’s wooden pickets were replaced over the years.

Lelands agrees that pickets snatched by souvenir hunters or ruined by the weather were replaced, but maintains “the wooden cross members that make up the main frame and the metal posts are original and predate 1963.”

Several of the pickets have JFK-related graffiti, including the message, “Oswald Was Framed.” Conspiracy theorists believe a second gunman might have hidden behind the fence.

The minimum opening bid for the fence is $5,000.