David Sneyd reports from Dallas

WHAT DO YOU wear to an assassination site?

The JFK assassination site, no less?

Are ankle socks appropriate?

Shorts? What about dress shorts? Is there even such a thing? Surely pale, sticky legs need to be covered?

After just over three weeks at this World Cup, these are now some of the idle thoughts invading your correspondent’s mind between racing to games and making media shuttles. It was decided this was the day that a blue and white striped shirt – Dunne’s finest, thank you very much – was a suitable way to at least appear somewhat respectful.

With a spare few hours last Sunday afternoon before a four-hour bus from Dallas to Houston, a visit to Dealey Plaza was a must.

Maybe the effects of the previous morning’s red-eye flight from Boston, followed by a 1am finish after making it to watch Lionel Messi come off the bench to score for Argentina against Jordan, were beginning to take hold.

Until this point, wardrobe decisions were made purely on the basis of what wouldn’t be able to get a soggy grip of my inner thighs in the baking heat.

In Texas, we were reaching eye-stinging levels of sun.

Not to go all Ryan Tubridy about it – there was definitely no suit in my trusty 10kg bag – but a form of decorum felt necessary.

This is, after all, where the President of the United States was murdered on 22 November 1963.

A plaque put up by the Texas Historical Commission.

It’s one of the most significant events of the 20th century, ending the age of 1950s innocence in America.

I am eager to discuss this with my taxi driver en route to Dealey Plaza. He states that it’s probably the only tourist attraction in Dallas.

I ask if the World Cup has at least helped?

“I suppose.”

I’m dropped off outside The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza. Before paying $27 (€24) for what is a fascinating exhibition, I walk through the concrete plaza beside the Grassy Knoll which overlooks where JFK was killed.

There is a homeless woman protecting herself under some valuable shade drinking from a 7-Eleven Big Gulp.

Just beside her, a large, red banner is tied to some of the small openings chiselled into the concrete plaza.

Author Marshal Evans has a signing for his book, JFK: The Reckoning. Some fans of the band Rush are in town for a gig and are peppering Evans with questions. He tells them about working as an advisor on Oliver Stone’s 1991 film JFK, and how he did the same on a movie about Lyndon B. Johnson with Woody Harrelson.

The Grassy Knoll.

“I only wanted to do it because Woody’s dad was a contract killer,” he says, explaining how Harrelson Snr was sent to life in prison for carrying out a hit a federal judge.

He is sitting at a table that he has set up and has filled with gruesome photographs of JFK’s autopsy. Football fans wearing Argentina and Mexico jersey take photos.

He also has a small bronze bust of JFK on top of copies of Robert J Groden’s book, The Case for Conspiracy’, as well as some of his own lengthy research.

Evans has two more blue binders, one with information about the shooter, Lee Harvey Oswald, and another packed with more autopsy photos.

Suddenly I don’t feel so bad wearing ankle socks.

Evans says he comes here most weekends and on special occasions. “And the World Cup is on here now too.”

I ask why he would want to be sitting here and why he feels it’s still important.

“It’s that that unique thing where you had this handsome king struck down in the prime of his life with a beautiful wife and kids and it was never solved completely the way people wanted it,” he says.

“It’s got all of those things, all of those juicy things and people latch onto different parts of it, in the same way that people still latch onto the Titanic, and that was 1912. It’s got all of those components.”

Walk down from the Grassy Knoll (the fence has been restored to resemble its original structure) and you will see a handful of different tour guides all offering their unique take on proceedings, and the theories of a second shooter from this location.

The old Texas School Book Depository, where Lee Harvey Oswald shot President Kennedy from the sixth floor.

One man is leading a couple and their son (around 10 years old) to just beside where the shots struck Kennedy from across the road on the sixth floor of the old Texas School Book Depository.

He is getting the child to tilt his head back and use the Pepsi bottle as a prop to explain the direction of travel for the bullet.

“BAM, BAM, BAM” he shouts, loud enough to startle people on the other side of the road.

This feels odd.

The Texas Historical Commission has a plaque on the old depository building stating it’s where “Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly shot and killed” the president.

JFK’s motorcade was on Elm Street about to head under a triple underpass when the three shots were fired. We know this as, helpfully, there are two white Xs marked on the road.

People hover around the streets waiting for a break in the traffic to stand on the spots and take selfies or have someone pose with them.

A Romania fan with Hagi on the back of his jersey does not care that there is oncoming traffic as he takes his photos, does a full 360 swivel with his phone in the air and then holds his hands up in the air apologising as cars beep and come to a standstill.

An American couple become a comedy double act.

“Hey man, history shows that’s a dangerous position,” the man says.

“You could get shot,” the woman says. “Or run over!”

No one wants to die in ankle socks.