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Harry D Holmes


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Yes, I'm slowly getting a feel for HDH. He strikes me as smug in that he can be so blatantly contradictory. He must have a reason for this. I speculate a kind of sense of untouchability and sudservience where he doesn't really care but is performing his role which was of a number of types. I've described him as a gofer in the past, Id say he was more complex than this. While a gofer in many respects he also had connections (trusted) and latitude, beyond what one might expect a PI to have.

I live, and have on other occasions in a fairly small town, and always the postal workers are kind of central to everything and everyone. They get to know things. I suppose that's why traditionally they were/are agency informants.

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Guest Tom Scully

John, you are certainly correct. In a small town, the postal employees serve as an extension of the security-surveillance state. A case in point, no warrant was required to almost immediately dish all of this up on Jack W. Martin of Goldonna, LA.:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=14340&view=findpost&p=167264

...Special Agent in Charge of New Orleans office of the Secret Service, John W. Rice reported,

"....I immediately proceeded to Goldonna, Louisiana, arriving at approximately 5:00 PM, and interviewed Mrs. Irena McGee, Postmaster, Mr. G. C. Quarles, Rural Carrier, and Millie xxxsier, ...

...For serveral yeras the subject has been traveling around the country, and apparently has been connected with an unidentified religious cult. It has been rumored, according to Mr. Quarles, that Martin desires to become a preacher....

..."Martin reportedly has never married, and so far as is known he has never been

gainfully employed. He has communicated with his parents by mail from various

places throughout the country, and always uses a general delivery address. He

reportedly has been in Massachusetts, New Jersey, California, Texas, and other

states."...

...Rural Carrier Quarles said that he believed that Martin's either had been writing to him in Texas, city unrecalled, recently."...

If you want to preserve your privacy, even renting a P.O. box in a small town or postal jurisdiction won't help you much. Live in a populated area and rent a box at the busiest post office you can find and have your mail delivered there. We have privately owned mail storefronts franchised by UPS and able to accept delivery of both U.S. mail and parcel delivery companies, but busybody staff and managers are probably a greater risk there than at a large postal facility. Since 9/11 ushered in the new paranoid, locked down, America, two forms of government I.D. are required to rent a box at a Post Office. We enjoy a Bill of Rights; the first ten amendments of our Constitution. The Fourth Amendment guarantees us "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated,..."

We've given up those rights because we were not willing to stand up against moves by the government to undermine them.:

http://web.archive.org/web/20011027071225/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/10/20011026-5.html

For Immediate Release

Office of the Press Secretary

October 26, 2001

Multi-front Operation, 2001 Video & Timeline President Signs Anti-Terrorism Bill

Remarks by the President at Signing of the Patriot Act, Anti-Terrorism Legislation

The East Room

... The changes, effective today, will help counter a threat like no other our nation has ever faced. We've seen the enemy, and the murder of thousands of innocent, unsuspecting people. They recognize no barrier of morality. They have no conscience. The terrorists cannot be reasoned with. Witness the recent anthrax attacks through our Postal Service....

As of today, we're changing the laws governing information-sharing. And as importantly, we're changing the culture of our various agencies that fight terrorism. Countering and investigating terrorist activity is the number one priority for both law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

Surveillance of communications is another essential tool to pursue and stop terrorists. The existing law was written in the era of rotary telephones. This new law that I sign today will allow surveillance of all communications used by terrorists, including e-mails, the Internet, and cell phones.

As of today, we'll be able to better meet the technological challenges posed by this proliferation of communications technology. Investigations are often slowed by limit on the reach of federal search warrants.

Law enforcement agencies have to get a new warrant for each new district they investigate, even when they're after the same suspect. Under this new law, warrants are valid across all districts and across all states. ....

.... It is now my honor to sign into law the USA Patriot Act of 2001. (Applause.)

(The bill is signed.) (Applause.)

http://web.archive.org/web/20011028063426/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/10/20011027.html

For Immediate Release

Office of the Press Secretary

October 27, 2001

Radio Address of the President to the Nation

.....The bill I signed yesterday gives intelligence and law enforcement officials additional tools they need to hunt and capture and punish terrorists. Our enemies operate by highly sophisticated methods and technologies, using the latest means of communication and the new weapon of bioterrorism.

When earlier laws were written, some of these methods did not even exist. The new law recognizes the realities and dangers posed by the modern terrorist. It will help us to prosecute terrorist organizations -- and also to detect them before they strike....

..... Intelligence operations and criminal investigations have often had to operate on separate tracks. The new law will make it easier for all agencies to share vital information about terrorist activity.

Surveillance of communications is another essential method of law enforcement. <h3>But for a long time, we have been working under laws written in the era of rotary telephones. </h3> Under the new law, officials may conduct court-ordered surveillance of all modern forms of communication used by terrorists.

In recent years, some investigations have been hindered by limits on the reach of federal search warrants. Officials had to get a new warrant for each new district and investigation covered, even when involving the same suspect. As of now, warrants are valid across districts and across state lines.......

...... These measures were enacted with broad support in both parties. They reflect a firm resolve to uphold and respect the civil liberties guaranteed by the Constitution, while dealing swiftly and severely with terrorists.

Now comes the duty of carrying them out. And I can assure all Americans that these important new statutes will be enforced to the full.

Thank you for listening.

Good to go? Fast forward to nearly 3-1/2 years later.:

http://www.anonymousliberal.com/2006/02/what-bush-said-then-vs-what-he-says.html

"...Now comes the duty of carrying them out.

And I can assure all Americans that

these important new statutes will be

enforced to the full. Thank you for

listening."

Within months after making this assurance to the American people, President Bush authorized the NSA to ignore the requirements of the law he had just signed and which he assured the American people would be "enforced to the full." Now that he's been caught, what is his stated reason for disregarding the law? He tells us the law was too "old" and "outdated" and not designed to deal with the realities and dangers posed by the modern terrorist.

http://web.archive.org/web/20051222102931/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/12/20051219-1.html

For Immediate Release

Office of the Press Secretary

December 19, 2005

Press Briefing by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and General Michael Hayden, Principal Deputy Director for National Intelligence

James S. Brady Briefing Room

......Q General, can you tell us why you don't choose to go to the FISA court?

ATTORNEY GENERAL GONZALES: Well, we continue to go to the FISA court and obtain orders. It is a very important tool that we continue to utilize. Our position is that we are not legally required to do, in this particular case, because the law requires that we -- FISA requires that we get a court order, unless authorized by a statute, and we believe that authorization has occurred.

The operators out at NSA tell me that we don't have the speed and the agility that we need, in all circumstances, to deal with this new kind of enemy. You have to remember that FISA was passed by the Congress in 1978. There have been tremendous advances in technology --

And, nine months after his attorney general was again describing a "problem" the president told us back in October, 2001, had been solved by passing changes to the law that loosened our protections against warrantless government surveillance, here is the president again, with the identical, exactly five years old rhetoric.:

http://web.archive.org/web/20060914070440/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/09/20060907-2.html

For Immediate Release

Office of the Press Secretary

September 7, 2006

President Bush Discusses Progress in the Global War on Terror

Cobb Galleria Centre

Atlanta, Georgia

...Last year, details of the Terrorist Surveillance Program were leaked to the news media, and the program was then challenged in court. That challenge was recently upheld by a federal district judge in Michigan. My administration strongly disagrees with the ruling. We are appealing it, and we believe our appeal will be successful. Yet a series of protracted legal challenges would put a heavy burden on this critical and vital program. The surest way to keep the program is to get explicit approval from the United States Congress. So today I'm calling on the Congress to promptly pass legislation providing additional authority for the Terrorist Surveillance Program, along with broader reforms in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. (Applause.)

When FISA was passed in 1978, there was no widely accessible Internet, and almost all calls were made on fixed landlines. Since then, the nature of communications has changed, quite dramatically. The terrorists who want to harm America can now buy disposable cell phones, and open anonymous e-mail addresses. Our laws need to change to take these changes into account...

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/05/21/fisa_changes/print.html

May 21, 2007

...And beyond McConnell's plainly false Op-Ed, the lies told by the Bush administration on the issue of eavesdropping have no equal. In light of the revelations from James Comey, just re-visit the statements from Alberto Gonzales in December 2005 -- five days before the New York Times revealed the warrantless eavesdropping program -- in which he assured his audience: "All wiretaps must be authorized by a federal judge." <h3>That is the same Alberto Gonzales who barged into John Ashcroft's hospital room to coerce his consent to their ongoing warrantless eavesdropping activities.

Worse, the President himself -- literally one month after the dispute with Comey and Ashcroft over warrantless eavesdropping -- one month -- ran around the country as part of his re-election campaign insisting that the only eavesdropping done by the government was one done with warrants:

Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so.

The same President who ordered warrantless eavesdropping -- and who almost had the entire top level of the DOJ resign as a result -- told Americans weeks later that the Government only eavesdrops with warrants. To call that "lying" is to understate the case. It really is to our great discredit that we have acquiesced to this level of presidential deceit.

(CIA Director) McConnell's Op-Ed demonstrates that this level of deceit with regard to eavesdropping continues unabated. The notion that the administration would demand, and that Congress would entertain, further expansions of FISA under these circumstances is just staggering.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/20/AR2007052001058.html

A Law Terrorism Outran

We Need a FISA For the 21st Century

By Mike McConnell

Monday, May 21, 2007

In 1978, the first cellular mobile phone system was still being tested, a personal computer's memory had just been expanded to 16 kilobytes and our greatest threat was the largest nation-state on Earth, the Soviet Union. That same year, the framework governing electronic surveillance of foreign powers and agents of foreign powers -- the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- was signed into law....

....Technology and threats have changed, but the law remains essentially the same. If we are to improve our ability to protect the country by gathering foreign intelligence, this law must be updated to reflect changes in technology and the ways our adversaries communicate with one another...

..We are in this situation because the law simply has not kept pace with technology.

ad_icon

The failure to update this law comes at an increasingly steep price. The congressional joint inquiry into the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks recognized that there were systemic problems with covering communications of potential terrorists.

As director of national intelligence, I see every day the results of FISA-authorized activity and its contribution to our efforts to protect America. This surveillance saves lives -- the lives of our children and grandchildren. I also see the flaws inherent in the current law....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/20/AR2007052001058_Comments.html

Your Comments On...

A Law Terrorism Outran

Terrorists use up-to-date technology. Too bad our surveillance laws haven't kept pace.

-

By Mike McConnell

Bartron wrote:

Mr. McConnell, you are LYING.

"Technology and threats have changed, but the law remains essentially the same."

In fact, the FISA Act was amended in October 2001. When he signed the FISA amendments into law, George Bush stated that "This new law I sign today will allow surveillance of all communications used by terrorists, including e-mails, the Internet, and cell phones. As of today, we'll be able to better meet the technological challenges posed by this proliferation of communications technology."

Weirdly enough, the words you yourself have written in this article as an explanation for why FISA "needs" [further] amendment closely parallel the statements given by President Bush in 2001, when he claimed that the newly-amended FISA Act fixed exactly the problems which you claim were never addressed.

Let's compare what you wrote here with what Bush said in 2001:

You: "Technology and threats have changed, but the law remains essentially the same. If we are to improve our ability to protect the country by gathering foreign intelligence, this law must be updated to reflect changes in technology and the ways our adversaries communicate with one another."

Bush, in 2001: "When earlier laws were written, some of these methods did not even exist. The new law recognizes the realities and dangers posed by the modern terrorist. It will help us to prosecute terrorist organizations -- and also to detect them before they strike. . . .

Surveillance of communications is another essential method of law enforcement. But for a long time, we have been working under laws written in the era of rotary telephones. Under the new law, officials may conduct court-ordered surveillance of all modern forms of communication used by terrorists."

In short, Mr. McConnell, your boss asked for and GOT everything which you claim he did not get, and which you are demanding today.

I deeply suspect that the new changes you are pushing for will enable you to continue to hide the illegal FISA violations which Mr. Bush has been covering up these past five years. You, sir, have no business running a whelk stall, let holding the position of Director of National Intelligence.

And the Washington Post would do well to start fact-checking its guests' editorials.

5/23/2007 11:35:32 AM

But resident Bush, who is now proudly strutting around the country shilling his new book about the marvelous accomplishments of his two term presidency, was not done, when it came to the problem he had declared solved in October, 2001, by changes to the law.:

http://web.archive.org/web/20070815073030/www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/07/20070728.html

5153314149_7c13354f1d_b.jpg

John, I'm sorry this got long winded and a tad O.T., but I thought you needed to see this presentation to understand why I think there is no hope of Obama suddenly acting appreciably less unaccountable and forthright than Bush acted, or that the elected officials or the federal justice department will ever respond constructively to the facts presented from our research of assassination conspiracy and coverup, or our demands for further investigation. If there was any concern of accountability or of an attentive public or press, could the sequence I have presented here have possibly taken place? After Bush completed the above, seven year campaign of lies and deception, Obama reversed himself while he was a senator running for president in 2008, and voted for amnesty in advance of finding what crimes the telecoms had committed against the privacy of their customers, and for the changes Bush wanted in the laws.:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-502163_162-4200105-502163.html

June 21, 2008 12:20 PM

(CBS/AP) - Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., issued a statement in support of the House's update of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, but said he would try to strip a provision granting immunity to telecommunication companies when the bill comes to a vote in the Senate next week....

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9501E2DA1E3AF936A35754C0A96E9C8B63

THE CAUCUS; A Post From Obama

By SARAH WHEATON

Published: July 5, 2008

What does a candidate do when his popular Web site becomes a forum to attack that candidate's positions on a sensitive topic?

In the case of the campaign of Senator Barack Obama, you engage the critics.

Thousands of Obama supporters have organized on the Obama campaign Web site to attack his support of legislation to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, known as FISA. The measure grants immunity to telecommunications companies that worked with the domestic wiretapping program after the Sept. 11 attacks...

...''This was not an easy call for me,'' Mr. Obama said of his stance in a statement posted to the diary of Joe Rospars, a top Internet adviser to the campaign. ''I know that the FISA bill that passed the House is far from perfect.''

But he made his case for the bill....

Edited by Tom Scully
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Thanks Tom. It helps to flesh out the role of communications in the field of intelligence, sets the scene as it were..., HDH apparently was in constant communication with his superiors in DC. Kansas City used to be a hub but it shifted to Chicago. The Army has its own communications network through mail and later setting up what we now use as the internet and they then created a new separate internet. Today the USAF has a division that treats the internet as a field of operations.

The USPO PI department was the oldest of the intelligence agencies dating back to B Franklin and acted in many roles usually actvating fully in times of strife.

During the Civil War the Confederacy formed its own department and the head of it drew many employees from the Union. (He was also the last of the Confederate Cabinet captured with Davis (In front of whose house JFK is buried).) The PMG was traditionally automatically a Cabinet member. PMG JE Day in JFK's Cabinet (ex Ford executive?) resigned in mid '63 ostensibly over a personal issue but a previous topic reveals it was a forced resignation over a Civil Rights matter. HDH was old school southern USPO and while Days replacement refused to continue the participation of the USPO in the illegal mail openings that likely tracked Oswald (his mum had related things to say about this re letters to/from Kruschev) I suspect HDH continued a working relationship with the CIA via his boss (name?, After the USPO was disbanded by Nixon records seem to have disappeared and official sites seem to treat the USPS ( where the PMG is no longer an automatic Cabinet member (perhaps burrowing deeper into the Intelligence Agencies with less oversight ) as if it has always existed, afa early history goes, at least through searches from here.)

So, basically what I'm getting at is that COMMUNICATION must be an integral part in a coup, which in this case places HDH in the centre and his allegiances can be deduced from his location and the various roles he performed before, during and after the assassination.

(Again I state a belief that whoever can ID the persons with him in his office overlooking the kill-zone, (which BTW he was likely very familiar with having experienced it for years), who he conveniently forgets the names of, will likely crack a major hole that lead to the core conspirators.)

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Thanks Tom. It helps to flesh out the role of communications in the field of intelligence, sets the scene as it were..., HDH apparently was in constant communication with his superiors in DC. Kansas City used to be a hub but it shifted to Chicago. The Army has its own communications network through mail and later setting up what we now use as the internet and they then created a new separate internet. Today the USAF has a division that treats the internet as a field of operations.

The USPO PI department was the oldest of the intelligence agencies dating back to B Franklin and acted in many roles usually actvating fully in times of strife.

During the Civil War the Confederacy formed its own department and the head of it drew many employees from the Union. (He was also the last of the Confederate Cabinet captured with Davis (In front of whose house JFK is buried).) The PMG was traditionally automatically a Cabinet member. PMG JE Day in JFK's Cabinet (ex Ford executive?) resigned in mid '63 ostensibly over a personal issue but a previous topic reveals it was a forced resignation over a Civil Rights matter. HDH was old school southern USPO and while Days replacement refused to continue the participation of the USPO in the illegal mail openings that likely tracked Oswald (his mum had related things to say about this re letters to/from Kruschev) I suspect HDH continued a working relationship with the CIA via his boss (name?, After the USPO was disbanded by Nixon records seem to have disappeared and official sites seem to treat the USPS ( where the PMG is no longer an automatic Cabinet member (perhaps burrowing deeper into the Intelligence Agencies with less oversight ) as if it has always existed, afa early history goes, at least through searches from here.)

So, basically what I'm getting at is that COMMUNICATION must be an integral part in a coup, which in this case places HDH in the centre and his allegiances can be deduced from his location and the various roles he performed before, during and after the assassination.

(Again I state a belief that whoever can ID the persons with him in his office overlooking the kill-zone, (which BTW he was likely very familiar with having experienced it for years), who he conveniently forgets the names of, will likely crack a major hole that lead to the core conspirators.)

This will be my last post regarding somewhat famous Holmes names and possible genealogical connections to Harry D Holmes, but considering the interest in the

PURPLE intercepts, John B Hurt, Lee Harvey Oswald, and the not so irrelevant fact that McGeorge Bundy's brother William was at Bletchley Park in the same general

time frame that John B Hurt was decrypting JN-19, JN-25 some particularly important material at that time, maybe someone will get my point

Wilfred J. "Jasper" Holmes was a U.S. Naval intelligence officer in Hawaii during World War II. He was assigned to the Estimates Section of the Fleet Radio Unit Pacific (FRUPAC) at Pearl Harbor, where he was deeply involved in the interpretation and analysis of Japanese wireless intercepts. In fact, he was one of a handful of officers in Hawaii who was privy to material classified above "top secret." Holmes was part of the team that interpreted and analyzed intelligence derived from the breaking of the Japanese naval encryption code JN-25 – classified as "Ultra."

Hypo

Fleet Radio Unit Pacific, also known as Station HYPO, the codebreaking and intelligence station at Pearl Harbor.

Holmes came to FRUPAC, or Station HYPO, as the unit was known, by an unusual route. He was neither a cryptologist nor an intelligence officer by training; he was a line officer in the Navy, a submariner. By the mid-1930s he was a lieutenant, commanding the submarine S-30 at Pearl Harbor, when he began suffering from arthritis in his back. In 1936 he was medically retired.

Holmes had a degree in engineering, and quickly found a position as an instructor at the University of Hawaii. He had considerable skill as a writer, too – he'd written the prize-winning essay in the U.S. Naval Institute's annual competition in 1934 – and began publishing essays and short stories under the pen name Alec Hudson, several of which were published in the Saturday Evening Post. These often had a naval theme, and Holmes' descriptions of naval equipment and procedure we detailed enough that another aspiring writer, Naval Academy Midshipman Edward L. Beach, recognized that "Alec Hudson" must have been a naval officer.

Holmes was called back to active service in mid-1941. Tensions between Japan and the United States were rapidly increasing, and most naval officers were convinced that at some time soon, those tensions would flare into a shooting war. At the time, HYPO seemed to be making good progress on the JN-25 naval code, and another section of the unit was able to read much of the diplomatic code, Purple. Because Holmes had no cryptographic experience, he was assigned to the Estimates Section, where his experience as a serving line officer would be best employed, compiling intelligence drawn from various sources to determine the strength, composition and movements of various Japanese military units – naval groups, air wings and island garrisons.

Holmes

Jasper Holmes. Image: Naval Security Group via U.S. Submarine Veterans.

Holmes' work brought him into contact with units from all over the Pacific Fleet, but he remained a submarine officer in spirit, if not in assignment. Holmes developed a close working relationship with Dick Voge, the operations officer of the Pacific submarine fleet. Voge would come by HYPO every morning around nine o'clock, where he and Holmes would compare the current positions of U.S. submarines with decrypted messages concerning Japanese fleet movements. Most days this information was somewhat general in nature, but from time to time intercepted and decoded messages provided enough detail to put an American submarine in exactly the right spot to intercept a major target.

In June 1944, during the buildup to what would later be known as the Battle of Philippine Sea, HYPO collected and decoded Japanese operational plans detailed enough to enable two submarines, Cavalla and Albacore, to position themselves directly astride the Japanese Navy's lanes of approach. Albacore got the big new carrier Taiho, but Cavalla, on her first patrol, got the grand prize – the Japanese carrier Shokaku, a veteran of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Of the six Japanese aircraft carriers that had taken part in the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Shokaku was the fifth to be sunk. We had long since identified all the ships of the Kido Butai that had attacked Pearl Harbor, and their sillouettes were posted on the wall in the Estimates Section. It gave me an unprofessional vindictive satisfaction to check off each of those ships as it was sunk. I told Voge I would give a bottle of Scotch to any submarine skipper who sank one of them. Voge was careful to present every qualifying skipper for his bottle, but I never saw Herman J. Kossler, the captain of the Cavalla, after he sank the Shokaku. Kossler was the only submarine captain to sink a capital ship of the Kido Butai, and I still owe him a bottle of Scotch.

Holmes' private ritual became known among the submariners at Pearl; Ned Beach, the Naval Academy midshipman who had recognized "Alec Hudson" as the pen name of a naval officer, went into submarines himself and soon learned of the practice. As he wrote many years later,

[Holmes] had become an intelligence officer at Pearl Harbor and, after the attack on the Day of Infamy, had taken on himself the particular and personal dedication to see the destruction of every ship that had participated in it. During the war, from time to time, commanders of submarines would receive by messenger, without explanation, a bottle of fine whiskey. Little by little the word got around that one of the ships sunk on a recent patrol had carried special significance for someone. In this way Jasper Holmes never left out submarines. It was through him that we would receive orders to be somewhere at a certain time – and on occasion there was a bottle of booze at the end of the trail.

Holmes doesn't mention it, but he missed Kossler because Cavalla did not return to Pearl Harbor after that first, eventful patrol, instead putting in at the new forward submarine base at Majuro. In fact, Cavalla wouldn't return to Pearl Harbor until September 1945, after the war had ended. Instead, Cavalla's five subsequent patrols were all run out of forward operating bases in Australia, the Philippines and the western Pacific.

After the war Jasper Holmes returned to the University of Hawaii, where he eventually became Dean of Engineering. More than thirty years after the war, when the existence of Ultra intelligence was finally made public, Holmes published a memoir of his experiences, Double-Edged Secrets: U.S. Naval Intelligence Operations During World War II. It's a fascinating account of a central, essential part of the war that's gotten relatively little attention. Holmes writes with considerable modesty describing his role at HYPO; in fact, he was deeply and intimately involved in many of the critical episodes that took place there, and one suspects he gives himself too little credit.

http://maritimetexas.net/wordpress/

If the names Oswald, Friedman, Holmes, Hurt, Miller and Bundy, are not enough to get a focus on cryptologic

matters maybe another name will. Does anybody remember William Kunstler and his relationship to the JFK assassination?

Oh yes he was at Fort Monmouth also

See

page 36 William Kunstler: The Most Hated Man In America

See google books, for online access.

Also, when the McCarthy Era allegation that there was some sort of Communist infiltration of the Signal Corps facility

going on at Fort Monmouth, Kunstler was all over that; but to the best of my knowledge, his own attendance as a trainee

there was never mentioned.

In the Fall of 1951, Senator William Benton of Connecticut persuaded the Subcommittee on Privileges and Elections of ... inquiries concerning mainly the Voice of America and the Signal Corps installations at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey

See And Justice For All -William Kunstler published 1963

Wasn't Kunstler quoted as saying, words to the effect that .....the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, kept America from going Communist?

Edited by Robert Howard
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Guest Tom Scully

Now hold on, Robert; why are you making your Wilfred Jasper Holmes post your last one on Holmes genealogy?

You aren't alone in this search. I spent some time this past week searching all the Holmes death certificates in Jackson County, MO from 1915 to 1950. I waded through suicides by hanging, a couple who lost three children in one year to measles and pneumonia, too many premature infants, young mothers who died from post child birth complications...enough misery to fit in a book, and all just among folks named Holmes.

This is all I came up with, and it was a dead end, but it doesn't feel like it is time to stop the search. It is time though, to look for other likely Missouri counties offering online death certificate images.

5155743184_6fef1af692_z.jpg

http://gravelocator.cem.va.gov/j2ee/servlet/NGL_v1

1. HOLMES, WILFRED J

CAPT US NAVY

WORLD WAR II

DATE OF BIRTH: 04/04/1900

DATE OF DEATH: 01/07/1986

BURIED AT: SECTION U SITE 1399 Click to view the cemetery map

NATIONAL MEMORIAL CEMETERY OF THE PACIFIC

2177 PUOWAINA DRIVE HONOLULU, HI 96813

http://libweb.hawaii.edu/names/holmes.html

Wilfred Jay Holmes was appointed to the Naval Academy in 1918 from the state of New York.: http://books.google.com/books?id=V_8sAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA217&lpg=PA217&dq=wilfred+jay+holmes&source=bl&ots=dS8twIthKT&sig=exlTwnD0nWSs1ltjLTlijgsZcGU&hl=en&ei=chXXTLiQJ8TflgeFqIz9CA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CDMQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=wilfred%20jay%20holmes&f=false

http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy&hl=en&safe=off&tbs=nws:1%2Car%3A1&q=Dr.+John+Eric+Holmes%2C+to+Miss+Beatrice+Alyce+Bystrom&aq=&aqi=&aql=&oq=WILFRED+Jay+HOLMES&gs_rfai=&pbx=1&fp=bb84dc0be2ad39a5

Miss Bystrom Repeats Vows With Dr. Holmes

Pay-Per-View - Los Angeles Times - Jun 8, 1957

Capt. Wilfred J. Holmes, USN ret., vice-president of the University of Hawaii and Mrs Holmes came from Hawaii to attend the marriage of their son Dr John Eric Holmes to Miss Beatrice Alyce Bystrom last evening ...

http://www.erbzine.com/mag31/3149.html

...John Eric Holmes was born Feb. 16, 1930, in South Dakota, but later lived in Hawaii, where his father was a submarine commander at Pearl Harbor. His dad left the Navy to teach math and write short stories. But when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, his father re-entered the Navy to serve his country. It was while a young boy in Hawaii that Eric had the opportunity to meet author Edgar Rice Burroughs, who was also living there at the time. Young Eric obtained Burroughs's signature in a copy of Tarzan and the Leopard Men, a book he kept all his life.

Eric followed his father in the armed services tradition, joining the Marines and fighting two years in Korea.

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Now hold on, Robert; why are you making your Wilfred Jasper Holmes post your last one on Holmes genealogy?

You aren't alone in this search. I spent some time this past week searching all the Holmes death certificates in Jackson County, MO from 1915 to 1950. I waded through suicides by hanging, a couple who lost three children in one year to measles and pneumonia, too many premature infants, young mothers who died from post child birth complications...enough misery to fit in a book, and all just among folks named Holmes.

This is all I came up with, and it was a dead end, but it doesn't feel like it is time to stop the search. It is time though, to look for other likely Missouri counties offering online death certificate images.

5155743184_6fef1af692_z.jpg

http://gravelocator..../servlet/NGL_v1

1. HOLMES, WILFRED J

CAPT US NAVY

WORLD WAR II

DATE OF BIRTH: 04/04/1900

DATE OF DEATH: 01/07/1986

BURIED AT: SECTION U SITE 1399 Click to view the cemetery map

NATIONAL MEMORIAL CEMETERY OF THE PACIFIC

2177 PUOWAINA DRIVE HONOLULU, HI 96813

http://libweb.hawaii...mes/holmes.html

Wilfred Jay Holmes was appointed to the Naval Academy in 1918 from the state of New York.: http://books.google....0holmes&f=false

http://www.google.co...b84dc0be2ad39a5

Miss Bystrom Repeats Vows With Dr. Holmes

Pay-Per-View - Los Angeles Times - Jun 8, 1957

Capt. Wilfred J. Holmes, USN ret., vice-president of the University of Hawaii and Mrs Holmes came from Hawaii to attend the marriage of their son Dr John Eric Holmes to Miss Beatrice Alyce Bystrom last evening ...

http://www.erbzine.com/mag31/3149.html

...John Eric Holmes was born Feb. 16, 1930, in South Dakota, but later lived in Hawaii, where his father was a submarine commander at Pearl Harbor. His dad left the Navy to teach math and write short stories. But when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, his father re-entered the Navy to serve his country. It was while a young boy in Hawaii that Eric had the opportunity to meet author Edgar Rice Burroughs, who was also living there at the time. Young Eric obtained Burroughs's signature in a copy of Tarzan and the Leopard Men, a book he kept all his life.

Eric followed his father in the armed services tradition, joining the Marines and fighting two years in Korea.

The reason I made the comment about it being my last post on Holmes genealogy, is because I was getting the impression, no-one was particularly interested, as long as there is interest I will be more than glad to provide help, and any resources I can.....

Thanks for the concern....

Edited by Robert Howard
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I'm certainly interested. I wish I could do more from here. You guys are making connectons and digging up stuff that I think that unless one is actually doing it one cannot see what a lot of it means so I'm like a bystander trying to make sense of stuff I only have a fragmented vew of. In a way HDH was so in your face but when one starts to look closer he blurs around the edges and starts to fade. That in itself is part of what intrigues me about him. There must be a reason for it, and quite frankly, given the context, the one that makes most sense to me is that he was an integral part of the conspiracy.

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Guest Tom Scully

John, here is an example of the kind of backwater garbage case all of these players, included Henry Wade's office were "working on" in the weeks surrounding the assassination. They seem to have known one way to do business, and they weren't too particular about the merits of what they pursued, or about procedure and the weight of the evidence to influence their priorities. They turned this nothing event into a federal crime by luring the suspect into using the mail to sell what they knew to be at the time very mild adult photos to another consenting adult who was their undercover designate. The milkman probably got promoted to postal inspector.

The money wasted in this particular example; appeals all the way up to the federal level that stretched out for five years, and Henry Wade could not even insist or pay for Fritz to have a tape recorder to document interrogations. Are you familiar with the Richardson, TX, P.D.;s cooperative postal inspector, and Harry Holmes sidekick, RH Robinson? If not, we'll have to check him out.

http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F2/401/401.F2d.232.24293_1.html

401 F.2d 232

Ben Herbert PHELPER, Appellant,

v.

Bill DECKER, Sheriff of Dallas County, Texas, Appellee.

No. 24293.

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit.

Aug. 6, 1968.

...The facts may be quickly capsulated. In November of 1963 Appellant showed some pictures of nude women to his milkman, James Bartley. Bartley talked to Officer Smith of the Richardson, Texas, police department about the occurrence, and a meeting was arranged between Appellant and Smith at a local drugstore, even though Appellant knew Smith to be a police officer. After conversing for a time about photography, Appellant invited Smith to his home to view photographs and to discuss possible sales outlets for the pictures. Smith went to the house the next day with a fellow officer and they observed from one to two hundred colored slides of various girls, but Officer Smith considered only one of these slides obscene.

3

After this meeting in Appellant's home, Officer Smith reported to his superiors, and soon thereafter a Postal Inspector using a pseudonym and posing as a buyer for the pictures, began to correspond with Appellant, but the State does not contend that any obscene pictures ever passed through the mails. From November of 1963 until January of 1964, Officer Smith visited Appellant's home on several occasions and the men discussed photography and viewed more pictures, several of which Smith considered obscene.

4

Since things were evidently not moving fast enough, the police and the postal inspectors procured a search warrant for Appellant's home. But before the warrant could be executed, the two officers and two postal inspectors met Appellant in a Richardson drugstore (not by prearrangement) near the location where Appellant was conducting an art show. After talking about going for coffee, Appellant went outside and got in the car, apparently of his own volition, although he later testified that he thought himself to be under arrest. The postal inspectors then identified themselves and they all drove to the police station. Once there, the men drank coffee and reminisced about World War II experiences. Appellant was told that he was under investigation and was warned of his rights, and he then executed a written consent to the search of his house without a search warrant. He was not told, nor did he then know, of the existence of the search warrant. The police, postal inspectors, and Appellant then proceeded to Appellant's house, where, after allowing him time to talk to his wife alone to explain the situation, the officers searched the house and found the obscene pictures in controversy here.

5

On the State Court trial, Appellant testified on his own behalf and that the only reason he signed the consent to search was because the police said he could either consent or they would use the warrant.4 He also swore that the consent was executed after the house was searched, not before.

6

This testimony was sharply disputed by the police....

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&tbs=nws%3A1%2Car%3A1&q=%22drug+store+and+introduced+him+to+Postal+Inspector+Harry+D.+Holmes.+%22&btnG=Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

Texas Case Law - PHELPER v. STATE, 396 SW2d 396 (Tex.Cr.App

Texas Case Law - Dec 6, 1965

...when the witness James Bartley was in the home delivering milk, appellant showed him some pictures of nude women.

Subsequent to seeing the pictures, Bartley had a conversation with Detective Bob Smith of the Richardson Police Department.

On November 7th Detective Smith who had some experience in photography met the appellant in a drug store and the two became engaged in a conversation...showed him between one and two hundred pictures which were colored slides of different girls. Of the pictures exhibited only one appeared to be obscene, it being a photograph of a woman with her pubic hair exposed. On such occasion appellant emphasized that he was interested in selling the pictures and thought the detective could use some of his contacts in helping him sell them.

Police and Postal Inspector RH Robinson was later called. In a meeting on November 12th with the Inspector, a buyer for appellant's photographs was set up under the name of Garrett who was to correspond with appellant relative to the pictures. On December 5th Detective Smith returned to appellant's home and appellant showed him Page 398 some 'series' pictures of the same girl in sequence of undressing. At that time appellant stated he was mailing the pictures to a man by the name of Garrett with whom he had had correspondence. On December 13th Detective Smith again met appellant in the drug store and appellant informed him that he was sending some more pictures to Garrett. The state's proof further shows that on January 22nd Detective Smith again saw appellant in the drug store and introduced him to Postal Inspector Harry D. Holmes... at the police station appellant proceeded to sign and execute a written consent to the search of his home by Inspector Holmes without a search warrant.

Edited by Tom Scully
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John, here is an example of the kind of backwater garbage case all of these players, included Henry Wade's office were "working on" in the weeks surrounding the assassination. They seem to have known one way to do business, and they weren't too particular about the merits of what they pursued, or about procedure and the weight of the evidence to influence their priorities. They turned this nothing event into a federal crime by luring the suspect into using the mail to sell what they knew to be at the time very mild adult photos to another consenting adult who was their undercover designate. The milkman probably got promoted to postal inspector.

The money wasted in this particular example; appeals all the way up to the federal level that stretched out for five years, and Henry Wade could not even insist or pay for Fritz to have a tape recorder to document interrogations. Are you familiar with the Richardson, TX, P.D.;s cooperative postal inspector, and Harry Holmes sidekick, RH Robinson? If not, we'll have to check him out.

http://bulk.resource...32.24293_1.html

401 F.2d 232

Ben Herbert PHELPER, Appellant,

v.

Bill DECKER, Sheriff of Dallas County, Texas, Appellee.

No. 24293.

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit.

Aug. 6, 1968.

...The facts may be quickly capsulated. In November of 1963 Appellant showed some pictures of nude women to his milkman, James Bartley. Bartley talked to Officer Smith of the Richardson, Texas, police department about the occurrence, and a meeting was arranged between Appellant and Smith at a local drugstore, even though Appellant knew Smith to be a police officer. After conversing for a time about photography, Appellant invited Smith to his home to view photographs and to discuss possible sales outlets for the pictures. Smith went to the house the next day with a fellow officer and they observed from one to two hundred colored slides of various girls, but Officer Smith considered only one of these slides obscene.

3

After this meeting in Appellant's home, Officer Smith reported to his superiors, and soon thereafter a Postal Inspector using a pseudonym and posing as a buyer for the pictures, began to correspond with Appellant, but the State does not contend that any obscene pictures ever passed through the mails. From November of 1963 until January of 1964, Officer Smith visited Appellant's home on several occasions and the men discussed photography and viewed more pictures, several of which Smith considered obscene.

4

Since things were evidently not moving fast enough, the police and the postal inspectors procured a search warrant for Appellant's home. But before the warrant could be executed, the two officers and two postal inspectors met Appellant in a Richardson drugstore (not by prearrangement) near the location where Appellant was conducting an art show. After talking about going for coffee, Appellant went outside and got in the car, apparently of his own volition, although he later testified that he thought himself to be under arrest. The postal inspectors then identified themselves and they all drove to the police station. Once there, the men drank coffee and reminisced about World War II experiences. Appellant was told that he was under investigation and was warned of his rights, and he then executed a written consent to the search of his house without a search warrant. He was not told, nor did he then know, of the existence of the search warrant. The police, postal inspectors, and Appellant then proceeded to Appellant's house, where, after allowing him time to talk to his wife alone to explain the situation, the officers searched the house and found the obscene pictures in controversy here.

5

On the State Court trial, Appellant testified on his own behalf and that the only reason he signed the consent to search was because the police said he could either consent or they would use the warrant.4 He also swore that the consent was executed after the house was searched, not before.

6

This testimony was sharply disputed by the police....

http://www.google.co...l=&oq=&gs_rfai=

Texas Case Law - PHELPER v. STATE, 396 SW2d 396 (Tex.Cr.App

Texas Case Law - Dec 6, 1965

...when the witness James Bartley was in the home delivering milk, appellant showed him some pictures of nude women.

Subsequent to seeing the pictures, Bartley had a conversation with Detective Bob Smith of the Richardson Police Department.

On November 7th Detective Smith who had some experience in photography met the appellant in a drug store and the two became engaged in a conversation...showed him between one and two hundred pictures which were colored slides of different girls. Of the pictures exhibited only one appeared to be obscene, it being a photograph of a woman with her pubic hair exposed. On such occasion appellant emphasized that he was interested in selling the pictures and thought the detective could use some of his contacts in helping him sell them.

Police and Postal Inspector RH Robinson was later called. In a meeting on November 12th with the Inspector, a buyer for appellant's photographs was set up under the name of Garrett who was to correspond with appellant relative to the pictures. On December 5th Detective Smith returned to appellant's home and appellant showed him Page 398 some 'series' pictures of the same girl in sequence of undressing. At that time appellant stated he was mailing the pictures to a man by the name of Garrett with whom he had had correspondence. On December 13th Detective Smith again met appellant in the drug store and appellant informed him that he was sending some more pictures to Garrett. The state's proof further shows that on January 22nd Detective Smith again saw appellant in the drug store and introduced him to Postal Inspector Harry D. Holmes... at the police station appellant proceeded to sign and execute a written consent to the search of his home by Inspector Holmes without a search warrant.

There is no lack of information on the internet regarding Ben Herbert Phelper.

Here is one of the more informative ones, and which should answer

some questions, about who he was.

See google books

War and politics by other means: a journalist's memoir By Shelby Scates

On page 48 beginning with

None of these Dallas friends was more colorful than Ben Phelper

a pre-war carnival driver, middleweight prizefighter and pilot of racing airplanes.

A ball turret gunner on a B-17, Ben finished the war as a prisoner in Stalag-17,

the German camp for downed airmen made famous by a play and movie of the

same name. Phelper claimed both were based on the diary he wrote and then

smuggled out of the prison camp, although he never got any Broadway

credit. An examination of the weathered document indicated either an

extraordinary forgery, or that Phelper was egregiously denied his due.

Phelper had a wife and three kids when he lost his job writing manuals

for a nearby aircraft factory. He needed a steady payday and fast. For laughs

he invited the eminent “INS drama critic” to go with him for a job interview

at the apartment of Jack Ruby, the Selznick of strip in Big D. Ruby needed

a bouncer for one of his honky tonks. Ben certainly had the credentials. This

was in June and sweltering Dallas heat. A tall, gaunt gent with a pallor that

suggested solitary prison time met us at the door. He wore a buttoned-up,

double-breasted suit, that bulged up a bit under his left shoulder. He must

have been right-handed. Inside Ruby’s apartment, the nite-club king, clad

in pants and an old-fashioned tank-top undershirt, sat in a pool of discarded

newspapers, talking on the telephone. He was short, fat and balding and had

a house-cat in his lap. I did not like his looks or those of his companions, one

of whom boasted of swindling small-town merchants with what he called

“my pots-and-pans scam”— perhaps to distinguish it from his other forms of

larceny. He took the merchant’s money, but never gave pots or pans in

return. The other-fellow, the man in the double-breated suit, took his seat

in the apartment’s mezzanine—the better, I guessed to observe his boss

and the unusual guests.

Ruby was a show-off, he made no attempt to disguise his string of telephone

calls. On the contrary, they went to Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and

New Orleans. Between these calls, he instructed Phelper on the gentler art

of “handlin rowdy broads.” The trick was to cinch the lady’s upper lip

between your thumb and index-finger and then pull. He used me, not

Phelper, to demonstrate, and it hurt like the dickens. “See what I mean,”

said Ruby, returning to the telephone.

“Gotta deal,” he said, without explaining what.

We drank a few of Ruby’s beer’s and then left. Barely beyond earshot,

I turned to my friend and commanded,”You can’t take a job with that creep.

He’s bad news, He’s a gangster. For the sake of your kids, forget Ruby.

Find another job.”

International News Service folder a few weeks later, the summer of 1958.

They called it a “merger” with United Press. If so it was like a merger

like the cat with the canary. I was one of a few INS staffers retained by the

new agency, United Press International. So were Bill Theis of Washington

and Harry Trinborn of New Orleans. For a month I worked the Dallas bureau

under the eye of Preston McGraw, the day editor, and Ward Colwell, the

Southwest supervisor. McGraw was a gifted writer. Colwell was a wire-service

operator working the bush-leagues.

The hot story for a couple of days that month was a “top-secret military”

meeting at the otherwise wide-open Hilton Hotel in Dallas. The place “crawled

with brass, mission unknown.” The hotel’s second and third-floor windows

were closed to civilians, guarded by military-police. There wasn’t even

enough information for a newspaper speculation. The Times-Herald and

Morning-News played it front-page, anyway.

One day, for the hell of it, I bet McGraw I could lift the sheets off the secret meet-

ing during my noon lunch hour. He accepted, I rushed to the Hilton, walked past

a bored MP by flashing my retired army credentials and upstairs to the

mezzanine. There, like a candy-store display was a long table almost sagging

with scientific papers prepared for the meeting. More papers were in

wastebaskets outside conference rooms. I helped myself. Back at the bureau,

I read enough of the purloined papers to dash a story. Its lead read something

like this: “Top Air-Force commanders and civilian scientists are meeting in

secrecy behind barricades at the Hilton to discuss exotic meals needed for

rocketships to take an American to the moon.” This was a decade before our

first moon-trip.

McGraw promptly filed the same— a scoop— on the UPI wire. Colwell came to

look over the editor’s shoulder, frowning. “Can’t we spark up that lead?”

The supervisor was serious. McGraw looked at me and rolled his eyes.

I was assigned to the New Orleans bureau a few days later, McGraw

still owes me a beer.

FINIS

I especially liked the part about "Handlin rowdy broads," it seemed

almost like the Three Stooges.

Back to business. See Below

321) Postal Inspector Harry D. Holmes [deceased 10/89]:

a) 7 H 289-308, 525-530 / testimony;

B) other WC references: WR 121, 181, 201, 312; 4 H 228-229; 7 H 155, 256, 266, 590, 592; 13 H 4, 25-26; 15 H 151; 20 H 177-180; 24 H 488-492;

c) "Murder From Within" by Fred Newcomb and Perry Adams, p. 213 (based off an early 1970's interview)--- "A postal inspector [Holmes] picked up a piece of skull from the Elm St. pavement. He said it was as "...big as the end of my finger..." Furthermore, it was one of many: "...there was just pieces of skull and bone and corruption all over the place..." He later discarded it.[!!!]";

d) "No More Silence" by Larry Sneed (1998), pp. 351-371+photo---[p. 352] "…there was just a cone of blood and corruption that went up right in the back of his head and neck. I thought it was red paper on a firecracker. It looked like a firecracker lit up which looks like little bits of red paper as it goes up. But in reality it was his skull and brains and everything else that went up perhaps as much as six or eight feet. Just like that!";

e) “Murder In Dealey Plaza” by James Fetzer (2000), pages 46, 124, 172

http://palamaravince.blogspot.com/2010_01_01_archive.html

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The picture I'm getting is that of a person who, unless sanctioned, would have been in jail. Is that a sign of the times? Is it systemic, ie is HDH no worse or better than any other? Is it an insight into his true persona and relevant to the issue (JFK assassination) and if so is he a reflection of the true core conspirators?

If so then his immediate contacts are imo 'persons of interest'.

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One person he reminds me of is a more 'sophisticated' version of the guy who invented 'the Tague shot' who was killed in a shootout some time later.

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One person he reminds me of is a more 'sophisticated' version of the guy who invented 'the Tague shot' who was killed in a shootout some time later.

John

I call these the facilitators they had or were of service in their own particular capacity and could not wait to "serve"

Usually just a jobsworth or busybody till called into "Action" .I would put Shelley in this catagory.

How's the weather down there? , Its cold and wet here,No change there.

Ian

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Hi Ian,. Yes, I think so too. To my mind servers to a what was to them a worthy cause and they knew their role and willingly performed them no questions asked and knew consequences of stepping out of line and compromising the cause and their higherups. Therefore, through them, imo, one may be able to step up the ladder.

The weather? It's got a mind of its own at the moment over here, but winter didn't bring much rain and everyone's expecting a long hot summer.

Best, John.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I think one must consider communication always. This is one reason HDH often comes to mind. (for me anyway). I think he must be viewed in the context of the testimony of PMG J.E. Day (and his successor) and the historical role of the USPO (not USPS). It was to him that the request that theUSPO participate in the covert (and illegal) mail opening campaigns a couple of weeks after starting work (afaik the campaign took off around '53.) came in the form of a meeting with top CIA as published in the later investigation of inteligence agencies>. Therfore while the USPO PI servide was a separate entity within the USPO this must have been transmitted to the head of the USPO PI department and as HDH said he was in constant contact with his superiors in Washington who therefore must have been in constant communication with someone. One thing I've yet to learn is exactly who was the USPO PI head?

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I think one must consider communication always. This is one reason HDH often comes to mind. (for me anyway). I think he must be viewed in the context of the testimony of PMG J.E. Day (and his successor) and the historical role of the USPO (not USPS). It was to him that the request that theUSPO participate in the covert (and illegal) mail opening campaigns a couple of weeks after starting work (afaik the campaign took off around '53.) came in the form of a meeting with top CIA as published in the later investigation of inteligence agencies>. Therfore while the USPO PI servide was a separate entity within the USPO this must have been transmitted to the head of the USPO PI department and as HDH said he was in constant contact with his superiors in Washington who therefore must have been in constant communication with someone. One thing I've yet to learn is exactly who was the USPO PI head?

John

Found this interesting maybe you will?.

Postal Reorganization Act

In May 1969, four months after he became a member of President Richard Nixon's Cabinet, Postmaster General Winton M. Blount proposed a basic reorganization of the Post Office Department. The President asked Congress to pass the Postal Service Act of 1963, calling for removal of the Postmaster General from the Cabinet and creation of a self-supporting postal corporation wholly owned by the federal government. On March 12, 1970, after extensive hearings, the House Post Office Committee reported a compromise measure containing postal reform provisions similar to those proposed by the President and providing a pay increase for postal employees, but postal employees called it "too little, too late." Six days later, a postal work stoppage began and ultimately involved approximately 152,000 postal employees in 671 locations. The Postmaster General agreed to negotiate with the seven exclusively recognized unions upon the employees' return to work. Consequently, the employees went back on the job, and negotiations began on March 25. On April 2, the negotiating parties announced they had agreed to recommend to Congress a general wage increase of six percent, retroactive to December 27, 1963, for all federal employees, plus an additional eight percent increase for postal workers that would take effect if the parties could agree on legislation reorganizing the Post Office Department and if the legislation could be enacted. Management and the unions agreed to develop jointly a reorganization plan and, on April 16, 1970, announced agreement on such a plan. The agreement was embodied in a legislative proposal and sent to Congress by President Nixon. The proposal included four basic provisions enunciated earlier by the Postmaster General as necessary to reform the postal system: adequate financing authority; removal of the system from politics, assuring continuity of management; collective bargaining between postal management and employees; and the Postal Service's setting rates after an opportunity for hearings before an impartial rate panel. In addition to the eight percent pay increase for postal employees, the bill provided for negotiation of a new wage schedule so employees could reach the maximum step in grade after no more than 8 years, instead of 21 years. On August 3, by a roll call vote of 57 to 7, the Senate approved the conference report on House Resolution 17070, a modified version of the legislation proposed by the President; three days later, the House of Representatives approved it. On August 12, 1970, President Nixon signed into law the most comprehensive postal legislation since the founding of the Republic, Public Law 91-375.

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