Jerry Bruno was an advance man in Dallas planning the president's trip along with Governor Connally. He wanted the larger Woman's Building which was easily secured by the Secret Service and was accessible by a shorter, more direct route than the one taken.

Connally was adament about the Trade Mart – a building with many entrances and catwalks to the the men guarding the president nightmares. The got into a knock out, drag out shouting match so Connally got on the phone to Burno's boss. He explained the situation and told Bruno the the decision was to use the Trade Mart in spite of the security issues in the building itself and the route to get there. The only problem was that no one was on the other end of the phone call and he completely bamboozled Bruno.

For a long time after that Bruno nursed the feelings of personal guilt for allowing the plan to fall into place. He was charitable to Connally by viewing the dispute as more of a power play than a conspiracy – at least publicly. He had many talks with Bobby Kennedy about these feelings and eventually came to the necessary conclusion that it would have happened anyway. Otherwise he could never have gotten out from the feelings of responsibility.

While he stayed on at the White House for a while, he eventually left to join Bobby's campaign.

The Advance Man
by Jerry Bruno

The Advance Man is a memoir-style collection of stores from Jerry Bruno's time working on the presidential campaigns of John, Robert, and Ted Kennedy and in the J.F.K. White House. Bruno was an "advance man," charged with doing the ground work for the events and appearances by the candidate or President. Bruno's job was to make the events look flawless and on-schedule, the crowds look big and happy, and the candidates look popular and prepared -- even if none of those things actually was true.

Written as a memoir, the book also tells the stories of the assassinations of both Kennedy brothers from Bruno's front-row vantage. These parts of the book are personal and poignant, yet they still manage to focus on the importance of advance work -- and on the importance of improvising under duress.

Finally, toward the end of the book, Bruno makes some prognostications that stand now as relics of an apparently unpredictable era in American politics.

The Advance Man is out of print but can be found through used & rare book vendors.