Oswald, Hidell and the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency

First topic message reminder :

September/October, 1962
The Oswald's meet the De Mohrenschildts. Marina moves in with Elana Hall. Lee has an aptitude test at the TEC and rents PO Box 2915, requesting all mail be forwarded to that box. Lee is referred by TEC to Jaggers-Chiles-Stovall, is employed at their base rate, and moves into the YMCA. They had been living on Mercades from August. June is baptized by the White Russian Church without Lee's knowledge.

November, 1962
The Oswald's reunite at 604 Elspeth but Marina moves out the following day to live with the Mellers before moving again to the Ford's, but reunites with Lee at the Elsbeth address on the 17th. Lee and Marina attend a family reunion at Robert's which does not include Marguerite. Marina has a written discussion with John in his notebook talking about various medical terms and drugs. John works in a military hospital and marina had been trained as a pharmacist. The same notebook contains the travel distance from the military base to Robert's house - details usually kept for tax purposes, indicating he may be falsely claiming to the trip as a tax deduction, or it was in fact, work-related.

December, 1962
Lee pays $190 off his State Department debt. The couple attend a New Year's Eve party at the Ford's.

January, 1963
On Jan 9, Lee pays another $100 off his dept. On Jan 14, he enrolls in a typing course. On January 27, he allegedly orders a pistol from Seaport Traders and pays a $10 deposit; the balance to be paid COD. Hearings of the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency into interstate traffic of mail-order firearms are held January 29 and 30. Seaport Traders is one of the mail-order companies of interest.  On January 29, Lee pays the balance owing on his debt of $106. 

February, 1963
The Oswald's attend 2 dinner parties, the first at the DeM's and the second at Everett Glover's on the 22nd. They meet Ruth Paine for the first time at the latter.

March, 1963
March 2, Marina and Lee allegedly move into 214 W. Neely (I believe it was really only Marina and June). March 7, another hearing on mail-order weapons is held by aforementioned senate subcommittee. On March 12, Lee allegedly orders a rifle from Klein's Sporting Goods by mail, purchasing the money order dyring the "early morning". Also on that day, Ruth Paine visits Marina at the W. Neely address and they leave together - Ruth is noncommittal, but thinks they went to a park. Klein's is another company under the scrutiny of the subcommittee. Both pistol and rifle are shipped into Dallas on March 20 - despite being ordered around two months apart from different companies in different states. Also on March 20, Ruth again picks up Marina on W. Neely. Sometime after this, Marina allegedly takes a number of photos of Lee holding the weapons, together with the publications of opposing extreme left wing parties. The camera used is an Imperial reflex. This camera is also used to take some - but not all - of the photos allegedly taken by Lee of Edwin Walker's house in preparation for his alleged assassination attempt on the former general.

April, 1963
Lee is fired by J-C-S and has his last day on the 6th. He and Marina attend another dinner party. This time, both Ruth and Michael Paine are in attendance. On the 10th, a single shot is fired at Walker through his window. It misses. On the 12th, Lee files for unemployment. On April 24, he moves to New Orleans to find work and a now pregnant Marina moves to Irving to stay with Ruth.

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Supplementary information

The weapons
The pistol was shipped by the Railway Express Agency (REA) - an agency which had a very close association with the FBI. There would have been an advice placed in the PO Box to say that the parcel had to be picked up at the REA office and that ID would be needed. REA records show that "Hidell" picked up the parcel and paid the balance owing. How would this be possible? Well, Dale Myers claimed Oswald would have used his fake Hidell ID. The same ID that was obviously a fake. Texas law also required (and Myers concedes) that the purchaser of a pistol or handgun must obtain a letter of good character from a JP, or a County or District judge. This time, the excuse is that REA regs do not specifically state that they would withhold the consignment if such a letter was not produced. This line of thinking, if true, means REA was breaking Texas law. But in addition to that excuse, the head of REA stated that it "has approximately 32,000 of its own employees, with individuals retiring or leaving the service each day, being replaced by new employees...It would be practically impossible to exercise such close control over and communication with all of our delivery employees to keep within the requirements of the law..." - an admission it probably routinely broke the law and had virtually no real checks and balances in place, despite any state or federal law.

The rifle was shipped by US Mail direct to the PO Box. As it would not fit in the box, an advice would also be left for it to be picked up at the parcel pick-up window. Harry Holmes testified that all that would be required to pick it up would be the card left in the box as it would be assumed that the holder of the card had authorized access to the box. To put it another way, if the weapon had fit in the box, all that would be needed to get it was the key - obtaining it with the card from the box was seen as being no different.

Holmes also testified that Lee told him during questioning that he seldom went to the box and that part 3 of the box application was destroyed. Part 3 stated those who had access.

This box was a long walk from where Oswald worked. Given that, and given Holmes' testimony, I believe that Marina had access (and obviously a key) and that she, with the assistance of Ruth Paine, would collect the mail. Alternatively (and this would provide a rock solid reason to destroy part 3 against PO regs), Ruth Paine was listed as having access (and obviously a key) and she would collect the mail  whenever she was going to visit them.

The name game
Lee's father (and therefore Lee himself) was a distant cousin to Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Lee listed as a reference in NO, one Bob Hidell. Thanks to Tom Scully (credit where due - his most lucid and profound post), we know there was a H. Robert Hidell, aged 70 in 2011, who was a descendant of William Hidell, the Secretary to Confederate Army leader, Andrew Stephens. the "H" stood for Henry, but apparently he preferred his middle name.

The names allotted to AJ Hidell - Alek James also hold their own intrigue. Alek means "defender or helper of mankind" and James means "supplanter" which itself means someone who seizes power. The meaning of those names, given the civil war name they are attached to - and importantly, also given the ambush of a Northerner on Nov 22,1963 do give pause for thought. 

But there is one more name to consider: "DF DRITTAL" was listed on the pistol coupon as someone who vouched that Hidell was a US citizen and had not been convicted of any felonies.

Google does not throw out a single person in the world with the surname "Drittal". That in itself is proof that Oswald did not simply pluck the name at of thin air. What it does do is point to it having some other meaning.

And it does. I believe that DF stands for "Dienst Fur" so that the full meaning is  "Dienst Fur Drittal" - which is German for "service for a third party"

From Google Translate



Another timeline for a similar period should be read in conjunction with this one, dealing with Oswald's mail.

https://reopenkennedycase.forumotion.net/t1203-oswald-and-forrest-gump

Just throwing this out for consideration:
I think it is possible that Oswald did order the pistol and used the fake Hidell id (without any photo attached) to test whether laws were being followed. He was paid for this work and this helped pay his State Dept debt. The pistol was then dropped off at a pre-arranged point and ended up in the hands of a Dallas police officer for use as a throw-down (after being disabled).

The use of a throw-down is well-documented in this famous Houston case.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1978/04/29/5-houston-policemen-are-fired-1-resigns-in-death-of-suspect/64bb9a5d-0753-4ec2-95ed-2ae102c629b7/

Roger,

Nearly 20 years ago I interviewed Dr. Ruth Peters (Kloepfer), daughter of Ruth Kloepfer and one of the two daughters Mrs K had taken to visit the Oswald's.

Unfortunately it was done via email and those mails were lost in a crash. She told me that Lee had told her he was heading east when he left NO. When she pressed him on why, he had replied it was to buy a weapon (can't recall now whether she said "rifle" or "gun").  

At the time, I was just puzzled by why he would need to go buy a gun... and why he needed one at all when he allegedly already had a carbine and pistol.

Seems to me, Lee was akin to a "secret shopper" between January and September.

January he is ordering a pistol by mail while a Senate Subcommittee is investigating that very thing - and the very company he orders from. He also begins ordering Soviet publications just as new laws are coming in regarding receipt of such publications. And then come his FPCC efforts... which kick in just after the FPCC is cleared by the State Dept despite the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee finding it was a Communist Front organization.

greg parker wrote:Roger,

Nearly 20 years ago I interviewed Dr. Ruth Peters (Kloepfer), daughter of Ruth Kloepfer and one of the two daughters Mrs K had taken to visit the Oswald's.

Unfortunately it was done via email and those mails were lost in a crash. She told me that Lee had told her he was heading east when he left NO. When she pressed him on why, he had replied it was to buy a weapon (can't recall now whether she said "rifle" or "gun").  

At the time, I was just puzzled by why he would need to go buy a gun... and why he needed one at all when he allegedly already had a carbine and pistol.

Seems to me, Lee was akin to a "secret shopper" between January and September.

January he is ordering a pistol by mail while a Senate Subcommittee is investigating that very thing - and the very company he orders from. He also begins ordering Soviet publications just as new laws are coming in regarding receipt of such publications. And then come his FPCC efforts... which kick in just after the FPCC is cleared by the State Dept despite the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee finding it was a Communist Front organization.

Very interesting. I'd agree with the "secret shopper" idea. I think LHO's time in the FPCC gets mischaracterized, though; I think joining it was mostly a means to an end, and the end was getting in good with the intelligence-connected rightwingers who were infiltrating and using the organization. I think it was the Right he was spying on for the most part. That's why when he talks to Alba he's really digging for information, being pushy.

rogerhucek wrote:

greg parker wrote:Roger,

Nearly 20 years ago I interviewed Dr. Ruth Peters (Kloepfer), daughter of Ruth Kloepfer and one of the two daughters Mrs K had taken to visit the Oswald's.

Unfortunately it was done via email and those mails were lost in a crash. She told me that Lee had told her he was heading east when he left NO. When she pressed him on why, he had replied it was to buy a weapon (can't recall now whether she said "rifle" or "gun").  

At the time, I was just puzzled by why he would need to go buy a gun... and why he needed one at all when he allegedly already had a carbine and pistol.

Seems to me, Lee was akin to a "secret shopper" between January and September.

January he is ordering a pistol by mail while a Senate Subcommittee is investigating that very thing - and the very company he orders from. He also begins ordering Soviet publications just as new laws are coming in regarding receipt of such publications. And then come his FPCC efforts... which kick in just after the FPCC is cleared by the State Dept despite the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee finding it was a Communist Front organization.

Very interesting. I'd agree with the "secret shopper" idea. I think LHO's time in the FPCC gets mischaracterized, though; I think joining it was mostly a means to an end, and the end was getting in good with the intelligence-connected rightwingers who were infiltrating and using the organization. I think it was the Right he was spying on for the most part. That's why when he talks to Alba he's really digging for information, being pushy.

You could be right. I'm just making assumptions from timelines.

May 16, 1963: An informant tells the FBI that over the past year, the FPCC has made an effort to clear out all communist influence.

May 26, 1963: LHO writes to the Fair Play for Cuba Committee requesting a charter. 

May 29, 1963: "Osborne" orders 1,000 handbills for FPCC.

May 30, 1963: FBI is advised that head of FPCC will use CP and SWP when it suits him or the FPCC but that no one, including those orgs would determine FPCC policy.

June 3, 1963: LHO rents a new PO box, using A.J. Hidell as one of the people that will receive mail there.

June 16, 1963: Someone is handing out FPCC flyers stamped AJ Hidell at the Dumaine St Wharf where the Wasp is docked
 
Oswald's letters to FPCC suggest attempts to RElink the CP etc to the FPCC, and the timing of those letters underlines that, in my opinion. 

One possibility is that he is taking directions from "Hidell" who I believe was the person handing out at the wharf and who possibly ordered the handbills. He then asked Oswald to take over the dissemination of the bills and Oswald or whoever stamps some with HIS name on them.

If Oswald was acting under instructions for this, he may also have been acting under instruction in ordering the pistol and in questioning Alba and in pretending to anyone else that he was interested in obtaining weapons. 

He may have done all of this unquestioningly either because he was working for some agency or group through "Hidell" - or was deceived into thinking he was.

I think he he did order the pistol. His "good character" reference from DF Drittal is a big clue because I believe it stands for the German phrase 

I do not believe he ordered the carbine. I think Marina and Lee had split - Lee staying at Elsbeth and Marina and June moving into the W Neely apartment. I think the weapon was ordered by Ruth through Lee's mail box which Marina had access to and it was kept at the Neely apartment then relocated to Irving with Marina when Lee went to NO.

As for the pistol, it was probably given over to an investigator for the Dodd Committee (or so Lee was told) but instead, it ended up with Dallas police who disabled it to use as a "throwdown" at some later date.

My own gut instinct is that he was being run/used by the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission through a specific CIA connected agent of the commission. This person had been signed up by CIA when at college and promptly disappeared for 10 or 11 years, before turning up working in the south (he was a Northerner) for small town newspapers before going to work for the commission and later, for Eastland's office, ostensibly for the CIA looking for Soviet moles. During his "missing" years, he would claim to have spent some time behind the Iron Curtain. This may have  coincided with the time Oswald was there.

greg parker wrote:

rogerhucek wrote:

greg parker wrote:Roger,

Nearly 20 years ago I interviewed Dr. Ruth Peters (Kloepfer), daughter of Ruth Kloepfer and one of the two daughters Mrs K had taken to visit the Oswald's.

Unfortunately it was done via email and those mails were lost in a crash. She told me that Lee had told her he was heading east when he left NO. When she pressed him on why, he had replied it was to buy a weapon (can't recall now whether she said "rifle" or "gun").  

At the time, I was just puzzled by why he would need to go buy a gun... and why he needed one at all when he allegedly already had a carbine and pistol.

Seems to me, Lee was akin to a "secret shopper" between January and September.

January he is ordering a pistol by mail while a Senate Subcommittee is investigating that very thing - and the very company he orders from. He also begins ordering Soviet publications just as new laws are coming in regarding receipt of such publications. And then come his FPCC efforts... which kick in just after the FPCC is cleared by the State Dept despite the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee finding it was a Communist Front organization.

Very interesting. I'd agree with the "secret shopper" idea. I think LHO's time in the FPCC gets mischaracterized, though; I think joining it was mostly a means to an end, and the end was getting in good with the intelligence-connected rightwingers who were infiltrating and using the organization. I think it was the Right he was spying on for the most part. That's why when he talks to Alba he's really digging for information, being pushy.

You could be right. I'm just making assumptions from timelines.

May 16, 1963: An informant tells the FBI that over the past year, the FPCC has made an effort to clear out all communist influence.

May 26, 1963: LHO writes to the Fair Play for Cuba Committee requesting a charter. 

May 29, 1963: "Osborne" orders 1,000 handbills for FPCC.

May 30, 1963: FBI is advised that head of FPCC will use CP and SWP when it suits him or the FPCC but that no one, including those orgs would determine FPCC policy.

June 3, 1963: LHO rents a new PO box, using A.J. Hidell as one of the people that will receive mail there.

June 16, 1963: Someone is handing out FPCC flyers stamped AJ Hidell at the Dumaine St Wharf where the Wasp is docked
 
Oswald's letters to FPCC suggest attempts to RElink the CP etc to the FPCC, and the timing of those letters underlines that, in my opinion. 

One possibility is that he is taking directions from "Hidell" who I believe was the person handing out at the wharf and who possibly ordered the handbills. He then asked Oswald to take over the dissemination of the bills and Oswald or whoever stamps some with HIS name on them.

If Oswald was acting under instructions for this, he may also have been acting under instruction in ordering the pistol and in questioning Alba and in pretending to anyone else that he was interested in obtaining weapons. 

He may have done all of this unquestioningly either because he was working for some agency or group through "Hidell" - or was deceived into thinking he was.

I think he he did order the pistol. His "good character" reference from DF Drittal is a big clue because I believe it stands for the German phrase 

I do not believe he ordered the carbine. I think Marina and Lee had split - Lee staying at Elsbeth and Marina and June moving into the W Neely apartment. I think the weapon was ordered by Ruth through Lee's mail box which Marina had access to and it was kept at the Neely apartment then relocated to Irving with Marina when Lee went to NO.

As for the pistol, it was probably given over to an investigator for the Dodd Committee (or so Lee was told) but instead, it ended up with Dallas police who disabled it to use as a "throwdown" at some later date.

My own gut instinct is that he was being run/used by the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission through a specific CIA connected agent of the commission. This person had been signed up by CIA when at college and promptly disappeared for 10 or 11 years, before turning up working in the south (he was a Northerner) for small town newspapers before going to work for the commission and later, for Eastland's office, ostensibly for the CIA looking for Soviet moles. During his "missing" years, he would claim to have spent some time behind the Iron Curtain. This may have  coincided with the time Oswald was there.

Greg, I'd really like to hear that commission agent's name but I understand if it's something you're keeping under wraps.

Speaking of the MSC and related Southern rightwingers, did you ever read Jim Garrison's comment that the National States' Rights Party had been operating as a "cat's paw" for the CIA for years? It's one of those little tidbits that I've often wished I had more info on-- why Garrison thought that, what info that was based on.

As for Ruth Paine ordering the rifle, I think it would make a lot of sense for her to do so if she thought she was gathering damning info on the political right in Texas. Just because she seemed to be gathering intel on leftist groups doesn't mean she wasn't a liberal of sorts-- look at her background: she was not a rightwinger despite her participation in Oswald's framing, anticommunism etc. I don't think she knew much more than Oswald even as she was setting him up. I think she did as she was told.

But I think picking Oswald as the patsy took place only a few months before the assassination, and I don't think he was the first choice. I think he wound up playing the role of a lone nut (think "lone wolf" with its decidedly rightwing connotations) but was utterly miscast.

I think Joseph Milteer, for one, knew about this and was tickled pink. Hence his quote, "The patriots have outsmarted the communists and had infiltrated the communist group in order that they [the communists] could carry out the plan without the rightwingers becoming involved." To Milteer anyone to the left of the John Birch Society was a certified Communist. He and his ilk had a real animus towards Oswald for Oswald's attempts to penetrate Dallas and New Orleans rightwing groups; they knew he was playing along to get info on them, and when it came time to pick a sacrificial lamb it was them who picked him. That's why the issues of left and right are so convoluted with this case; why it's so hard (to paraphrase Daniel Hopsicker) to put uniforms on the players.

Here are some things that may be of interest.

A newspaper named "The Morning Call" ordered a pistol through the mail on the 2nd anniversary of the assassination in the name of LH Oswald. They got it without any problems.


That was taken from the 1966 Congressional records.

From the same records

These incidents show beyond all doubt that anyone could have ordered and collected the Hidell weapons and all debate about forms not completed and the need to show ID are all off the table. The only stipulation would be that the person would need access to the PO box. Only two people had that - Lee and Marina.

One more thing from those records shows one of the ways in which cops obtain weapons to use as "throwdowns"



I don;t think all of those weapons got tagged. Some would be disabled and kept for use as non-traceable throwdowns.  Not all such weapons would come to them that way.  Maybe some were handed in after being ordered illegally as part of an investigation? The one Oswald was being framed with was one such example.

The cops claimed Oswald admitted having the pistol. That has fooled a lot on both sides of the debate The cops only put words in his mouth when it was necessary -- and this was necessary because they had planted it. His "admission" to having it would negate any need to investigate other possibilities. Think about it - why would Oswald confess to having a pistol that he allegedly ordered illegally? 

Myers and co have discovered that the pistol and carbine were ordered on the same day. That would at least explain their arrival in Dallas on the same day. It doesn't explain the different writing style and a January 27 date on the pistol order by Hidell aged 28. I don't know how to explain that, yet the resarch on this looks solid. https://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2020/06/solving-mystery-of-oswalds-seaport.html

If Oswald wanted to order cheap weapons anonymously, using an alias alone is pointless. He would have needed to use a mail box obtained under - preferably - the same name used for the weapons. 

I am left with this:
-The weapons orders originally could not have been intended for any future illegal activity

-Oswald had nothing to do with ordering them

-When Oswald became a designated patsy, it became no-brainer to use those weapons in the frame since they could be traced to his PO box - although I do not think the 36 inch carbine was readily available for the frame so a 40" model was substituted. That caused some problems in reconciling the size of the bag and other issues. It also exonerates Hill in any pre-planning as he correctly identified the shells at the Tippit scene as from an automatic.

-the weapons were ordered for a "third party" by someone familiar with German per the DF Drittal clue

-Hidell or more accurately, someone using that name, was the link between Ruth Paine and the third party and he also got the FPCC ball rolling in NO. 

A stringer for a Mississippi paper with deep CIA and Sovereignty Commission ties fits the bill. As a stringer, for one of the three papers he worked for, he traveled a lot... he was certainly the right age at that time and would undoubtedly be aware of the Civil War name "Hidell" a humble secretary to Stephens... himself later filling a similar role with Eastland. Moreover, he spoke the same language, in the same accent and with the same erudition as the Paines.

It's puzzling all round Greg. And yet here we have the BYP's allegedly snapped in late March early April '63 in the backyard at W. Neely St. We Know Marina had  been living there which ties Oswald to that address. And further if the photo's were taken at about the time mentioned then somebody knew to place the props we see into the hands of the person in those photographs. Two incriminating newspapers, a specific model of rifle which would later be discovered as the alleged assassination weapon and a gun in a holster which would later be claimed was the same as the one Oswald used to kill Tippit and allegedly carried into the theater.

If those photo's are correctly and accurately time stamped then someone knew exactly which props to use in the photographs and which weapons at the time of the two murders to have appear as evidence on Friday 22nd November 1963.

That Dale Myers article does seem pretty convincing. (Funny, I only knew Myers' name from being the boogie man of McBride's Into the Nightmare.) The handwriting does look overwritten, too, and that 1/27 date is a big question mark in my mind as well. (Unless, of course, backdating it meant nothing significant to the person filling out the form, which is a possibility.) Typically people backdate things to hide the fact they slacked off.

So someone ordered the two guns in Dallas in March 1963. If it wasn't Oswald, why was Oswald asking Adrian Alba in New Orleans (the gun nut with his clutch of contemporary magazines at his garage) about ordering weapons a few months later?

Roger, for what it's worth, you may want to read the hoodwink Myers pulled on the general public back in the early aughts. I'm not trying to change the subject here, but anytime someone does an out and out deception, you have to question that person's research elsewhere.

http://www.patspeer.com/chapter12c:animania

To me, what it means is he's biased and is not going to question even the latest bit of doubt or opposing evidence to lead to a different conclusion.

JFK Case wrote:Roger, for what it's worth, you may want to read the hoodwink Myers pulled on the general public back in the early aughts. I'm not trying to change the subject here, but anytime someone does an out and out deception, you have to question that person's research elsewhere.

http://www.patspeer.com/chapter12c:animania

To me, what it means is he's biased and is not going to question even the latest bit of doubt or opposing evidence to lead to a different conclusion.

That would be in keeping with the Lone Nutter tribe, in my experience. I'm pleasantly surprised when they aren't dissembling because it's an uncommon occurrence, like a broken clock being right twice a day.

I saw that terrible CGI cartoon in some "Oswald did it after all" documentary my dad showed me on TV a few years ago. Hard to take it seriously.

There are compulsive liars (eg JVB) and there are dissemblers (eg Myers). The latter types only lie when necessary. Even McAdams tells the truth when it supports him at best or does no harm to his claims at worst.

The DPD operated the same way. They did not change the narrative out of compulsion - they did it out of a necessity to promote the lone nut case - and they only changed the parts that they needed to change to fit that lone nut scenario. 

For example, they were quite happy to run with Roger Craig's story - until they found out they had to make Oswald a lone nut. 

In this case, the research that Myers and friends did actually helps make sense of the records which show that the pistol order was received on March 13 and shipped into Dallas on the same day as the rifle - March 20. 

But as stated earlier, there are still questions about the orders in regard to the different writing and the date on the pistol order form. To clarify further, though the writing is different (and possibly with a different writing implement), it still could be by the same hand.

So someone ordered the two guns in Dallas in March 1963. If it wasn't Oswald, why was Oswald asking Adrian Alba in New Orleans (the gun nut with his clutch of contemporary magazines at his garage) about ordering weapons a few months later?

We could flip that and ask why wasn't Oswald making these inquiries and talking about wanting a gun to anyone in Dallas?

I know it is commonly believed Oswald lied in custody. While that can't be ruled out,  I don't think he did. The only lies I detect are things we know were put in his mouth. One thing he is supposed to have said in custody is that he only came across the name Hidell in NO.  Maybe that was self-serving to distance himself from the weapons orders, but let's assume it is true.

Ruth, with Marina's help in using Lee's PO Box, orders the weapons on behalf of a "third party" using the alias of the person representing that third party. Oswald knows nothing about it as he is still living at Elsbeth, 

The weapons are kept at Neely St where the carbine is spotted by the DeMs. 

When Lee goes to NO, the weapons are either taken to Irving or otherwise disposed of and the pistol ends up with Dallas police.

In NO,  Ruth's appearance in May with Marina triggers Lee's interest in the FPCC and suddenly he is in contact with "Hidell" who orders the flyers and hands some out at the wharf with the Hidell name, before getting Lee to take over that duty in future. Lee then starts handing them out with his name on them.

In short, Lee became part of whatever was going on - but was a late invite to the party, missing the ordering of the weapons in Dallas. 

And what was going on fits perfectly with the whole mail order weapons investigations. Whether it was really a part of that, or that was just cover for something else, is another question. Either way, Lee was getting drawn in.

As per the new #NRA and following up on my earlier comments I would recommend a 2020 book, The NRA: The Unauthorized History by Frank Smyth published by Flatiron Books. It's the very first critical history of the organization.

Among the interesting things in the book I learned: the NRA is named after the UK's National Rifle Association established in 1859, which "organized rifle practice for the Home Guard civilian defense force, established the same year" (p. 25). It supported and rearmed the British Home Guard before WWII as well (p. 57). It's important to recognize that the civil defense aspect of the NRA is baked-in, so to speak.

Longtime American Rifleman editor C.B. Lister, whom I mentioned in previous posts as proposing a domestic paramilitary force called The Minutemen, gets some coverage in the book as well. His increasingly apocalyptic anti-communism and paranoia during his 17 month tenure as president of the NRA (while still editing American Rifleman) is briefly covered, as are his strident arguments against gun control, which were way ahead of their time in that they mimic contemporary arguments by the NRA that any form of firearm regulation is inherently totalitarian.

Smyth writes, "By 1947 Lister was escalating his warnings about communists. Until they were strong enough to take power, he said, 'they [would] resort to every form of trickery, subterfuge and lying that will enable them to advance the cause. All this is in the record. It is widely known'" (p. 59). Smyth wonders whether the brain cancer that killed Lister in 1951 heightened his paranoia. "Lister's editorials took on an ever more alarmist tone. He connected 'the Communist and the criminal,' saying that both 'prefer dealing with a disarmed citizenry'" (p. 59).

His leadership of the NRA is treated as both a harbinger and an anomoly for the time period by Smyth. I've often wondered, though, whether Lister's ideas resonated throughout certain murky corners of the American military-industrial complex during the '50s and early '60s, whether someone decided to realize his plans for a group called The Minutemen that would behave in the way he advocated. (It's also worth mentioning that far-right former Marine Corps officer Pedro del Valle also proposed a similar group, also known as The Minutemen, in the 1950s to the CIA, as mentioned in his autobiography.)

On page 71 we read, "President Kennedy's assassination in November 1963 was one of the watershed moments in American life. Among the changes it ushered in was a movement to further restrict firearms-- especially those purchased through the mail. Earlier in the year, Lee Harvey Oswald had ordered a cheap surplus foreign military rifle advertised in the back pages of the American Rifleman. The fact that he obtained the weapon through an ad in the NRA's own magazine put the Association itself against the wall and fueled the call for reform in Washington."

Then Smyth mentions the Dodd regulatory bills that failed in committee in 1964 and 1965. Fears of Black gun ownership as well as of right-wing paramilitaries (such as The Minutemen and California Rangers) stockpiling weapons obtained through the NRA lead the NRA to disavow the latter publicly in 1964. Prospective NRA members were required to swear that they are not members of any organization seeking "the overthrow by force and violence of the Government of the United States or any of its political subdivisions" (p. 73). Nevertheless, paramilitary groups in the US continued to take advantage of NRA weapons programs for decades.

NRA chief executive Franklin Orth would disagree with Dodd's bills and openly clash with RFK, then a Senator, who said,"I think it is a terrible indictment of the National Rifle Association that they haven't supported any legislation to try and control the misuse of rifles and pistols in this country." RFK and MLK's assassinations would facilitate the passage of Dodd's third bill (p. 76).