The west side of downtown Dallas holds three open-air places that tell the city's story from its first log cabin to its worst day: Dealey Plaza, where the town began and where President Kennedy was shot; the John F. Kennedy Memorial Plaza a block away; and Pioneer Plaza, where a herd of bronze longhorns recalls the cattle drives that passed through Texas. All three are open-air places, all three are stops on our scavenger hunt, and they sit close enough together to visit in one go.
Dealey Plaza
Dealey Plaza is the small park at the western edge of downtown where Main, Elm and Commerce streets come together and run under a railway bridge, the triple underpass. It was completed in 1940 as a project of the Works Progress Administration, the New Deal agency that also built the underpass, and it is named after George Bannerman Dealey, the long-time publisher of The Dallas Morning News, who had campaigned to clean up this part of town. The ground is sometimes called the birthplace of Dallas: the city's first house, which also served as its first courthouse, post office and store, stood here.
On 22 November 1963 President John F. Kennedy's motorcade turned from Houston Street into Elm Street, past the Texas School Book Depository, and he was shot as the car rolled down towards the underpass. The plaza has changed very little since, which is why so many people come to stand here, and the whole area has been a National Historic Landmark District since 1993. It is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The white X painted on the road surface of Elm Street, marking the spot where the fatal shot struck; it is sometimes removed and repainted. Watch the traffic if you look for it.
- The grassy knoll, the sloping lawn on the north side of Elm Street, a name made popular by a news agency report sent within half an hour of the shooting.
- The two concrete pergolas on either side of the plaza, with markers to John Neely Bryan, the founder of Dallas, on the north side and the Cockrell family on the south side.
- The bronze statue of George Dealey by Felix de Weldon, unveiled in 1949 on the Houston Street side of the plaza.
John F. Kennedy Memorial Plaza
A block east of Dealey Plaza, in a square bounded by Main, Market, Commerce and Record streets, stands the city's official memorial to Kennedy. It was designed by Philip Johnson, who took no fee, and dedicated on 24 June 1970. The money came from Dallas residents: about 50,000 individual donations had been collected within a year of the assassination. The memorial was restored in 2000, after the Sixth Floor Museum took over its care.
Johnson designed it as a cenotaph, an empty tomb, open to the sky as a symbol of the freedom of Kennedy's spirit. The walls are made of 72 white precast concrete columns that form a square room 30 feet high and 50 feet wide. Only eight of them reach the ground, so the walls seem to float a short distance above the pavement. It is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The narrow openings on the north and south sides: walk inside to feel the city noise drop away.
- The low block of dark granite in the centre, with the name John Fitzgerald Kennedy carved in gold letters on two sides.
- The light fixture at the end of each column, which lights up the memorial at night.
Pioneer Plaza
Pioneer Plaza, on the south side of downtown next to the Convention Center, opened in 1994 on a site of about four acres. Its centrepiece is a sculpture by the Texas artist Robert Summers: 49 bronze steers driven by three cowboys on horseback, a cattle drive frozen in mid-stride. It is described as the largest bronze monument of its kind in the world. The scene recalls the Shawnee Trail, the most easterly of the routes along which Texas longhorns were driven north to market in the 19th century.
The steers are each about six feet tall and life-size, and they are set in a landscape made to look like open country, with a ridge, a stream and native plants. Next to the plaza is the old Pioneer Park Cemetery. It is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The man-made limestone cliff and the waterfall that the herd seems to be crossing.
- The three mounted cowboys riding with the herd.
- The contrast between the longhorns and the glass towers of the skyline rising behind them.
Around the plazas
Two more stops on the way between the plazas show how far back the story goes. The Old Red Courthouse, a red sandstone Romanesque Revival building from the early 1890s, stands directly across Houston Street from Dealey Plaza and now holds the Old Red Museum of Dallas County History and Culture. Close to the Kennedy memorial, in Founders Plaza, a replica log cabin represents the one built by John Neely Bryan, the city's founder.
How to see them in one walk
Start at Pioneer Plaza and walk among the longhorns, then head north-west through downtown to the John F. Kennedy Memorial Plaza. From the memorial it is a short walk west past the Old Red Courthouse and the Bryan cabin to Dealey Plaza, where you can stand on the grassy knoll and look back at the old book depository. If you can, come back to the memorial after dark, when the lights in its columns are on.
See Dallas with World City Trail
Our Dallas scavenger hunt turns downtown into a game you play on your phone. The route links 10 stops, from Klyde Warren Park to Thanks-Giving Square, and Dealey Plaza, the John F. Kennedy Memorial Plaza and Pioneer Plaza are all among them, along with the Dallas Museum of Art, the Perot Museum, the Dallas World Aquarium, the Holocaust and Human Rights Museum and the AT&T Discovery District. At each stop you solve a puzzle and hear a short story, at your own pace.
There is also a self-guided walking tour and an outdoor escape game in Dallas, for people who prefer a different format.
Play the Dallas scavenger hunt →
Take the self-guided walking tour of Dallas →
Play the outdoor escape game in Dallas →
Facts checked in October 2026.