An Old Article On Marina

Came across this article from the LA Times published in 1988.




First Person : Life Catches Up to Marina Oswald
By ALLAN GRANT
Nov. 22, 1988
12 AM


Marina Oswald was a very sweet and gentle lady, and it especially showed in the relationship she had with her children, even under such stress. She had an inner peace that I felt would save her from being destroyed by this catastrophic event that took her husband from her in the same way and as swiftly as John F . Kennedy was taken away from his family.

The tragedy was overwhelming for the Kennedys and for our country. But there was no less a personal tragedy in the one that received very little press at the time of the assassination, the tragedy of this young bewildered family that Lee Harvey Oswald left behind the day after he picked up his rifle, peered through the telescopic sight and squeezed the trigger.

At 10:46 a.m. Friday, Nov. 22, 1963, when I was called at my home in Los Angeles by the chief of the West Coast bureau of Life magazine and told that President Kennedy had been shot, I thought it was a very sick practical joke. I was getting ready for a 3-day weekend on my boat. I was told to get to the airport. There would be a special flight to Dallas at the American Airlines terminal.

Every journalist in the world seemed to be on that flight, a lot of them looking as if they had just crawled out of bed. The aisles were cluttered with TV and photo equipment. It was one of the biggest stories of the century, but no one knew much of anything. Rumors abounded.

About 11:05 a.m. the pilot announced it over the intercom. “Ladies and gentlemen. . . .” He paused. “We have just been informed that President John F. Kennedy has died. I’m so sorry. . . .” His voice choked up then faded out.

The aisles cleared as everybody quietly returned to their seats. A few minutes later, as I looked around the cabin, I saw some of the toughest news people I knew sobbing. I knew then that the tragedy of this moment would last a long time.

Life teams were being flown in from Washington and Chicago. I was one of four Life photographers who would be arriving in Dallas along with five Life correspondents.

When we landed we contacted the Dallas bureau of Life and were told of the capture, in a theater, of Lee Harvey Oswald, a suspect in the shooting. Oswald was being held in the Dallas County jail and Life reporter Tommy Thompson and I rented a car and headed there. Tommy, a young, aggressive reporter, born in Texas, had joined the Life staff a couple of years before. The corridors of the jail were swarming with photographers and reporters. Some were standing on chairs, some on their camera cases. I had covered many stories in my 23 years with Life but never had I seen so many reporters and photographers pushing and shoving as I saw in this tiny corridor--all to get in position for the same photograph of suspect Lee Harvey Oswald being led from one room to another.

I told Tommy Thompson that we should get out of there and look for a more exclusive angle to the story. Before we left the Dallas jail, Tommy, using his Texas accent and disarming demeanor, located a deputy sheriff who seemed to know a lot about the one suspect they had captured.

Friendly Housekeeper

Tommy managed to get the address of the rooming house in Dallas where Oswald was staying. We headed for 1026 N. Beckley Ave. in southwest Dallas. There we found a red brick house with a friendly, talkative housekeeper, Erlene Roberts, who showed us the closet-size room that she rented to “O. H. Lee” for $8 a week.

She showed us the phone in the rooming house and told us of the phone calls made by “Mr. Lee” to somebody in Irving, Tex.--a small town between Dallas and Ft. Worth. She said that he always spoke in a foreign language when he made those calls.

When Tommy asked about the last time she had seen “Mr. Lee” Mrs. Roberts said that he had returned to the rooming house a few hours before, around 1 p.m., which was very unusual for him, and she remarked to him that he “seemed to be in an awful hurry. . . .” Oswald did not respond. A few minutes later he emerged from his room zipping up his jacket and rushed out. A short time later, she said, a swarm of what she thought were Secret Service men or FBI agents descended on the rooming house looking for evidence. We thanked the landlady for the information and headed toward Irving.

On the way out I shot some photographs of some of Oswald’s neighbors in the boarding house, watching the TV screen for a glimpse of the man they knew as O. H. Lee.

Once we got to Irving, we had no idea of who or what we were looking for. On a hunch I turned a corner and found a lone sheriff’s car parked in front of a building where a flag flew at half staff. We entered and found a sheriff’s dispatcher. Tommy once again turned on that Texas charm and asked the dispatcher if anything had gone on in Irving that day concerning the shooting of the President. Well, replied the man convinced we were Dallas newsmen, as a matter of fact there were “feds” out here earlier, looking for some woman a few streets south of here. He gave us the name of the street but no address and no name for the woman.

We found the street which, fortunately, was only a few blocks long. But in those few blocks there were at least 30 houses lining both sides of that street. We spotted a man getting out of a car and leaped to life. We were convinced that he was a reporter who knew more than we did.

The man opened the trunk of his car and removed several bags of groceries. Relieved, I hung a couple of cameras around my neck and Tommy and I approached him. He looked at us and smiled. “Well,” he said, “we wondered when the press would find us. You might as well come inside.”

More Surprises

Michael Paine introduced himself and his ex-wife, Ruth Paine. Tommy asked Ruth Paine if she knew Lee Harvey Oswald. Yes, she said, Lee is a friend. He lives here with his wife Marina. When Tommy asked her if she thought that Oswald had killed the President, a distraught-looking elderly woman wearing a nurse’s uniform, with her stockings rolled down to her knees, jumped up and said, “Don’t you think that I should answer that question; I am Lee’s mother.” Tommy and I were astounded and, moments later, we got another shock.

A pretty, pale young woman appeared in the doorway with a small baby in her arms and headed for the kitchen. That, Ruth Paine said, was Marina Oswald, Lee Harvey’s Soviet wife. Her 18-month-old daughter June was asleep in the bedroom. Tommy and I looked at each other in disbelief.

I started taking pictures as unobtrusively as I could, not knowing what to expect from my obvious invasion of these people’s privacy. Tommy started asking questions. How long had the Oswalds been living there? How much time did Lee Harvey spend at the Paine house with Marina? When had they last seen him?

Our biggest fear was that at any moment a horde of reporters, photographers and TV newsmen would find the Paine house, just as we had, and snatch the story away from us. We had to move the Oswalds to a different location. Then the answer came in the form of a question from Marguerite Oswald. “Would it be possible,” she asked, “for Marina and I to go to Dallas and see Lee Harvey?” Tommy offered to drive the women and children to Dallas and to give them our room at the Adolphus Hotel--where they could spend the night practically next door to the Dallas jail.

‘Scoop of My Career’

Marina didn’t want to wake up her children. She told Ruth Paine in Russian she thought it would be best if we picked them up in the early morning. Tommy and I looked at each other and decided not to push our luck.

We sat there in our rented car trying to absorb the last few hours. Tommy was twirling the keys on his index finger, watching the house. “This, my friend, is probably going to be the scoop of my career. I will kill the first newsman that approaches that house. . . .”

“Let’s go,” I said, “I want to get this film off to New York.”

“We’re not leaving here until those lights go out,” he said.

We sat there in the dark waiting for the sounds of approaching cars. None came. The lights in the house went out. Tommy finally relaxed and we headed back to Dallas.

Early Saturday morning, Nov. 23, we returned, as promised, to the Paine house. There were newly washed diapers drying in the sun and a suitcase to be packed for the short trip to what would turn out to be the end of the world for them. (Within 12 hours Lee Harvey Oswald would be shot and killed by Jack Ruby.)

Marina put a fresh diaper on her daughter, June. Marguerite cradled young Rachel in her arms and wiped away some tears in anticipation of seeing her son in the Dallas jail. We loaded our car with diapers, baby clothes and other necessary items and headed for Dallas.

To avoid running into any press people at the hotel, we took the Oswalds through the basement and then up the freight elevator to our room where we had arranged for a Russian translator. We ordered breakfast for the Oswalds. The older Mrs. Oswald wanted to call her other son, Robert Oswald, and have him come to the hotel. All morning I carefully took photographs of Marina, trying not to interfere with the normal routine of this young mother and her two children. The older Mrs. Oswald was alternately loving and abusive to her young daughter-in-law, caressing her, then claiming from time to time that she was a “whore” who was responsible for the trouble that Lee Harvey was in. Later, we would refer to her as “Hurricane Momma.”

A Loud Knock

Shortly before noon there was a loud knock on the door. Tommy slowly opened the door to FBI special agent Bardwell Odum. He asked to see Marina Oswald, and said that he wanted to take her to his office for questioning. Marguerite announced to us that she had made arrangements to see her son--evidently using the phone in her room--with Capt. Will Fitz of the Dallas Police Department, whom she had seen on television.

Meanwhile, I had been shooting pictures as special Agent Odum tried to get Marguerite to persuade Marina to go with him. But the old lady held her ground, determined to see her son as promised by Captain Fitz. She, Marina and Robert were going to see Lee Harvey--as promised--and going nowhere else until they talked to him--as promised.

The visit to Lee Harvey Oswald was set for noon. The arrangement was for us to drop the family off in the basement of the courthouse where they would be met by two detectives. We were to leave and they would return the Oswalds to the hotel after their visit. (As it turned out later Robert was not permitted to see his brother.)

At noon, we left the Oswalds, including the children, at the courthouse. Later we discovered they had to wait four hours before they got to see Lee Harvey. They offered Marina a private room where she could nurse Rachel and take care of June.

A Guarded Meeting

When they finally got to visit Lee Harvey, they spoke to him via telephone from a glass-enclosed booth where they could see, but not touch each other. The meeting lasted for 4 or 5 minutes. Marguerite said Lee Harvey was bruised around the face and had a black eye and that Lee told her it happened during a scuffle. He told Marguerite not to worry, that he was fine, and had arranged for an attorney. Marina stayed on a little longer and when she left she was crying. Marguerite told us that Marina said, “I tell Lee I love Lee and Lee says he love me very much--and Lee tell me to be sure to buy new shoes for June.”

Two plainclothesmen brought the Oswalds back to us at the Adolphus Hotel. At this point we decided to move the Oswalds to the outskirts of town. I gave Marguerite money for expenses, which she put in her pocket without looking at it. I drove them to the Executive Inn and helped them get comfortable.

It was about 7 p.m. when I returned to the Adolphus. We had a meeting of the Life people to assess what we had captured on film in the two days in Dallas. Since Oswald was in custody, and the President’s funeral was to be the big story for the next issue of Life, the photographers were sent back to their bureaus. I returned to Los Angeles with the memory of the face of the pretty, young Soviet girl whose path crossed with an ex-Marine with a chip on his shoulder.

The next morning, back in Los Angeles, I woke up late to call a friend. “Lee Harvey Oswald has just been shot!” he said. “It’s on TV right now.”

Tommy asked Ruth Paine if she knew Lee Harvey Oswald. Yes, she said, Lee is a friend. He lives here with his wife Marina


So Ruth is claiming that Lee was living at her place?