A House of Cards?

Fri 30 Aug 2013, 9:08 pm

In a couple of days I will be posting a very long essay that I have been putting together for many months with the assistance of Greg Parker and Hasan Yusuf.

One of Robert Charles-Dunne's recent posts has already made me very aware of the standard of proof some people will require before dispensing with a wide variety of myths that have long been accepted as established truth. I will be very open to constructive criticism, questions and observations but more than anything else I need your help to keep digging further and further into the old narrative to see if we can establish a new and more accurate one.

Before I post my work I figured I'd get the ball rolling starting with a quote from Robert's post on the Prayer Man thread followed by some questions.

Robert Charles-Dunne said "I am open to persuasion regarding whether or not Oswald lived at the Beckley boarding house, but haven’t yet encountered anything that proves conclusively he lived elsewhere, or even suggests a reason for having fabricated his tenancy there."

For many of you reading this you probably didn't know what Robert was referring to. Robert has known for some length of time that I had started trying to deconstruct Oswald's tenancy at 1026 North Beckley. The more information I have collected the more I have become convinced that he never lived there.

So, as a series of starter questions, using points made in RCD's post:

i). What evidence do we possess that suggests Oswald lived at Mrs. Gladys Johnson's rooming house at 1026 North Beckley?

ii). What evidence do we possess that suggests an imposter lived at 1026 North Beckley?

ii). Do we have to prove Oswald lived elsewhere to prove he didn't live at 1026 North Beckley?

iii). What possible reasons could there have been "for having fabricated his tenancy" at 1026 North Beckley?

Seeing as how Sean Murphy has recently tried to dismantle one large Lee Oswald myth, let's keep the motivation going and see what happens with this one.

Thanks

Lee

Fri 30 Aug 2013, 10:53 pm

Wrong thread

Fri 30 Aug 2013, 11:58 pm

Lee David Farley wrote:In a couple of days I will be posting a very long essay that I have been putting together for many months with the assistance of Greg Parker and Hasan Yusuf.

One of Robert Charles-Dunne's recent posts has already made me very aware of the standard of proof some people will require before dispensing with a wide variety of myths that have long been accepted as established truth. I will be very open to constructive criticism, questions and observations but more than anything else I need your help to keep digging further and further into the old narrative to see if we can establish a new and more accurate one.

Before I post my work I figured I'd get the ball rolling starting with a quote from Robert's post on the Prayer Man thread followed by some questions.

Robert Charles-Dunne said "I am open to persuasion regarding whether or not Oswald lived at the Beckley boarding house, but haven’t yet encountered anything that proves conclusively he lived elsewhere, or even suggests a reason for having fabricated his tenancy there."

For many of you reading this you probably didn't know what Robert was referring to. Robert has known for some length of time that I had started trying to deconstruct Oswald's tenancy at 1026 North Beckley. The more information I have collected the more I have become convinced that he never lived there.

So, as a series of starter questions, using points made in RCD's post:

i). What evidence do we possess that suggests Oswald lived at Mrs. Gladys Johnson's rooming house at 1026 North Beckley?

ii). What evidence do we possess that suggests an imposter lived at 1026 North Beckley?

ii). Do we have to prove Oswald lived elsewhere to prove he didn't live at 1026 North Beckley?

iii). What possible reasons could there have been "for having fabricated his tenancy" at 1026 North Beckley?

Seeing as how Sean Murphy has recently tried to dismantle one large Lee Oswald myth, let's keep the motivation going and see what happens with this one.

Thanks

Lee

Knock ém dead, Lee. If there is anyone here who doesn't believe Oswald never lived at 1026 North Beckley after reading your essay.... I will delete my membership from the forum!

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 1:26 am

I have decided, similar to the manner in which Sean Murphy has pieced together his Prayer Man thread, to post some of my research in installments so, hopefully, discussion can take place in a more structured way.

I will post the first part tonight but as a precursor I would like to post two quotes. The first is from Jack Ruby during his Warren Commission testimony and the second is from Earl Ruby, Jack's brother, again, during his Warren Commission testimony. These pieces of testimony should set the scene for where we will eventually end up (bold emphasis is mine):

From the Warren Commission testimony of Jack L. Ruby

Mr. SPECTER. Mr. Tonahill, do you have any other questions you would like to have asked?
Mr. TONAHILL. …I think if you asked him why he went out about 4 o'clock in the morning with George Senator and Larry [Crafard} and took that picture of the sign----
Mr. RUBY. Don't mention anything about that--we're in a bad spot down here because of that.

From the Warren Commission testimony of Earl Ruby

Mr. GRIFFIN. How about Larry Crafard, did you pay him any money?
Mr. RUBY. Larry Crafard, I think we just gave him a few dollars, $5 maybe because he was broke when he was living on the road, he didn’t have a dime, so I think I gave him some money.
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Larry incidentally contact you any time while you were in Detroit?
Mr. RUBY. No, no; I wish he would have, because he hitchhiked all the way down there, and I was driving at the same time, but he didn’t know I lived there, and we--
Mr. GRIFFIN. How was he notified to come to the trial?
Mr. RUBY. I don’t know. If I remember correctly he came on his own. He just thought that when all this came out about, you know, Jack getting him to take that picture of Earl Warren, he had the camera or something, I forgot the full details myself, but he is the one who took the picture, right, if I am not mistaken, and he just thought he should come down to help Jack as much as he possibly could. Could I go a little further?
Mr. GRIFFIN. I don’t really want to pry into this unless this is something you care to reveal.
Mr. RUBY. The most important thing is coming up now; I mean one of the most important things.
Mr. GRIFFIN. All right. I do want to reflect this -- that I don’t want to push you into saying things, talking about subjects that you would rather not talk about, and I realize that this in one of them.

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 5:07 am

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The Hitcher

Curtis Laverne Craford, also known as Larry Crafard, is a JFK assassination enigma. For someone so close to Jack Ruby during those final few days before Jack walked down that City Hall basement ramp, very little is known about him as an individual. This is despite the fact that he appeared as a witness at Jack Ruby's trial and his testimony to the Warren Commission runs for over 200+ pages.

Depending upon which statement you wish to choose from Larry Crafard was "hired" by Jack Ruby in either late October or early November, 1963, to work for him at the Carousel Club on Commerce Street. The pair met at the Dallas State Fairground when Larry was allegedly working on an attraction called "How Hollywood Made Movies." When Larry was released from this job he started working for a short lived show that took its place called the Rock'n'Roll show. Upon meeting the unemployed carnival worker Jack was quick to pick him up and take him under his wing. Jack's salary for the young Crafard would be a couch to sleep on in the wonderful surroundings of the Carousel Club and some spare change from the till to buy food and smokes each day.

Crafard was born in Michigan on March 10, 1941, and his real name was Curtis LaVerne Craford. As a youngster he moved with his family to several different states including California. He enlisted in the Army in September, 1958, and it was here, Crafard said, that his name change occurred. Instead of enlisting him as Craford he claimed they made an error and he was enlisted as Curtis Laverne Crafard. Upon his discharge from the army he said he decided to keep the new name. Crafard served only 13 months of the normal 3-4 year tour period before he was given what his mother claimed was a "medical discharge" and what Crafard himself said was "As far as I understand it is the next thing to a medical discharge." The discharge, according to Crafard, was "honorable" but his cousin back in Michigan told the FBI that Crafard's discharge was "dishonorable." My own suspicions concerning Crafard's discharge were under the cover of, or actual claims of, homosexuality.

Crafard was 22 years old in 1963 and, aside from being almost the same age as Lee Harvey Oswald he also had a striking resemblance to him. So much so, as we will see, many witnesses would come forward in the aftermath of the assassination claiming they had seen Lee Harvey Oswald in the company of Jack Ruby. Most, if not all, of these Oswald "sightings" in Dallas and elsewhere were, in fact, Larry Crafard.

Larry, in 1963, was a seasoned hitchhiker having started in his teenage years. In 1957, when he was 17 years old, he reportedly hitchhiked from Royal Oak in Michigan to Los Angeles, California with Leo D. Brennan. Brennan,who would later become a United States Army Sergeant, recounted that shortly before making the long hitchhiking trip to Los Angeles Crafard had "just come from California shortly before." In every sense, Larry Crafard was a hitchhiking professional. Brennan also stated that while in California they stayed for two weeks with Crafard's sister who lived with Crafard’s brother in law "somewhere near Wiltshire Boulevard." Crafard's brother in law sold newspapers on street corners and was "on narcotics" according to Brennan, and was always bragging about having "lots of contacts in Chicago." Brennan also said that that the brother in law was 36 years of age and had a criminal record, "probably for narcotics."

When Larry Crafard appeared before the Warren Commission he was asked about his family. The sister, who he stayed with in California with Leo Brennan in 1957 was Corabelle Crafard whom he named when asked by Warren Commission counsellor Leon D. Hubert but when you read the testimony concerning her husband you are presented with the following;

Mr. CRAFARD. I have three sisters
Mr. HUBERT. All right, will you state their names please and whether they are married?
Mr. CRAFARD. Corabelle Crafard, she is married.
Mr. HUBERT. To Whom?
Mr. CRAFARD. [Deleted]

The husband of Cora Belle Crafard, whose name the Warren Commission took it upon themselves to [delete], was, in 1964, serving a sentence in a Michigan State Penitentiary. The sentence was 2 1/2 to 15 years for the theft of firearms. His name was Chauncey W. Ingersoll.

The time period that Larry Crafard lived and "worked" at the Carousel Club was quite short having begun his employment probably on October 18, 1963, before hitchhiking out of Dallas on either November 22nd or 23rd, 1963. During this short period, Larry's responsibilities appear on the surface to be linked to his being a general dogsbody for Ruby; answering the telephone, writing down numbers and names, bartender, lighting for Carousel Club shows, errand running and feeding Jack's dogs.

According to Larry Crafard he became frustrated working at the Carousel Club for no salary and on November 17th, 1963, he gave Jack an ultimatum. Crafard wanted to be paid a salary or he was leaving. Jack, we are told, said yes to Crafard's demand and convinced him to stay. The interesting thing about this ultimatum is that it was quickly followed by a very specific event.

This event took place on November 18, the day after Crafard's demands for a salary, and it was a meeting between Jack Ruby and Bertha Cheek. The meeting took place in the Carousel Club and was supposedly concerning business interests.

Bertha Cheek was the sister of Earlene Roberts who was the housekeeper at 1026 North Beckley.

Vacancies

On October 3rd, 1963, according to the official investigation into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, arrived back in Dallas from an unusual trip to Mexico City.

Oswald’s wife, Marina, had been living with her strange Quaker benefactor, Ruth Paine, for a number of weeks out in Irving, Texas. Oswald would not reconcile with his wife upon his return to Dallas and Marina's separate living arrangements would continue with Ruth Paine until the afternoon of November 22, 1963. Oswald, therefore, on the morning of Monday October 7, 1963, would be out hunting for an apartment to rent in the Oak Cliff area of Dallas. We are told he found one immediately because the official narrative has him quickly moving in with a landlady, Mary Esther Bledsoe, at 621 North Marsalis Avenue during the afternoon of October 7th.

The renting situation with Bledsoe would be short lived, however, because she quickly kicked him out of her residence on the morning of Saturday October 12th, less than a week after he had arrived. Bledsoe, according to her Warren Commission testimony, did not like Oswald disturbing her naps and he went into the refrigerator on far too many occasions for her liking.

Therefore, on October 14, 1963, Oswald was on the move yet again and, as before, he quickly found another place to live. His new residence would be 1026 North Beckley staying with landlady Mrs. Gladys Johnson and her housekeeper, Earlene Roberts. If his short-lived tenancy with Mary Bledsoe was somewhat strange, things were going to get a whole lot stranger.

There has always been a very big problem concerning Oswald living at the 1026 North Beckley rooming house. The authorities, and subsequently the Warren Commission, had no documented evidence that Lee Harvey Oswald ever lived there. According to both the landlady and the housekeeper, Oswald registered under the assumed name of O. H. Lee.

The Warren Commission used this particular problem to their own ends by suggesting that it was evidence that Lee Oswald was living an existence detached from reality but what evidence was collected and placed into the record that supported this conclusion?

Mrs. Johnson Empty Handed

When Mrs. Gladys Johnson, who owned the 1026 North Beckley rooming house was deposed by the Warren Commission she quite conveniently forgot to bring her tenant register with her. Why this was never taken as evidence on the afternoon of the assassination is a question that will forever remain unanswered but Johnson did, thankfully, bring with her a slip of scrap paper that had the name "O. H. Lee" written on it with a short chronology of when this Mr. Lee paid his weekly rent of $8. This was the only hard proof ever handed over from the owners to assist the authorities in proving that Lee Oswald ever lived at the property.

Once again, we are left with a problem. It is a problem that requires us to swallow a massive coincidence if we are to dismiss it as completely benign and it was a problem not investigated by the Warren Commission.

Coincidentally, there was, at the very same time period that Lee Oswald was allegedly living at the rooming house under the assumed name of Mr. Lee, another tenant whose name was Mr. Lee. Herbert Lee was 21 years of age at the time and was working for a Dallas flooring company called Trinity, when he was, according to his FBI report, sharing a room at 1026 North Beckley with a work colleague called James Douglas Watson. Gladys Johnson was asked during her testimony how many rooms her property had and how many tenants she had and whether it was a rooming house that was generally out of vacancies:

Mr. BALL. What size house is that, how many rooms?

Mrs. JONHSON. Well, it has about 20-odd-22 rooms.

Mr. BALL. 22 rooms?

Mrs. JOHNSON. Yes.
…
Mr. BALL. How many tenants did you have in October last year?

Mrs. JOHNSON. You know, I'm sorry I didn't bring my register. I couldn't tell you exactly; I imagine I had about 10 or 12.

Mr. BALL. Was it full?

Mrs. JOHNSON. No; I don't - I most always have vacancies.

Mr. BALL. You do?

Mrs. JOHNSON. I have had more even since this happened.

Mr. BALL. Oh, you have?

Mrs. JOHNSON. Yes; I have; people are funny about things like that, you know.

The Warren Commission, to its eternal shame, did not ever produce the definitive list of names that were staying at the property over October and November, 1963. The list we do have was, I believe, put together by researchers over the years. The list consists of the following individuals:

Bobby Joe Palmer, C. C. Lehmann, Roy Samuel Cleghorn, Floyd DeGraffenreid, Hugh Slough, Jack Cody, A. C. Johnson, George Gibboney, Donald Green, John Carter, James Watson, Herbert Lee.

If we include Lee Harvey Oswald that would make 13 residents living there. Gladys Johnson said they were almost never full and “most always had vacancies.” One of the times she said they were full was when Lee Oswald first turned up asking to rent a room. She said this was "three weeks before" he finally did acquire a room. This is impossible if the official timeline is accurate because he was allegedly in Mexico City three week's before October 14. So, because this was never challenged by Warren Commission counsel, we have to assume that Oswald, if he did turn up at the property prior to his actual residency there, that this occurred week commencing October 7 - - the week that he allegedly moved into the Bledsoe rooming house.

When Lee Oswald was allegedly taken in as a tenant on October 14, he was given Room 0. Mrs. Gladys Johnson is on record claiming that they never usually rented out room 0 in the Beckley Rooming house. It was the smallest room in the house with just enough space to swing a cat in. She said it was used as a spare bedroom when her grandchildren visited. Yet, even though the rest of the house was not full, by her own admission and by the 12 names we have of the other tenants, they gave him the room that claimed they never rented out, and it was so small you'd struggle to swing a cat in it.

Johnson's testimony and also the evidence concerning this part of the story simply does not make any sense. For starters, Johnson said they were almost never full. Yet they were full, according to her testimony, 3 weeks before Oswald moved in.

The 12 additional names who were renting create an issue concerning occupancy because A. C. Johnson, who is on the tenant list, is actually Gladys Johnson's husband. In addition, H. Lee was sharing a room allegedly with another tenant called James Douglas Watson and their FBI statements throw up issues with their claims concerning their shared occupancy which we will discuss later. That makes a maximum of 9 rooms being used in a large boarding house that had a total of 22 rooms albeit not all were bedrooms but according to CE1144, which is a Secret Service report into Oswald’s residences, Gladys Johnson’s rooming house had room for 18 tenants. Therefore, if the list we have is complete then the house wasn't full, so why was Lee Oswald allegedly given not only the smallest room in the house but also a room that was never usually rented out?

Two Mr. Lees

If we accept that Herbert Leon Lee was living at 1026 North Beckley in October and November, 1963, then Gladys Johnson had two Mr. Lee's living there at the same time. She had:

H. Lee
and
O. H. Lee

The piece of evidence that Gladys Johnson turned up with in her purse during her Warren Commission testimony is only worth something by way of evidence if we have other evidence to compare it to. We don’t.

Where are the same slips of paper showing the names of the other tenants and their payments? Surely there would be one for a Mr. H. Lee as well? Why wasn't she asked for it and why weren't the Warren Commission concerned in the slightest that there was another tenant there using the one of the same initials and the same surname? Neither the Dallas Police or the FBI ever took possession of the register or the scrap paper and they certainly did not request other payment slips to compare them to the one that was put into evidence bearing the name "O. H. Lee."

The issues concerning Herbert Lee are not confined to him having the same surname as Lee Oswald's alleged pseudonym. The FBI interviewed his grandfather in Shreveport, Louisiana, after they investigated the outgoing telephone call records from the Beckley rooming house. The details of the records indicating the dates of the calls are not included in the record. After the FBI had interviewed Herbert Lee's grandfather in Shreveport, LA, Lee himself contacted the FBI by telephone on December 10. He was formally interviewed on December 17, 1963, after he said he'd been informed, by his grandfather, that the FBI were looking for him. The story he told to the Federal Agents did not match the story of the person who he claimed he actually shared a room with, James Douglas Watson. Lee claimed that he lived at the property "for about four or five weeks in October, 1963." Lee also claimed that he didn't remember seeing Lee Harvey Oswald living there and that both he and Watson left the Beckley rooming house on November 1st, 1963. He did make a point of claiming that James Watson may have remembered Oswald and had spoken to him even though he himself didn't remember Oswald.

When the FBI interviewed James Watson he does not mention Herbert Leon Lee as a roommate. Actually, he does not mention the name Herbert Leon Lee at all. In addition, Watson told the FBI that he stayed at 1026 North Beckley for "one week in early November." These anomalies in recollections between the pair is enough to raise my suspicions that all is not how it appears to be concerning the Beckley rooming house tenants and the FBI did not reinterview either of them to clear up the discrepancies.

So, we are left with evidence that is full of holes and questions concerning the following:

When Herbert Lee and James Watson started living at 1026 North Beckley.

When they both left.

Whether they did actually room together.

Why we have no registers to prove who the other tenants were in October and November and how many.

Why we have no documentation or evidence to compare the O. H. Lee rent receipt to.

Why we have no telephone records to show the numbers that were incoming and outgoing to the Beckley rooming house.

Just when you think things cannot get any stranger, when Gladys Johnson appeared before the Warren Commission, she not only turned up with evidence related to the assassination of a United States President in her purse, but she was also reluctant to turn it over to them:

Mr. BALL. Did he tell you what his name was?
Mrs. JOHNSON. O. H. Lee [Spelling]
Mr. BALL. Did he sign anything with that name?
Mrs. JOHNSON. Yes, sir. I have it in my purse.
Mr. BALL. May I see it?
Mrs. JOHNSON. I will be glad to -- I don't want you to keep it. I want you to -- I brought it for your information. I knew you was going to ask that.
Mr. BALL. Now, is this in his handwriting ?
Mrs. JOHNSON. This "O. H. Lee" is in his handwriting and this other is in the housekeeper's handwriting -- Mrs. Roberts.
...
Mr. BALL. I would like this marked as an exhibit to this deposition. Mark this Exhibit A.
[Exhibit so marked]
Mr. BALL. Could we make a copy of this and return this to you, Mrs. Johnson.
Mrs. JOHNSON. Yes; I have been told that I can sell this and I haven't got any money. I think about $30 is what I have received, all the trouble and all I've had and I've had to take the rugs up once or twice. People like to have driven us crazy before we asked for any information what to do. I hated being rude to people, I didn't know what to do but they got so ---
Mr. BALL. We will make a picture of this and give it back to you.
Mrs JOHNSON. May I have something to erase this November 13, 15 -- I got that wrong, anyway. I was looking at the calendar and this, I was thinking it was November 13 that he left my place on a Wednesday before this assassination on Friday.
...
Mr. BALL. Were you at home at the time?
Mrs. ROBERTS. No; I wasn't. I was at my restaurant, so I got this copied wrong.
...
Mr. BALL. We will make a copy of this and give you the original back to and we will mark this "A."

The story gets more and more peculiar the more one delves.

What does Gladys Johnson want to "erase" from the exhibit she is holding on to? Why has she got her dates mixed up? Why was she using a calendar in relation to the exhibit? What did she copy wrong?

According to her testimony Gladys Johnson is asking to erase a date. That date was either the 15th or the 13th of November. She is saying she thought O. H. Lee left her rooming house on Wednesday, November 13. She is claiming she "copied" something wrong. The photocopy we are left with as published in the Warren Commission volumes is very poor and the witness was, unbelievably, allowed to walk out of her deposition with the original still in her personal possession even though it was direct evidence in the murder of the President of the United States.

Why did the FBI or Dallas Police not take this evidence on 11/22? Why was it not subjected to handwriting analysis and fingerprinting? Why was this the only "receipt" placed into evidence (and a photocopy at that)? Why was Johnson allowed to keep such important evidence to "sell?"

The most interesting aspect of the “O. H. Lee” scrap of paper is that on March 12th, 1964, three weeks before Johnson was due to testify, Burt Griffin sent a memo to J. Lee Rankin asking for the following:

f. Handwriting evaluation of piece of paper turned over to the Dallas police by Mrs. Roberts on which she claims Lee Oswald wrote the name O. H. Lee and which she used to maintain the account for O. H. Lee. Also, determination of whether or not it was a normal practice to keep accounts on a scrap of paper such as the one in question.

According to Gladys Johnson, the scrap of paper was never turned over to the Dallas Police. In addition, no “handwriting evaluation” was ever performed on the paper and to cap it off, no one from the Warren Commission ever saw fit to follow Griffin’s suggestion to determine whether “it was a normal practice to keep accounts on a scrap of paper” when she was deposed during her Warren Commission testimony.

There are elements of the whole 1026 North Beckley situation that make no sense whatsoever and were never fully investigated. The investigation concerning this is absolutely shocking. Gladys Johnson was interviewed in 1964 due to allegations being made in Wisconsin concerning a phone call from Oshkosh, WI, to the rooming house at North Beckley. During this FBI interview she came out with quite a curious statement:

“On the weekend in question, beginning Friday evening, November 15, 1963, OSWALD was in residence throughout the weekend to Monday morning when he left for work. Mrs. JOHNSON said she has a distinct recollection of this as she had checked OSWALD’s room at about 6:30 P.M. Friday, November 15, 1963, to see whether the room might be available for use of her grandchildren on that weekend. She was astonished to find OSWALD there, and in her astonishment commented: “Oh! You’re not going to Irving this weekend!” OSWALD did not say a word. Mrs. JOHNSON quickly withdrew from his room.”

“Mrs. JOHNSON said that she had not associated OSWALD with her guest O. H. LEE until she had seen OSWALD on television following his arrest – this after local officers had checked the guest register for about 30 minutes trying to identify someone among the tenants as OSWALD, and, failing to do so until his appearance on television when Mrs. JOHNSON identified him as her guest, O. H. LEE.”

During an interview conducted by John J. Moriarty for the House Select Committe on Assassinations on October 14, 1977, Gladys Johnson once again reiterated some unfortunate information that she had previously touched upon during her Warren Commission testimony. Johnson claimed that the Dallas Police were at her property much sooner than the official narrative allowed. Oswald was not arrested at the Texas Theater until approximately 1:50 PM and Will Fritz did not speak to him directly until 2:30 PM while he was in custody but Johnson claimed that the police and the FBI were at her property asking about Oswald at 1:30 PM. Even if we allow for Johnson losing track of time by one hour the police were still there long before they should have been.

Therefore, it would appear that the police knew well in advance where Oswald was supposed to be lodging but the question that I now pose is this; was it really Lee Harvey Oswald that was living there?

To be continued

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 5:21 am

Keep it going, Lee!

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 6:32 am

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The Dallas Carousel

On November 15, 1963, Jack Ruby allegedly had some trouble with a Carousel Club MC by the name of Earl Norman. During the disagreement Jack hit Norman and then told his multi-purpose employee, Larry Crafard, to go and fetch his pistol from his car. Crafard dutifully obliged.

Ruby kept his gun in his car in a "brown paper sack" and when Crafard was interviewed by the FBI after the assassination he made a point of telling investigators that this was the "only time he ever held Ruby's gun."

What jumps out at you when reading the record detailing their relationship, from the moment Larry Crafard started working for Jack Ruby in October, 1963, Larry comes across as nothing more than a general dogsbody who was incredibly loyal to a man that, we are informed, didn't even pay him. Crafard, in lieu of a salary, was instead given a room to sleep in at the Carousel Club that was situated next door to Jack Ruby's office in exchange for his work at the club.

Larry was continuously at Jack Ruby's beck and call and what Jack wanted Larry to do, Larry obeyed and responded immediately, whether it was feeding Jack's dogs or retrieving Jack's gun during physical altercations. However, scrape the surface and there is far more to Larry Crafard than initially meets the eye. Was Jack using Larry or was Larry using Jack?

Larry Crafard's Ultimatum

In November 1963 a spate of Oswald sightings occurred over in west Dallas. If the official timeline and chronology of events is correct, none of these sightings were the historical Lee Harvey Oswald. Oswald was allegedly seen in restaurants, cafés, rifle ranges, an auto dealer courtyard, a laundrette, a dry cleaners, an insurance company, as a hitchhiker and, on the day of the assassination, a convenience store, a record shop, the balcony and alley of the Texas Theater and sat in a car of the Chico Restaurant in Oak Cliff.

It was in November, 1963, that Larry Crafard allegedly gave Jack Ruby an ultimatum. He wanted a salary or he was leaving. This allegedly took place on November 17. The following day, Jack Ruby met with Bertha Cheek who was the sister of the housekeeper at 1026 North Beckley, Earlene Roberts. The meeting was supposed to be about Cheek purchasing one of Ruby's clubs but Ruby was never questioned during his Warren Commission testimony concerning the meeting.

Cheeky Testimony about a Cheeky Meeting

Bertha Cheek's testimony before the Warren Commission can best be described as evasive and forgetful. There are pages of testimony wasted trying to get her to supply copies of her business records to the Commission, something she was incredibly reluctant to do. She says about 1/3 of the way through that she has to leave to visit her daughter who had cancer and may/or may not be sick?

She tells them that she thought her testimony would only take 15 minutes and when she is asked specific questions regarding her business meetings with Jack Ruby she is very forgetful. Many of her responses consist of "I don't remember much about it" which result in counsel prompting her to recall the bits she did remember.  

On the subject of the "business meeting" she had with Jack Ruby that took place in the Carousel Club on November, 18, she at first told the Commission that she could not recall much of what was said. When the Commission had to inform her that the meeting lasted 2-3 hours she gave some small snippets of information. From her testimony, this 2-3 hour meeting basically consisted of this:  

Ruby invited her to discuss investing in an unnamed nightclub  
He wanted Cheek to invest $6,000 and he was going to invest $1,000 
Any returns would be a 50-50 split 
Ruby would use his contacts and expertise to run the club 
Cheek wasn't interested in the deal because she didn't have $6,000 to invest 
Ruby never gave her the name of the club in case she went around him 
There was no discussion as what Cheek's potential returns might be from her 50-50 split.  

That's it.

That's what this 2-3 hour meeting basically consisted of if we are to believe Bertha Cheek's testimony. In her testimony she got the investment amount wrong too because she thought Ruby asked her to invest $6,500.

  I cannot believe, given the evasive nature of Cheek's testimony and the incredibly small amount of information that was gotten from her, that this meeting she had with Jack Ruby was concerning a nightclub investment.  

The most interesting thing that is contained in Bertha Cheek's testimony is the fact that she used to let a property to Ruby's buddy in the Dallas Police Department, Harry Olsen. 

Little Lies

On April, 15, 1964, Karen Bennett Carlin was deposed by Leon Hubert. Carlin was better known in Dallas as Little Lynn. Carlin was a stripper who worked at Jack Ruby's Carousel Club and according to her testimony she started working for Ruby about "two months" before the assassination of the President. When you read through the statements and testimony of Larry Crafard it becomes quite apparent that he knew Carlin very well insofar as he was always receiving and noting telephone calls from her concerning her work while she was employed at the club. He refers to her by name during his deposition and he gives the impression that she also knew who he was:

Mr. GRIFFIN. Who was the one that he fired?  
Mr. CRAFARD. It was Jada.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. And who did he hire in her place?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Little Lynn.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long after he fired Jada did Little Lynn come on?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I believe it was 2 or 3 days between them.
...
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long had you known Little Lynn before she was hired as a stripper?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I believe I met her one day and she was hired the next evening, something like that.
...
Mr. GRIFFIN. How about her husband, Bruce Carlin, did you meet him?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I met him at the same time I met Little Lynn.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. How often did Bruce use to come to the club?
 Mr. CRAFARD. When Little Lynn went to work for the club at first he was there almost every night--he was there every night.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. How did he get along with Jack?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I never seen any difficulty between them.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. How would you describe Bruce Carlin?  
Mr. CRAFARD. He seemed like a pretty likable young fellow to me.
...
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did Little Lynn remain around the club while Bruce was out?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Yes; most of the time.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. How long would you say Little Lynn worked for Jack?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Oh, man; I believe it was 2 or 3 weeks. I am not sure.
...
Mr. GRIFFIN. I think you mentioned that Little Lynn called on Friday night sometime.  
Mr. CRAFARD. Yes.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. When was it that you think she called?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I believe---I said I believe it was 9 or 9:30, I believed it was.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. What was it that she said when she called?  Mr. CRAFARD. She wanted to get ahold, of Jack, it was urgent or something to that effect.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. And did she indicate she knew the club had been closed?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Yes; she knew the club had been closed.  Mr. GRIFFIN. And at that time did she know how long it was going to be closed?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Not that I know of.
...
Mr. GRIFFIN. Do you want to look at the reverse side of page 2?  
Mr. CRAFARD. There is only one number on there, on the reverse side of page 2 that we used very frequently. That was Little Lynn's phone number.
...
 Mr. GRIFFIN. You testified that you believe Little Lynn called sometime on Friday evening, November 22?  
Mr. CRAFARD. Yes.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. What time would be your recollection that telephone call was received, was it before or after you had dinner at 8 o'clock over at the drug store?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I believe that was before I had dinner. I believe I said something to Jack about it when he came back and he said if she called again to give, tell her to call Miss Grant.  
Mr. GRIFFIN. Did she call back?  
Mr. CRAFARD. I believe so. And I told her to call Miss Grant  

So, it's quite apparent reading through Crafard's testimony that he knew Little Lynn and that she knew him. They had frequent interactions and spoke regularly on the phone. So I find it somewhat laughable that Little Lynn (Karen Carlin) played it like a dumb stripper during her own testimony:  

Mr. HUBERT. Do you know a man by the name of Larry Crafard?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Not by name; no.  
Mr. HUBERT. Do you remember Larry?  
Mrs. CARLIN. No  
Mr. HUBERT. Do you remember a man that stayed there and slept on the premises?  
Mrs. CARLIN. No; I don't know of anyone that did. Andrew was the only one I knew that ever spent the night there, and that was just because he would say so the next evening. He said, "I am tired." Said, "I had to stay here all night."  
Mr. HUBERT. I might add that this man Larry's full name was Curtis Laverne Crafard.
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes. That was a little young boy, the one that worked the lights.   

So, she didn't remember him by the name everybody called him by; Larry. But the minute his full name, that he didn't use, is thrown in the mix then Carlin suddenly remembers him.   It's quite a performance by Carlin. The next piece of testimony, if you have the ability to ignore the disgraceful performance of Leon Hubert who not only leads the witness but answers for her, is the interesting bit in relation to Crafard:  

Mr. HUBERT. He [Larry Crafard] stayed on the premises?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes. But he stayed next door most of the time. I know he was sleeping there for a while, but Jack put a stop to it.  
Mr. HUBERT. You mean Jack wouldn't let him sleep in the club?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Jack didn't like him sleeping there, because there was too many things gone.  
Mr. HUBERT. Then he made him go next door?  
Mrs. CARLIN. He went next door. I don't know who was next door or what it was next door, but he went next door.  
Mr. HUBERT. But what you heard was that this man had, Crafard, Curtis Laverne Crafard had been staying on the premises, but that Jack had put a stop to it and made him move to some place next door, but you don't know which next door?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes.  
Mr. HUBERT. Who did you hear this from?  
Mrs. CARLIN. It was from Larry. He was taking care of the dogs or something.  
Mr. HUBERT. He told you he had to move out?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes.  
Mr. HUBERT. Out of the premises altogether?  
Mrs. CARLIN. No. He Just said, "I am going to have to move. I can't stay here. I don't know where I am going to get the money, but I am going to have to move."  
Mr. HUBERT. That must have happened just before the assassination of the President?
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes. After that I didn't see Larry no more.  Mr. HUBERT. So to your knowledge he never did actually move, but Just said he was going to have to move, and he informed you that Jack had told him he would have to move?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes.  
Mr. HUBERT. When you say move, you mean move out at night and not sleep there?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes.  
Mr. HUBERT. That is what I meant, to move next door, I think is what you meant?  
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes.  

What we now have, in the November timeframe, is a witness claiming that Larry Crafard "just before the assassination" said he was having to move out of the Carousel Club. 

Little Lynn AKA Karen Carlin, contrary to her testimony, did know "Larry" from the Carousel Club because she said so during her FBI interview on November 26, 1963:

  "Mrs. Karlin [sic] pointed out that it is very difficult to identify anyone in the club from the stage due to the lighting arrangements.  She stated that she knew a "LARRY" and that he worked at the Carousel Club for RUBY for a short time as a light operator. She described LARRY as a white male, approximately 23 years old, sandy hair, 5'8" to 5'10", slender build with four upper front teeth missing. She said that LARRY tried to impress her by showing her a badge and told her he was a policeman."  

After Carlin was so specific concerning her recollections of Larry Crafard during her November 26 interview it makes it a little difficult to swallow when we read what she said to the Warren Commission:  

Mr. HUBERT. Do you know a man by the name of Larry Crafard?
Mrs. CARLIN. Not by name; no.
Mr. HUBERT. Do you remember Larry?
Mrs. CARLIN. No
Mr. HUBERT. Do you remember a man that stayed there and slept on the premises?
Mrs. CARLIN. No. 
Mr. HUBERT. I might add that this man Larry's full name was Curtis Laverne Crafard.
Mrs. CARLIN. Yes. That was a little young boy, the one that worked the lights.

  Pure Theatre  

To be continued

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 8:40 am

Albert Rossi wrote:

Hello, all -- from another newbie.

First of all, I must say that this is unequivocally the best JFK Forum I have yet come into contact with, given the sophistication, care, and civility of the ongoing discussion. Thank you all for that. I personally will probably not be intervening much as I am here primarily to learn, have nowhere near the command of the testimony that you all do, and wish to avoid injecting jejune, erroneous or banal observations. As another new member just said, I am not a researcher, though I have had an ongoing, intense interest in this case for the better part of 46 years now.

I would, however, like to ask one question, to Lee. Earlier on this extremely provocative thread (I know I should read Sean's original posts but I haven't the courage to step into the EF snake pit), you voiced your opinion to the effect that:

"The longer I have studied this case and the more convinced I have become that Oswald knew nothing whatsoever about the pending assassination of JFK. I base this upon my suspicions that he was performing low-level informer activities for Jim Hosty and I cannot now comprehend that anybody involved in the assassination mechanics would bring Lee Oswald in to the plot when he was the designated Patsy. I think his work involved something associated with observing Joe Molina (and as was the case in many situations Joe Molina observing Oswald) and due to Oswald's background I see the information he was possibly gathering being connected to the activities of the CPUSA, GIForum and the ACLU."

To me it makes perfect sense that LHO was meant to keep a lower profile in Dallas than during the previous two months, given the fact that the alarms on him were apparently switched off at FBI just prior to the arrival of the cable from Mexico City.

What I was wondering: Do you have any opinion about the story given by an informant of Buddy Walthers' concerning LHO's presence at the Alpha 66 safe house allegedly at 3128 Harlendale during the weeks leading up to the assassination? (correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the source here is Eric Tagg's Brush with History).

Thanks!

Al

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 2:54 pm

Hey Lee, very informative. This O.H. Lee business and that of Larry Crafard are news to me.

To play devil's advocate, an innocent explanation is Crafard's deleted name may have been the WC helping out someone with a complicated personal life. Just a couple months ago doing some research for a case I stumbled over the fact one of the parties (not my client fortunately) was a bigamist. It wasn't relevant to the case so I let sleeping dogs lie.

If a WC lawyer discovered Crafard's sister was, say, legally married to two men (one of whom was a felon), the prudent thing to do would be to redact the husband's name from testimony. Both men could read it (wonder if prison libraries stocked the WC Report) and assume the deleted name was himself. Likewise if Mrs. Carlin had a romantic (or a, umm, pecuniary) relationshp with Crafard, she'd have good reason to play dumb.

Don't mind me, I just like throwing curveballs. Carry on. Surprised

)

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 3:13 pm

Nothing wrong with curve balls. This is all about seeing how bullet-proof it is. If there are flaws, you guys are expected to jump in and say so.

As it stands, we've at least convinced ourselves Smile

H Lee?
OH Lee?

How the hell has that stood the test of time?

The level of backstopping used wouldn't have hed up much longer than the weekend in most other operations.

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 6:32 pm

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The Useless Telephone Numbers

There aren’t many areas of the JFK assassination narrative that are simple and straightforward. Every step one takes the official story is problematic and complicated to understand. The evidence concerning Lee Oswald’s accommodation in Dallas is no different.

Ruth Paine, the woman who would bend over backwards to be of assistance to the FBI after the assassination, would claim during her Warren Commission testimony that Lee Oswald had given her the telephone numbers to both of the rooming houses that he was supposed to be living should Marina wish to contact him. Oswald, we are informed, wanted his wife and her patron to have the contact numbers for a very specific and important purpose. Marina would soon be giving birth to Oswald’s second child, Rachel, and the phone numbers were allegedly given to Paine by Oswald should Marina go into labor and they needed to contact him:

Mr. JENNER. Yes ; now, give it as chronologically as you can ; how you came by that telephone number, the circumstances under which it was given to you.

Mrs. PAINE. He said this is the telephone number.

Mr. JENNER. Was Marina present?

PAINE. Yes. He said of the room where he was staying, renting a room, could reach him here if she went into labor.

Mr. JENNER. I see, the coming of the baby was imminent?

Mrs. PAINE. Yes.

The 621 Marsalis telephone number was never used by Paine (although she says she was given it). Ruth and Marina did not use the 1026 N. Beckley telephone number to contact Lee until November 18 according to Paine, which was almost a month after Rachel was born. The reason expressed was because Marina, being "lonesome", asked Paine to ring it and get Lee on the phone so she could speak to him.

The fable goes that when Ruth Paine eventually called the North Beckley number she asked if she could speak to Lee Oswald and was told by whoever took the call that no such person lived at the address. This was more than a month after Oswald was supposed to have moved in and, on the surface, it seemed to support the idea that Oswald was living some kind of Walter Mitty-like existence whilst separated from his wife. The reason was because he had allegedly registered at the property under an assumed name – O. H. Lee.

There are a number of problems with the story as told by Marina Oswald and Ruth Paine concerning their possession of these phone numbers if we bear in mind the original reason why Oswald first passed them on. The most striking issue is this; if Lee Oswald had given Ruth the telephone numbers to both rooming houses so they could contact him in the event that his second child was on the way, then why did he register at 1026 North Beckley under an assumed name? How was Ruth Paine going to reach him? Surely the thing that happened on November 18 when she called the number, being told that no one called Oswald lived there, would have happened if she called with news of Marina being in labor? The whole thing makes no sense:

Mr. JENNER. Did he give you more than one telephone number?

Mrs. PAINE. Yes.

...

Mr. JENNER - Did he say anything that would indicate to you that you are other than free to call him and ask for him by his surname you knew him by?

Mrs. PAINE - No; he did not make such a limitation.

Mr. JENNER - I take it from your testimony that the number was given to you, at least the discussion was, so that you could call him in connection with the oncoming event of the birth of his child?

Mrs. PAINE - Yes.

Mr. JENNER - Am I correct about this?

Mrs. PAINE - That is correct.

Ruth Paine, the woman who remembered and documented everything important that ever happened to her suddenly had one of her occassional periods of selective amnesia when she was asked when Oswald had given her the numbers:

Mrs. PAINE - He gave me a second number, I suppose by phone, but I don't recall.

Mr. JENNER - When?

Mrs. PAINE - It was certainly before the birth of the baby because again it was so that I could reach him if she went to the hospital.

Oswald, according to the official narrative, registered at the first Oak Cliff rooming house at 621 Marsalis Avenue under his real name, Lee Oswald, on October 7. Ruth Paine says Oswald gave her the telephone number for 621 Marsalis so he could be contacted should his unborn child start making an appearance. However, one week later we are asked to believe that he turned up to a new boarding house and registered under the name O. H. Lee. Why? Oswald still gave the phone number of the rooming house to Paine in the event of Marina giving birth even though it was pretty much useless.

Searching through Marina's recollections on the whole rooming house situation throws up more questions than answers. In an FBI interview that took place at the home of James Martin on December 1, 1963, Marina gave a different date that the Paine phone call to 1026 North Beckley took place, she claimed it was Sunday, November 17, and when she spoke to Oswald and then the next day, on November 18, when Oswald returned her call, after Paine had been told there was no one by the name Lee Oswald living at the rooming house, Marina claimed that Oswald "told [her] to tear his telephone number out of Mrs. Paine's book." Could Oswald have told Marina to rip the Beckley telephone number out of Ruth Paine's book because it was not his number or was something else going on?

Ruth Paine was under the impression that the date of her call to Beckley was Monday, November 18:

Mrs. PAINE - Looking back on it, I thought that there was a call made to him by me on Monday the 18th, but I may be wrong about when it was made.

There is an even more fundamental problem concerning the timings involved in this. During Ruth Paine's testimony she said that Oswald gave her the first telephone number, to the Marsalis boarding house, on the weekend of October 12:

Mr. JENNER - Had you had any information that he was not residing at the YMCA?

Mrs. PAINE - Yes.

Mr. JENNER - How did you come by that information?

Mrs. PAINE - He gave me a telephone number, possibly this same weekend.

Mr. JENNER - That is of importance, Mrs. Paine. Would you give us the circumstances, please?

Mrs. PAINE - He said that he was at a--

Mr. JENNER - Excuse me, where was he when he said this?

Mrs. PAINE - He was at the home so far as I remember. It might have been during one of his telephone calls to the house, but I don't think so. He rarely talked with me when he was out.

Mr. JENNER - This would be the weekend of what?

Mrs. PAINE - So this must have been the weekend of the 12th of October, the same weekend.

The basic problem with Oswald giving the Bledsoe telephone number to Ruth Paine on the weekend of October 12 is very simple. He had, according to the official narrative, already been kicked out by Mary Bledsoe and would only return to the Marsalis address on Monday to pick up his belongings before quickly moving into the Beckley residence. So why would he give Ruth Paine the telephone number of a rooming house he was no longer living at?.

Once we dig beneath the veneer of Ruth Paine’s story there was no absolutely no point in Oswald giving the Bledsoe telephone number to her over the weekend of October 12 if the official version of events is true. Also, there was no point giving her the telephone number to his next rooming house because, as the events described by Ruth Paine when she tried calling it demonstrate, she couldn’t get in touch with him because we are led to believe he wasn’t using his real name.

These unexplained questions may give us an important insight into what was really happening concerning Oswald's accommodation situation but as the evidence put togther by the Warren Commission proves the official narrative makes little sense.

To be continued

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 6:36 pm

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The Hitcher Part II

On the November 17 the official record suggests that Larry Crafard told Jack Ruby he wanted a salary or he was leaving his employ. On November 18 the meeting between Jack Ruby and Earlene Roberts' sister, Bertha Cheek, took place. Little Lynn claimed that Larry Crafard, just before the assassination, was going to have to move out of the Carousel Club. It was around this time that the sightings of "Lee Harvey Oswald" over in Oak Cliff, at times and places where we know it couldn't be the real Oswald, increased.

On November 20 or 21 a refrigeration engineer called Ralph Leon Yates picked up a hitchhiker at the Beckley entrance of the R. L. Thornton Expressway. Yates contacted the FBI on November 26, 1963, and said to them that the hitchhiker was carrying a package and that they discussed the upcoming Presidential visit. Yates said to the hitchhiker that he felt the President might be in danger due to the recent problems concerning the Adlai Stevenson visit. Both he and the hitchhiker discussed the possibility of the President being shot from the window of a building.

Yates said he let the hitchhiker out when he was stopped at the traffic lights of Houston & Elm which is directly in front of the Texas School Book Depository building. According to the FBI reports concerning Ralph Yates' recollections when first interviewed, on Tuesday November 26, he said the hitchhiker asked him about a "party" whose name Yates couldn't recall but the hitchhiker did ask him whether he knew the Carousel Club.

When Yates was interviewed the second time in early December he now remembered the name of the "party" who the hitchhiker asked him about. The name was Jack Ruby. What is interesting is that if you look at the raw FBI interview report (typed version) Yates claims that the hitchhiker asked him if he knew the Carousel Club as soon as he got into the vehicle. On the report are handwritten changes that remove the Carousel Club being mentioned as soon as the driver started to drive away and instead make it appear as though the Carousel Club is mentioned later in the journey. It appears to me that the hitchhiker's destination was the Carousel but was changed to make the Carousel more of a discussion point during the ride. This in one of only two changes to the raw FBI report before it was officially typed up. The other change swaps who it was that brought up the motorcade route. In the original it was Ralph Yates who brought it up. With the change, it was the hitchhiker.

The main reason, prior to the assassination, that Ralph Yates hitchhiker was so memorable was because Yates and one of his colleagues at the Texas Butcher Supply Company, Dempsey Jones, had discussed exactly the same thing that the hitchhiker had discussed with Yates; namely the shooting of the President from a window of a tall building.

During Yates' second FBI interview he suddenly remembered the name of the "party" that the hitchhiker asked him whether he knew. The name was "Jack Ruby." Yates would later retract this in subsequent interviews.

Was Ralph Yates' hitchiker that he picked up in Oak Cliff Larry Crafard?

To be continued

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 8:10 pm

beowulf wrote:Hey Lee, very informative. This O.H. Lee business and that of Larry Crafard are news to me.

To play devil's advocate, an innocent explanation is Crafard's deleted name may have been the WC helping out someone with a complicated personal life. Just a couple months ago doing some research for a case I stumbled over the fact one of the parties (not my client fortunately) was a bigamist. It wasn't relevant to the case so I let sleeping dogs lie.

If a WC lawyer discovered Crafard's sister was, say, legally married to two men (one of whom was a felon), the prudent thing to do would be to redact the husband's name from testimony. Both men could read it (wonder if prison libraries stocked the WC Report) and assume the deleted name was himself. Likewise if Mrs. Carlin had a romantic (or a, umm, pecuniary) relationshp with Crafard, she'd have good reason to play dumb.

Don't mind me, I just like throwing curveballs. Carry on. )

Hi Beowulf,

That's a pretty reasonable explanation of the [deletion] to Crafard's testimony. The fact is that Ingersoll's name does crop up elsewhere in the volumes and my curiosity was aroused due to the possible connections to Chicago, firearm theft, and drug dealing accusations. As I progress posting different elements of the record I am sure a different picture of Larry Crafard will emerge and the pains taken by the Warren Commission to hide some of the background to the Crafard-Ruby relationship and the strange way that Larry both arrived in and left Dallas.

I severely doubt Crafard was involved in any sort of romantic relationship with Carlin. The guy was a creepy dude who, as you will soon see, seemed to be more interested in writing "romantic" letters to his cousin (Gale Ann Cascaddan) back home in Michigan. His romantic relationships or at the very least his distant coveting of women he was interested in are also riddles that just create more confusion. Trying to unravel the shit from the shinola with this guy is a tough job.

Gale Ann Cascaddan had this to say about our friend Larry when she was interviewed by the FBI:

"In summing up her impressions of CRAFARD, Mrs. CASCADDAN said he was "nuts" and he made her "puke." She elaborated on this characterization by stating that CRAFARD was obviously of below average mentality, unreliable, and unpredictable. He was a "loner", drifted around the country from job to job, and had no close friends or associates. He reportedly received an undesirable discharge from the United States Army. He was conceited and frequently bragged of his muscular strength and his "excellent" physique. He claims to have extensive knowledge of judo. To support this latter claim, on occasions he would use a "judo chop" (striking objects with the heel of his hand while fingers are extended and hand held stiff) on the interior wall of a house to show the power of his blow. He told Mrs. CASCADDAN's mother that by continuously snapping his fingers on a woman's breast he could cause the woman so much pain that she would beg him to kill her rather than be further tortured.

Mrs. CASCADDAN further stated that CRAFARD was over-sexed and she never liked to be alone with him. He always wanted to put his hands on her body, smell of her hair, and try to kiss her, despite the fact that she and CRAFARD were first cousins. At times, CRAFARD said he "got the spirit so bad" that he had to pick up the Bible and and read from it. On such occasions, he would read in a mumbling fashion and what he read could not be completely understood by persons listening to him. This conduct on his part was not ostensibly in jest, but suggested religious fanatacism to Mrs. CASCADDAN."

Full Gale Ann Cascaddan interview here (5 pages):
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11589&relPageId=107

Now, whether Karen Carlin had a pecuniary interest with Larry is a different kettle of fish all together. Believe me, there is much more down the Larry Crafard rabbit hole.

To use a final quote from Gale Ann Cascaddan "CRAFARD seemed about as disturbed over the President's assassination as he would be "over killing a cat."

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 8:46 pm

Building nicely, Lee.

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 8:47 pm

I severely doubt Crafard was involved in any sort of romantic relationship with Carlin... Now, whether Karen Carlin had a pecuniary interest with Larry is a different kettle of fish all together.

Was Jack Ruby pimping out his dancers? Not to stereotype strip club owners, but yeah, he owned a strip club. In which case, it'd be cheaper for Ruby to pay Crafard in something other than Federal Reserve Notes.

Thu 05 Sep 2013, 11:19 pm

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

Parking Problems

On March 7, 1964, the FBI received information from confidential informant Dallas T-3 who said that a Mrs. Carnes Nance, an employee of Mobil Oil Company, Dallas, had recently visited a friend of hers who lived next door to 1026 North Beckley.

The friend of Mrs. Nance told her that prior to the assassination of the President she had made complaints because Jack Ruby had been "parking his car in her driveway when he would visit Oswald."

The informant stated that the woman did not report the incidents to the authorities because "she didn't want to become involved in the matter."

The FBI report dealing with the information concerning the possibility that Jack Ruby had been visiting 1026 North Beckley claims that the following neighbours were interviewed in an effort to establish the accuracy of the information:

WILLIAM and LAVADA WILSON, 1022 North Beckley
Mr. & Mrs. G. W. MILLER, 1028 North Beckley
ELLA McNABB, 1030 North Beckley
LEONARD GRISWOLD, 1014 North Beckley

The FBI report states that the above neighbours denied Jack Ruby ever parking in their driveway or seeing him visit 1026 North Beckley. The strange thing is that there are no formal FBI interview reports contained within the volumes regarding the alleged interviews with these neighbours concerning Jack Ruby visiting 1026 North Beckley. In fact, in the FBI report that put a premature end to this part if the investigation it states that the neighbours had been "reinterviewed" to discuss Ruby's car. There are no FBI interviews of the neighbours whatsoever in the Warren Commission volumes. None. There was a complete disinterest in collecting any sort of evidence related to Oswald's stay at this rooming house. No registers were collected. The O. H. Lee receipt was not only left in the possession of Gladys Johnson but she was told she could sell it. There were no expeditious interviews of the other tenants. The neighbours weren't interviewed and when information was given to the FBI concerning Jack Ruby visiting the address the FBI very swiftly swept it under the rug.

When Dallas T-3 was asked to get further information concerning Mrs. Nance's friendship with the 1026 North Beckley neighbour they suddenly backtracked saying it was "probably gossip" and said that under no circumstances should Mrs. Nance be interviewed directly concerning the information because if she was then the informant's job was at risk. So, obligingly, in the investigation of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Mrs. Nance wasn't interviewed and the matter was put to bed.

If it was Jack Ruby's car parked outside of one of 1026 North Beckley's neighbors, then who could Jack have been visiting?

Was there any other connection between Jack Ruby and 1026 North Beckley that was swept under the rug? Simple answer; yes.

To be continued

Fri 06 Sep 2013, 5:57 am

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The Warren Commission Knows

Posted below is the text from a Warren Commission document that I believe is incredibly important because it strongly suggests to me that they had members of the team asking the right questions even if they never found out the answers.

It is an internal WC memorandum from Hubert and Griffin to Ball and Belin. Ball and Belin were the lawyers who would ultimately be responsible for deposing Oswald landlady Mary Bledsoe and Oswald cab driver William Whaley. Whenever I read through these lower level counsellor memos I'm torn between concluding that the less senior lawyers were trying to keep the investigation honest by running down and highlighting the important leads or whether they were simply identifying the weakest plot holes so the more senior counsellors could avoid any bear pits during the hearings. If this information was fleshed out, the questions they suggested asked, and the witnesses examined in relation to the testimony of other witnesses then we would have had a completely different investigation.

Remember, these dynamite leads were being documented in March, 1964 and they knew full well that Larry Crafard was being mistaken for Oswald all over Dallas as we will shortly begin to see.

What did Belin and Ball do with this information?

Absolutely nothing.

Virtually none of the questions posed in the memo were asked and none of the evidence asked for was collected:

MEMORANDUM

March 10, 1964

To: Mr. Joseph A. Ball
Mr. David W. Belin

FROM: Leon D. Hubert Jr.
Burt W. Griffin

SUBJECT: The testimony of Mary Bledsoe and William Wayne Whaley

1. Mary Bledsoe. In light of our memorandum of March 6th and our previous conversations with respect to Earlene Roberts, Mrs. Bledsoe should be carefully examined to ascertain the following:

a. Whether or not Oswald’s pattern of activities as a roomer while at the Bledsoe house differ in any particular respect from his pattern of activities as described by Mrs. Roberts and Mrs. Johnson at 1026 N. Beckley

b. Any information Mrs. Bledsoe may have as to how Oswald happened to locate the room at 1026 N. Beckley. (General) impression that some people have that Oswald found the room at 1026 N. Beckley though a newspaper advertisement or sign seems inconsistent with the statement of Mrs. Johnson, that, when Oswald first inquired concerning a room, she told him that she had none available, except for the room next to Mrs. Roberts which she ordinarily did not rent, but when he returned a second time, she agreed to make it available.)

c. Whether or not Mrs. Bledsoe knew of any difficulties that Oswald was experiencing finding another place to live.

d. Whether or not Mrs. Bledsoe had communicated her dissatisfaction or knowledge of Oswald to any other persons including, especially, others who operated rooming houses.

e. Whether Mrs. Bledsoe was at any time aware of Oswald’s background prior to the assassination of President Kennedy.

f. The familiarity of rooming house operators in the Oak Cliff area with one another and Mrs. Bledsoe’s acquaintanceship with Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, Earlene Roberts, and any other persons whom she may specify, (especially Bertha Cheeks) who operate rooming houses. In this regard, it would not be wise to specifically mention the name of Bertha Cheeks.

g. Whether or not Mrs. Bledsoe knows or rents to any persons who are employees or patrons of the Carousel Club or who are friends or associates of Jack Ruby, or who are employees or patrons of the Vegas Club. Also, friends or George Senator, Ralph Paul, or Eva Grant.

h. Any interviews she may have had on TV or radio, including the date, time, person and station doing the interviewing, place of the interview and approximate time that the interview was shown on TV or heard on radio.

i. Her own activities in detail from the time she saw Oswald on November 22nd until Ruby shot Oswald. The purpose of this would be to ascertain how the police came to learn about her, the extent to which her testimony may now be colored by pressure from friends, the police, or the press and to provide a standard of comparison against the conduct of Earlene Roberts after the shooting of President Kennedy.

j. All of her rooming house records covering the period September 26, to date. The purpose here is to enable us to ascertain whether anyone who lived at the Bledsoe house when Oswald did could form a link to either Ruby or the 1026 N. Beckley house.

k. Oswald’s habits with respect to telephone calls, eating meals (including any places Mrs. Bledsoe knew of where he did eat); laundry and dress, (there is evidence that Oswald had occasion to have a white shirt laundered, and a tie and a pair of pants pressed which would indicate that while he was working at the Schoolbook Depository, he was enjoying some night life or visiting under circumstances where it would be necessary to have some sort of semi-formal attire); his habits with respect to buying or reading newspapers (in that regard if Oswald was not observed to have newspapers at the Bledsoe residence, it would indicate that he had access to and was reading them either at work or at the home of some associate, since Oswald seems to have been a person who would keep himself informed habitually. If the people at the Texas School Book Depository did not testify to his habit of reading a newspaper, there would be a strong indication that Oswald did make the practice of spending some time every day away from his rooming house and job with other people).

2. William Wayne Whaley. Whaley has stated that he was acquainted with Jack Ruby prior to Ruby’s killing Oswald. Although we do not suggest that Whaley may be linked to Ruby in any kind of conspiratorial plot, his knowledge of Ruby suggests that, if Ruby were involved in any sort of plot wherein Oswald were to be a dupe, a conspiratorial group might have used Larry Crafard (who many persons state closely resembled Oswald) as a deliberate decoy, or that Crafard himself may be the real assassin and that, fortuitously, both Crafard and Oswald happened to take taxicabs. In that regard, it might be considered that an assassin or conspirator in a plot to assassinate the President who was not detained for any period in the Schoolbook Depository, as was Oswald, might very well have entered a cab at 12:30 PM making the trip that Whaley claims Oswald took. To gain more evidence with respect to this possibility, investigation should be undertaken by:

a. Carefully questioning Whaley with respect to his identification of Oswald including questioning as to identifying scars, marks, dress which might distinguish between Oswald and Crafard or any other persons who may resemble Oswald.

b. A check of taxi company record to ascertain whether or not any persons were picked up in the Oak Cliff—Jack Ruby residential area and driven to the vicinity of the Carousel Club between 12:30 and 1:30 PM on November 22nd.

c. An examination of bus schedules in the in the Jack Ruby – Oak Cliff residential area to determine possibility of picking up a bus to return to the Carousel Club before 1:30 PM.

Note: With response to the lines of inquiry suggested by a, b, and c above, we are aware that the Dallas Police records indicate that Oswald admitted that he had taken a taxi ride as Whaley says he did; nevertheless, there remains the possibility that Whaley’s passenger was Crafard and not Oswald, and that therefore the Dallas Police record is incorrect or that Oswald admitted the episode only after being told about it and in an effort to further complicate the situation; or that both Oswald and Crafard took taxi rides, but in fact Crafard was Whaley’s passenger.

3. Bledsoe and Whaley together with all other governmental witnesses should be asked the general question whether anyone has given them information concerning Jack Ruby, Lee Oswald, or associates of either one. If the answer is in the affirmative, the witness should then be interviewed after testifying before the Commission to gather all information that may have been passed on to that person, including the sources of such information and approximate time the information was provided.

**************END OF MEMO**********************

In addition to the above memo from March 10 there was a different memo sent from Burt Griffin to J. Lee Rankin on March 12, 1964. In it he asks for the following:

a. Obtain copies of registration records for rooming houses of Mrs. Bledsoe and Mrs. Johnson for the period September 26, 1963 to January 1, 1964 and identify all other rooming house records presently retained by Mrs. Bledsoe and Mrs. Johnson.

b. Details as to persons whom Oswald could have expected to be present at 1026 N. Beckley when he returned after the assassination on November 22nd.

c. Detailed statement of the activities of Bertha Cheek and Earlene Roberts on November 21, 22, 23, 24, and 25 to be provided by deposition or interrogation before the Commission.

d. Determination of police cars in the vicinity of 1026 N. Beckley Street at 1 PM on November 22, 1963, including car 207.

e. Detailed statements rfom Mr. Johnson, Mrs. Johnson and Mrs. Roberts concerning their activities and communications between the time Oswald returned to the North Beckley address and Mr. Johnson called the Dallas Police Department to inform the police that he had seen Oswald's picture on television.

f. Handwriting evaluation of piece of paper turned over to the Dallas police by Mrs. Roberts on which she claims Lee Oswald wrote the name O. H. Lee and which she used to maintain the account for O. H. Lee. Also, determination of whether or not it was a normal practice to keep accounts on a scrap of paper such as the one in question.***************END OF QUOTE*********************

Other than the FBI and the Dallas Police going out of their way to muddy the waters on item (d.) above concerning the police cars around Beckley after the assassination, nothing whatsoever was done concerning any of the other points and as we have already seen Gladys Johnson turned up to the Warren Commission with worthless evidence in her purse and was allowed to walk out with it too but on item (f.) above Griffin seems to have different information to us. He is claiming Johnson handed over the scrap of paper to the DPD when during her own testimony she stated that she was told she could keep it to sell.

Not only were no questions whatsoever asked about whether writing on scrap paper was her "normal practice to keep accounts" but the scrap of paper was not subjected to handwriting analysis according to the record but Joseph Ball let her keep it.

To be continued

Fri 06 Sep 2013, 9:45 am

The following observations are offered as Devil’s advocacy. They are not intended to refute anything presented by Lee, but to help bandy the topic back and forth, in hopes that thorough discussion helps us to arrive at a persuasive and accurate conclusion. I think that’s everyone’s goal.

Re: Crafard’s discharge for (possible) homosexuality:

An admittedly cursory scan of the attached reveals that depending upon the nature of the (homosexual) act, commanding officers of the day had some latitude in how to proceed with charges. In no case was homosexuality allowable, outlawed by the Army for the sake of the troops’ “morale.” The “next thing to a medical discharge," as Crafard puts it, is likely a psych discharge. As homosexuality was still considered a mental disorder then, it could result in just such a discharge.

http://www.whs.mil/library/mildoc/AR%20635-89%2015%20July%201966.pdf

Having said that, it’s only one of numerous possible grounds for a less than honourable discharge. And, to my knowledge, we do thus far have only one person claiming Crafard was cashiered early under some kind of cloud.

Re: Rental Anomalies:

Lee notes:

“The Warren Commission, to its eternal shame, did not ever produce the definitive list of names that were staying at the property over October and November, 1963. The list we do have was, I believe, put together by researchers over the years.”

Couldn’t agree more. But this next comment seems discordant:

“Therefore, if the list we have is complete then the house wasn't full, so why was Lee Oswald allegedly given not only the smallest room in the house but also a room that was never usually rented out?”

The first statement accurately stipulates that the Commission never compiled a definitive list of Beckley tenants, and that what little we do know of the tenants is based upon researchers' efforts.

The second statement is predicated on "if the list we have is complete," which the prior statement has already acknowledged is almost certainly not the case.

But it needn’t have been the case, for DPD showed an interest in the paperwork the Commission did not seek out, as testified to by the landlady’s husband, A.C. Johnson:

Mr. Belin: What did they say?

Mr. Johnson: Well, they wanted to see the records, and we showed them--the register, I mean--and we showed them the register. And then they searched his room.

Mr. Belin: You showed them the register with this name of O. H. Lee?

Mr. Johnson: That's right.

Irrespective of the number of rooms in the house, A.C. Johnson was asked about tenancy and said that when they’re full - which presumes that they were at least sometimes, contrary to his wife’s statement - “..we have 17.”

Where he did agree with his wife, it came in answer to the question whether the house had been full in the prior six months, to which he replied in the negative. It is also apparent from his testimony that A.C. was less involved in the running of the rooming house than his wife had been. And even more apparent that the house HAD been full within the prior six months:

Mr. Belin:   When he first came, were you all full at that time or not--or don't you know?

Mr. Johnson: I believe that--uh--the little room. he took was the only room available at that time.

No questions were asked about roommates or more than one person sharing a room, so we don’t know how flexible that “17" number is. But Mr. Johnson said they had 17 rooms for rent which translated into 17 tenants in a full house.

If this suggests that H.L. Lee and James Watson were never roommates, that might also explain why only one of the two men admitted it. Given the “crimes against nature” statutes that prevailed at the time, this may also explain the second man’s reluctance to admit having so casual a roommate to FBI or police. (A.C. Johnson will soon also give us many other interesting details.)

Moreover, is it not unusual for a landlady to refuse a prospective tenant when she has spare rooms to let? Did she not want his money? If Gladys Johnson refused to rent a room to Oswald when he first applied for one, we must presume that she had no such room to rent.

And that is precisely what she claimed in testimony, as did her husband:

“...the first time, he told me he wanted a room and I told him I was very sorry, I just rented the last room and he said he was very sorry, he wanted to get near his work and he didn't have a car and it being on the bus line, he was sorry he missed it.”

If she, as Bledsoe purportedly did, had some personal disdain for Oswald (because he gave her a poor impression, for example), she certainly didn't balk at renting him a room later, when one came available. We must presume that Oswald struck her as he did most others, polite to a fault and well-spoken, or she would have continued to tell him she had no vacant rooms. On the contrary, when Gladys Johnson first told him no room was available, she told him to watch for a “room for rent” sign and she’d rent the very next vacancy to him. Which is pretty much what seems to have happened. (A.C. said Oswald “..was nice enough, I'd say, as a roomer because he always kept his room nice and he was very well- behaved.”)

(She also referred ever so briefly in testimony to having run ads in the local paper, the number and frequency of which might help to determine the the dates of the vacancy rate.)

Further still, it seems that rooms in her house must have been at a premium, because when Oswald finally did move in, it was into an unsuitably tiny room that was not usually available for rent, because Gladys Johnson reserved it for grandchildren when they visited. And she wanted it available for that purpose, so they struck a compromise:

“I said I only have the small room and he looked at it and said, "I will take this room with the understanding I can have a larger room at the time you have one go vacant"

Despite her testimony that there were usually rooms vacant at all times, it seems not to have been the case when Oswald first showed up, nor did it change dramatically in the interim, because when he did move in, it was into a room not usually available for rental. If other rooms were vacant, why did she put him there? She and her husband testified uniformly that when he first came, they had no rooms, and that when he came a second time, only the smallest room was free to rent.

She testified that a few other rooms thereafter did become vacant. She offered to show them to him, but he demurred.

“I had other vacancies which in just 2 or 3 days I had two or three more accommodations go vacant, so I told him I had other accommodations that are larger and he said, "I find this room to be light and comfortable." It was four windows on the outside wall; it was all light. He said, "I find it to be light and comfortable and worth the money, you don't mind, I will remain in this room."

It was also cheaper than a larger room, proving Oswald’s frugality was unchanged.

If Johnson first denied Oswald a room, and then thereafter rented him the smallest one. I suggest it is for the very reason both Johnsons alleged: there were no other vacancies, a possibility that exists for our consideration only because, as Lee points out, the Commission failed to procure from Johnson any of the pertinent bookkeeping paperwork to ascertain the truth. Paperwork the DPD had already examined, per A.C. Johnson, though the Commission seemed disinterested.

When Mrs. Johnson did address the vacancy rate, she said that it had suffered as a result of the Oswald connection. “[P]eople are funny about things like that, you know.” One imagines there are such people, who predictably steered well clear of her boarding house. It seems an outcome she might have anticipated, leading one to wonder why she courted financial hardship by falsely claiming Oswald had been her tenant. Assuming, arguendo, that Oswald had never been a tenant at her Beckley boarding house, which is what we’re presently mulling.

We must also note in passing that in Oswald’s highly idiosyncratic phone book, there is a scribble that says “Dallas Rooming House” beneath which we see a scratched out entry saying “Mrs. M. Bledsoe” and her legitimate phone number: WH 2-1985. Both have been scribbled over in pencil, presumably because they were no longer pertinent. Beside this entry, we find “WH 3-8993" which number was registered to Mrs. A. C. Johnson - 1026 N. Beckley in Dallas. If Oswald was never a tenant there, why do we see the rooming house phone number in his hand entered into his book? And why is it under the heading “Dallas Rooming House?”

O.H. Lee and other oddities:

I cannot help Lee decipher the peculiarities regarding the tenancy of H.L. Lee or J. D. Watson, nor did authorities seem to try terribly hard when it might have been of help.

However, there are a couple of highly oddball stipulations in the record that might be worth noting. We are told by Oswald himself during interrogation - assuming we can accept what was presented, but not recorded by tape or stenographer - that he did not register at Johnson’s boarding house under O.H. Lee, and that this was merely the result of a misunderstanding on Glady’s Johnson’s part. Perhaps.

Alternative suggestions include that Oswald deliberately employed an alias to preclude being found and harassed by the FBI. But there is no record that at the time he rented the room he’d had any contact with FBI since 1962, save for the New Orleans arrest when he asked to speak with FBI. Given that his last encounter with the Bureau had been voluntary, one is puzzled to think he may wish to elude them for some reason, several weeks prior to the known attempts by SA Hosty to locate and question him in Dallas. Why hide from people who aren’t looking for you?

The necessity for an alias seems spurious, and only becomes more so the more one delves into it.

Certainly, the testimony given on this by both wife Marina and Ruth Paine indicated he was displeased at them trying to call him at the Beckley house specifically because he “was using a false name.”

However, even the briefest pause for thought illustrates that if a man expects to be using a false name, he does not then provide the phone number at which he can be reached without advising the person to whom he gives the number that he’s not registered under his real name.

It is a self-defeating gambit to do otherwise. Either the caller will be turned away, as was reputedly the case in this instance, meaning there is no point in giving them the number, or the person answering the phone might realize the person being sought has registered under an assumed name, the very thing one is seeking to avoid.

We have another anomaly here:

Mrs. PAINE - “Whether he called that Saturday or whether he had called Sunday, I am not certain. Indeed, I am not certain but what he had called the very day, had already called and talked with Marina the very day that I then, at her request, tried to reach him at the number he had given. me, with his number in my telephone book.”

Did her telephone book contain a listing for Oswald at WH 3-8993?

A reference to Harold Weisberg’s large list of possibly relevant phone numbers (82 single spaced pages) and search for the name PAINE within it reveals that 89 citations on that list were numbers taken from Ruth Paine’s phone notebook. None of them is WH 3-8993.

Doing a similar search by that number reveals only one listing: “LHO addr. book 16/42: Also; Kantor notes 20/360. Phone number at Beckley St. Apt. Mrs. A. C. Johnson, 1026 N. Beckley, Dallas.”

Doing a search for the phone number at Mary Ferrell’s site draws a complete blank. A similar search at NARA, likewise.

If Ruth Paine’s personal phone notebook is not among Commission exhibits, this may offer one reason for the omission.

It is possible, though unlikely, that this is a number missed by Weisberg in his search of Paine’s book. It is possible that it was a phone number jotted down elsewhere other than in her book. Yet she DID say “his number in my telephone book.”

Without access to Paine’s phone records for the pertinent period, there is no way to certify that Ruth placed that call to Oswald’s boarding house, and as a local call it may not even be possible to determine. There is also absolutely no reason to believe that she did.

In her testimony Ruth maintained that a man had answered when she called for Oswald at the Beckley Street boarding house. He did not know the name Oswald, and said no such person was there.

Given the alleged time of the purported call in the evening, and that A.C. Johnson would be the likeliest male to answer the phone in that house, it is odd to note Commission counsel never queried A.C. as to whether there had ever been a call from a woman asking to speak to a man named Oswald. There is no guarantee that A.C. would necessarily have remembered such an incident, but the question should have been posed to him in any event, as questions that are not asked can never be answered.

(While still on the topic of A.C., he made some other highly revealing comments.

* He claimed that he and his wife had first heard of the assassination from a police officer named Nicholson who worked for the Cotton Belt Railroad. Along with the police officers known by Earlene Roberts, for some of whom she did laundry, it seems that the boarding house may have had some regular police visitos.

* When they heard on the radio that the President had died, the Johnsons went home from their restaurant, which took about 5 minutes. Within a half hour or so later - around 1:30 pm, the very time attested to by his wife and by Earlene Roberts - police showed up looking for “Lee Harvey Oswald.” They had no search warrant, but later obtained one.

* It is interesting that there was no doubt about the man’s name, and that police didn’t ask anything about an A.J. Hidell, presumably indicating the raid of the Beckley home occurred before Oswald’s arrest.

* It is also quite telling that when A.C. was asked how police had managed to locate the suspect’s home (even before they allegedly knew the suspect they were seeking), he said: “"Well, uh--after he was--uh--apprehended out there searched him and found my address in his pocket “ So it is thought prudent by an assassin to lodge under an assumed name so authorities cannot find him, yet carry his own address on his person as though he otherwise may not recall it himself? If such a piece of paper was found on Oswald when arrested, police could not possibly have been at the Beckley house nearly a half hour before that arrest took place.

* There is no mention of Oswald having such a note on his person. There may, however, have been such a note in the wallet found at the Tippit scene, which may explain the arrival of police at the Beckley home even before they’d been called to the Texas Theatre. If such a note existed, it should have been entered into evidence, thereby eliminating dark suspicions about how police could arrive so quickly at a suspect’s home when they had no apparent way to know his address. But in so doing, police would have to have admitted they found an “Oswald” wallet at the Tippit murder scene, which became a sinister excess when Oswald was arrested in possession of his own wallet.   I also argue that ALL of the spurious “Hidell” ID originated in the Tippit murder scene wallet, which is why the “Hidell” ID only came into play once the Mannlicher Carcano had been traced to a buy named Hidell at Oswald’s PO box.)

* It is also possible that police had some other, still undetermined method of knowing Oswald’s address on Beckley, and misinformed A.C. about the non-existent note of his address they claimed to have found upon him. They needed to give him some kind of reason to explain their uncanny ability to arrive there within only an hour or so of the assassination. The note may have simply been an improvised alibi.

Police & Commission Intransigence:

Lee said:

“Surely there would be one for a Mr. H. Lee as well? Why wasn't she asked for it and why weren't the Warren Commission concerned in the slightest that there was another tenant there using the one of the same initials and the same surname? Neither the Dallas Police or the FBI ever took possession of the register.”

This seems to presume DPD, FBI and/or the Commission had an apparent interest in locating a co-conspirator, part of the very conspiracy they were all anxious to avoid. One cannot expect them to launch a search for a conspirator while they’re busily ignoring any and all signs of conspiracy. And reassuring others, constantly, that only one man had done the deed, and they had him dead to rights. They had, I would argue, no such apparent interest.

I share Lee’s anger over the deplorable shallowness of interest displayed. But given their common untenable situation, I would expect any internal interest displayed by subordinate employees of DPD, FBI and/or junior Commission staff to be foreshortened. As an example, the two counsel tasked with learning all that was knowable about Jack Ruby were themselves excluded from being present during Ruby’s testimony. Such incidents, and they are numerous, are not accidental. The Commission’s own appointed “experts” were excluded from the investigation of that on which they are experts.

Expecting a more thorough investigation under these circumstances is unrealistic, no matter how deplorable. That said, if A.C. Johnson was truthful, we know DPD at least looked at the tenants’ registry his wife maintained. And the Commission, undoubtedly aware of said fact, neglected to request either the registry or what DPD had divined about it.

Ownership of Evidence:

“Why did the FBI or Dallas Police not take this evidence on 11/22? Why was it not subjected to handwriting analysis and fingerprinting? Why was this the only "receipt" placed into evidence (and a photocopy at that)? Why was Johnson allowed to keep such important evidence to "sell?"

Again, much as I share Lee’s abhorrence, we cannot really express much surprise. Whether it’s a page from Bledsoe’s calendar, a slip of paper signed by “OH Lee,” home movies of the assassination, and what have you, as the Aus Midnight Oil asked: “Who can stand in the way when there’s a dollar to be made.”

Recently, I heard tell “Oswald’s” bathtub and toilet were being sold, and even the burial plot next to his has long since been snapped up by an ultimate opportunist whose head stone reads: “Nick Beef.” He bought it years ago for the date when he’ll need it. Where there are collectors with money, there will be artifacts for sale.

In this case, I find the purported artifact puzzling. When a tenant pays rent, the tenant is given a receipt to prove payment has been made.

What scrap of paper does a landlady need signed by a tenant? I do not argue that she had no such paper, necessarily, because she presented one from her purse. But what purpose was served by such an item? What was it intended to verify or signify? What, in short, required a tenant’s signature to be affixed? If the provenance is open to question, so is the purpose it was meant to serve.

Early Arrival of Authorities:

Gladys Johnson testified that police arrived to search for Oswald at around 1:30 pm, give or take a few minutes. Likewise, Earlene Roberts testified that police showed in a similar time frame, as did A.C. Johnson. It is possible they are all mistaken. But it is likelier, I would suggest, that all are correct about the anomalous early arrival - before police could possibly have known where Oswald resided - because an unknown source had informed police of the Beckley boarding house.

Recall Roberts’ testimony about the arrival in front of the boarding house of a police car shortly after Oswald arrived to change clothes. By that event we already have precedent to believe somebody connected to the force knew of Oswald’s living arrangements. And even if that police car was there for some other purpose unrelated to Oswald, we can still discern that police where directed toward such interest in Oswald by anonymous informant(s).

Recall the chase that led DPD toward a library and the Abundant Life Temple, neither of which seemed to bear fruit. While they may have been tips from citizens wishing to appear helpful, in the absence of demonstrable evidence one cannot accept that with any certainty.

Recall the anomaly of DPD arriving en masse at the Texas Theatre and assuming the culprit was in the balcony, per this radio bulletin:

DPD dispatch 1:45 pm: “Have information a suspect just went in the Texas Theater on West Jefferson ... supposed to be hiding in balcony.”

Julia Postal, whose phone call to DPD presumably altered police that a suspect was in her theatre, said nothing about him being in the balcony. Nor could she, for she had seen no such thing with her own eyes, nor had she been told such a thing by anyone else. Yet, officers entering the front of the theatre stormed the balcony, and according to some of the subsequent police reports, effected an arrest there.

There is an anomaly because whatever shoe store employee Johnny Brewer told Julia Postal, it couldn’t have included a reference to the balcony, since he’d gone inside to locate the suspect he was pursuing, and having checked the balcony to no avail, he wouldn’t have told Postal that the suspect’s location was in the balcony. Even if we somehow posit against the known evidence that Brewer nipped inside the theatre and saw his suspect, that man was located on the ground floor, not the balcony.

Yet police attention was focused there, and remained so. The DPD Tippit homicide report stipulates that the "suspect was later arrested in the balcony of the Texas Theater at 231 W. Jefferson." Likewise, the after action report from Lt. Stringfellow stipulates the same thing: “Oswald was arrested in the balcony of the Texas Theater."

The purpose of the foregoing about the arrest and “balcony” is simply to indicate that yet again we see evidence of an unknown informant providing police with locations that are not congruent with information given by known persons in the public record.

(For that matter, it would continue even after Oswald’s death, when unknown person(s) directed police attention to Dial Ryder and Hutchison’s market, indicating - to my mind at least - that an unknown party or parties informed police about witnesses who did not themselves come forward or volunteer their tales. This strange pattern, I submit, includes tips leading to the presciently early arrival of police at the Beckley boarding house. I further submit that such tips were provided for the very purpose of giving police evidence they hadn’t found or would not find on their own. But then, it must be asked, who was in a position to know about witnesses and artifacts when police did not? How does this invisible hand know where police must be directed?)

I am gratified that Lee has returned and continues to challenge both the discredited official version, and our own imaginations. As this thread continues, I may have more observations to contribute.

Fri 06 Sep 2013, 7:19 pm

Roberto,

That's a reasonable summary of the pros and cons of the case re Nth Beckley. On balance, I think the case is still stronger that he was not living there.

I am taken with your idea that the address came from the "throwdown" wallet at Tippit site.

"He had it in his wallet"... maybe this indicates he was supposed to have THAT wallet planted on him...?

Sat 07 Sep 2013, 12:14 am

Robert Charles-Dunne wrote:
Further still, it seems that rooms in her house must have been at a premium, because when Oswald finally did move in, it was into an unsuitably tiny room that was not usually available for rent, because Gladys Johnson reserved it for grandchildren when they visited. And she wanted it available for that purpose, so they struck a compromise:

“I said I only have the small room and he looked at it and said, "I will take this room with the understanding I can have a larger room at the time you have one go vacant"

It was also cheaper than a larger room, proving Oswald’s frugality was unchanged.

Hi Robert,

Thank you for reading through and providing such a detailed and thought provoking response. A lot of what you have written has got the brain cells turning. Some aspects of what you have written I struggle to accept given the full array of evidence we have. I will be replying to specific pieces of your post over the coming days as I am less than half way through posting my own overview.

One thing that the other members here might find interesting is the following that related to Oswald allegedly taking the small room at 1026 North Beckley. Gladys Johnson was interviewed concerning a phone call for Oswald that was supposedly made on Friday, November 15, 1963, to her boarding house from Wisconsin. During Johnson's interview with the FBI she said this:

“1.b. On the weekend in question, beginning Friday evening, November 15, 1963, OSWALD was in residence throughout the weekend to Monday morning when he left for work. Mrs. JOHNSON said she has a distinct recollection of this as she had checked OSWALD’s room at about 6:30 P.M. Friday, November 15, 1963, to see whether the room might be available for use of her grandchildren on that weekend. She was astonished to find OSWALD there, and in her astonishment commented: “Oh! You’re not going to Irving this weekend!” OSWALD did not say a word. Mrs. JOHNSON quickly withdrew from his room.”

No wonder the room was cheap. I just find all this harder and harder to believe. "Astonished!" The only thing astonishing about this case is the amount of shit we're expected to swallow. Let's hope the .38 revolver wasn't under his pillow over the weekends, eh?

The specifics of the phone call from Wisconsin will be posted later this evening.

Sat 07 Sep 2013, 12:57 am

The idea that the address was in Hidell wallet at the shooting scene explains a lot. If Oswald was not the shooter, it makes sense gunman would drop Hidell wallet next to Tippit's body, this in turn explains the absurdity of the Hidell photo ID draft card. As LHO (the supposed forger) knew, draft cards never had photos but conspirators needed a photograph to link Hidell identity to LHO. On the other hand, if Oswald WAS the shooter, he's not going to frame himself. Perhaps it was Tippit who had the wallet and the mission of dropping it next to Oswald's dead body but Lee got the drop on him. To completely box the compass, its possible wallet was dropped by neither shooter nor Tippit but by a third party first responder (not necessarily a cop, didn't ambulance grab and go with Tippit before police even got there)?

Finally the below makes me consider that if this were Korea, I'd be obliged to ask Lee Farley if he was any relation to Lee Oswald. Surprised

)
--------------------
Lee said:
“Surely there would be one for a Mr. H. Lee as well? Why wasn't she asked for it and why weren't the Warren Commission concerned in the slightest that there was another tenant there using the one of the same initials and the same surname?

Sat 07 Sep 2013, 1:00 am

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

Oshkosh by Gosh

A strange piece of information was relayed to the Milwaukee FBI Field Office a couple of days after Jack Ruby killed Lee Oswald.

The story goes like this. On Friday November 15, 1963, a telephone operator, I believe by the name of Miss PETERSEN, received a flash on her switchboard where she worked at the telephone exchange in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. She answered the call and believed that someone from a hotel or motel switchboard told her that she had a credit card call. She was then switched to a man who wanted to call person to person with Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas, and this man gave her a telephone number that when interviewed by the FBI she could not recall. She stated she rang the number in Dallas and and a woman answered stating, "A. H. Johnson residence." The operator then asked for Lee Harvey Oswald, and there seemed to be some discussion because Mrs. Johnson seemed to think the operator had asked for someone by the name of OSTWALD. The operator was then told that there was an OSWALD living there at that address, and it was at that point that the operator completed the call and switched out of the conversation.

Miss PETERSEN said she could specifically remember this call because HARVEY was the name of the husband of one of her colleagues (Sophie Luebke) who was working with her that night and she distinctly remembered the three names LEE HARVEY OSWALD.

The FBI interviewed Sophie Luebke who was unable to remember this call by PETERSEN but as per the curiosity of the FBI concerning this case the simple question concerning whether Luebke's husband's name was Harvey remained unasked and unanswered.

PETERSEN went on to state that as soon as the call was finished by the caller he flashed her again and told her that he had another call to make which she believed was to a VICTORIA, or possibly AUGUSTA, middle name MARINA and last name of SOWVITSCHKA or something to that effect. He gave her a telephone number in Irving, Texas, and when she asked for the person she says she made a mess of the surname and the gentleman on the line laughed and said "Just ask for Marina." There was some conversation in a language that was definitely not Spanish, French or German. The entire period of the calls lasted 7-12 minutes and she had no idea where the telephone call originated from.

However, we do know that it was from somewhere in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Miss PETERSEN's supervisor told the FBI that when she was first informed of the story she did believe it. Miss PETERSEN was, according to her supervisor, a complete introvert who very rarely spoke to anybody but after hearing the story for the third time she told the FBI that she thought PETERSEN had made it up because she could recall details that she did not mention when she first told it. One interesting aspect of the story is that we do not know exactly when PETERSEN first informed her superiors. The FBI interviewed her on 11/26 but PETERSEN was alleged to have first told her own supervisor, who then informed someone higher up in the company, who then informed the FBI before they came out to interview her. So the original conversation to her supervisor could have been 11/23, 11/24, 11/25 or 11/26 but, for some reason, we are not told.

The FBI's response was to only pursue this matter if it turns out that Oswald was as home on 11/15/63 to receive such a call. Well, he was allegedly at home, and they didn't pursue it after speaking with Johnson and Roberts..

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=62267&relPageId=137

Now, why do I think this is important? This call to the North Beckley rooming house was from Oshkosh, Milwaukee.

During the testimony of Earl Ruby, Jack's brother, he was specifically asked about a phone call that he made to Oshkosh, Wisconsin, on November 1, 1963 on behalf of his brother. After initially claiming ignorance and after prompting by counsel that the call was to a very specific company called Triangle Manufacturing Co., Earl Ruby told the Commission that the call was concerning ball bearings for the Twist Boards that Jack wanted to manufacture and sell.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=62267&relPageId=137

There is evidence in the record that Triangle Manufacturing did in fact make the ball bearings that were used in the Twist Boards and I guess we have to swallow a huge coincidence if the phone call to 1026 North Beckley came from Oshkosh, WI, two weeks after Earl Ruby is phoning the exact same place concerning purchasing parts to manufacture a novelty item that Jack wanted to begin making.

When the FBI contacted the owner of 1026 North Beckley, Mrs. Gladys Johnson, a week later, regarding the alleged call from Oshkosh, Wisconsin came out with a very interesting comment that I don't believe has been discussed by any other researcher before.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?mode=searchResult&absPageId=329343

“1.b. On the weekend in question, beginning Friday evening, November 15, 1963, OSWALD was in residence throughout the weekend to Monday morning when he left for work. Mrs. JOHNSON said she has a distinct recollection of this as she had checked OSWALD’s room at about 6:30 P.M. Friday, November 15, 1963, to see whether the room might be available for use of her grandchildren on that weekend. She was astonished to find OSWALD there, and in her astonishment commented: “Oh! You’re not going to Irving this weekend!” OSWALD did not say a word. Mrs. JOHNSON quickly withdrew from his room.”

So we are now led to believe that in Oswald’s absence Gladys Johnson shanghaied his room for her grandchildren to sleep in even though she is on record stating that the rooming house was not full, was never full, and so therefore had spare bedrooms available for her grandchildren to sleep in but she preferred to use one that was occupied by a tenant on his absence who, we are told, had a .38 revolver under his pillow. Seems safe!

This was a rooming house that rented to transients that arrived in Dallas from all over the country who had God knows what in their rooms? Pornography? Hypodermic syringes? Cannabis? Liquor? Firearms? “Come on, Kids! This strange man’s room is free. Get yourself into bed and don’t be rooting through any of his stuff, okay?”

Also contained in the report into the Oshkosh call is the following:

“2.b. It is noted that the telephone number in question was a person to person call to LEE HARVEY OSWALD at the Beckley address. Mrs. JOHNSON advised that OSWALD was known at the JOHNSON residence only as O. H. LEE. Mrs. JOHNSON said that she had not associated OSWALD with her guest O. H. LEE until she had seen OSWALD on television following his arrest – this after local officers had checked the guest register for about 30 minutes trying to identify someone among the tenants as OSWALD, and, failing to do so until his appearance on television when Mrs. JOHNSON identified him as her guest, O. H. LEE.”

So, the DPD spent 30 minutes looking through a register of names to identify someone as Oswald and they didn't think two people with the surname of LEE could have possibly been LEE OSWALD?

We are instead spoon-fed a narrative that states the marrying up of Oswald and O. H. Lee was done by either Mr. Johnson or Mrs. Johnson seeing Oswald's photo on TV and declaring "That's our Mr. Lee."

To be continued

Sat 07 Sep 2013, 1:11 am

beowulf wrote:Finally the below makes me consider that if this were Korea, I'd be obliged to ask Lee Farley if he was any relation to Lee Oswald. )
--------------------
Lee said:
“Surely there would be one for a Mr. H. Lee as well? Why wasn't she asked for it and why weren't the Warren Commission concerned in the slightest that there was another tenant there using the one of the same initials and the same surname?

It's possible I suppose, Beowulf. Mad as Hell

I think where I'm coming from is that we are expected to believe that the Dallas Police were stood around Gladys Johnson's house for some undetermined length of time twiddling their thumbs as some unidentified detectives repeatedly scoured through a tenants register (that was never collected as evidence) looking for the name Lee Oswald and repeatedly skipped over "Mr. Lee" and then repeatedly skipped over "Mr. Lee."

I suppose I have higher expectations of any detective who has the ability to read. Instead, while they're all sat around having a cup of tea exhausted from repeatedly looking over 20 names, Mr. or Mrs. Johnson tie the case up by seeing Mr. Lee on TV. Case closed.

Sat 07 Sep 2013, 2:03 am

beowulf wrote:I severely doubt Crafard was involved in any sort of romantic relationship with Carlin... Now, whether Karen Carlin had a pecuniary interest with Larry is a different kettle of fish all together.

Was Jack Ruby pimping out his dancers? Not to stereotype strip club owners, but yeah, he owned a strip club. In which case, it'd be cheaper for Ruby to pay Crafard in something other than Federal Reserve Notes.

Personally, I don't think he did. At least there doesn't appear to be any evidence that he pimped them out. He may have been a low level hoodlum who ran strip clubs and occasionally got up to other business (including pornography) but I think he believed he treated his girls right (even if he had many disagreements with some of them) and, in his world, probably thought he was looking out for them.

Maybe some of the other members have different information but I've never come across anything that suggests Ruby was acting as a pimp.

Fri 13 Sep 2013, 8:13 pm

Hopefully, I can finish posting some information on this thread today.

Given the level of fraud and outright lies that exist concerning Lee Oswald's background, movements, and behaviours I really do not know what to believe from official channels concerning this chap any longer.

Official story is he learned Russian on his own
Evidence says he was taught Russian by the military

Official story is he was a defector to the USSR
Evidence says he was a false defector to the USSR

Official story says his marriage to Marina was legitimate
Evidence says it was part of some sort of intelligence operation

Official story says he was a psychologically unbalanced loner
Evidence says he was a social and friendly character

Official story says he was a Marxist
Evidence says he was a patriotic American

Official story says he ordered a rifle and revolver
Evidence says he did not

Official story says he took a shot at General Edwin Walker
Evidence says he did not

Official story says he lived at 1026 North Beckley
Evidence says he did not

Official story says he got the TSBD job through Ruth Paine and Linnie Randle
Evidence says he got the job through the Texas Employment Commission

Official story says he had no ties to the FBI
Evidence says he had ties to the FBI

Official story says he carried a rifle to work in a long brown package
Evidence says he carried nothing more than a grocery bag

Official story says he was in the TSBD during the shooting
Evidence says he was outside

Official story says he left the TSBD immediately after the shooting
Evidence says he hung around and gave his name and an address to the police

Official story says he left Dealey Plaza by bus
Evidence says he did not

Official story says he shot Officer J.D. Tippit
Evidence says he did not

Official story says he tried to shoot officers in the Texas Theater
Evidence says he did not

Official story is that there was evidence he fired a weapon on 11/22
Evidence says he did not

A House of Cards?

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