When was Oswald first ID'ed in media

[Len Osanic]

Here is a forwarded question from Jeff Carter, who has been working with me on the 5o Reasons series:

Watching same-day TV coverage of the assassination and I am curious when Oswald was first identified by name in the media. The earliest I have found is interesting. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbiS7AaUDfA (at aprox 2 minutes 45 seconds). Footage originates from ABC's network studio in New York, where news anchor Don Goddard is on camera with network VP and former Eisenhower press man James Hagerty.

Over the course of several segments, Hagerty had been making a case that this has the appearance of a well-planned conspiracy. He is finishing up a discussion of the difficulties of Secret Service protection in large-city motorcades when Goddard says: "Well, this adds one to the case for conspiracy then. and the Dallas Police are apparently trying to add another - they have arrested a 24-year-old man, Lee Oswald in connection with a slaying of a Dallas policeman and presumably also the slaying of a secret service man in another part of Dallas which happened shortly before the President…" Hagerty inhales and cuts Goddard off to praise quick reaction by the Secret Service in speeding away from Dealey Plaza. (Based on eyewitness report from ABC reporter Bob Clark, who also interestingly said that the motorcade came to a complete halt, which Hagerty does not mention). (The story of a dead Secret Service man has been attached to the news from Oak Cliff up to this time, but soon is dropped. )

This sequence occurs soon after Zapruder's appearance on the local affiliate (WFAA-TV), which began approx 2:10 PM CST - so the Oswald ID as delivered by Goddard happens somewhere between 2:20 - 2:25 PM CST (certainly before 2:30). Not only that, Goddard appears to read this information from a piece of paper which has been sitting before him since they returned to air immediately following Zapruder.

Interestingly, the local affiliate WFAA follows up about a half hour later with information attributed to DPD captain Pat Gannaway that the "suspect" worked at the TSBD and lived in Russia (WFAA Part 14). Oswald's name and age are not mentioned.

Would this mean that Oswald's name and age was available to ABC's network office in NYC before it was announced to reporters in Dallas?

[William Kelly]

Here is a forwarded question from Jeff Carter, who has been working with me on the 5o Reasons series:

Watching same-day TV coverage of the assassination and I am curious when Oswald was first identified by name in the media. The earliest I have found is interesting. See

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbiS7AaUDfA

(at aprox 2 minutes 45 seconds). Footage originates from ABC's network studio in New York, where news anchor Don Goddard is on camera with network VP and former Eisenhower press man James Hagerty.

Over the course of several segments, Hagerty had been making a case that this has the appearance of a well-planned conspiracy. He is finishing up a discussion of the difficulties of Secret Service protection in large-city motorcades when Goddard says: "Well, this adds one to the case for conspiracy then. and the Dallas Police are apparently trying to add another - they have arrested a 24-year-old man, Lee Oswald in connection with a slaying of a Dallas policeman and presumably also the slaying of a secret service man in another part of Dallas which happened shortly before the President…" Hagerty inhales and cuts Goddard off to praise quick reaction by the Secret Service in speeding away from Dealey Plaza. (Based on eyewitness report from ABC reporter Bob Clark, who also interestingly said that the motorcade came to a complete halt, which Hagerty does not mention). (The story of a dead Secret Service man has been attached to the news from Oak Cliff up to this time, but soon is dropped. )

This sequence occurs soon after Zapruder's appearance on the local affiliate (WFAA-TV), which began approx 2:10 PM CST - so the Oswald ID as delivered by Goddard happens somewhere between 2:20 - 2:25 PM CST (certainly before 2:30). Not only that, Goddard appears to read this information from a piece of paper which has been sitting before him since they returned to air immediately following Zapruder.

Interestingly, the local affiliate WFAA follows up about a half hour later with information attributed to DPD captain Pat Gannaway that the "suspect" worked at the TSBD and lived in Russia (WFAA Part 14). Oswald's name and age are not mentioned.

Would this mean that Oswald's name and age was available to ABC's network office in NYC before it was announced to reporters in Dallas?

Len, this subject has been brought up before, and i think David Lifton has the best handle on it, as he did a chronology of the network reports.

I have his list posted on my blog somewhere and I'm sure it is here at Ed Forum, but I don't know under what thread.

I mention it on my chronology of the AF1 Radio tape traffic.

BK

Edited February 12, 2013 by William Kelly

[William Kelly]

“Lee H. Oswald” was first named at 3:46pm CST. - the timing comes from the original WFAA and WBAP radio tapes, which means their source was either a local reporter or UPI.

[Len Osanic]

The ABC network desk in New York ID's Oswald by (likely) 2:30 CST. It can be timed because it immediately follows Abraham Zapruder's appearance on the local affiliate. Zapruder left for Kodak by 2:45 PM, so his TV appearance was somewhere between 2:10 & 2:40, probably closer to the former. They seem to be far ahead of the curve on this info.

[David Andrews]

Thanks for this footage, Len, which includes Bill Shelley and the TSBD workers in its last quarter..

Edited February 13, 2013 by David Andrews

[Len Osanic]

Jeff, who originally posited the question, has followed up:

"JFK Countercoup published an account of early AP and UPI wire service reports on March 12, 2012. AP sent out wire report mentioning Oswald by name and age at 2:35 PM CST. That is probably what is on the ABC desk in NYC. So the time of the broadcast can be pushed to around 2:40-2:45 CST. Affiliate WFAA-TV adds the TSBD and Russia angle about a half hour later - attributed to DPD captain Gannaway. Note: DPD are already at the Paines, and were greeted with "We've been expecting you", although it is clear that there was definitely no way of hearing LHO ID from arrest from the media."

David Andrews - don't thank me, thank DVP who collected and posted all this stuff to YouTube. Annoying as he can be, he has done good service here.

[William Kelly]

From the Museum's Zapruder time line (http://www.jfk.org/g...film-chronology) :

2:20 p.m.

WFAA assistant news director and chief photographer Bert Shipp called Kodak, asking them to process the 8mm color film, since the station had only 16mm black-and-white film equipment.

2:31 p.m.*

Zapruder appeared live on ABC and WFAA with WFAA's program director, Jay Watson, while Schwartz stood nearby holding the camera with the film.

2:40 p.m.

Zapruder, Schwartz, and Sorrels, riding in a Dallas police car, arrived at the Kodak lab near Dallas Love Field about the time Air Force One took off for Washington with Kennedy's body.

The Zapruder appearance time is exact, according to tapes and other documentation at The Sixth Floor Museum, the very first media mention of Oswald by name came at 3:46 Dallas time. The ABC clip posted (from Dave Von Pein's site!) aired much later than the Zapruder interview.

Gary

Edited February 13, 2013 by William Kelly

[Len Osanic]

A follow-up from Jeff C:

"I don't necessarily want to question the knowledge of folks who have spent a lot more time with this footage, but what is available and listed as WFAA-TV Part 10-Part 11 (posted on YouTube) has the appearance of being contiguous - even as it fades after the Zapruder interview as the anchor says they are returning to NY. The reasons for saying this are that a) Jim Hagerty does not appear again after this segment the following sequence after returning to the Dallas station features the host make direct reference to Hagerty's comments about the bubble-top c) they are still referring to a rifle found on the "fifth floor". None of this is consistent with this segment being done "much later", and a "much later" segment being pasted in is not consistent with how this footage plays out (i.e. it doesn't seem to happen anywhere else).

It may be simply an academic point, but I believe this is strong evidence that Lee Oswald's name first crossed the airwaves here on ABC-TV at around 2:40 PM CST.

If so there is an irony in that Oswald's name is contained in a sentence which also conatins the word "conspiracy". ABC was the least watched network that day, but they scored some scoops.

(There is another irony within this ABC footage: Jim Hagerty, coincidentally one must assume, is voicing a Phase One scenario - "this has to be a planned conspiracy". Hagerty appears on the Youtube WFAA-TV in parts 8-11. Hagerty hired, and mentored to an extent, Peter Jennings - who, of course, decades later hosted ABC's notorious "Beyond Conspiracy" with its fierce defense of the Phase Two scenario.)

WFAA-TV Part Ten also features an extended clip from Love Field in Dallas, beginning of the motorcade , which is really astonishing. Part Eight has an amazing first hand account from reporter Bob Clark, who was in the third or fourth car of the motorcade - interesting observations on the limo stop and LBJ at Parklands. Part Fourteen has raw footage from Oak Cliff including the wallet dropped beside Tippit and brief clips from inside the Texas Theater at the time of Oswald's arrest. "

[William Kelly]

A follow-up from Jeff C:

"I don't necessarily want to question the knowledge of folks who have spent a lot more time with this footage, but what is available and listed as WFAA-TV Part 10-Part 11 (posted on YouTube) has the appearance of being contiguous - even as it fades after the Zapruder interview as the anchor says they are returning to NY. The reasons for saying this are that a) Jim Hagerty does not appear again after this segment the following sequence after returning to the Dallas station features the host make direct reference to Hagerty's comments about the bubble-top c) they are still referring to a rifle found on the "fifth floor". None of this is consistent with this segment being done "much later", and a "much later" segment being pasted in is not consistent with how this footage plays out (i.e. it doesn't seem to happen anywhere else).

It may be simply an academic point, but I believe this is strong evidence that Lee Oswald's name first crossed the airwaves here on ABC-TV at around 2:40 PM CST.

If so there is an irony in that Oswald's name is contained in a sentence which also conatins the word "conspiracy". ABC was the least watched network that day, but they scored some scoops.

(There is another irony within this ABC footage: Jim Hagerty, coincidentally one must assume, is voicing a Phase One scenario - "this has to be a planned conspiracy". Hagerty appears on the Youtube WFAA-TV in parts 8-11. Hagerty hired, and mentored to an extent, Peter Jennings - who, of course, decades later hosted ABC's notorious "Beyond Conspiracy" with its fierce defense of the Phase Two scenario.)

WFAA-TV Part Ten also features an extended clip from Love Field in Dallas, beginning of the motorcade , which is really astonishing. Part Eight has an amazing first hand account from reporter Bob Clark, who was in the third or fourth car of the motorcade - interesting observations on the limo stop and LBJ at Parklands. Part Fourteen has raw footage from Oak Cliff including the wallet dropped beside Tippit and brief clips from inside the Texas Theater at the time of Oswald's arrest. "

Wait a minute here - is this the same Jim Hagerty of ABC News who was Eisenhower's Press Secretary and Lisa Howard's editor?

If so, then I don't think he is an unbiased, independent source.

BK

[David Von Pein]

Yes, Bill, it is the same Jim Hagerty.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hagerty

[David Von Pein]

WFAA-TV Part 10-Part 11 (posted on YouTube) has the appearance of being contiguous - even as it fades after the Zapruder interview as the anchor says they are returning to NY. The reasons for saying this are that a) Jim Hagerty does not appear again after this segment; b ) the following sequence after returning to the Dallas station features the host make direct reference to Hagerty's comments about the bubble-top; c) they are still referring to a rifle found on the "fifth floor". None of this is consistent with this segment being done "much later", and a "much later" segment being pasted in is not consistent with how this footage plays out (i.e. it doesn't seem to happen anywhere else).

FYI---

I did make some edits during my 50-part WFAA-TV video series [which I condensed into just 3 parts in August 2013]. And also keep in mind that all of that WFAA footage comes from a 1983 WFAA retrospective program entitled "The Kennedy Tapes", hosted by Tracy Rowlett.

And that '83 program, while containing a lot of "long form" segments of uncut WFAA footage from November 1963, also has been heavily edited in many areas, with Rowlett filling in gaps along the way with brief narration before moving on to another section of "long form" coverage. As I recall, however, the majority of the extensive editing comes later in the "Kennedy Tapes" program, during the November 23-25 segments.

The "fade out" that was mentioned above (right after Mr. Zapruder's complete 2:31 PM CST interview) is one that I definitely remember putting in myself. That's not an '83 edit done for "The Kennedy Tapes" broadcast. But I cannot recall how much time elapses between the time of the Zapruder fade-out and the place where I pick up the live footage once again.

I have the raw DVD-R discs from which I extracted the video files for online use, and if I should get time in the future, I would be happy to look and see what material I edited out, and how much elapsed time was edited. But offhand I can't remember. It's been about 5 years since I created that WFAA series.

JFK-Assassination-As-It-Happened.blogspot.com/WFAA-TV Coverage

Edited July 19, 2016 by David Von Pein

[David Von Pein]

The "fade out" that was mentioned above (right after Mr. Zapruder's complete 2:31 PM CST interview) is one that I definitely remember putting in myself. That's not an '83 edit done for "The Kennedy Tapes" broadcast. But I cannot recall how much time elapses between the time of the Zapruder fade-out and the place where I pick up the live footage once again.

Correction to my above-quoted comments:

I was incorrect when I said that the edit right after Zapruder's WFAA interview was wholly my own edit. I have checked my raw DVD source for that material, and the only thing I edited out at that point was some of Tracy Rowlett's narration and an intro jingle that was used in 1983 by WFAA for the "Kennedy Tapes" broadcast.

When I wrote my post yesterday on this matter, I had thought there was some footage missing after Zapruder's interview, but there definitely isn't, because after the break that was put into the '83 show, it cuts back to Jay Watson and Abe Zapruder for just a split second before the cut is made to ABC in New York and Jim Hagerty. So I can tell that the '83 show picked up the WFAA coverage again without any edits after the Zapruder interview.

In fact, the split-second of footage which shows Watson and Zapruder AFTER the edit is even included in my YouTube version (go to 9:47 of Part 10).

Sorry for my earlier error, and I hope I didn't confuse or mislead anyone on this matter to any great degree.

[David Von Pein]

The ABC network desk in New York ID's Oswald by (likely) 2:30 CST. It can be timed because it immediately follows Abraham Zapruder's appearance on the local affiliate.

“Lee H. Oswald” was first named at 3:46pm CST. - the timing comes from the original WFAA and WBAP radio tapes, which means their source was either a local reporter or UPI.

The Zapruder appearance time is exact, according to tapes and other documentation at The Sixth Floor Museum, the very first media mention of Oswald by name came at 3:46 Dallas time. The ABC clip posted (from Dave Von Pein's site!) aired much later than the Zapruder interview.

Bill,

Len is correct (almost) regarding this matter. Because that time of 3:46 CST is positively not accurate (unless the 2:31 PM CST timestamp for the Zapruder interview as shown in the "Zapruder Film Time Line" is incorrect).

I just checked my WFAA-TV footage and found that ABC News in New York is saying the name "Lee Oswald" at approximately 2:40 PM CST (about three minutes into Part 11 of my WFAA video series). BTW, the ABC anchorman doesn't say "Lee H. Oswald" at that point in time. He just says "Lee Oswald", without including the middle initial.

The 2:40 PM timestamp can be obtained by the timing of the Zapruder interview (as Len Osanic mentioned). And I can only assume that the "2:31 PM" timing for Zapruder's WFAA interview is referring to when that interview STARTED, not when it ended. Not that that would be a huge difference in real time either way, because the whole uncut interview with Zapruder lasted just a shade less than five minutes.

So if the Zapruder interview began at 2:31 PM CST (as it says on the Sixth Floor Museum website), it's easy to time other events that occur just after that interview. There is one minute of additional footage after the Zapruder interview in Part 10 of my WFAA series. And then after about three minutes in Part 11, ABC in New York announces that Lee Oswald had been arrested.

And there are definitely no breaks or edits in my WFAA series after Zapruder's interview up until the time when Oswald's name is mentioned over ABC-TV in New York.

Therefore, we have a 2:31 PM starting point, plus five minutes for the entire Zapruder interview, plus one minute more at the end of Part 10, plus roughly three more minutes at the start of Part 11....which would equal Oswald's name first being uttered on ABC-TV at about 2:40 PM CST (3:40 PM EST).

Bill, I wonder if someone has confused Central time with Eastern time in that 3:46 PM timestamp you and Gary Mack posted earlier. Because it was, indeed, very close to 3:46 Eastern time when we hear ABC say the name "Oswald" on the air. That would, of course, be a common and understandable "time zone" error for someone to have made. The same type of one-hour mistake in time occurred in Wayne Hawks' transcript for the Perry/Clark Parkland press conference.

But I really can't see where some of the conspiracy theorists can go with this information concerning the first time Oswald's name was spoken on live TV on November 22. By 2:40 PM CST, Oswald had been in custody for about 50 minutes, and he had been inside City Hall for approximately 40 minutes. So there was certainly ample time there for a crack reporter or two, who would have undoubtedly been hungry for information about this guy the cops just brought into the police station in handcuffs, to dig out the name "Oswald" from somebody at Dallas City Hall.

And, quite obviously (via the WFAA footage that does exist), that is exactly what did happen (even though there was the initial confusion as to what Oswald's real name was--Oswald or Hidell). Somebody was able to find out from someone at the Dallas Police Department, prior to 2:40 PM CST, that the man who had just been arrested in the Texas Theater was named Lee Oswald. Simple as that.

Edited February 15, 2013 by David Von Pein

[David Von Pein]

These next two posts contain e-mails I received from Gary Mack:

Date: 2/14/2013 1:58:33 P.M. Eastern Standard Time

From: Gary Mack

To: David Von Pein

Hi Dave,

The Kennedy Tapes, as broadcast in 1983, has a few segments out of sequence since the original WFAA tapes were rarely marked with exact times. John Sparks produced that series and we’ve been friends and, for awhile at KXAS years later, coworkers since then. Both John and Tracy Rowlett are still active in local broadcasting.

WFAA donated all its tapes and films to The Sixth Floor Museum in 1998; five years later when we made new digital masters of the original tapes, I confirmed that the station did not record continuously that weekend or even the first day.

Finally, The Sixth Floor Museum’s collections include a copy of the ABC News log of the network’s weekend coverage, and their documentation showed the very first mention of Oswald by name came at 3:48pm Dallas time. It was preceded at 3:43 by a live WFAA report from Ed Hogan and followed at 3:54 by an audio report from Bernard Kaplan in Paris.

Gary Mack

Edited February 15, 2013 by David Von Pein

[David Von Pein]

Date: 2/14/2013 7:48:12 P.M. Eastern Standard Time

From: Gary Mack

To: David Von Pein

Some of my previous information was incorrect. From The Sixth Floor Museum's index of the original WBAP tapes is this description (written by a former WBAP staffer who digitized them). I have no evidence to contradict his summary:

16. 2:43 pm WBAP's David Daniel interrupts for word from Dallas Police of the arrest of "a 24-year-old man, Lee H. Oswald" in connection with the shooting of Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit. He's being questioned to see if he has any connection with JFK assassination. "Oswald was pulled screaming and yelling" from the Texas Theater in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. After a pistol is taken from him during a scuffle, he's quoted as saying, "It's all over now."

I must have overlooked an EST reference, for which I apologize.

Gary Mack

Edited February 15, 2013 by David Von Pein