Gordon Arnold

[Jack White]

The thing is, he would have been insane to try to climb over the pipe.  It was giving off steam and he would surely have felt the heat coming off of it.  Why wouldn't he simply go around the pipe?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The steam pipe was not open to the air and did not give off steam from what I have learned about it. Also, earlier in this thread it was mentioned that Seymour Weitzman burnt his hands on the pipe, so I don't see how Arnold could have been any more forewarned than Weiztman obviously was. And I still think we cannot be sure that Gordon actually made contact with the pipe before being stopped.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The so-called steampipe was covered in a heavy thickness of asbestos pipe insulation.

Jack

[Guest Eugene B. Connolly]

Did President Kennedy have any views on assassination?

Extracts taken from book The Kennedys

An American Drama by Peter Collier & David Horowitz

P 364

While President:

Sitting in on one of the Hickory Hill seminars,

tapping his front teeth intensely during

Princeton historian David Donald's

talk about Reconstruction and then,

during the question period bringing up the

question of Presidential greatness. What separated a great

President from a mediocre one? How did a President acquire greatness?

And what about Lincoln? Would he have been regarded as a great President if he had not been assassinated? Because of the delicacy of this question, Donald equivocated. But Jack continued to press

him earnestly about Lincoln and assassination and where and why he would rank the Presidents.

Pp 391/392

After funeral Mass for son Patrick:

He grabbed at the tiny casket in such a disoriented manner that (Cardinal) Cushing had to restrain him, whispering,

" Come on, Jack, let's go. God is good."

He (John Kennedy) still thought and talked about his own death and on an occasion after Patrick's burial when he was sailing with Bartlett and Billings one afternoon. The wind vanished, leaving the boat drifting lifelessly in the water, and after looking over the side for a long time, he asked suddenly, "How do you think Lyndon would be if I got killed?" He returned to the subject a few weeks later while swimming with Torby MacDonald in the pool at Palm Beach. They were talking about how both their fathers had been incapacitated by strokes and how neither of them wanted such a fate. Torby asked Jack what way he'd choose to die. After thinking for a moment, Jack said: " Oh, a gun. You never know what's hit you. A gunshot is the perfect way."

Is it possible that there was a plan to assassinate President Kennedy the night before he went to Dallas? Some strange things happened in connection with the men who were supposed to be guarding President Kennedy. President Kennedy made a remark the following morning saying: "Last night would have been a great time to assassinate a President." President Kennedy was unaware of the events of the previous evening when he uttered these prophetic words.

EBC

Edited December 20, 2004 by Eugene B. Connolly

[Daniel Meyer]

I'm resurrecting the Gordon Arnold thread, as he's being referred to currently in other discussions.

Per the discussion 5 years ago, it looks like there was debate about his presence in Dealey Plaza, but some more recent posts in other threads seem to take it as a given.

Has there been more recent independent confirmation of his story?

[Bill Miller]

I'm resurrecting the Gordon Arnold thread, as he's being referred to currently in other discussions.

Per the discussion 5 years ago, it looks like there was debate about his presence in Dealey Plaza, but some more recent posts in other threads seem to take it as a given.

Has there been more recent independent confirmation of his story?

Nigel Turner was said to have gone to great lengths to check out Arnold's story before going forward with it in his documentary. To this day I have not read where a critic has either spoken to Earl Golz who had several discussions with Arnold back in the late 70s or with Nigel Turner and/or his people to see what they did to verify in their mind to verify Gordon's claim. Of course on the other hand - why would an Arnold critic want to for it may not serve their purpose.

I would also say that if anyone got burned touching the steam pipe on the day of the assassination that it must have been because they touched a spot that had the insulation broken away. In the interview that Holland gave with Mark Lane, Holland said he put his hand on the steam pipe and jumped over it .... nothing said about ever being burned. Holland mentions that two others guys went over it as well. In the video Lane shot of that walk through with Holland it appears the pipe had insulation on it still.

Bill

Edited October 20, 2010 by Bill Miller

[Bernice Moore]

here's marguerite it shows the insulation well wrapped around the pipe..i believe this was taken around the time that mark lane was in touch with her perhaps someone has the date for such..b

[Gerry Down]

If one was facing Elm street and dove forward like Gordan claimed, they'd likely roll down the hill uncontrollably, or roll down when they'd try to stand back up. Anyone who's been there will know how steep the grassy knoll is as can be seen in this video:

 

 

[Chuck Schwartz]

For the record, here is what Sparticus says about  G. Arnold, "

Gordon Arnold was born in Dallas, Texas, in 1941. After completing his education he joined the United States Army and was based at Fort Wainwright in Alaska.

Arnold was home on leave on 22nd November, 1963, and decided to take his movie camera to Dealey Plaza in order to film the visit of President John F. Kennedy. While walking by the Grassy Knoll he was stopped by a man claiming to be a member of the Secret Service. He later told Jim Marrs: "I was walking along behind this picket fence when a man in a light-colored suit came up to me and said I shouldn't be up there. I was young and cocky and I said, "Why not?" And he showed me a badge and said he was with the Secret Service and that he didn't want anyone up there. I said all right and started walking back along the fence. I could feel that he was following me and we had a few more words. I walked around to the front of the fence and found a little mound of dirt to stand on to see the motorcade."

Arnold claimed that the first shot was fired from behind him. After the firing had finished, Arnold claimed that a policeman with a gun forced him to hand over the film in his camera. Arnold returned to Fort Wainwright and was never interviewed by the Warren Commission or the House Select Committee on Assassinations about what he had seen on 22nd November, 1963."

[Gerry Down]

1 hour ago, Kathy Beckett said:

That is not where Gordon Arnold said he was was.  If you'd like to know more, this video will tell you what he said and where Gary Mack and Jack White thought looked like Arnold and Badge man in the Moorman photo.. Gary never let go of this belief.

If that's not where he was, then the dictabelt evidence is off as that evidence apparently was dependent on the shooter being 8 feet west of the corner of the fence. 

[Jonathan Cohen]

27 minutes ago, Kathy Beckett said:

Where did you get 8 feet west of the corner of the fence?  James files?

I do know that Mack was in DP during an acoustic recreation, and he stated you couldn't tell where the shots were coming from because the sound was bouncing all over.

Out of curiosity, why isn't Gordon Arnold visible in any films or photos of the assassination sequence? 

[Michael Crane]

Don't get your pants in an uproar,but didn't Arnold say that he was the guy that looked like the Gorton Fisherman in the Badgeman photo?

I can be way off base here,so relax.

Edited April 3, 2023 by Michael Crane

[Gerry Down]

1 hour ago, Kathy Beckett said:

Where did you get 8 feet west of the corner of the fence?  James files?

I do know that Mack was in DP during an acoustic recreation, and he stated you couldn't tell where the shots were coming from because the sound was bouncing all over.

I think actually it could be 10 feet. The HSCA positioned the microphone 10 feet west of the corner of the fence and then tried to match the acoustics from that to the dictabelt and then proceeded to say it matched. There was a margin for error allowed. Not sure what it was. Could have been 5 feet either side of the microphone at the fence or something like that.

I don't ascribe to anything James Files says.

[Michael Crane]

Arnold said that he was standing here.

 

[Gerry Down]

6 minutes ago, Michael Crane said:

Arnold said that he was standing here.

 

If he was standing there and badge man with rifle in-hand came around the fence to take the camera off him, then why didn't Sam Holland see him seeing how Holland ran straight around to there specifically to see if anyone had a rifle there?

[Michael Crane]

Sam might have seen him,but was concentrating on the man who was walking fast in the opposite direction after handing the rifle off.

We should see Arnold in the original Moorman photograph if he didn't already hit the ground.

 

Edited April 3, 2023 by Michael Crane

[Jonathan Cohen]

3 minutes ago, Michael Crane said:

We should see Arnold in the Moorman photgraph if he didn't already hit the ground.

There sure doesn't look to be a human being on the ground anywhere in this photo.