Constructing Assassin - 3 (JFK Place)(/title></head><body><pre> <center> Constructing the Assassin by David Reitzes (3) Based on *Harvey and Lee* by John Armstrong</a> </center> <br> <center> Constructing the Assassin, Part 3 - Continuing my adaptation of "Harvey and Lee" by John Armstrong</center> <br> On October 3rd at 3:39 pm, someone the CIA identified later as "Lee Harvey Oswald" speaking in English and some broken Spanish phoned the Russian Embassy in Mexico City to ask if his visa has been processed yet (1). This may well have been a misidentification -- neither Oswald nor an impostor. Harvey Oswald arrived in Dallas on the evening of October 3, 1963, and stayed overnight at the local YMCA (2). On October 3rd at about 6 pm, an Oswald was in Alice, Texas, some 400 miles south of Dallas, 100 miles east of Laredo, and about 40 miles west of the Gulf City of Corpus Christi. He drove up to radio station KOPY in a battered 1953 model car and asked about a job. He was told to return the next day and speak to the manager (3). On October 3 around 6:30 or 7:00 pm in Freer, Texas -- 35 miles west of Alice -- an Oswald was in the B. F. Cafe, asking a waitress, whose name is still censored by the federal government, if she knew of any job opportunities nearby. She told him there was a plant opening up nearby in November. He was accompanied by a woman resembling Marina Oswald as well as a child of about two to four years of age and a newborn baby, perhaps two weeks old. (Harvey Oswald at this time had a very pregnant wife, a year-and-a-half old girl, and would have a second daughter on October 20th.) The man wore blue jeans and a dirty white T-shirt, and had several days' growth of beard. The woman looked about 24 years old, about 110 pounds, and had shoulder-length blond hair. The waitress noted the woman seemed a little frightened of the man. Oswald asked the waitress how far it was to San Antonio, and was surprised to find out that it was over 100 miles. The couple stayed about half an hour, and conversed in a foreign language over pie and coffee. The woman spoke a slight amount of broken English; she said "Thank you" and "Goodbye" to the waitress in a foreign accent. The family left in an old gray car, possibly a 1952 or '53 Dodge or Plymouth sedan (4). Oswald spent the night of October 3rd in Alice, Texas. The next day at about 1:30 pm, Oswald returned to KOPY in a battered 1953 model car, accompanied by a woman and a 2-year-old child, where he filled out a job application and conversed a while with station manager Laymon "Sonny" Stewart and traffic manager Robert Janca. He mentioned he had just come from Mexico, and said he'd happened to spot the station while driving north on Highway 281. Stewart and Janca recalled his name as "Lee Oswald," and said he was unshaven and wore blue jeans. The woman remained in the car, and at some point Oswald mentioned that his wife didn't speak English. Stewart told Oswald that the station didn't have any openings at that time, but suggested he try radio stations in Pleasanton, 90 miles north, and Simton. He expressed interest in the Pleasanton station, and was last seen driving north on Highway 281 towards that city. (5). Sonny Stewart called the FBI the day after the assassination, convinced he had spoken to the President's assassin on October 4th. He told the Associated Press, "The first time I saw Oswald's picture on TV, I recognized him. It was like a song [where] you can't remember the name. When it finally hit me who it was, I almost fell on the floor" (6). On an unknown date, possibly October 4th, Oswald bought gasoline in Pleasanton, Texas, and asked a gas station attendant where he could find a pay phone, then requested change for $2.00. He was accompanied by a woman and at least one child in the car; the woman spoke no English (7). On an unknown afternoon in October, possibly October 4th, Mrs. Ben Parker at KBOP radio station in Pleasanton, Texas, received a phone call from Oswald, inquiring about job openings at the station. She told him to come by and speak to her husband, the station's owner. Oswald came and spoke with Dr. Ben Parker, who recalled Oswald was driving through town looking for work. He described Oswald as about 5'7" or 5'8", in his mid 20s, with sandy hair, and a "rather dirty appearance." Parker did not have any job openings, and did not see the car Oswald was driving (8). On October 3, 1963, an Oswald checked into the LaSalle Hotel in New Orleans, Louisiana (9). On the same day, someone using the name Lee Harvey Oswald returned four of Oswald's library books to the public library in New Orleans (10). In Dallas, Harvey Oswald spent the nights of October 3-6, 1963, at the YMCA (11). On October 4, 1963, the stocky, 30s-ish man in Mexico City who's earlier identified himself as Lee Harvey Oswald was photographed again outside the Soviet Embassy (12). On October 4th, an Oswald, apparently Harvey, applied for a job at the Padgett Printing Company on Industrial Boulevard in Dallas (13). Padgett overlooked the expected parade route that President Kennedy's motorcade would take (14). Harvey spent the afternoon and night with his wife and child at the Paine residence in Irving" (15). Around lunchtime on an unknown date in October, Lee Oswald applied for a job at Hill Machinery Co. in Alice, Texas. He filled out an application and spoke to mechanics Leo Sepulveda and M. E. Pope. Sepulveda later specifically recalled his name as "Oswald," and Pope remembered that he'd listed Marine service on the application. Pope described him as about 30 years old, 5'8", and weighing about 150-155 pounds. Pope also recalled Oswald's wife waiting in his car, an old model Plymouth or Chevrolet sedan. After the assassination, Sepulveda and Pope believed the President's assassin had been the man they'd spoken to. The FBI painstakingly searched through the Alice town trash dump before discovering that October's trash had long since been incinerated (16). On another unknown date, Oswald walked into the Hub City Glass Co. in Alice, Texas, asking for directions to the bus station. He was very agitated and loud, stating he needed to get to Dallas, and said he was going to be "getting there late" even if there was a bus leaving immediately. The glass worker who spoke to him, whose name is not recorded, saw the President's assassin on television and insisted he'd been the man looking for the bus station (17). In early October, Oswald was seen in the Atlantic Mills Shopping Mall in Corpus Christi, Texas by Mrs. Ellis Brown, whose husband, an attorney, reported it to the FBI after the assassination. He was accompanied by a woman with a small baby, and the couple looked at clothing. The woman had a "European" look about her, and the couple conversed in a foreign language; as Mrs. Brown spoke French, Spanish, and German, she told her husband it wasn't one of these the couple were speaking. She later saw them depart in an old model car. After the assassination she told her husband it was Lee Harvey Oswald she saw at the mall. The FBI declined to interview her personally (18). On an unknown date in early October, between 8 and 9 pm, Oswald talked to Martha Doyle at the Hertz Rent-a-Car office at the San Antonio International Airport about renting a car. He said he'd been driving a friend's car and now wished to rent one. Doyle remembered him as being maybe 27 years old, 5'8", 145 to 150 pounds, with light brown hair. He wore a white T-shirt that was so dirty it was turning gray. He was accompanied by a woman with a baby. The woman was about 27, 5'5", 125 pounds, with black hair, and wearing a stained brown dress. She didn't say anything, and simply smiled; she had two slightly chipped front upper teeth. From the way she was dressed, Doyle thought she was probably a foreigner. Both the man and the woman appeared "unkempt." Doyle didn't remember much about the baby; she guessed it was four to eleven months old, and she remembered it sucking on a pacifier. Doyle refused to rent Oswald a car because he had no credit cards. She suspected the couple were both unemployed, although Oswald said he was in the publishing industry. After the assassination, Martha Doyle reported that a couple identical to Lee Harvey and Marina Oswald had been at the airport. She said the physical resemblances were unmistakable, and she also had "never encountered people of this type before at the airport." Doyle's story was corroborated by Joan Dunsmore, a clerk at the National Rent-A-Car counter at the airport, who remembered the couple. The thing she particularly remembered was Oswald playing with the baby by tugging the pacifier in and out of its mouth (19). Marina was nine months pregnant in early October; Rachel Oswald was born on October 20, 1963. Not a single report mentions that the foreign-speaking woman with Oswald was pregnant. The FBI reports of these sightings are vague about the descriptions of the woman and child or children. June Oswald was about a year and a half old; not a baby nor a small child; the descriptions largely do not fit her. Despite all of the above information in the FBI files before the Warren Commission held its first meeting, the following passage appears in the "Speculation and Rumors" section of the Warren Report: *Speculation* -- On his way back from Mexico City in October 1963, Oswald stopped in Alice, Tex., to apply for a job at the local radio station. *Commission finding* -- This rumor apparently originated with the manager of radio station KOPY, Alice, who stated that Oswald visited his office on the afternoon of October 4 for about 25 minutes. According to the manager, Oswald was driving a battered 1953 model car and had his wife and a small child in the car with him. Oswald traveled from Mexico City to Dallas by bus, arriving in Dallas on the afternoon of October 3. The bus did not pass through Dallas. On October 4, Oswald applied for two jobs in Dallas and then spent the afternoon and night with his wife and child at the Paine residence in Irving. Investigation has revealed that Oswald did not own a car and there is no convincing evidence that he could drive a car. Accordingly, Oswald could not have been in Alice to look for a job on any occasion (20). Warren Commission attorney W. David Slawson wrote in a memo which was kept secret for almost 35 years, "We are beginning to uncover bits of evidence which indicate that Lee Harvey Oswald may have been better able to drive a car than we previously believed. If this is so, it is significant primarily because he must have had a motive for keeping his ability secret" (21). The Warren Commission concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald could not drive a car. They were half right: Harvey could not drive, but Lee could and did (22). Neither the FBI nor the Warren Commission took any interest in fourteen credible witnesses who, on numerous different occasions, believed they'd seen or spoken to Lee Harvey Oswald in or near Alice, Texas -- many of whom recall him as unkempt and unshaven, wearing jeans and a dirty T-shirt; with a "foreign" wife who spoke no English; an infant, a baby, or both; driving a battered old model sedan, possibly a 1953 Plymouth, Dodge or Chevrolet; and others who recalled other details coinciding with the life of Lee Harvey Oswald, including his being a Marine, and either returning from Mexico or headed towards Dallas (23). Researcher Chris Courtwright reports an interesting coincidence: Oswald's companion on his bus ride to Mexico City, Albert Alexander Osborne, aka John Howard Bowen, the "itinerant preacher," ex-Nazi, and alleged KGB courier, was a "frequent visitor" to the home of Reverend Joe Amarine of the Southern Baptist Church of Alice, Texas (24). On Saturday, October 5, around 7 am, a motorist, Stanley Moczygemba, picked up Lee Oswald hitchhiking along Loop 281 in southern San Antonio, and drove him 28 miles south to Leming, Texas, where Moczygemba owned a farm. Oswald told him that he'd recently traveled from Laredo to San Antonio, but was now heading back towards Laredo. Moczygemba described Oswald as mid 20s, about 5'8", 150 pounds. Oswald was wearing a hat and a heavy coat that was much too warm for the weather; the coat was closed up all the way to the neck (25). Around this same time, Lee Oswald applied for a job at the Continental Oil Company in Houston, and was interviewed by a Mrs. Sheppard. He told her he had just returned from Mexico with a friend, and that they had attempted to proceed from Mexico to Cuba. He mentioned he was staying at the Savoy Apartments two blocks away (26). "George Ryan, manager of the Stop-N-Go drive-in grocery in Houston, told the FBI that Oswald tried on three successive days around this time to cash a $65 check at his store. He told the Houston Press that he was under orders from the FBI not to discuss the case" (27). To sum up, one Oswald drove through Alice, Texas on October 3 and 4 with a woman and a young child or baby -- or both -- applying for jobs in Alice, Freer, Pleasanton, and Houston, residing at the Savoy Apartments the week of October 7, and trying to cash a $65 check. At the same time we have another Oswald in New Orleans on October 3rd, registered at the LaSalle Hotel, the hotel registration card showing him registered for a period of two or three hours in 218 for $5.00 (28). At the same time, Oswald is in Dallas, registered at the YMCA (29), and there is a "Lee Harvey Oswald" calling the Russian Embassy in Mexico on the afternoon of October 3rd, and captured on film there on October 4th (30). On October 7th, Oswald inquired about a room at a boarding house at 1026 North Beckley Avenue in Dallas, and was told that none was available. He soon rented a nearby room from Mary Bledsoe at 621 Marsalis Street (31). She would evict him within a week; she thought he made too many trips to her refrigerator, and she didn't like him talking on the phone in a foreign language (32). Prior to leaving New Orleans, Oswald closed out his New Orleans post office box and filed a change-of-address card. Postal Inspector and FBI Informant Harry D. Holmes told the Warren Commission that a second change-of-address card, not in Oswald's handwriting, was sent to the post office in New Orleans; it was postmarked in New Orleans on October 11 and in Dallas on October 16 (33). Junior Counsel Wesley J. Liebeler frankly admitted this was problematic, stating, "Let me come bluntly to the point. My problem is this: Oswald wasn't in New Orleans October 11. He was in Dallas" (34). Holmes conjectured that an unknown person had telephoned the New Orleans office with the change of address. Liebeler summed up the Commission's position when he sighed, "Well, in any event, we will add this to the pile" (35). Sometime in October 1963, Dallas resident Mrs. Lovell Penn was at home when she heard gun shots outside. She went out to find three men target-shooting on her property, and chased them away; they left by car. She found a spent Mannlicher-Carcano cartridge case in the grass. She would later realize that the man charged with the President's assassination was one of the men she'd confronted earlier. The FBI concluded that the 6.5 caliber cartridge had not been fired from the rifle allegedly belonging to Oswald (36). On Sunday, October 13, Lee Oswald was at the Sports Drome Rifle Range (37). On Sunday, October 13, shortly after 8 pm, Oswald was seen at a meeting of the Student Revolutionary Council (DRE), the anti-Castro group of which Carlos Bringuier was a member. After the assassination, Edwin L. Steig reported to the FBI that "at this meeting which was held at the First Federal Savings and Loan Association Conference in the North Lake Shopping Village in Dallas, Texas," at which there were "about 75 persons present," an "individual sat in the back of this room who he believes is identical with Lee Harvey Oswald. The individual spoke to no one but merely listened and then left" (38). DRE Secretary Sarah Castillo, was interviewed shortly thereafter. She herself did not recall seeing Lee Harvey Oswald, but confirmed that "among [the] visitors present was former General Edwin A. Walker" (39). Mr. LIEBELER. Do you recall . . . going to any meetings of anti-Castro Cubans during the month of October 1963? General WALKER. . . . I don't remember a date of attendance. Mr. LIEBELER. Isn't it a fact that there were some meetings here in Dallas sponsored by an organization known as DRE, which is a revolutionary group that is opposed to Fidel Castro? Do you remember that? General WALKER. What does DRE stand for? Mr. LIEBELER. It is the initials of a lot of Spanish words, which stands for the Student Revolutionary Council. . . . General WALKER. . . . Well, there is a student directorate group . . . I attended a meeting sometime and listened to some speakers. Mr. LIEBELER. They came from Miami? General WALKER. I believe they came from Miami. Mr. LIEBELER. And you contributed $5 to the organization that night? General WALKER. I believe I did. Mr. LIEBELER. Did you see Lee Harvey Oswald at that meeting? General WALKER. No, I did not (40). On October 14, Harvey Oswald rented a room at 1026 North Beckley Street in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas, where he had inquired unsuccessfully a week before. He paid in cash, and identified himself as "O. H. Lee" (41). The same day at about 2 pm, Oswald applied for a job at the Wiener Lumber Co. on Inwood Road in Dallas, located directly between Love Field and the Trade Mart. The final parade route for President Kennedy's motorcade had not yet been announced; Inwood Road was located along one of the possible routes. Oswald said he'd served two terms in the Marines and had received an honorable discharge the previous month. He was turned down when he appeared evasive about producing a record of his honorable discharge (42). Laurel Kittrell of the Texas Employment Commission interviewed Lee Harvey Oswald before he began work at the Book Depository on October 15. He told her he had come up from New Orleans. She described him as neat in appearance and articulate. He told her that his first job had been selling shoes. He mentioned having lived in Encino, California in 1956, and working six months as a motor scooter messenger boy before joining the Marines. We believe this was Harvey, who worked at the Dolly Shoe Co. in 1955, and wrote the infamous note in his mother's name to Warren Easton High School in October 1955, stating "we are moving to San Diego." Kittrell's curiosity was aroused when Oswald told her he had lived in Russia and had a Russian wife. She noticed the woman accompanying him was about to have a baby, and recalled her as being quite short and wearing no make-up. Kittrell asked Harvey what he liked best about Russia. He replied, "The opera" (43). A week later, Lee Harvey Oswald showed up at the Texas Employment Commission, and was interviewed by Laurel Kittrell. But Mrs. Kittrell realized instantly that this Oswald was not the Lee Harvey Oswald she'd interviewed before. She was correct; by then Harvey was working at the Texas School Book Depository, a job apparently arranged through a neighbor of Ruth Paine's. Lee and Harvey were very, very similar, Kittrell recalls, but undoubtedly two different people. She said, "The man I remember as Oswald [Harvey], and the man I remember as 'the Teamster' [Lee] were much alike in size, shape, and outline, generally; there was a marked difference between them in bearing and manner. The man I remember as Oswald was a trim, energetic, compact, well-knit person who sat on the edge of a chair. The man I remember as 'the Teamster' was sprawled over his chair and was rather messy looking." After the assassination, Mrs. Kittrell wrote and phoned the FBI, but was not interviewed until a year later, after the Warren Commission Report and volumes of evidence were completed and published, and the Warren Commission had been dissolved (44). On October 15, 1963, Harvey Oswald, applied at the Texas School Book Depository. He impressed the superintendent, Roy S. Truly, who found him well-dressed and uncommonly courteous. Truly especially liked the Oswald called him "Sir," which "a lot of them don't do nowadays" (45). On October 15, 1963, the Mexico City "Oswald" is photographed again, this time outside the Cuban Consulate. This is reported in several recently declassified CIA cables of November 23, 1963, one of which inquires about when exactly Oswald left Mexico City. Some at the Agency were speculating that this man was "Alek Hidell," as it wasn't established until later that afternoon that "Hidell" and Oswald were one and the same. Once that was cleared up, the dates of the October 4th and 15th Mexico City "Oswald" photographs were apparently revised to reflect the official date of Oswald's departure, the night of October 2-3 (46). On the evening of October 22, while Harvey Oswald was at his room in Oak Cliff, an "Oswald Lee" visited the home of Harold Zotch in Grand Prairie, just south of Irving, Texas. Mrs. James Walker and Oswald spoke for nearly two hours. Oswald told her he had been to Russia and was writing a book about his experiences. He said that he had been working for the "Texas Book Store" for eight days, had a room in Oak Cliff and a wife in Irving, Texas. She noticed a tattoo of a dagger with a snake on his left forearm. She asked him what this meant, and he said, "don't tread on me -- you know, don't step on me." About 10 pm, Oswald left in an old model car driven by a tall, dark-headed young man (47). Earlene Roberts, the housekeeper at 1026 North Beckley, told the Warren Commission that Oswald -- except for weekend visits to Irving -- always came home right after work, and never went out in the evening (48). On the evening of Wednesday, October 23, several people saw Oswald sitting quietly in the back of an ultra right wing meeting held to drum up support for the following day's protest against the Dallas appearance of UN Ambassador Adlai Stevenson. The speaker was General Edwin A. Walker, of whose attempted assassination Oswald would be posthumously accused. If Earlene Roberts was correct about Harvey Oswald staying home on weeknights, then this could not be Harvey Oswald at the meeting. On November 1st, Mrs. Lillian Springler was working at the Parrot Jungle Gift Shop in Miami, Florida, when a Cuban man entered the store and engaged her in conversation. President Kennedy's name came up, and the Cuban man said he hated Kennedy. He bragged he was a very good shot, and next time Kennedy came to Miami he would like to shoot him right between the eyes; he touched his finger above the bridge of his nose for emphasis. He also mentioned that he was ambidextrous. He added, "If I don't get him, I have a friend who will." He said his friend Lee was an American, a Marine, and a sharp-shooter. Lee was a really smart guy, too; he spoke Russian and German. Lee lived in either Texas or Mexico -- Springler couldn't remember which the man said. She didn't see him again until after the assassination, on December 10, 1963, and when he spotted her he jumped into a two-toned blue and white Chevrolet sedan. She wrote down his license plate number (49). The license was traced to a 1954 Chevrolet four-door belonging to Jorge Antonio Martinez Soto. His address on file was no longer current, but the FBI found that he worked at Miami's Fontainbleau Hotel. The Bureau got his current address from the Fontainbleau; the agents also noted the names of Martinez' references from the job application he'd filled out in 1961; among them was Michael J. McLaney, Jack Ruby's gunrunning friend who'd lost a casino to Castro's Cuba and was providing facilities and arms for a Cuban exile training camp in LaCombe, Louisiana (50). Martinez had once lived rent-free in a room above the garage of McLaney's LaCombe house (51). Martinez told the FBI he had been to the Parrot Jungle Gift Shop on or about November 1, 1963. He recalled talking to employees there, and demonstrating his ability to write with both hands. He said he had no association with or knowledge of Lee Harvey Oswald, and wasn't acquainted with anyone named Lee, any Americans who were Marxists, any ex-servicemen who were Marxists, anyone who spoke Russian, had no friends in Texas or Mexico, and "he could think of no acquaintance whom he knew to be a Marksman or Sharpshooter (52). Martinez said that perhaps his poor pronunciation of English had led to a misunderstanding. He admitted that he was rather excitable, particularly in regard to the subject of Fidel Castro, and he might have made some remarks about Castro that had been misinterpreted as having to do with Kennedy. He said that perhaps he might have told the Parrot Jungle employees that he wished HE was President so he could "blow up Fidel Castro." When pressed, Martinez said it was possible he "also expressed some displeasure as [to] what he regards as the failure of the United States to rid Cuba of Castro, but it was not a criticism of the United States Government, which he considers to be the best in the world." He denied he'd ever said anything about shooting Kennedy (53). On Wednesday, November 6, while Harvey Oswald was at work, Jack Ruby and a man who looked identical to Oswald were at the Contract Electronics store in Dallas at 3 pm for approximately one hour. Store employees Kermit Patterson, Donald Stuart, and Charles Arndt discussed the buying and selling of electronic equipment with the two men. Patterson identified Lee Harvey Oswald from New Orleans Police photographs as the person he saw in his store. He said Oswald had a tattoo on his left forearm (54). Clifton Shasteen operated a barber shop less than a mile from the Paine house in Irving. Shasteen, an Irving city council member, was Lee Oswald's barber. He saw Oswald at various Irving locations including Williamsburg's Drug Store, Hutchison's Grocery, and the Paines' house. Every other week in the summer of 1963, Oswald drove the Paines' light green 1955 Chevrolet station wagon to Shasteen's barber shop for a haircut. Shasteen was deposed by Warren Commission attorney Albert Jenner on April 1, 1964. When the news of a suspect's arrest for the assassination was announced, Shasteen initially had no idea he'd had contact with the accused. Mr. SHASTEEN. [T]he name didn't mean anything to me when they first mentioned the name. Mr. JENNER. The name Lee Harvey Oswald? Mr. SHASTEEN. It didn't mean a thing, but later on in the evening when we began to see the pictures, you know . . . the first I remember seeing him to recognize that I had saw the face before was about -- over there around 5 o'clock, when I saw him over at the jail or something and I seen him when they come out there and when he looked toward the cameras. I didn't say anything to anybody. I had before told them, you know, what I said was just a gag -- I said, "You can't tell. That guy might live here in Irving." You know how guys pop off or something, but I didn't know a thing about it. . . . when I saw his picture I remembered him coming in the shop and I just knew that. It finally dawned on me where I had saw him. I knew where he lived. Actually, I knew where the station wagon was that was parked, that I saw him and this lady in, so I just took out of the shop and told the boy, I said, "I'm going to run to the house and I'll be back in a minute. So, I drove up there and my lands of living, you couldn't get within 4 blocks of that house, and knew then I was not mistaken that that was the guy that came in my barber shop . . . All three of the barbers in there have cut his hair, but I cut it more, I guess, than the rest of them did. I think the boy on the front chair cut it once and the boy in the middle chair cut it a couple of times, but I think I cut his hair three or four times. Mr. JENNER. . . . Now, normally, this man you have in mind has his hair cut every 2 weeks? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. Either on Friday night or on Saturday morning? Mr. SHASTEEN. Right. Mr. JENNER. And there were occasions when you personally cut his hair? Mr. SHASTEEN. . . . I know of three times that I cut it and I might have cut it more than that, but I don't think that I did because you just can't hardly forget a guy like that or you can't miss knowing him when he is in your chair. Mr. JENNER. You cut his hair three times and your other barbers in your shop, your employees, also cut his hair, is that right? Mr. SHASTEEN. That's right. . . . I would say we cut his hair five or possibly six times. . . . At least. The front guy cut his hair one time, Mr. Clover, and Mr. Law cut his hair one time and Buddy -- he might have cut it one other time and if he did that would've made six. . . . It could have been five, but I personally know of five times he was in there and like I told him, he could have been in there two or three other times when I wasn't in there, because sometimes, it's not very often I do, but occasionally Mr. Law will open up in the morning and I won't be there right on time. Because, like I said, I went to a football game and that -- there could have been other times that he came in that I wasn't there, but I asked Buddy did he ever remember cutting his hair and he said he thought he did cut it another time than the time -- so if he did, there was six times, and of course, Mr. Glover, he doesn't keep up with whose hair he cuts as much as some of the others -- he's not a friendly type guy, but Buddy said he might have cut his hair more than once. Mr. JENNER. . . . [D]id this hair-cutting go back into the summer? Mr. SHASTEEN. . . . I just can't pinpoint the first time. . . . it seemed to me like there was a dead spot in there. Some time maybe a month or 6 weeks that we might not have saw him . . . but the last three haircuts -- it seemed to me like he was pretty regular. Mr. JENNER. So, if you had a dead spot, allowing for -- let's say getting a haircut somewhere else occasionally, or not coming in precisely at the end of every 2-week period and having in mind that your present recollection is at least five or six occasions, that would run it back into the summertime? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; it was. In other words, 2 or 3 or 4 months that we had been seeing him, but I don't know just exactly to the date or nothing. Mr. JENNER. . . . Did you seek to engage this man in conversation when he came into your shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. You couldn't do it. Mr. JENNER. Did you seek to do it? Mr. SHASTEEN. Oh, yes naturally . . . if a man gets in a chair, and I tell my other barbers that, if he gets in a chair and you strike up a conversation with him and he doesn't want to talk, don't talk to him -- you say just as little as you can. . . . But if the guy wants to talk, then talk to him, if he if you can talk to him on his level or understand the thing he's talking about, but if a man gets in your chair and he doesn't want to talk, you can find it out without him turning around and saying, "Cut my hair, I didn't come in here to have a bull session." . . . Mr. JENNER. . . . [H]e evidenced no interest in the bull session, as you described it? Mr. SHASTEEN. No. . . . [H]e just had a hard look, just sitting in the chair. I'll tell you this much -- if a guy comes in the barbershop and he's got a pretty good disposition and he smiles and speaks to people, every barber will want to cut his hair, but if a guy comes in there and he kind of looks grouchy, in barber language we call it soldiering on one another. We might work on a guy just a little bit longer if this guy's next so somebody else will have to get him. He's just the type guy you don't care about working on. I mean, he was just that type. I believe I can speak for all three of the barbers because I have heard their opinion about him. They didn't care if he never came back. . . [I]n the conversation, any time anything would come up -- anybody else would talk to him, he was just disgruntled. I remember him particularly one time. The barber in the front chair, one Saturday morning, he cut his hair. You know, the barber chair is only so far from the sink, but there's not room for two men between that and the sink. Well, the fellow on the front chair cut his hair and he gets up and goes back in the middle chair and gets between the barber and his bench back there and stands back behind and combs his hair. In other words, what he was trying to do -- fixing to or wanting to, he just pushed him out. He was just rude and we all remembered that time . . . When Mr. Clover cut his hair, he went around and instead of using his back bar to look in the mirror and comb his hair, he went down to the one at the middle chair and just rudely pushed out of the way and he got up there and combed his hair and turned his water on, you know, and got some more oil and put on it, on his hair, and he didn't say thank you or excuse me or nothing. He just pushed in there those things make you remember. . . . [H]e never did say, "That looks nice," or "That's all right." He would say, "Aw, that's pretty good, that will do until I get another one, or that will do for this time." He never did say, "That's a good haircut." I do remember him saying, "Take a 32nd off of the temple." Well, you can't take a 32d off of a man's hair, you know. . . . we have talked about that . . . We laughed about his saying, "Take a 32nd," or he would say, "Take a 16th off of the top," or something. I do remember him saying them things. Mr. JENNER. . . . What color hair did this man have? Mr. SHASTEEN. Oh, he was dark headed--I wouldn't say he was real black, you know, what I mean, he wasn't jet black, but most people would call him black-headed. Mr. JENNER. . . . How much hair did he have? A full head of hair? Mr. SHASTEEN. To me, he didn't have a full head of hair. It was rather short and thin around here by the temples and the way his hair lies back, he would have been bald if he had been 40 years old. Mr. JENNER. He had hair around the center, but he was losing his hair around the sides of the forehead? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; there was just a little crease that started back here. Naturally, a barber would notice that because the hair is much finer back here, you see, than it was down here [indicating]. . . . in another 5 or 6 years he would have been bald-headed. Mr. JENNER. . . . On the occasions you saw this man would you describe his appearance so far as his attire is concerned? How was he dressed? Mr. SHASTEEN. The best I remember is that he had on some kind of coveralls, nearly every time he came in. Mr. JENNER. Coveralls? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; he wore unionalls or coveralls, you know, sir. were GI, of some description and they were green or a khaki-colored. The only time he wasn't dressed that way when he came in the shop was the night I went to the football game and that night he had on a pair of old worn out dress pants of some kind, they were dark, and he had on a sports shirt with his shirttail out. Mr. JENNER. Let me get at these coveralls--would you describe them? Mr. SHASTEEN. They buttoned down the front. Mr. JENNER. They buttoned down the front and they had sleeves--it was a one-piece unit? Mr. SHASTEEN. Right. Mr. JENNER. And covers you from top to bottom, full sleeves? Mr. SHASTEEN. Now, one pair--one time I remember--he had pretty hairy arms. I remember that about him, you know, he had black hair on his arms, and one time he had on short sleeves. These coveralls had the sleeves cut off and they were ragged -- I mean -- they were long sleeves originally but they had just been chopped off. He is the type of guy that when you met him you couldn't hardly forget him. I'll say that. I mean, there is just something about him and I think I could say that for all three of us that worked there in the shop that every time he came in -- we would ask him to come back, but right down deep we didn't want him back. Mr. JENNER. . . . And what color did you say these coveralls were? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, they were either -- I don't know what color you call them old dungarees. You know, them old combat coveralls that the Army wears. That's what they were. Now, somebody, I believe that [FBI Special Agent Bardwell] Odum is the one that asked me was they Marine coveralls or Army or something like that, and that, I don't have any idea . . . They were the military type. They wasn't the kind you just go down to the dry goods store and buy. I know that. He may have bought them at a surplus store for all I know. Mr. JENNER. . . . Would you describe these coveralls a little bit further -- they were full length? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes, sir. Mr. JENNER. Did they zipper or button down the front? Mr. SHASTEEN. . . . I wouldn't say, but I would almost say that they buttoned. At least they had a button at the top. Mr. JENNER. And did he normally have them buttoned up to the top, or did he have them open at the throat? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; he had them open, but another thing -- you know -- there are little things, like we get to thinking about now -- I know that these old coveralls -- he wore them like that [indicating]. Mr. JENNER. He wore them with the collar up? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; and just flopping out. Mr. JENNER. And you remember one occasion when the coveralls, while they were long sleeved, somebody had sheared off the sleeves on a particular pair? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; they were just ragged, they were just chopped off. Mr. JENNER. . . . Did these coveralls have any pockets in them? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. Would you give me -- what do they look like, looking at them just the full front? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, the full front? . . .Well, the ones that were cut off at the sleeves, I can remember the most. They just had some old pockets up here -- [indicating]. Mr. JENNER. On each breast area? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. Was that a large pocket, large patch pocket? Mr. SHASTEEN. No; they were just outside patch pockets and pockets on the front were patch pockets, I believe. Mr. JENNER. Do you mean at the hip on either side? Mr. SHASTEEN. They had some front pockets on either side. . . . When he got his billfold out, I just wondered how in the world, if he ever sat down he didn't lose the thing. You know, they were big enough -- that's why I said they were big enough for two. They sagged and the pockets just leaned back and you could have just walked up and reached in there and got his billfold and never touched him. Mr. JENNER. . . . And these coveralls were so loose fitting that it made the pockets hang down? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; they were just real loose. Even if you had a belt on them that pulled them around or something -- I just couldn't stand to wear something shuffling through it like that. Mr. JENNER. . . . Would you describe these house shoes, please? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, yes; they were I wish I could find something -- they were a darker yellow than this right here [indicating]. And they had a much tanner sole on them -- it was almost what you call a brown sole. It wasn't a leather, it wasn't a rubber, it was like a neoprene. . . . They were soft and nice, but they were sturdy house shoes. . . . they didn't have no heels--they may have had a little heel, but I mean they didn't have an extra heel, because I looked at them good. I mean, I wasn't interested in them until he said he got them from Old Mexico, and I knew that was out. Mr. JENNER. Were they the pull-on type or lace type? Mr. SHASTEEN. No; they were the just the pull-on type. [H]e was always disgruntled, and the only time I ever saw him smile he had on a pair of yellow house shoes and I never saw any like them before. . . . . I admired them and I said, "Them looks expensive," and he said, "They are not." He said, "I gave a dollar and a half for them." I said, "My goodness, where did you get a pair of house shoes for a dollar and a half?" And he said, "Down in Old Mexico." Mr. JENNER. Down in Old Mexico? Mr. SHASTEEN. And I said, "Man, I'd like to have a pair of them. . . ." and he said, "Well, I'll get you a pair the next time I'm down there," and that is the only time he ever was nice and polite . . . Mr. JENNER. . . . On reflection, you fix it as 2 to 3 weeks on a Saturday morning prior to November 8? Mr. SHASTEEN. Right. Mr. JENNER. That would take us back to -- that would be either the 25th of October or the 18th of October? Mr. SHASTEEN. Possibly; yes, sir. . . . he had the shoes on, the house shoes on that morning, because the thing that made me remember that was the fact that it seemed like I'd found something he agreed with me on. He even smiled about this; you know, he had a good look on his face when I complimented his house shoes. Mr. JENNER. What time of day was this? Mr. SHASTEEN. Oh, it was probably 6:45 in the morning. Mr. JENNER. It was a Saturday morning? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes, sir. Oswald sometimes had a companion, a 14-year-old boy. Mr. SHASTEEN. There was a 14-year-old boy come in with him a few times, and -- not every time, but I know he has been in there as much as two or three times with him, but he never did say nothing until about 3 or 4 days before this incident happened. This kid was in the shop -- Mr. JENNER. Three or four days before November 22? Mr. SHASTEEN. Right. This boy was in the shop and the boy in the front chair was cutting his hair, and you know how men are talking, and there is this old saying, "If you haven't heard this you haven't been around barbershops." The guys are always talking about we spend too much money overseas and we give away this and we give away that and you know, just the general consumption of the whole country and how everything is going. . . . anyhow, there was several guys in there and they were talking one evening and this kid was in there, and the best I remember, it must have been . . . 2:30 or 3 . . . they were doing all this talking and the [14-year-old] kid hadn't opened his mouth and the fellow on the front chair was cutting his hair . . . all this talk was going on and I could tell he was listening and directly, he said, "I can tell you when you will stop all of this greed and everything." And I said, "What do you mean, son?" And, he said, "Well, when you have one leader over everyone else." And, he said, leader -- he didn't just say country. I remember that -- how he said it. And, I said, "What do you mean 'one leader'?" And he said, "Well, when you don't have a leader in every little old country and them trying to scramble with one another" and he said, "Another thing, like you -- you own the shop and these other fellows work for you and you get part of their money and he said when everybody has a say, when one man is not allowed to hog up the whole country and let another man starve," he says, "that's when we are going to quit having wars and all this junk." And I said, "Where in the world did you get that kind of stuff?" He never did answer me, but it made me so -- if I knew then what, I know now, I would probably have took him and bought him a steak to try to quiz him and find out who it was and where he got all of that. Instead, it made me mad, just to be honest about it -- I would like to have took one of them razor straps and tore him up. If he had been a 14-year-old boy of mine that said a thing like that he would have got it, but he got up and left the shop and I haven't heard him since, and I didn't find out where he lived, who he was or nothing. Mr. JENNER. . . . How many times -- you personally, now, without someone else having told you the boy was in the shop, how many times do you recall when he was in your shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. . . . Three times -- I know. In other words, I know he came with Oswald the night I'm talking about when he wanted to know where I was going and I went to the back door. You see, I seen them coming in and I did hurry to get out the back door. Mr. JENNER. The boy came in? Mr. SHASTEEN. He was with him that night and he was with him one other time. Mr. JENNER. Can you fix that particular time? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, it was a couple of weeks and maybe 3 weeks before that night. Mr. JENNER. Excuse me the night you say you were going out to the football game when was that? Jenner is referring to an occasion Shasteen described when he was preparing to leave the store early to attend a football game, leaving one of his barbers alone in the shop. When Shasteen saw Oswald and the 14-year-old boy drive up, he scrambled out the back door so as not to be delayed should both want a haircut. Mr. SHASTEEN. It was Friday night and this was the last time Oswald came in . . . it was probably 2 weeks before [the assassination]. . . . And it was about Monday night before that when the kid -- it could be a week's difference there, but I don't think it is. Mr. JENNER. . . . This football game incident occurred, you think, 2 weeks prior? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. That would be the evening of the 8th of November? Mr. SHASTEEN. I believe that's right, just as near right as I can get it. . . . I'll tell you why I think it was the 8th. . . . The fact is, he [Oswald] never did want his hair cut -- he always wanted it to look like it was about a week old when he cut it and he got a haircut about every 2 weeks, and I don't think he ever went over 2 weeks -- he either got a haircut on Friday night or Saturday morning. . . . Mr. JENNER. And on that occasion was this 14-year-old boy with him? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. And that is the occasion when you were sneaking out to the football game? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. . . . When he came in with the 14-year-old boy, did the 14-year-old boy get his hair cut at the same time? Mr. SHASTEEN. No. Mr. JENNER. He just sat in the shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. He just come with him. I assumed, and I'm just saying this because I haven't ever saw him before and never saw him other than with Oswald, that he doesn't live in Irving. Mr. JENNER. He did not? Mr. SHASTEEN. I don't believe the boy lived there, because, you know, in other words - it has been in the back of my mind and the last -- and when I see school kids, I'm always kind of wondering if I'm ever going to see him again and I never, had never saw that kid since. Mr. JENNER. On how many of these occasions would you say---does your recollection serve you -- as to whether he was accompanied by this 14-year-old boy? Mr. SHASTEEN. Twice, in other words -- the only times I remember seeing the boy was twice when he was with him. He was with him the night he got the haircut, the last time he was in the shop, and he was with him before that, the time before that this kid was with him. The two last times he was in the shop, this boy was with him, and that's the only time I ever saw the boy with him, but then about -- in other words, what I am saying, he came in on Friday, was we'll say it is the 8th there and then a week from this coming Monday the boy was in and got a haircut, but Oswald wasn't with him. The boy came in by himself . . . but why I said I don't think he lived in Irving, I have never saw him before, and I have been there 4 years and I have seen so many kids grow up and I know their names, but I know their faces, but I just have never saw him before, and that's one of those times that you are sorry that you, like I said, let your temper get away. Since then I have really wished -- if I had done something, because this kid in my estimation, even though he is warped in his thinking, and I think he is warped, he could be helped if somebody could get ahold of him, but I was the one that had an opportunity to try to and I let it slip. Mr. JENNER. . . . And would you describe this young man [the 14-year-old] to me, how was he dressed? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, he had on blue jeans and they fit tight and he had on an old striped shirt, I remember him just like I see a picture over there right now and he was a husky kid, he wasn't what you call fat, but he was strong -- broad-shouldered -- he had a real full, and when I say full, I don't mean a round fat face, he was a wide-faced kid. You know, he was a nice looking kid. I mean, if he had had the personality and the teaching and the understanding to go with his looks, he could have done anything he wanted to do, but his personality to me made him look terrible and what he thought, and naturally when somebody disagrees with you to the point you get angry with them, you don't think much of their looks, but if you bring it down to his looks, he was blue-eyed, blonde-headed -- he was not a light blonde he was a dark blonde. In fact a lot of. people might call him brown-headed. But he wasn't nobody's dummy because a 14-year-old boy can't spit out -- I wouldn't attempt to say just how he said everything, but the things that struck me when he belittled our country and our leaders as a whole I might disagree with our leaders but I'll stick up for them when it comes time down to the point. Mr. JENNER. . . . It was on a Wednesday or Thursday and Oswald's hair was cut on that occasion by your fellow barber, Burr Glover? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; and Burr is the one that says that was on a Thursday. Mr. JENNER. You see, this is what you told Mr. Odum and that Glover says on the next Monday or Tuesday he cut the hair of the 14-year old boy? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. And that would be sometime in October? Mr. SHASTEEN. Evidently that's the time . . . Mr. JENNER. . . . Oswald was not in the shop but . . . somebody else . . . brought the boy to the shop. Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; somebody let him out. . . . somebody brought him and somebody picked him up, but they didn't pull right in front of the shop. They just let him out in front in the street. Mr. JENNER. Did you notice whether there was a woman or man or men that brought him to the shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. I know what you're fixing to ask and I could kick my own self, but I didn't pay no attention to it. Mr. JENNER. Do you recall what type of automobile did you notice it at all? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; I noticed the car. . . . it was in the 1958 bracket and . . . it didn't have the wings on it. . . . I think it was a 1958 Ford -- them there old gun-colored, it was a dark color, but it wasn't black or nothing, and that's what let him out -- the kid out in front. Mr. JENNER. But this was the occasion the boy made the remark, "There wouldn't be no peace until all the people had the same amount of possessions and that most of our trouble now is caused because the poor people have so little and the rich so much?" Mr. SHASTEEN. Right. Mr. JENNER. And this boy indicated peace would come when all the people had the amount of -- the same amount of wealth? Mr. SHASTEEN. And had one leader -- he didn't say "ruler," he said "leader." We talked about that and noticed it after he left. . . . just thinking of a 14-year old boy having that kind of distilled stuff in his mind. It's not funny to me, it hurts me to see a kid with that kind of an attitude, because somebody is teaching him wrong and the thing that hurts me the most was the fact that I did have a chance to have took him and bought him a coke or took him and done something and talked to him and found out who he was and where I could have at least reasoned with him or turned him in where somebody--some of the authorities could have gotten ahold of him or anything, but it made me mad and I didn't do it. . . . I would much rather have took him and whipped him with one of the belts or razor straps than took his money. . . . I never saw that boy since that day. Of course, I don't remember exactly, the exact words, you know, I was kind of angry and aggravated and then you say things, but I let him know that that was no way for anybody to feel and I told him he was just off -- way off base, and I said, "I don't know where you got your learning and your thinking," but I said, "Boy, I disagree with you wholeheartedly." And I said -- I have a bad habit of telling people they had better take inventory and see if they are right, and I told him, I said, "You had better take inventory and find out where you stand because you are just at the right age that you can get in a lot of trouble thinking like that." Shasteen's most chilling testimony involves seeing Oswald on several occasions outside of his barber shop, with two women. Mr. SHASTEEN. [T]he only time I remember seeing him, you know, other than just going in the grocery store across the street, Mr. Hutchison's food market, and I was down at the drugstore one night, down at Williamsburg's and he was in there. . . . And, why I remembered seeing him in there, I knew I couldn't understand his wife, and that was before -- I believe it was before she had her baby. The best I remember she was pregnant. . . . That's the only time I had ever saw her that I remember. . . . Sometimes there were two women with him and I assumed it was Mrs. Paine, but Mrs. Paine has never been in the shop. I have saw her around, you know, like my brother-in-law used to live right across the street from her and the fellow that lives right on the corner and I'm trying to think of his name . . . I knew him for years, but I don't never call his name and I can't think of it now to save my neck. I would know it if I hear it called, but anyhow, you know, I've stopped by and chatted with him a lot of times in the daytime. I've got some rent houses, you know, and I would get out of the shop and I would go by and see them and I would come by this fellow's house and I would stop there and I saw Mrs. Paine out in the yard and I know all of the people that live around there nearly, around the Paine's house, but I never had any connection with Mrs. Paine or Mr. Paine. . . . [O]ne other time, when the boy in the middle chair cut his hair. It was on Friday night and it was about 5 or 10 minutes to 7, the best I remember. . . . I was going to a football game. . . . as he came in the front door, I started out--I went out the back. The next morning this boy that works in the middle chair [said that Oswald] really was inquisitive as to where I went. He wanted to know where I was going and what I was going to do -- he asked this guy cutting his hair. . . . Mr. JENNER. Now, were there occasions you saw this man that you have in mind on the street when he didn't come into your shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes, I saw him going to the grocery store when he didn't come to the shop. Mr. JENNER. And you occasionally saw him -- is the grocery store across the street? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes, sir. Mr. JENNER. That's Hutch's Market? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. And how was he dressed on those occasions? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, I think most usually, like I said, the only time I ever saw him with anything but those coveralls on was that night he came in the shop--he had those on--those old coveralls on when he was over there and another thing, they were big for him. I always noticed they were big enough for him and somebody else. Mr. JENNER. . . . And even on those occasions when you saw him across the street at Hutch's, he had the coveralls, the military-type coveralls on? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; of course. He could have went in there times I didn't see him. And I don't know how many times I saw him but I have seen him over there. Mr. JENNER. Well, I just want the times that you saw him. Mr. SHASTEEN. I wouldn't even commence to guess -- probably three or four times over there. Mr. JENNER. You saw him about three or four times across the street? . . . and you have a distinct recollection, do you, that there were occasions when you saw this man in the coveralls over at Hutch's Market that he was accompanied by somebody else? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes. Mr. JENNER. And did you recognize any of the persons who were accompanying him? Mr. SHASTEEN. No; I wouldn't say I did because most of the time -- they headed -- they got out of the car and we saw their backs, and I would see him and I just knew it was him. Once you cut somebody's hair that close you are close enough so that you know them outside or when you see them. Mr. JENNER. So, you're not in a position, I take it, then, to say that you have a distinct recollection that Mrs. Paine accompanied them at anytime? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, now, that part of it I would have to take for granted because they were in his [Michael Paine's] car. Now, she [Ruth Paine], I understand through one of the men who questioned me out at the shop, said he [Oswald] never did drive her car. Again, I'm going to disagree because I know that he did. He drove it up there and got a haircut. Mr. JENNER. You have a distinct recollection that on occasions when this man came into your shop for a haircut, he drove an automobile up to your shop? Mr. SHASTEEN. He drove that there 1955, I think it's a 1955, I'm sure it's a 1955 Chevrolet station wagon. It's either blue and white or green and white it's two-toned -- I know that. Now, why I say -- why I take it for granted that Mrs. Paine was with him when he come to the grocery store I do remember he wasn't driving when they would come to the grocery store, there would be a lady driving and I'm assuming that that was Mrs. Paine, because like I say, I have been -- I have never been close enough to her and knew it, to speak to her, but she trades at the service station where I do and I saw her in there and I never did pay any attention to her and I saw her passing, met her in the road in the car and those things. Mr. JENNER. Were there any occasions when you have a recollection as to his being accompanied by more than one person? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes; that's what I said -- I saw him and two ladies get out and go in the store. Mr. JENNER. On how many occasions did you see that? Mr. SHASTEEN. Well, I was trying to think of that coming over here and I know of twice and one of the times that I'm saying -- it was the next morning after he had gotten a haircut the night I went to the football game, the next morning they were over to the store. You see, I open up early around 7 in the morning and it was 8 o'clock, or so, not knowing the exact hour. I would say it was 8 o'clock or 8:30 when they were over at the store that Saturday morning. Mr. JENNER. That would be the 9th of November? Mr. SHASTEEN. Yes . . . but whenever I saw him come with somebody else in the car he wasn't driving, but occasionally he drove himself up there to get a haircut and Mr. Odum says, "Now, that contradicts with some of the other information." I said, "I can't help what it contradicts with, that's just the fact and that's it" (55). Clifton Shasteen believed Oswald lived with the Paines; he knew Mrs. Paine by sight, and had seen Oswald with her on a few occasions. So did the neighborhood postman who remembered the substantial amounts of mail Oswald received at the Paines'. Shasteen and the other barbers in his shop cut Lee's hair numerous times, and Shasteen personally had cut his hair at least three times. Regarding the car Oswald drove, Shasteen said, "He drove that there 1955, I think it's a 1955, I'm sure it's a 1955 Chevrolet station wagon. It's either blue and white or green and white -- it's two-toned -- I know that." Ruth Paine's 1955 Chevrolet was green and white (56). Shasteen mentioned Hutchison's Grocery, across the street from his barber shop, as a place where he often saw Oswald. Store owner Leonard Hutchison recalled Oswald very well. He said Oswald came to his store during the weekdays, always purchasing the same items -- a gallon of milk and a package of cinnamon rolls. During the weekdays, Harvey Oswald was living thirteen miles away in Oak Cliff while working at the Texas School Book Depository, and his landlady, Earlene Roberts, testified that he came home promptly after work and stayed in evenings. He visited Marina at the Paine house virtually every weekend in late October and November (57). He remembered Oswald had "nearly black hair" as well as "hairy arms." He recalled that Oswald always wore either long sleeved coveralls that buttoned up the front; no coveralls were found among Lee Harvey Oswald's possessions following his arrest in Dallas, nor was Oswald known to ever wear coveralls. Shasteen also noticed Oswald's yellow shoes, which Oswald said he'd purchased in Mexico for $1.50 (58); no yellow shoes were found among Lee Harvey Oswald's possessions at the time of his arrest. Shasteen once saw Oswald at Williamsburg's Drug Store; he recalled the occasion because "I couldn't understand his wife, and that was before -- I believe it was before she had her baby. The best I remember is she was pregnant. . . . That's the only time I had ever saw her that I remember. . . . Sometimes there were two women with him" (59). John Armstrong writes, "Oswald said he frequently traveled to Mexico. Shortly after the assassination, the FBI was trying to find evidence of Oswald's visit to Mexico; they were unable to come up with any physical evidence that linked Lee Harvey Oswald with his alleged trip to Mexico City until a guide map of Mexico City, a pamphlet dated the week of September 24, 1963, and a portion of a bus ticket were conveniently provided by Marina, having been 'discovered' by Marina's newest friend, reporter and longtime CIA asset Priscilla Johnson McMillan, who'd interviewed Harvey in Moscow in 1959" (60). In early November, Oswald was in Hutchison's Grocery Store accompanied by two women matching the description of Marguerite and Marina. He attempted to cash a "two-party" counter check (not a payroll check) in the amount of $189, payable to "Harvey Oswald." (61) Possibly by coincidence, $189 is only a few dollars more than the amount Oswald left on Marina's dresser in Irving the morning of November 22. "Harvey lived in Oak Cliff, thirteen miles from the Paine house, worked at the Book Depository without missing a day, was not in Irving during the week, did not have a driver's license, and could not drive" (62). Lee Oswald had a Texas driver's license and was seen driving several different cars. His whereabouts on the weekend are unknown. If Cliff Shasteen was right, he may have lived at the Paine house during the week (63). C. A. Hamblen, night manager at a Western Union office in Dallas, reported that Lee Harvey Oswald had obtained money orders for small amounts there on several occasions. Hamblen specifically recalled that one was addressed to the YMCA, where Oswald is known to have stayed for a few days in early October. A co-worker, Aubrey L. Lewis, recalled that the man had showed him and Hamblen a Navy ID card, but Lewis couldn't recall anything else about the customer, except that he was "effeminate" and was accompanied by a man of "Spanish" descent. This is strikingly reminiscent of Dean Adams Andrews' description of an Oswald he assumed to be gay accompanied by an effeminate man of Cuban or Mexican descent. About ten days before the assassination, Oswald came to Western Union to send a telegram to Washington, DC -- possibly the Secretary of the Navy, Hamblen recalled (64). It is true that Harvey Oswald was lobbying the Secretary of the Navy, Fred Korth, to restore his undesirable discharge to an honorable one. On Thursday, October 31, while Harvey Oswald was at work, an Oswald applied for a job at the high-rise Statler Hilton Hotel in downtown Dallas (65). On Friday, November 1, while Harvey Oswald was at work, an Oswald purchased ammunition at Morgan's Gun Shop (66). Clerk Dewey Bradford remembered that Oswald had entered the store and grabbed a rifle right out of Bradford's hands. He vividly recalled Oswald's "military bearing" and "repugnant and obnoxious attitude" (67). In late October and early November, someone matching the description of Lee Oswald was used again and again to set Harvey up as the "patsy" (68). As of the summer and early fall of 1963, Harvey Oswald didn't know how to drive a car. On August 24, 1963, while Ruth Paine was visiting family in Paoli, Pennsylvania, she wrote to Marina (translated from its original Russian), "Lee told me that he learned a little from his uncle how to drive a car." This is odd, as Lee Harvey Oswald had no uncles -- all were dead. "It would be very useful for him to know how to drive. It is hard to find time for this when he works every day" (69). An undated FBI teletype which UK researcher Ian Griggs estimates to have originated in December 1963 contains a report of an interview with Marina Oswald. It says, "Marina stated she had insisted on several occasions that Oswald buy a car but he objected that he did not have sufficient money to buy it, and, further, the car would require repairs. She knows of no occasion when he saw anyone about the purchase of an automobile or mentioned to her that he had seen someone or intended seeing someone about the purchase of an automobile." For some reason this teletype was classified "Restricted" until October 24, 1995 (70). On October 14, Ruth Paine wrote in a letter to her mother, "If Lee can just find work it will help so much. Meantime, I started giving him driving lessons last Sunday (yesterday). If he can drive this will open up more job possibilities and locations." She testified to the Warren Commission that she'd given Oswald driving lessons on several Sunday afternoons. Michael Paine testified that Ruth had told him she was giving Oswald driving lessons, and reported that he wasn't very proficient yet (71). On an undetermined date in October 1963, Michael and Ruth Paine took Oswald to look at a used car that was for sale by one of Michael's co-workers, George Stephenson. It was a two-toned, blue and white Oldsmobile. At a slightly later date, Michael Paine purchased Stephenson's blue and white Oldsmobile for $200, writing two separate checks for $100 each from his account at Southwest Bank & Trust Co. The following day he wrote a $200 check to this account from a separate account at Irving Bank & Trust Co. This second check was presumably to cover the first two; both bank accounts were in Michael Paine's name, and both were checking accounts; the Paines had a joint savings account. The FBI asked Stephenson what the reason for this was. Stephenson said Paine told him he wrote the two $100 checks to avoid the sales tax on vehicles costing $200 or more (72). After days before or after the beginning of November, a friend of Michael's by the name of Raymond Krystinik drove Paine to Stephenson's house, followed Paine as he drove the blue and white Oldsmobile to the Paine house (where Krystinik briefly met Marina Oswald), then drove Michael back to work at the Bell Helicopter Laboratory in Arlington, where Paine's Citroen was parked. Krystinik didn't ask why the Paines needed a third car (73). When asked by the Warren Commission why he bought the Oldsmobile, Michael Paine replied that he wanted to demonstrate to the Oswalds that the purchase of a car was within their means. When asked the same question, Ruth Paine said it was to be a spare vehicle in case her husband's broke down. The Commission did not ask her why, then, Michael's spare vehicle was being kept at the house where Ruth lived, not at Michael's apartment; the Paines were separated until shortly after the assassination. While testifying at a grand jury hearing during the Jim Garrison investigation in 1967, Ruth Paine said the car was purchased for spare parts (74). The Dallas Police Department was unusually curious about this car. When they examined it in December 1963 they noted it had no tags. In January 1965, the DPD observed a tag on the vehicle, but were unable to trace its registration. In May 1965, the DPD noted that the car had a new tag, which was properly registered to the Paines. The police paid another visit to the Paine house in 1967 to inquire about the Oldsmobile; now it was gone, replaced with a 1959 white Plymouth station wagon. There is no record of why exactly the Dallas Police had taken such an interest in the blue and white Oldsmobile (75). Around November 8 or so, a man named Lee visited Edward A. Brand at the Tower Insurance Agency at 1045 North Zangs Boulevard, almost directly across the street from Harvey Oswald's rooming house at 1026 North Beckley. Lee said he expected to have his own car soon, and inquired about liability insurance. Exact rates were not discussed, because it depended on the car he would be driving. Brand recalled the prospective customer showed him one piece of identification -- a Texas driver's license. He wasn't sure what the first or middle name had been, but he remembered the name "Lee" and "believed the last name was Lee on this driver's license" (76). Around this time, an Oswald, his wife (apparently) and two daughters visited an Irving furniture store run by Mrs. Edith Whitworth, and spoke to Mrs. Whitworth and her friend, Mrs. Gertrude Hunter. The women would remember that the family drove up in a '50s-model two-toned, blue and white sedan. He'd come into the store looking for a gunsmith who'd previously been located there; a sign reading "Guns" still hung outside. Oswald decided to stay and look at some furniture, and called his wife in from the car where she was waiting with their two daughters, one of whom was two years old, one of whom was still a tiny baby. Oswald's wife was foreign, and didn't seem to speak English. She wore a short coat. Mrs. Whitworth cooed over the baby, whose name she learned was Rachel. Oswald mentioned that Rachel had just been born on October 20th. Oswald was carrying a brown paper package about fifteen inches long. He said that was looking to get the plunger (firing pin) of his rifle repaired. Mrs. Whitworth directed him to the nearby Irving Sports Shop. Mrs. Hunter was present the entire time, and corroborated Mrs. Whitworth's story (77). Marina Oswald was testifying before the Commission on June 11, 1964, when her frequently equivocal (and strangely flexible) statements were suddenly exchanged with some startlingly adamant denials that would be baffling were the implications of the subject matter not known to us. Mr. RANKIN. Now, Mrs. Oswald, I would like to ask you about the Irving Gun Shop in Dallas. Mrs. OSWALD. The what? I don't know anything about this at all. A reading of Marina's full testimony is required to understand what an abrupt departure the tone of the above statement is for the Marina Oswald the Commission knew. Mr. RANKIN. Your counsel tells me I should correct that, that Irving is not a part of Dallas. . . . A witness has said that you and your two children and your husband came into a furniture shop asking the location of a gun shop in that area in Irving, and after appearing there that you and your husband, with your husband driving the car, along with your two children, got in the car and went up the street in the direction of where the gun shop was. Did you recall any incident of that kind? Mrs. OSWALD. This is just a complete fabrication. Lee never drove a car with me. Only Ruth Paine drove a car with me. And I never took my baby with me. Mr. RANKIN. Did you ever go into such a furniture store in Irving? Mrs. OSWALD. Never. Mr. RANKIN. That you recall? Mrs. OSWALD. I was only twice in a store in Irving where they sell, like a cafe, where you can buy something to eat and where they sell toys and clothes and things like that; a little bit like a Woolworth's, a one-story shop but without any furniture in it. Mr. RANKIN. Do you know a Mrs. Whitworth who works in a furniture store in Irving? Mrs. OSWALD. I was never in Irving in any furniture store. Mr. RANKIN. Do you know a Mrs. Whitworth? Mrs. OSWALD. It is the first time I have ever heard that name. Mr. RANKIN. Do you know a Mrs. Hunter, a friend of Mrs. Whitworth? Mrs. OSWALD. No. Mr. RANKIN. Did you ever go on a trip with your husband to have a telescopic lens mounted on a gun at a gun shop? Mrs. OSWALD. No; this is all not true. In the first place, my husband couldn't drive, and I was never alone with him in a car. Anytime we went in a car it was with Ruth Paine, and there was never -- we never went to any gun store and never had any telescopic lens mounted. Mr. RANKIN. Did the four of you, that is, your husband, you, and your two children, ever go any place in Irving? Mrs. OSWALD. In Irving the baby was only 1 month old. I never took her out anywhere. Rep. FORD. Did you ever go anytime -- Mrs. OSWALD. Just to doctor, you know. Rep. FORD. Did you ever go anytime with your husband in a car with the rifle? Mrs. OSWALD. I was never at anytime in a car with my husband and with a rifle. Not only with the rifle, not even with a pistol. Even without anything I was never with my husband in a car under circumstances where he was driving a car. Rep. FORD. Did you go in a car with somebody else driving where your husband had a pistol or the rifle? Mrs. OSWALD. Never. I don't know what to think about this? (78) In an uncharacteristically logical move, the Warren Commission brought Mrs. Hunter and Mrs. Whitworth face-to-face with Marina and June Oswald. Mrs. Hunter and Mrs. Whitworth both positively identified Marina and June as the woman and child from the store; Marina denied ever having been to the store, or ever having meeting Hunter or Whitworth previously, although she said she did have a short rose-colored coat like the one described by Mrs. Whitworth, and Marina's second daughter, of course, was named Rachel. And oddly, Rachel had been born on October 20, 1963 (79). The session is one of the Warren Commission's more eventful. When introduced to Marina and June, Mrs. Whitworth and Mrs. Hunter recognize them immediately. They note that Marina has changed her hairstyle and lost a little bit of weight (she would have just given birth to Rachel a couple of weeks or so before), but, as Whitworth says, "Well, like I say, she has changed, but I am definitely sure they were in there" (80). She also says, "This little girl [June] -- it definitely was her" (81). Hunter is even more certain, and she also has more credibility because she had seen Marina once before, probably a month or two before the incident in the furniture store. She'd noticed Marina speaking a foreign language with another woman at a gas station, and while the other woman was inside, Hunter tried to talk to her. Marina was visibly in the later stages of pregnancy, and Mrs. Hunter tried to ask her where she was from, who was the father, and such, but was unable to communicate except for a few feeble gestures in sign language. Marina doesn't confirm or deny this, but she insists that she was never in a furniture store with Lee, never rode in a car with Lee, never saw Lee drive a car, and never went anywhere with him where he carried a short brown paper package (82). Hunter's response is, "Well, you've got your privileges -- you've got your privileges" (83). Marina is represented at this hearing by her lawyer, William McKenzie. When at one point Marina seems to be caving in, McKenzie jumps in and asks, "Why do you say they wouldn't have walked up there, Mrs. Whitworth?" (84) Because both Edith Whitworth and Gertrude Hunter saw the car, which they remember as a two-toned, blue and white sedan of a fairly old model -- they don't know what make it was: possibly a Ford or a Plymouth (85). The session turns a bit ugly when McKenzie and Commission Counsel Wesley J. Liebeler start bullying Mrs. Whitworth because she isn't sure what part of the gun Oswald was looking to have repaired. Her first statement to the FBI said she thought he had asked about a "plunger," which is a somewhat archaic term for a firing pin. Whitworth later couldn't remember what part Oswald named, and Liebeler -- giving the appearance of being rather desperate to discredit the witnesses -- strongly implies that she's lying because she can't remember a detail she'd previously provided about an incident that had happened half a year before. The fact that she readily admits she knows absolutely nothing about guns weighs in her favor; it's unlikely she could have pulled the word "plunger" out of thin air; it's extremely likely that Oswald had indeed mentioned a plunger (86). As critics as far back as Harold Weisberg and Sylvia Meagher have noted, certain Commission attorneys very noticeably apply different standards to witnesses who are deemed "helpful" to the Commission (i.e., having nothing to say that interferes with the Commission's sole purpose of condemning Lee Harvey Oswald) and those who are not. Liebeler, among others, denies to this day that the Commission operated with any bias whatsoever. The transcripts of his own words prove him wrong. The Commission went to great lengths to explain the obvious conflict. They had the FBI conduct an extensive search to find a similar family that might have been the family Whitworth and Hunter met. The Commission also asked the FBI to investigate all female births in the Dallas-Irving area on October 20, 1963. Nothing came of any of it. In the end, the Commission latched onto a statement from an acquaintance of Mrs. Hunter's, who told the FBI that Mrs. Hunter had an active imagination, and liked to inject herself into important events. Although, even if true, this would hardly explain Mrs. Whitworth's corroborative testimony, the Commission used this statement to dismiss the entire Whitworth-Hunter story. Mrs. Hunter's acquaintance was not asked to testify before the Commission; see staff counsel Wesley J. Liebeler's previously quoted remarks regarding Sylvia Odio for his opinion of such practices. Mr. Liebeler remains to this day one of the Warren Commission's staunchest defenders. Indication of how troubling the Whitworth-Hunter story was to the Commission, however, can be found in Vol. XI of the Hearings, which transcribes the events of a rare Commission FIELD TRIP, with attorney Wesley Liebeler physically bringing Marina Oswald -- accompanied by an entourage including Marina's lawyer, the court reporter, and two Secret Service agents -- to the Irving, Texas furniture store in question. In this instance, Mrs. Oswald is speaking in English, and there is no record of an interpreter even being along. Mr. LIEBELER. Have you had a chance to go through the store, Marina? Mrs. OSWALD. No, this is the first time. Mr. LIEBELER. This is the first time you have been here? Mrs. OSWALD. Yes. Mr. LIEBELER. And you have now looked at the outside of the store and looked through the inside? Mrs. OSWALD. Yes. Mr. LIEBELER. And you are quite sure you have never been here before? Mrs. OSWALD. I'm sure I never here before. I am quite sure. Mr. LIEBELER. You are sure of that in spite of the testimony that you heard this morning from Mrs. Whitworth and Mrs. Hunter, is that right? Mrs. OSWALD. Yes, that's right. She told how I was dressed with a rose jacket -- that's true, I had a rose jacket. Mr. LIEBELER. She may have seen you somewhere? Mrs. OSWALD. Yes; but I never was here; maybe she saw me on the street somewhere. She said it looked like she saw me someplace else and that's the reason why I wanted to see thrifts store, but maybe I have forgotten by now -- Mr. LIEBELER. You are now standing directly in front of the store at 149 East Irving Boulevard, aren't you? Mrs. OSWALD. Yes. Mr. LIEBELER. And you are sure that you have never been here before? Mrs. OSWALD. No; I have never been here before. . . . I don't know if I were inside this store, but I don't recall it now. Mr. LIEBELER. You don't recall this store as a place you have ever been before? Mrs. OSWALD. No. Mr. LIEBELER. I have no further questions, and this will adjourn the deposition (87). On November 4, Oswald visited the Irving Sports Shop -- the store to which Mrs. Whitworth believed she had directed Oswald -- to have a scope mounted on his rifle. Employee Dial D. Ryder wrote up the order. This is rather curious, as Mr. Davis at the Sports Drome Rifle Range had sighted in Oswald's rifle a few weeks earlier, and there definitely was a scope on that rifle. The Mannlicher-Carcano rifle ordered by "A. Hidell" in early 1963 from Klein's Sporting Goods came with a scope already mounted. The FBI paid the Sports Shop a visit after a TV newscaster received an anonymous phone call that Oswald had had a rifle sighted at the store. Neither Ryder nor the store's owner remembered Oswald, but Ryder did find the repair ticket among their records: a rifle that had a scope mounted, for a customer named "Oswald" (88). On an undetermined date between November 5 and 14, 1963, in the evening, an acquaintance of Jack Ruby, Wilbur Waldon Litchfield, known to his friends as Robert, sees Lee Oswald at the Carousel Club. If it is a weeknight, Oswald should be home at 1026 N. Beckley; if the weekend of Friday, November 8 to Sunday, November 10th, he should be with his family at the Paine house. Litchfield was waiting to see Ruby, but there is another man who has been waiting longer. The man was in his mid 20s, 5'7" to 5'9", slender, hair uncombed, and wearing a V-neck sweater. Litchfield noticed him because his dress was so sloppy compared to the others around Ruby. The man went into Ruby's office, and 15 to 20 minutes later he and Ruby came out together, then the man departed. He passed within two feet of Litchfield under a very bright light. After the assassination, Litchfield told the DPD he'd seen Ruby with a man he was positive was Lee Harvey Oswald. The police harassed him and bullied him into taking a polygraph test, which they alleged Litchfield failed. Litchfield repeated his story to the Warren Commission (89). On November 6, Oswald borrows from the Dallas Public Library Juan Jose Arevalo's The Shark and the Sardines. The book will be listed as overdue at the time of the assassination. On an unknown date in 1964, it will be anonymously returned to the library (90). A CIA report dated December 6, 1963, and classified until January 15, 1996, states, "Approximately two weeks (ca. 8 Nov. 1963) before the assassination of President Kennedy, Oswald reportedly visited Wytheville, Virginia, where he asked the local Red Cross office for fare to Ansted, West Virginia, near Charleston." No further information is given (91). Ruth Paine testified to the Warren Commission that on Saturday, November 9, she drove Lee, Marina, June, Rachel, and the two Paine children in her station wagon to the Texas Automobile Drivers License Bureau in Oak Cliff, so Lee could apply for an automobile driver's learning permit. Unfortunately, the Automobile Drivers License Bureau was closed because it was Election Day. Later in the afternoon she took Oswald for a driving lesson (92). Oswald spent the rest of Saturday, Sunday, and Monday the 11th (a holiday) with his family at the Paine house. Albert Jenner asked Ruth Paine specifically if it was possible for Oswald to have slipped away from her house to take target practice. She replied, "I have described my presence at the home [with the Oswalds] on November 9, 1963, and November 10, 1963. And to the best of my recollection, there was no long period of time that I was away from home when he [Oswald] was there" (93). On Saturday, November 9, while Harvey was in Irving, an Oswald was at the Downtown Lincoln Mercury dealership in Dallas, right around the corner from the Texas School Book Depository. He introduced himself to salesman Albert Guy Bogard as "Lee Oswald," test-drove a new car on Stemmons Highway at speeds of over 80 mph (which Bogard remembered vividly, as it shook him up a bit), and told Bogard he would soon have enough money to buy a new car. At one point while discussing prices, Oswald remarked that in order to get a good deal, he might have to go back to Russia to buy his car. Bogard wrote the customer's name on the back of a business card: "Lee Oswald." When he heard on the radio on November 22 that Lee Harvey Oswald had been arrested, Bogard tore up the card and threw it away, commenting to his fellow salesmen that he'd lost his prospective customer. Bogard's story was partially corroborated by co-workers Frank Pizzo, Oran Brown, and Eugene Wilson. None of the other men had a good look at Bogard's customer, but Pizzo and Brown both remembered his name was "Oswald," and all remembered Bogard tearing up the card and making the remark about losing his customer. The FBI asked Bogard to take a polygraph test, which he passed. The Warren Commission concluded that the men were mistaken, as Lee Harvey Oswald was with Ruth Paine at the time (94). Later that day, November 9th, Oswald was seen at the Sports Drome Rifle Range by Garland G. Slack and Malcolm Price, Jr., who recognized Oswald from his September 28th appearance (95). On Sunday, November 10, while Harvey Oswald was at the Paines', an Oswald was again at the Sports Drome rifle range, where Garland Slack saw him (96). Mr. SLACK. . . . [W]e were there the Saturday before Armistice Day. We marked it on our calendar. That was November 9, 1963. We were out there late in the evening and there were not very many people there. . . . Mr. LIEBELER. You went back to the rifle range the immediately following Sunday, is that right? Mr. SLACK. That is right, November 10, 1963. Oswald was there Sunday, November 10, 1963 (97). The weekend of November 16 and 17, Oswald stayed in Dallas. According to Marina, it was because one of Ruth's children was having a birthday party that weekend (98). Texas School Book Depository employee Buell Wesley Frazier lived half a block from the Paine house; it was from Wesley's sister that Ruth Paine had heard the Depository had a job opening. Oswald normally rode to Irving with Frazier on the weekends. When asked by Warren Commission counsel Joseph Ball if Oswald had told him why he wasn't going to Irving that weekend, Frazier replied, "He said he was working on his driving license and he was going to take a driving test." Ball asked, "Did you ever ask him afterward if he had taken his driver's test?" "No, sir," Frazier replied, "I never did. I assumed he had taken it and passed it, what part of the test he was taking." Frazier explained that he thought Oswald had probably taken a written test, and perhaps hadn't taken a driving test yet (99). Later in his testimony Frazier was asked if Oswald had ever indicated he knew how to drive a car. Frazier said, "Well, I say, I believe the first afternoon, the first time we was going home and we were talking about that and he said he was working on his driving license then [this would be Friday evening, October 18th], and then naturally like I told you, several weeks later, then he told me he was going to take his driving test and I assumed he could drive a car as being as old as he was because most everybody in the state of Texas by the time you are my age [19] if you can't drive a car something is wrong with you" (100). According to Ruth Paine, on Saturday, November 16, Oswald said he went by himself to the Texas Automobile Drivers License Bureau to apply for his learner's permit, but he arrived very late in the day, and there was too long a line ahead of him (101). According to housekeeper Earlene Roberts at Oswald's rooming house, Oswald never left the house for any length of time that weekend (102). On Sunday, November 17, Oswald was again at the Sports Drome Rifle Range. Mr. SLACK. He was there on Sunday, November 17, 1963. Sunday, November 10, 1963, was the turkey shoot (103). Slack is confusing the events of November 10 and 17; he recalls the 10th as the day of the Thanksgiving turkey shoot, but this was actually November 17, the Sunday before Thanksgiving (104). Lucille (Mrs. Garland) Slack later confirmed to A. J. Weberman that she, her husband, and Lee Harvey Oswald were at the rifle range on both the 10th and the 17th, and the 17th was the day of the turkey shoot when Oswald and her husband got in an argument (105). Mr. SLACK. I contacted him [Oswald] three or four times trying to get him to pay a dollar and get in the turkey shoot. Ten men were paying a dollar a shoot, and he commented he could win the turkey, but he didn't have the dollar. . . . Sunday, November 17, 1963, is where he and I had the run-in, where he shot my target. [This is the correct date.] I paid two bits and put up a target, and before I got ready to shoot it, somebody would shoot a hole in it. So Lucille, my wife, she was with me. She was keeping score. We got to noticing who it was . . . and I raised the devil. I didn't see why I had to pay my two bits and pay for a new target sheet . . . and the rifle range operator came and told him not to shoot at my target after that, and that is how I remembered the part in his hair, and the look on his face. And I told him, I said, "You are not going to win no turkey shooting rapid fire" (106). He shot rapid fire about three or four times, and they had a cap full of shells and they were shooting -- I mean he was burning up the ammunition. And I talked about this [with my wife] on the way back [home] to Snug Harbor, because somebody is going to get hurt, because everybody's shooting at everybody else's target. . . . And I remember when I told him that, he gave me a look that I would never forget. That is the only reason I remember him when they showed him on television. I made me sick, and I tried to figure it out. It took me a day to figure out where I had seen him. . . . And I went to the rifle range and these four or five other people knew he had been there, but they were afraid to say anything about it. But when I asked the manager, I said, "Oswald was over here," and he said, "Yes, I know he was." Mr. LIEBELER. . . . You mentioned there were other people out at the range who saw Oswald. Do you remember their names? Mr. SLACK. No, sir; because I was not taking their names. . . . Vernon Stone [Slack's brother-in-law] was with me and Jimbo [Stone], he is 12 years old, the boy, and when it dawned on me where I saw him, and I knew that I had my son-in-law take my gun, my custom-made gun out of Oswald's, take it out of his hand and put it in the car, because I was afraid he would steal it, and I told Vernon by long distance on the telephone, and Vernon did too, well, he had already made up his mind that he never had seen that fellow. He didn't want to remember, anything, and Jimbo doesn't either. He didn't want to remember (107). Apparently Slack is confusing dates again, because Lucille Slack told A. J. Weberman that her brother and his son had visited from November 9 to the 11th, and had accompanied Slack and herself to the rifle range on November 9 and 10. Slack also remembered that Oswald wasn't alone (108). Mr. SLACK. . . . [He wrapped up his rifle -- which was a Mannlicher-Carcano similar but not the same as the so-called "Oswald" rifle] and handed it over the fence, but they had two other guns that type. They had no scopes on them. Mr. LIEBELER. Was there somebody else? Mr. SLACK. That Sunday [November 10] there sure was . . . Lucille remembers the boy handing the guns over the fence, and they were throwing the guns in the back of an old-model car and taking off like they did. And I recognized that because a gun, a good gun, you are not supposed -- they just threw those old guns in that car . . . one was wrapped up in a blanket, a dirty-looking old gray blanket that had a red trim . . . Mr. LIEBELER. Do you remember what kind of car these fellows drove? Mr. SLACK. No . . . A four-door sedan, and it was a dark color, and he left there like a crazy bunch of hoodlums. And Lucille would remember that because she made a remark to me. You know how boys take off and make dust fly (109). When shown a photograph of Carousel Club employee Larry Crafard -- whom the Commissioners suspected had been mistaken by some for Oswald -- Slack said it wasn't the person he saw. Liebeler then showed him a picture of Oswald, and Slack said that it showed the man from the rifle range, except the man he saw had slightly longer hair (110). Lucille Slack told the FBI that she herself did not see Lee Harvey Oswald at the rifle range, although she did remember someone shooting at her husband's target on the 17th of November. She added that she accompanied her husband back to rifle range following the assassination to talk to the owners, Mr. and Mrs. Floyd Davis, and that the Davises didn't want to talk about Oswald for fear it would hurt their business. She also remembered that a dentist and his son had been at the rifle range, and had seen Oswald one day when the Slacks had been there (111). Malcolm Price was also at the rifle range on November 17th. Mr. PRICE. . . . I do understand there was a hassle between him and Mr. [Garland] Slack over shooting the wrong target or something like that. I was over at the opposite end shooting at a target for the turkey shoot, and I didn't pay attention to that. That was their business. . . . he did have the same gun. And I asked him if it was still doing the job, if it was still set, and he said it was shooting just fine, and Mr. Slack was there at the time . . . they were sitting right next to one another -- Mr. Slack was in Booth 9 and Oswald was in Booth 8, and [Oswald] commented on his telescope. . . . he asked me to look through it, and he said, "It's one of the clearest telescopes that I have ever seen -- one of the brightest." He said, "It's a Japanese scope, and I gave $18 for it. . . . he remarked that it was a four-power telescope, and he said it was mounted on Redfield mounts . . . we compared it with two scopes that Mr. Slack had on his gun[s], and a fellow that was shooting on the right side in Booth 7 -- I don't know who that was [the Commission never identified this witness], but we compared it with three different American-made scopes and his [Oswald's] telescope was brighter and clearer by far. . . . He said he got it from a gunsmith in Cedar Hill for a debt, the gun, and that he bought the scope and the gunsmith mounted it for him. Mr. LIEBELER. . . . And that was in Cedar Hill? Mr. PRICE. It might be, but I don't know of any gunsmith in Cedar Hill. [There was no gunsmith in Cedar Hill (112), although Cedar Hill is where Mrs. Lovell Penn said she saw Oswald firing on her property with two other men.] . . . I said, "I didn't know there was a gunsmith in Cedar Hill." He said, "Yes, one over there, and he owed me some money, and he gave me his gun to settle the debt," and he said, "I bought the scope, and he mounted it and boresighted it" (113). Price described the rifle, a Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5 caliber, in detail, then was shown photographs of the alleged assassination rifle; he observed it was similar to the gun he saw, but not the same (114). A. J. Weberman spoke to Mrs. Price in July 1993, and she confirmed that her husband was sure it was Lee Harvey Oswald he saw at the rifle range: "When we saw Oswald on television on the night of the assassination, he said that was the same man who had been down there [at the rifle range]. He was convinced it was Oswald, and he was not someone who went around making things up. My husband doubted Ruth Paine's testimony [that Oswald was with her at the times Price saw him at the range]. My husband had no reason to make up anything" (115). Mrs. Lovell Penn had seen Oswald and two other men with a 1957 black and white Chevrolet with Texas plates; Sports Drome witness Malcolm Price saw Oswald with an old model Chevrolet (116). Mr. LIEBELER. The last time you saw this man at the rifle range -- do you remember if there . . . was anybody else there that you know. Mr. PRICE. Garland Slack. . . . There was -- I just thought of it -- a doctor and his son there at the same time . . . (117) Dr. Homer Wood, a dentist, and his 13-year-old son, Sterling. Dr. Wood reported that his son was shooting at a target next to a man who had an unusual rifle that expelled what Dr. Wood called a "ball of fire" when he shot. (118) Wood jokingly warned his son to watch out for the "105 Howitzer," but Sterling said it was all right, that it was only an Italian carbine. He also pointed out what a good shot the man was; Dr. Wood looked at Oswald's target, and saw that Oswald was indeed shooting extremely well. Sterling Wood knew a lot about guns, and asked Oswald if his rifle was a 6.5 caliber Italian carbine with a four-power scope; Oswald replied simply that it was (119). When Dr. Wood saw Oswald on television following the assassination, he immediately told his wife that it looked like the man from the rifle range (120). Mrs. Wood was skeptical. A half hour or so later, Sterling Wood entered the room; neither Dr. nor Mrs. Wood said a word about Oswald to him. Sterling saw Oswald on TV and immediately said, "Daddy, that is the fellow that was sitting next to me out on the rifle range" (121). Homer and Sterling Wood each testified separately before the Warren Commission. First, both men were shown photographs of another man, Carousel Club employee Jack Crafard. Dr. Wood and Sterling each said it wasn't the man at the rifle range (122). Each unhesitatingly identified photos of Lee Harvey Oswald as the man at the rifle range. Sterling also identified a photograph of the Mannlicher-Carcano found in the Book Depository as the rifle Oswald had that day -- except Sterling, the young gun aficionado, noticed the telescopic sight was different (123). He reaffirmed that the man had been an excellent shot, "the most accurate of all" the sportsmen at the range that day. He mentioned that later he saw Oswald leave the range "with a man in a newer model car," possibly a Ford (124). The other man drove. Theresa (Mrs. Homer) Wood told the Warren Commission that after the assassination, her husband and son each independently recognized Oswald on the television as the man they'd encountered at Sports Drome (125). Floyd Guy Davis, the owner of the rifle range, denied to the FBI and the Warren Commission that he'd ever seen Lee Harvey Oswald, acknowledging only the Price and Slack had mentioned seeing him on several occasions, and that he did remember an incident where someone was shooting at Slack's target on the day of the turkey shoot, which he confirms was November 17th (126). Mr. LIEBELER. Did you determine which of the fellows was shooting at Mr. Slack's target? Mr. DAVIS. No, sir. Mr. LIEBELER. Did you speak to both of them or all three of them? Mr. DAVIS. . . . I spoke to the group to be sure they were firing at the right target . . . Mr. LIEBELER. This Mr. Slack, now then, believes that one of the two of these fellows could have been Lee Harvey Oswald, is that right? Mr. DAVIS. Yes, that's right. Mr. LIEBELER. Mr. Slack has told you that? Mr. DAVIS. Yes, sir. Mr. LIEBELER. And Mr. Price was also there that same day? Mr. DAVIS. Yes. Mr. LIEBELER. He also indicated that he thinks one of those two gentlemen was Oswald? Mr. DAVIS. Yes. Mr. LIEBELER. You yourself had an opportunity to observe both of these gentlemen, did you not? Mr. DAVIS. Yes, I sure did. Mr. LIEBELER. I want to show you some pictures . . . (127) Davis rejected the photograph of Larry Crafard, then admitted that the picture of Oswald resembled the man at the rifle range. Mr. DAVIS. It sure looks like him. I couldn't say definitely that it was him, but it sure looks like him. . . . Mr. Price helped him sight in that rifle in. . . . Mr. LIEBELER. How long have you known Mr. Price? . . . In your opinion, is he a reliable fellow? Mr. DAVIS. He is very reliable or I wouldn't have him down there [working on the range] . . . he was afraid -- he had five children, and he was afraid that it [the assassination] was some Communist plot or some gang that had done this, and he was afraid for his children or he would have called [the FBI] sooner. Mr. LIEBELER. He is not a publicity seeker? Mr. DAVIS. No, he wasn't. I would say he is very sincere of this. . . . There was also some doctor or lawyer in Oak Cliff, and his son, that he said he saw him out there on November 17, 1963. Mr. LIEBELER. . . . Was that Doctor Wood? Mr. DAVIS. I believe it was. . . . He might be a dentist (128). Mrs. Davis said she hadn't seen Oswald herself, but she verified that Price and Slack had both mentioned soon after the assassination that they believed Oswald had been at the rifle range (129). The Warren Commission decided that the numerous Sports Drome witnesses were simply mistaken (130). On or about the evening of Friday, November 15, with Harvey home at 1026 N. Beckley for the weekend, Lee is seen at Jack Ruby's Carousel Club by frequent Carousel entertainer Bill deMar, aka William Crowe, a magician and hypnotist. Crowe told the Associated Press on November 24, 1963, that he was positive he had seen Lee Harvey Oswald at the club about nine days previous. Carousel musician Bill Willis also recalled seeing Oswald sitting "right in the corner of the stage and runway." Stripper Kathy Kay told the Dallas Times Herald on May 22, 1975, that she'd seen Oswald in the club and even danced with him on one occasion (131). On November 16 -- again, while Harvey Oswald was supposed to be at home -- an Oswald applied for a job at the Southland Hotel Parking Garage. Oswald asked how high the Southland Building was, and if it had a good view of downtown Dallas. A rifle with a scope, ammunition, target practice, a tall building with a good view of the presidential motorcade route, and a sudden influx of funds: the framing of Harvey Oswald was nearly complete (132). On the evening of November 22, Deputy Sheriff E. R. "Buddy" Walthers would submit a report that Oswald had been spotted on several occasions attending meetings at 3126 Harlandale Street in Oak Cliff, a house occupied by a number of Cubans connected to the violently anti-Castro Alpha 66 organization, which the CIA sponsored through David Atlee Phillips. Walthers reported that the Cubans had vacated the premises at some time since November 15 (133). Shortly after Oswald's arrest on November 22, with the FBI claiming ignorance of Oswald as a potential security threat, the Dallas Police Department would leak a statement to Dallas reporter James Ewell that Oswald had been interviewed by the FBI on November 16. The bureau breathed fire in Dallas' direction, and Police Chief Jesse Curry promptly retracted the story publicly while maintaining privately to Ewell that the interview had taken place, though its subject matter had been kept a secret. If Oswald was interviewed by the FBI on November 16 -- either at 1026 North Beckley or elsewhere -- his landlady was unaware of it. The story may well have been anti-FBI disinformation; the DPD was seething mad at the FBI for usurping their jurisdiction. In the wee hours of November 17, a coded teletype was received by the FBI office in New Orleans. It was decoded by agent William Walters, who would later reconstruct its contents from memory; it warned that "information has been received by the bureau that a militant revolutionary group may attempt to assassinate President Kennedy on his proposed trip to Dallas, Texas" (134). Also on Sunday, November 17th -- the same day Lee Harvey Oswald was at home at 1026 North Beckley watching television AND at the Sports Drome Rifle Range, Lee Harvey Oswald was ALSO reported in Sulfur, Oklahoma. An FBI report of November 23, 1963, reads: "Willis B. Price, 1123 Broadway, advised he is the owner of the FINA Service Station . . . and at about 2:00 pm on Sunday, November 17, 1963, a group of people who appeared to be Cubans, with a light complexioned man who resembled Lee Harvey Oswald, drove up beside his service station in about a 1958 Ford station wagon, and some of them came to his station. He has seen a photograph in the *Daily Oklahoman* newspaper of Oswald, and the light complexioned man with the Cubans resembled Oswald. He has since, however, seen television pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald which did not very much resemble the man in the company of the Cubans" (135). Oswald was with two middle-aged women, a woman in her late twenties or thirties, a tall, slender girl of about 13, a two- or three-year-old child, and two men who appeared to be Cubans, with dark complexions and wide faces. The man who resembled Oswald was "light complexioned, pale, appeared to be in late 20s or early 30s, about 6' tall, 170 pounds, thin and slender, light brown hair, reasonably high forehead, thin lips, and wore slacks. The man who resembled Oswald spoke in the language of the other people who looked like Cubans" (136). Before getting out of the station wagon they asked if they could use the telephone in the station, and he gave consent. When they first drove up, the man who resembled Oswald was in the back seat and by motion attracted his attention, and motioned for one of the women to talk to him. She held up a small black book with a name and box number on it, which he does not remember. . . . they thought the box number was a street number or address. The woman who held up the black book spoke broken English. Price told her it was a mailing address and not a street address. . . . the woman . . . asked for a telephone directory, and . . . looked up a number. . . . The first number she attempted to call did not answer, and she looked up another number. She telephoned a second time and spoke in broken English. At the [end] of her telephone conversation, she gave some name as though referring to her own name, and said "from Cuba." She then hung up and talked to the light-complexioned man resembling Oswald in a foreign language. These people then left, driving west on Highway 7 . . . The man resembling Oswald never spoke English in the station, but only used motions to Price. He looked American, but spoke in the same language as the people he was with (137). The FBI interviewed every Cuban they could find in Sulfur, Oklahoma. They found a man named Miguel L. DeSocarraz living in the Oklahoma Veterans Hospital, who said that on Sunday, November 17, he'd been visited by a number of people in a older, cream-colored station wagon. This group included Manolito Rodriguez, aka Manuel Rodriguez Occarberro, his wife and young child, two other men, their wives, and a girl of 13 or 14. DeSoccaraz studied the photograph of Oswald printed in the Daily Oklahoman, and stated that Rodriguez "possibly did resemble Oswald," but not identically. "Rodriguez cannot speak English. He resides at 1208 Huspeth (Oak Cliff) Dallas, Texas, with a telephone number FR4-5923 . . . Rodriguez is employed as a welder in Dallas." Coincidentally, Rodriguez, born in Cuba in 1928 and living in the US since 1960, was in 1963 the President of the Dallas Chapter of Alpha-66, the anti-Castro paramilitary group based in Miami and funded by the CIA through David Atlee Phillips, aka "Maurice Bishop." Rodriguez was also an officer of an organization called the Second National Front of Escambray. Rodriguez told the FBI (in Spanish) that Alpha-66 held meetings at 3126 Hollandale in Oak Cliff, and that he had no contact "with any American persons or other persons" concerning arms purchases (138). The man with Rodriguez may well have been John Thomas Masen, a known client of Masen's gunrunning operation, run in conjunction with Minutemen and associates of Edwin A. Walker and H. L. Hunt. Masen has been connected with the Alpha 66 unit, which resided temporarily at 2126 Harlandale. According to Frank Ellsworth, the ATF agent who arrested Masen on November 20, 1963, for charges relating to his gunrunning activities, John Thomas Masen was a dead ringer for Lee Harvey Oswald -- so much, in fact, that when Ellsworth entered Captain Fritz' office and saw Oswald sitting there, he immediately thought it was Masen (139). (Masen spent only a night in jail, but was arrested again the afternoon of November 22nd.) Masen was one of only two arms dealers in Dallas who stocked 6.5 mm ammunition for Mannlicher-Carcano rifles. He has been speculatively named as a possible Oswald double in Dallas, but of course evidence is lacking. Dick Russell interviewed Masen in 1976, the first and last Kennedy assassination researcher to do so. Masen was tight-lipped in general, but he doesn't come across as someone who has anything to hide about the assassination specifically (140). The CIA sent a teletype to the Miami FBI office that an informant called "'D' reports one Manuel Rodriguez (matronym unknown) living in Dallas, Texas, was known to be violently anti-President Kennedy" (141). The Secret Service also received this report and rather belatedly issued a Protective Research Memorandum on Manuel Rodriguez Occarberro, describing him as "violently anti-Kennedy." On the evening following the assassination, an informant reported to Deputy Sheriff Buddy Walthers that Oswald had been seen attending meetings of the Alpha-66 group at "3128 Hallandale" in Oak Cliff (142). The CIA -- Alpha-66's sponsor -- denied that any such address existed. The FBI revealed in 1975 that the actual address at 3126 Harlendale Street; it had been vacated about a week before the assassination. The Bureau turned up 1963 Alpha-66 fundraising letters mailed from this address signed by "Manuel Rodriguez, General Secretary of Alpha-66." The CIA still feigned ignorance of the address or of their own paid agents who once occupied it. Lee Harvey Oswald had been seen in the presence of CIA officer David Atlee Phillips, aka "Maurice Bishop," by Alpha-66 officer Antonio Veciana in the fall of 1963 (143). "A few days before the assassination, Mr. W. M. Hannie was in Juarez, Mexico, preparing to drive to Fort Worth for medical treatment. He was asked if he would mind giving a ride to a young man named Lee Oswald. Hannie agreed, provided the young man would drive, since Hannie was using medication. En route to Fort Worth, Oswald told Hannie he had recently been in Mexico City. Oswald spoke of his two children, the 'book company' where he worked, and Jack Ruby's 'honky-tonk,' which he said he was getting tired of cleaning. Dorothy Marcum, Ruby's girlfriend in the summer of 1963, said that she was positive Oswald worked for Ruby that summer. Hannie recalled that during their trip from El Paso to Fort Worth, Oswald stopped frequently to use the pay phones" (144). "On Sunday, November 17, 1963 -- still the same day -- in Abilene, Texas, a little over halfway from El Paso/Juarez to Fort Worth -- a note was slipped surreptitiously under the apartment door of Harold Reynolds, a photographer. The note had been intended for his neighbor, Pedro Valeriano Gonzalez, president of the Cuban Liberation Committee. The note read, 'Call me immediately. Urgent.' Two Dallas phone numbers were given. The note was signed, 'Lee Oswald.' Reynolds turned the note over to Gonzalez, who seemed quite nervous when he read it. Although he had a phone in his apartment, Gonzalez proceeded directly to a pay phone to call Dallas. Reynolds reported that he had seen a man who looked like Lee Harvey Oswald with an older man from New Orleans at the Gonzalez apartment. After the assassination, Gonzalez went to Venezuela" (145). Gonzalez was known as a friend of Antonio Veciana, leader of the CIA-backed Cuban Revolutionary Council and member of the violently anti-Castro Alpha 66, also funded by the CIA. His neighbor, Harold Reynolds, tried twice after the assassination to engage the FBI's interest -- and failed (146). On Wednesday, November 20, while Harvey was at work, two unnamed individuals "believed they saw a person resembling Oswald firing a similar rifle at another range near Irving" (147). The week of November 18-22, an unidentified party in Covington, Louisiana -- which was where Lee Harvey Oswald spent several summers of his childhood, and also where Gerry Patrick Hemming's INTERPEN band of anti-Castro guerrillas had their training camp -- placed a person-to-person call to Lee Harvey Oswald at the Texas School Book Depository. "Operator recalled she contacted Dallas information and obtained number for Book Depository and was connected without difficulty. Call reportedly was placed by adult female, very polite, with no speech impediment or accent. Operator stated that answering party in Dallas, who was a female, was asked by operator for Lee Harvey Oswald. Answering party advised she did not know Oswald. Operator believes calling party then stated Oswald was a new employee. Operator believes calling party said Oswald was the janitor. Operator states that answering party said, "Oh," as if she knew who it was, and call was completed. . . . Security Manager for Southern Bell Telephone advised operator appears sincere, is level-headed and has seven to eight years' service. Security office tried to break her story but were unsuccessful. Operator stated she worried about this information on November 23, 1963, and November 24, 1963, and consulted her parents about same prior to reporting this to her supervisor November 24, 1963. Fact that this matter was discussed with parents was verified by Security office" (148). The FBI were unable to locate any verification of the call in Southern Bell's records. Bonnie Richey, the secretary at the Texas School Book Depository, told the FBI she had a "vague recollection of receiving a call on or about November 21, 1963, or November 22, 1963, for some person, name not recalled, whom she did not know, and recalls that during the conversation some mention was made of the person sought being employed as a janitor. She stated that her recollection is hazy in this regard, and she cannot be more definite about the call, cannot state that she did or did not receive the call, and has no recollection of receiving a call for Lee Harvey Oswald" (149). Marina Oswald never called her husband at work. At 10:30 am, November 20, a young man was picked up hitchhiking at the Beckley Street entrance to the R. L. Thornton Expressway, less than a mile from the Dobbs House. The expressway ran straight to downtown Dallas by way of Dealey Plaza. The hitchhiker introduced himself to the driver as "Lee Harvey Oswald." He was carrying a 4-foot long package wrapped in brown paper. He told the driver, Mr. Ralph Yates, that the package contained curtain rods. During the brief drive into town, the two men discussed the upcoming visit from the President. Mr. Yates dropped Oswald off across the street from the Texas School Book Depository. Upon returning to work, Yates told a fellow employee, Dempsey Jones, about the person he'd picked up in Oak Cliff and dropped off at the corner of Elm and Houston. After the assassination, the FBI gave Yates a polygraph test. When the results failed to discredit Yates, the Bureau called the tests "inconclusive" (150). Sometime on November 20, a package was mailed from Irving, Texas to "Lee Oswald, 2515 W. 5th Street, Irving, Texas" -- the Paine residence. On Thursday evening, November 21, Oswald rode to the Paines' house with fellow employee Buell Wesley Frazier. Oswald said he was making the special trip to pick up some curtain rods from Mrs. Paine. The package mailed on Wednesday had not been delivered. There was $.12 due on the postage, and it was held at the Irving Post Office. A notice of attempted delivery was received by Ruth Paine and turned over to the FBI; they picked up the package at the post office prior to searching the Paine residence (for the second time) on Saturday, November 23. The package, opened by US Post Office Inspector Harry Holmes, contained only "a long brown bag opened at both ends" -- similar to the brown bag allegedly found by the Dallas Police in the Book Depository (151). At 9:00 pm on November 21, 1963, while Harvey was in Irving, Texas, at the Paine house, there was a knock on an apartment door in Oak Cliff. Helen McIntosh, a guest in the apartment, answered the door. A man she would later identify as Lee Harvey Oswald asked her if a man named Jack Ruby was in. McIntosh asked her friend if she knew a Jack Ruby; her friend said that Jack Ruby lived in the apartment next door, and McIntosh relayed this information to the young man, Lee Oswald. She forgot the incident until she saw Oswald on the television the following evening (152). NOTES: 1. CIA report of November 27, 1963; Doc. #104-10015-10428. 2. 20 H 197. 3. Associated Press, November 28, 1963; New York Times, November 30, 1963; cited in Chris Courtwright, "Oswald in Aliceland," available on-line at:<a href="http://www.jfklancer.com/Courtwright1.html">Link 11</a> 4. FBI Record #124-10229-10425; Agency File #62-2115-170; cited in Courtwright. 5. *Alice Echo News,* November 27, 1963; Corpus Christi *Caller-Times,* November 28, 1963; FBI Report of November 25, 1963, Agency File #105-82555-165; Associated Press, November 28, 1963; HSCA #180-10031-10278; FBI Report of November 26, 1963, FBI #124-10178-10419, AF #89-67-131; FBI Report of November 27, 1963, #124-10018-10241, AF #62-109060-1543; cited in Courtwright; John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: The Case for Two Oswalds, Part 2," *PROBE,* Vol. 5, No. 1, November-December 1997 (hereafter JA 2), 24. 6. Ibid. 7. FBI Report of December 10, 1963, FBI #124-10257-10473, AF #89-75-215; cited in Courtwright. 8. FBI Reports of November 26, 1963, FBI #124-10018-10240, AF #62-109060-1542; FBI #124-10019-10236, AF #62-109060-800; cited in Courtwright. 9. JA 2, 24. 10. Weberman Web site (www.weberman.com). [LINK2] 11. WR 737. 12. CIA cable of November 23, 1963, from R. L. Easby to Director John McCone; Doc. #104-10015-10289. 13. WR 737. 14. JA 2, 24. 15. WR 666. 16. FBI report of December 5, 1963, FBI #124-10241-10364, AF #62-2115-248; cited in Courtwright. 17. William Weston, "Alice, Texas";cited in Courtwright. 18. FBI Report of November 29, 1963, FBI #124-10029-10424, AF #62-2115-171; cited in Courtwright. 19. FBI Report of November 27, 1963, FBI #124-10178-10282, AF #89-67-243; cited in Courtwright. 20. WR 666. 21. Memo of March 20, 1964; HSCA #180-10108-10339, AF #002962; cited in Courtwright; JA 2, 25. 22. JA 2, 25. 23. JA 2, 25. 24. FBI Report of February 20, 1964, FBI #124-10227-10433, AF #105-1291-147; cited in Courtwright. 25. CD 71, 22; FBI #124-10267-10387, AF #89-67-243; cited in Courtwright; John Armstrong, 1997 Lancer conference; Jerry Robertson's transcription of the 1997 presentation is available on-line here:<a href=".23.html"></a> Courtwright also reports some interesting rumors reported by the FBI concerning Alice, Texas. A small group of Alice residents got in touch with the FBI when a fellow hunter, whose name is not revealed, alleged that he'd been deer hunting in October 1963 when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald enter a hunting lodge where rumor had it he met with Alice political boss George Parr (FBI Report of February 7, 1968, FBI #124-10046-10486, AF #62-109060-6162). Parr is the man now documented to have controlled the votes of Alice's populous Mexican immigrant community who depended on Parr for their livelihood. It is now a matter of public record that Parr stole thousands of votes for Rep. Lyndon B. Johnson in Johnson's failed 1942 bid for the Senate, and whose vote fraud helped LBJ steal the infamous Senate election of 1948 (cf. Robert Caro, *The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Path to Power* and *Means of Ascent*). Several other reports alleging Boss Parr's involvement in the assassination were filed by the FBI over the years -- all hearsay, of course (Courtwright, Ibid.). 26. JA 2, 24. 27. JA 2, 24. 28. JA 2, 24. 29. WR 737. 30. CIA report of November 27, 1963; Doc. #104-10015-10428. 31. JA 2, 24. 32. 6 H 406. 33. 7 H 289-308, 525-30. 34. 7 H 529. 35. 7 H 530. 36. FBI Report of December 2, 1963, by SA Henry J. Oliver. 37. JA 2, 24. 38. FBI Reports of December 19, 1963, SA James P. Hosty; Commission File 205, pp. 646-47; cited in Weisberg, *Oswald in New Orleans,* 47-8. 39. Ibid. 40. 11 H 425; cited in Weisberg, 47. 41. WR 737. 42. John Armstrong, 1997 Lancer conference. 43. JA 2, 24. 44. JA 2, 24. 45. WR 738. 46. NARA Docs. #104-10015-10107,104-10015-10289. 47. JA 2, 24. 48. 6 H 437. 49. FBI Reports of March 5 and March 6, 1964; Doc. #124-10268-10367; Weberman Web site. 50. Ibid. 51. Record #60L3609-E of the Cannon Circuit Court, 11th Judicial District, Dade County, Florida; FBI Report of March 25, 1964, FBI #105-8342; Weberman Web site. 52. Ibid. 53. Ibid. 54. JA 2, 24. 55. 10 H 310-26. 56. JA 2, 24-5. 57. Ibid. 58. 10 H 311; JA 2, 25. 59. 10 H 311; JA 2, 25. 60. JA 2, 25. 61. 26 H 178; JA 2, 25. 62. JA 2, 25. At this point in Armstrong's "Harvey and Lee," Armstrong conjectures that FBI SA Carver Gayton may have been correct in his recollection that SA James Hosty had once stated that Lee Harvey Oswald was a paid FBI informant whom Hosty contacted at the apartment where he supposedly lived -- not the Paine house (HSCA testimony of Carver Gayton). Carver's story had changed quite a bit since he spoke to the Church Committee. This author believes SA Gayton was mistaken, and does not believe that James Hosty was acquainted with Oswald -- any Oswald -- prior to November 22, 1963. Gayton's affidavit to the Church Committee was posted on-line by William Parker: gopher://freenet.akron.oh.us:70/00/SIGS/JFK/Alphabet/HSCA/var-txt/fbi-swears [LINK 4] FIX 63. JA 2, 25. 64. John Armstrong, 1997 Lancer conference. 65. JA 2, 25. 66. JA 2, 25. 67. Weberman Web site. 68. JA 2, 25. 69. 2 H 502; Ian Griggs, "Oswald -- A Driving Force?", available on-line at: <a href=".ja-ex14.html">Here</a> 70. Ibid. 71. Ibid. 72. Carol Hewett, "Ruth and Michael Paine's Mystery Vehicle," 1995 COPA conference abstract, *Fair Play* #2, available here: <a href=".ja-ex13.html"></a> 73. Ibid. 74. Ibid. 75. Ibid. Oddly, when Oswald was interrogated by Captain Will Fritz of the DPD's Homicide department following the assassination, he told Fritz the Paines owned only two cars (WR 605). 76. FBI Report of December 2, 1963. 77. 5 H 428-29. 78. Ibid. 79. Ibid. 80. 11 H 283. 81. 11 H 277. 82. 11 H 281. 83. Ibid. 84. 11 H 284. 85. Ibid. 86. Ibid. 87. 11 H 319. 88. JA 2, 25. 89. 14 H 107-8; David Scheim, *Contract on America,* 243-44. 90. Weberman Web site. 91. NARA Doc. #104-10017-10037. 92. 2 H 505. 93. 2 H 515. 94. 10 H 343-50, 352-5 95. 10 H 358-9, 370-1. 96. 10 H 378. 97. Ibid. 98. 1 H 54. 99. 2 H 217. 100. 10H 218. 101. 2 H 516. 102. 6 H 437. 103. 10 H 380. 104. 10 H 357, 376-7. 105. Weberman Web site. 106. 10 H 380. 107. Ibid. 108. Weberman Web site. 109. 10 H 382. 110. 10 H 383. 111. FBI Doc. #62-109060-3765; cited in Weberman Web site. 112. WR 320. 113. 10 H 371. 114. Ibid. 115. Weberman Web site. 116. Ibid. 117. 10 H 378. 118. 10 H 386. 119. 10 H 392. 120. 10 H 387. 121. Ibid. 122. 10 H 389, 394. 123. 10 H 396. 124. 10 H 393. 125. 10 H 398. 126. 10 H 360. 127. 10 H 359. 128. 10 H 360. 129. 10 H 363-4. 130. WR 665. 131. Cited in Jim Marrs, *Crossfire,* 406. 132. JA 2, 25. 133. Cited in Russell, 541-45. 134. JA 2, 25. 135. FBI report of SA Wallace Heitman. 136. Ibid. 137. Ibid. 138. Ibid. 139. 7 H 548; 19 H 503,505. 140. cf. Russell, 541-45. 141. CIA 88-27; Weberman Web site. 142. 7H 548; 19 H 503, 505. 143. CIA 88-27; Weberman Web site. 144. JA 2, 25. 145. JA 2, 25. 146. Summers, *Conspiracy,* 430. 147. WR 318-19; cited in Lane, *Rush to Judgment,* 334. 148. FBI Doc. #62-109060-1603; FBI DL 89-43, SA Horton, November 28, 1963; FBI NO 89-69, SA Nathan O. Brown, November 27 and 30, 1963; cited in Weberman Web site. 149. Ibid. 150. JA 2, 26. 151. JA 2, 26. 152. Interview with Helen McIntosh; John Armstrong, "Harvey and Lee: Just the Facts, Please," *Fair Play,* No. 25, November-December 1998, available at:<a href=".ja-ex31.html">Link 7</a> </pre> </body> </html>