DALLAS—Retired Dallas police detective Jim Leavelle still gets letters from strangers because of that 1963 photo of him standing next to Lee Harvey Oswald.

You know—THAT photo.

“Most just want autographs,” Leavelle said. “One asked what affect the Kennedy assassination had on my life. The usual.”

As Dallas marks the 45th anniversary Saturday of the Kennedy assassination, the 88-year-old Leavelle remains one of the investigation’s most famous figures.

Standing out in his tan suit and matching Resistol cowboy hat on Nov. 24, 1963, Leavelle was handcuffed to Oswald when Jack Ruby fired his .38-caliber pistol in an attack immortalized in the famous photo from the basement of Dallas police headquarters.

The photo made Leavelle’s face known worldwide, and began a lifetime of narrating how he ended up handcuffed to Oswald more times than he can count.

Leavelle saw the gun in Ruby’s hand right away. He tried to jerk Oswald behind him, but that wound up only exposing Oswald’s body even more. Later, he was able to move the bullet lodged under Oswald’s skin with his finger.

Leavelle doesn’t believe in conspiracy theories. He said the number of people who claimed to have been on the grassy knoll when Kennedy was shot could fill the Cotton Bowl. And his ready quip about the photo? “I started to ask them to take it over. I didn’t like the look of it.”

He usually does television interviews in the five- and 10-year anniversaries of the assassination, including some overseas. Fewer requests came this year.