Bernie Weissman, Where Are You?

[Paul Trejo]

As it happens, Larrie Schmidt turned out to offer nothing more than information already known. Presuming that he's telling the truth and not covering for his old Dallas contacts and memories, his memoirs remain for me so much useless trivia.

I have far more interest now in Bernard William Weissman (Bernie), who was one of those who testified before the Warren Commission. His testimony is interesting, and in light of the naivete exhibited by Mr. Schmidt, I now suspect that Bernie Weissman was the one member of CUSA who had any real brains -- or any real honesty.

The members of CUSA are public knowledge -- all listed by the Warren Commission (and to a lesser extent in the January 1965 LIFE Magazine article that told the story about the CUSA). Bernie Weissman's sworn testimony gave us the true character of these few.

Of them all, Larrie was the only member that Bernie looked up to -- somewhat. But Bernie would hold things back even from Larrie.

CUSA was set up by five liberal Army guys -- nothing right-wing about them -- who had black and Jewish friends, and who read Barry Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative and decided that they could take over the right-wing in the USA when they got back to the States -- if they wanted to.

Larrie Schmidt was their leader because he actually finished Ayn Rand's, Atlas Shrugged. He was the intellectual of the group. But he wasn't a trained politician -- he wasn't even a poli-sci student -- he was a journalist by education, and an Advertisement copy writer by trade.

As a follower of Ayn Rand, as an atheist Objectivist, Larrie conceived the notion of CUSA as a means to take over the rightist political parties in the USA from the top -- from their headquarters.

All his underlings liked the idea -- it was great fun. But Larrie was in love with the idea. When he got out of the Army in October 1962 (this is all part of that LIFE article and also part of the Warren Commission testiomony) he went straight to Dallas and planned to get married -- yet the day before he got married in early November 1962, he had already convinced the NIC (National Indignation Convention) of Dallas to given him control of their headquarters.

So, Larrie made the start, and wrote back to Bernie Weissman and Larry Jones in the US Army in Germany that he was preparing things for them when they got out of the Army. They were amused and even intrigued, but nowhere near as motivated as Larrie Schmidt.

Over the course of 1963, Larrie's contacts in the right-wing in Dallas gradually grew, and he found a job for his brother Robbie when Robbie was discharged from the Army -- Robbie was going to be the chauffeur of ex-General Edwin Walker.

During all this time, Larrie kept writing letters of encouragement to his Army buddies, telling them how great CUSA was progressing in Dallas. By this time, Larrie had also taken over the YAF (Young Americans for Freedom), and was expanding his influence among the John Birch Society in Dallas.

This is where it started to get hairy.

Later, during October, 1963, the John Birch Society -- and especially its most perhaps exhibitionistic Dallas member, ex-General Edwin Walker, chose to set up a US-Day event the night before Adlai Stevenson's UN-Day Event (using the same venue, the Dallas Memorial Auditorium).

As Chris Cravens amply documented, Walker and the John Birch Society used the entire night to plan their relentless heckling of Adlai Stevenson's speach planned for the following evening. They were to buy up as many tickets as they could afford, and bring Halloween noisemakers, and in general make it impossible for Adlai to get a message across.

They were to picket all day and night. Larrie Schmidt was one of the volunteers in that organization, as he admitted in one of his letters to Bernie Weissman.

When the scandal of the Dallas treatment of Adlai Stevenson hit the national newspapers, Bernie Weissman decided that Larrie Schmidt had really become a powerful person in Dallas -- he must have had tremendous social influence amongst the right-wing in Dallas to lead this national scandal. Bernie chose to move to Dallas right away.

When Bernie got to Dallas, he found a different situation than he expected. Rather than having a paying job in the NIC or the YAF, Bernie was expected to get any old job, and support himself and work for CUSA on the side. Larrie didn't have any unusual influence in Dallas at all.

Actually, contrary to appearances, Larrie Schmidt was a roadie in the orchestration of the Adlai Stevenson heckling scandal. Larrie brought some college kids to the event to carry signs outside the Auditorium before the speech, but those kids left early. That was basically it. Then, the day after the scandal, Larrie Schmidt stepped up to the Dallas Times Herald newspaper and spoke as an eye-witness defending the protesters -- they were peaceful, he claimed, and the stories about misbehavior were grossly exaggerated. Yes, this did earn him extra points among the John Birch Society leaders.

How many points would become apparent to Bernie Schwarz two weeks after he arrived in Dallas. Larrie had been working the Joe Grinnan of the John Birch Society to draw up a newspaper ad to criticize JFK, and suggest that he was a Communist.

Well, Larrie's expertise was newspaper advertising, and so he took the job, as a volunteer, and he also volunteered CUSA member Bernie Weissman to add his name to the advertisement.

Bernie told the Warren Commission he did not know where the text came from for the advertisement, except that he himself struggled to change one of the sentences. Larrie may have changed a sentence or two -- but the actual and original source of the copy text for the ad was unknown to Bernie. It seemed, however, that the people paying for the ad would send in their demands for a new item, or to change an existing item, on a daily basis for two weeks up until the finalization of the ad. But Bernie never knew their names. All he saw was that Larrie and Joe would back anything the funders wanted.

Who actually provided the text for the ad? Bernie honestly doesn't know, and probably Larrie didn't know either -- he claims that he didn't know. Joe Grinnan of the John Birch Society was the middle-man between the Real Creators of the black-bordered ad, and the mere mechanics -- Larrie, Bernie and the Dallas Morning News advertising desk.

The Warren Commission and the FBI dug deeper -- they found the names of the funders who had given all of the money to Joe Grinnan. All were members of the John Birch Society. But at that point they let the topic drop.

Thus, in two weeks, on the morning of 22 November 1963, the Dallas Morning News published a full page advertisement, for one siingle day, at the cost of $1,600 (which is about $16,000 in today's dollars). Bernie's main contribution (except for that one sentence that he amended) was his recommendation of a much thicker black-border on the ad than usual.

The black-bordered ad was published anonymously as far as the Real Creators of the ad were concerned -- but to the public, the name of Bernard Weissman would capture their imagination for a long time.

Anonymity of the Real Creators was assured, since Bernie Weissman only knew Larrie Schmidt, and Larrie Schmidt only Joe Grinnan, and Joe Grinnan could be relied upon to keep quiet. This was probably the main reason for choosing Bernie Weissman as the alleged author of the black-bordered ad. The second reason, as Larrie Schmidt had suggested to LIFE magazine, was to put a Jewish name on the ad to prove that the right-wing also had Jews on their side.

Anyway, the black-bordered ad will never be forgotten as a historical icon of the JFK assassination. Its twin handbill of the day, attached to the Dallas Morning News externally, and also passed around Dallas during the daytime, is the infamous "WANTED FOR TREASON: JFK" handbill.

When asked about this, Bernie Weissman swore that he had nothing to do with it -- but that he did see at least one copy of that handbill -- perhaps a stack -- in the back floorboard of ex-General Walker's automobile that Robbie Schmidt had been driving that day.

When the Warren Commission asked Bernie what he first thoughts were regarding the JFK assassination, he admitted his first thought was that he fervently hoped that General Walker's people had nothing to do with the killing, otherwise, all of the members of CUSA faced the possibility of serious prison sentences.

The connection with ex-General Walker (not retired, but resigned from the US Army) with the events of Dallas on 22 November 1963 has never been fully explored by anybody -- not the Warren Commission, not Jim Garrison and not the HSCA (House Select Committee on Assassinations).

Today, the only person left standing who can tell us more about these daily Dallas activities is, IMHO, Bernie Weissman. He will turn 75 next month. He was living in New Rochelle about 50 years ago. Where is he today? Does anybody know?

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo, MA

<edit typos>

Edited October 21, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Bernice Moore]

thanks paul...fwiw details about the black bordered poster and.........

http://www.orwelltod...sdallasad.shtml

JFK JBS Hate Ad

Edited October 7, 2012 by Bernice Moore

[Steve Cearfoss]

What is CUSA?

[Bernice Moore]

Try this Steve fwiw...b

http://books.google.ca/books?id=cg0bDS8bL8QC&pg=PA27&lpg=PA27&dq=cusa+jfk&source=bl&ots=Tw-KfR1Ft_&sig=GN59Mry1b4PGpqAJnDSNf7bNK_Y&hl=en&sa=X&ei=BiN0UP2CIOL00gH66IDgDw&sqi=2&ved=0CEgQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=cusa%20jfk&f=false

[Paul Trejo]

What is CUSA?

Steve, CUSA, judging from the 1965 LIFE magazine article (as confirmed by Larrie himself) and Warren Commission records, was the brainchild of an enlisted man, Larrie Schmidt, when he was biding his time in the US Army in Germany during the early 1960's.

It was a sophomoric enterprise of inexperienced Army guys, who, by the hand of Fate, were thrust into limelight of the Fall of Germany and the crippling of England and the acendancy of the USA as World Empire. In other words, they were Young Americans in the 1950's, the first full decade of American World Power, and were feeling their oats.

As the 1960's began, these young Army guys, all in their early 20's, decided they could take over the world by taking over the right-wing groups in the USA. It was a tempest in a teapot from the very beginning.

None of these Army guys had any political experience of any kind whatsoever. The most worldly of them all was Larrie Schmidt, and the most worldly experience he had was in journalism at Miami University, and in the US Army, as an advertising copy writer for German vacation resorts now owned by the US Army (and formerly used as vacation resorts by the top Nazi brass).

Larrie was good at his job -- very good. Sometimes celebrities would visit the resorts, and sometimes top brass would visit, and Larrie enjoyed his role as their host. These young Army guys would hang out at bars together, scouting for girls as young Americans do, and would pass the time by plotting to take over the world from the top. They decided to form a formal corporation called CUSA, which stands for "Conservatism USA."

They didn't read political books beyond Barry Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative. That was the only required book. The second book on their list was Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. As far as we can tell, only Larrie Schmidt read this book, and he took it as a personal calling to greatness. (Ayn Rand was the 20th century version of the 19th century Max Stirner, the outspoken champion of egotism, actually.)

To most of the members it was like a boy's club -- LIFE magazine compared it to a high-school club -- it was cool to be in CUSA, because you got to hang out with cool guys and meet pretty girls in Bavaria. To Larrie Schmidt it became an obsession.

When Larrie was discharged in October, 1962, he made a bee-line to Dallas. He knew that the right-wing in the USA had congregated there, and he knew that one of their leaders was the billionaire oil baron, H.L. Hunt, and that Hunt himself had a right-wing radio program (sort of like Rush Limbaugh today) and had published some books on rightist politics. (For example, Hunt's book, Alpaca, is an elitist manifesto which claims that votes should be permitted by taxes only -- so that the average amount of taxes would give the average person one vote, but that paying 100 times the average amount of taxes would give a person 100 votes. Also, taking money from the government would forfeit any voting rights. That was H.L. Hunt's idea of 'justice.')

So, in his very first four weeks in Dallas, Larrie Schmidt met Frank McGehee, founder of NIC (National Indignation Convention) which had been one of the fastest growing right-wing organizations in America -- and he actually took over the leadership! Larrie accomplished this the night before he got married (which is shown in the Warren Commission exhibits).

He was on a roll. He wrote to Bernie Weissman and Larry Jones who were still enlisted in Germany and made them drool.. Power. Power and riches were now at their fingertips. Easy money. Limos and girls. It was in their reach. Larrie's letter promised each of them jobs in NIC as officers -- they would all have paychecks and expense accounts. NIC was the first trophy of CUSA.

In early 1963, Larrie met the famous lawyer, Robert Morris, who was President of the University of Dallas in 1960, but in the 1950's had also been one of the lawyers to promote Joe McCarthy. (Some say that Morris did most of McCarthy's work for him.) Robert Morris was also a fierce conservative voice in Dallas, and had recently (in January 1963) convinced a Grand Jury to release ex-General Edwin Walker from custody for charges of starting deadly riots at Ole Miss University on the night of September 30th and the wee hours of October 1st, 1962.

Although Walker was guilty as sin, Morris got him acquitted, and then began a three-year, $30 million lawsuit campaign against all US newspappers that had suggested Walker's guilt.

Although the Ole Miss riots had given Walker a foul smell among higher Dallas society circles, Robert Morris was still a city treasure, and one night in February, 1963, Morris introduced Larrie Schmidt to a gala event at his house -- and announced to the converative gathering that Larrie Schmidt would now be the head of the YAF (Young Americans for Freedom) from that point forward.

The YAF had 50,000 members, so this was another feather in Larrie's cap, and Larrie wasted no time in telling his CUSA buddies (who were all still in the Army) about his accomplishment on their behalf.

We can tell from Bernie Weissman's testimony that Bernie (and perhaps most of the guys) were skeptical of Larrie. He was young, energetic, bright and amibitious, but he had no experience in politics. He knew how to promote events and products -- and himself -- but ultimately it was a newspaper ad, it was hot air, it was all fluff. They still kept their club going, but they didn't realy take Larrie as seriously as Larrie took himself.

So, when Bernie and the guys were finally discharged in mid-1963, only Larrie's brother Robbie had gone to Dallas to join Larrie. Larrie quickly got Robbie a job as a general's aide -- to ex-General Edwin Walker. Larrie got him the job through Walker publisher, Robert Allen Surrey (member of the ANP, and also a publisher for the ANP; Larrie claims that Surrey never made his ANP membership known to Larrie, which is at least remotely possible). Later, Larrie would claim that he "assigned" Robbie to "spy" on Walker in order to take over his American Eagle Publishing Company and "Friends of Walker" organizations -- but the evidence shows otherwise. Robbie needed a job - period. Actually, Walker could not pay much beyond room and board in his large house at 4011 Turtle Creek Boulevard. That was perfect for Robbie, who was used to Army life, and whose job in the Army had been General's aide. The results of Robbie's months of "spying" on Walker were exactly zero, according to all known reports.

Later in June, Larry Jones did show up in Dallas, with his fiance. They were excited about the prospect of CUSA, but immediately saw the reality behind the myth. NIC was almost bankrupt -- it was that way when Larrie inherited it, so it was simply dying on the vine. There were no jobs for anybody - that had been a lot of advertising fluff. As for YAF, the current leaders were resistant to Larrie, and although his name appeared on letterhead, his influence in YAF was still minimal at best. No jobs there, either. So, Larry and his fiance got local jobs in Dallas, but that didn't fly well, either. CUSA had a business arm named, AMBUS, short for "American Business," which was a commercial enterprise to generate money for political campaigns. Their funds were exactly zero dollars, and so they tried to buy a local bar (with no capital) to get them started. When that deal fell through, Larry and his fiance left Dallas, perhaps in July or August. They didn't stay long.

But Larrie was still busy putting a positive spin on everything. When Larrie got drafted to help prepare for the planned heckling of Ambassador Adlai Stevenson in Dallas, he wrote to Bernie about it. Bernie thought that Larrie was just boasting about nothing again -- until the morning after the Stevenson event -- then the national newspapers broadcasted the humiliation of Adlai coast to coast. Bernie was finally impressed.

Also - Larrie was now looking forward to merging with the John Birch Society next -- which was at least six times larger than the YAF. But there were obstacles -- the JBS had some very powerful people as leaders. Larrie was a young, inexperienced though ambitious advertising copy writer,hardly ready to lead 350,000 dedicated readers. Just how could Larrie Schmidt and his CUSA be of any use to the JBS?

Yet the impression that Bernie got -- according to his Warren Commission testimony -- was that Larrie was the king-pin of the Adlai protest. He really got the idea that Larrie was somebody special, somebody who was going to rise to political power quickly -- just as Larrie always said he would. Finally, in late October, 1963, Army buddies Bernard Weissman and Bill Burley moved to Dallas. When they got to Dallas, however, they found exactly what Larry Jones and his fiance had found -- Larrie had again been exaggerating.

No jobs for them -- they had to quickly find work as carpet salesmen. But they were willing to work hard -- that was no problem. Yet where were all these political underlings? There were none. All Larrie had really done in the Adlai protests was coordinate a few students from a local college to carry signs for a couple hours -- and then go home. The action had been planned by others above Larrie's head, and Larrie had little or no idea who they were.

I'm inclined to believe Larrie when he claims (in that LIFE magazine article and personally) that he had no idea who was calling the shots above his head. He really was that naive, it seems to me. (Therefore, all those articles from Mae Brussell that try to make Larrie sound like a Nazi conspirator would be pipe-dreams.)

Bernie and Bill were disappointed -- but Larrie had another plan -- if you want intrigue for your boring life, Bernie Weissman, let's put your name on my first real advertising job for the John Birch Society -- they want their involvement to be super-secret, so we will instead put our own CUSA name on the advertisement, and we will put your name on the ad itself.

Bernie listened closer. You, Bernie, will take the money to the Dallas Morning News, and you will order the ad on your own behalf. Don't worry about the money -- somebody else will provide the $1,600 (that is, $16,000 in current dollars) for the full-page ad.

And don't worry about the text -- somebody else will come up with the words. Just make sure the ad says exactly what the anonymous donors want it to say -- and you will be a hero in the morning.

Well -- the next day, November 22, 1963, Bernie got the shock of his life as the black-bordered ad was closely linked to the assassination of JFK in the public mind. Also, CUSA, which was not really Bernie's organization at all, was now linked with the black-bordered ad in the lock boxes of American History.

The John Birch Society, which was the true origin of the black-bordered ad, is generally not considered in connection with the black-bordered ad.

By my reading, CUSA was a naive little errand boy for the John Birch Society. In cooperation with ex-General Edwin Walker and sundry foot soldiers, the JBS gave us the WANTED FOR TREASON: JFK handbill, the heckling/hitting/spitting attacks on Ambassador Adlai Stevenson in October, and the black-bordered ad on November 22nd.

Where there's smoke there's fire.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

<edit typos>

Edited October 21, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

I would like to illustrate these issues with excerpts from Bernie Weissman's testimony to the Warren Commission. I will focus specifically on four sections from that testimony, namely, those four places in which the name of ex-General Edwin Walker was raised.

As is well-known, my theory finds Walker close to most of the prominent events leading up to the JFK assassination on 11/22/1963. Bernie Weissman was pulled into the Walker orbit in early November, 1963, and Walker's role was only vaguely known to Weissman. Weissman, a young man seeking work, came to Dallas to be with his Army buddy, Larrie Schmidt, who had been in Dallas for a solid year, started up their CUSA rightist organization, and had come into Walker's orbit fairly early in 1963.

Larrie Schmidt was not called to testify before the Warren Commission (and it is a myth that the US Government could not find Schmidt). Actually, the Warren Commission barely danced around the topic of ex-General Walker, and did not pursue his famous hatred for JFK in any depth.

Here is the first section. I add the header information as a fomality.

======================= Begin Section One ===============

TESTIMONY OF BERNARD WILLIAM WEISSMAN

10:30 a.m., June 23, 1964

200 Maryland Avenue NE, Washington, DC.

Present were:

Chief Justice Earl Warren (Chairman)

Senator John Sherman Cooper (member)

Representative Hale Boggs (member)

Representative Gerald R. Ford (member)

Allen W. Dulles (member)

J. Lee Rankin (general counsel)

Albert E. Jenner, Jr. (assistant counsel)

Thomas A. Flannery (counsel for the witness)

The CHAIRMAN. The Commission will be in order. Mr. Flannery, you are here representing Mr. Weissman?

Mr. FLANNERY. Yes, Your Honor.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Jenner, would you mind making a brief statement of the testimony we expect to develop here?

Mr. JENNER. Yes; Mr. Chief Justice. Mr. Bernard William Weissman, who is the witness today, played some part in the preparation of and the publication of the advertisement in the Dallas Morning News on the 22nd of November 1963, and we will seek to develop the facts with respect to that. It has been marked as Commission Exhibit No.1031, entitled “Welcome, Mr. Kennedy.”

The CHAIRMAN. Yes. (The document referred to was marked Commission Exhibit No. 1031 for identification.)

<snip>

Mr. WEISSMAN. ...Now, in Exhibit No. 1033, the letter I received from Larrie on October l – that was typed on October 1,1963, and mailed on 7 October 1963.

Mr. JENNER. You are looking at the envelope in which the letter was enclosed when you received it?

Mr. WEISSMAN. That is correct. And he states in the last paragraph of his letter in a postscript, “My brother has begun working as an aide to General Walker. He is being paid full time, et cetera. Watch your newspaper for news of huge demonstrations here in Dallas on October 3 and 4 in connection with UN Day and Adlai Stevenson speech here. Plans already made, strategy being carried out.” This was the only advance notice I had of this. And I didn’t give it too much thought, because he had said many things like it before, just to build something up, and nothing ever came of it.

Mr. JENNER. Is that document signed?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No; it is not.

Mr. JENNER. Does it bear a typed signature?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Did you have occasion to speak with Mr. Schmidt respecting the contents of that letter at any time subsequent to your receiving it?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I don’t recall.

Mr. JENNER. Did you ever talk with him about having received that particular letter, that he acknowledged having sent to you?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes; as a matter of fact, I was pretty worried about his brother becoming involved with General Walker, and I thought it might give us a black eye.

Mr. JENNER. And what did you do – call Mr. Schmidt or talk with him on that subject?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I don’t recall if I spoke with him, or if I wrote it to him in a letter. I don’t recall.

Mr. JENNER. But you had occasion to confirm the fact that the letter now identified as Commission Exhibit No. 1033 was written by Mr. Schmidt and mailed to you in an envelope, which we will mark as Commission Exhibit No. 1033-A?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. So that when you had your telephone conversation which you were in the course of relating, with Mr. Schmidt, you were aware when he made the exclamation which you have described, of that to which he was then referring –- that is, the Stevenson incident?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Was there anything else in Mr. Schmidt’s letter that disturbed, you?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I received so many. Mr. Jenner, would it be permissible to read this letter into the record?

Mr. JENNER. My trouble is, Mr. Weissman, and Mr. Flannery – I haven’t seen the letter. Mr. Chief Justice...

========================= End of Section One ======================

Obviously, since I underlined the sentence about Walker above, I am interested in Weissman's earliest, pre-assassination feeling about Walker. Weissman was already worried about Walker -- and yet the Warren Commission did not ask Weissman why he was worried. We are given no details about the trouble that might occur because Walker was involved in any events in Dallas where politics were concerned.

In another day or so I'll post Section Two in this series.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited October 17, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Paul,

Have you ever looked into the "Wanted for Murder" posters that were being placed in store windows in Dallas and Houston in the Summer of 1963? The poster had a picture of Nikita Kruschev and detailed his "Criminal Record".

It was investigated by SA Roger C. Warner of the USSS and allegedly led back to Robert D. DePugh, founder of the Minutemen.

DePugh was interviewed for a radio "expose" in November, 1974 in Cleveland, Ohio called "Conspiracy; Dallas to Watergate" with Stan Major.

In the show he alleges that he "received a letter in November, 1963 containing a plastic shell casing which bore a slogan of the Patriotic Party." He claimed it was from Dealey Plaza.

Obviously this case is full of never-ending-leads, most of which are nonsense, but I was wondering whether you had ever looked into the Kruschev posters?

Well, Lee, this is a new one for me. I'm delighted to learn about this, however -- the details are intriguing.

For one thing, in the Walker archives at the Briscoe Center, there is a similar "Wanted" poster for Chief Justice Earl Warren. The "mug shots" are similar, and this is followed by a list of "crimes". So - we are close to the mind-set that gave us this ugly attitude.

The Minutemen angle brings us closer to the ground-crew than any other group I know about. Some have said that Roscoe White was a member of the Minutemen. Some have said that J.D. Tippit was a member of the Minutemen. (Both were members of the Dallas Police Department in November, 1963). It is impossible to prove these allegations because the Minutemen carefully kept no public membership roles -- it was very secret.

The connection between ex-General Edwin Walker and the Texas Minutemen (as well as to Guy Banister and the Louisiana Minutemen) is one of the most urgent connections in my theory.

I want to know more about the linkage and any incidents involving Walker and the Minutemen (and Banister and the Minutemen). Any bit of evidence we can bring to light in this regard will repay us in multiples when the data is finally tallied -- I feel certain of this.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited October 19, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Here is a continuation of Bernie Weissman's testimony to the Warren Commission on the morning of 23 June 1964. In this section Bernie informs the American public that Larrie Schmidt's brother, Robbie, worked for ex-General Edwin Walker, yet Bernie himself never met Walker.

======================= Begin Section Two ===============

Mr. WEISSMAN. ...Here is how far we did get. Larrie had – and this was according to plan –- the first organization we planned to infiltrate was the NIC, National Indignation Convention, headed by Frank McGee in Dallas. About a week or so after Larrie got to Dallas he got himself a job with the NIC, as one of the very few paid men. This didn’t last too long, because a few weeks after that the NIC went under. And we had also, in other words, we had planned to use these organizations as vehicles to accomplish...

Mr. JENNER. Keep going on those details of your infiltration.

Mr. WEISSMAN. All right. We had planned to infiltrate these various right-wing organizations.

Mr. JENNER. You mentioned one.

Mr. WEISSMAN. The NIC. The Young Americans for Freedom. We succeeded there.

Mr. JENNER. What organization is that?

Mr. WEISSMAN. The Young Americans for Freedom? This was an organization essentially of conservative youths, college students, and if I recall I think the most they ever accomplished was running around burning baskets from Yugoslavia.

Mr. JENNER. Where was it based?

Mr. WEISSMAN. This is southwest. Regional headquarters was in Dallas, Texas, Box 2364.

Mr. JENNER. And the earlier organization, the organization you mentioned a moment ago, NIC – where was that based?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Dallas.

Mr. JENNER. All right. What is the next one?

Mr. WEISSMAN. We had also discussed getting some people in with General Walker, getting some people into the John Birch Society.

Mr. JENNER. Stick with General Walker for a moment. To what extent were you able to infiltrate, as you call it, General Walker’s group?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Well, this was rather a fiasco. Larrie’s brother, as I mentioned in the letter – Larrie’s brother went to work for General Walker.

Mr. JENNER. What was his name?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I don’t know his first name. But Larrie led me to believe his brother was some guy. His brother is about 29. And the only thing I ever heard from Larrie about his brother was good: and when he mentioned that his brother had joined the Walker organization, I figured this is another step in the right direction. In other words, he was solidifying his argument as to why I should come to Dallas.

Mr. JENNER. And this is what he told you?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Right. So when I got to Dallas, I found that Larrie’s brother drank too much, and he had – well, I considered him a moron. He didn’t have any sense at all. He was very happy with $35 a week and room and board that General Walker was giving him as his chauffeur and general aide. And so I tossed that out the window, that we would never get into the Walker organization this way.

Mr. JENNER. This man’s name, by any chance, was not Volkmar?

Mr. WEISSMAN. This name is entirely unfamiliar to me. Never heard it before.

Senator COOPER. Could you identify the Walker organization? You keep speaking of the Walker organization.

Mr. WEISSMAN. General Edwin Walker.

Mr. JENNER. General Edwin A. Walker?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Did you ever meet him?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No; I never have...

========================= End Section Two ===================

Weissman did not tell us what he was hoping for from Robbie Schmidt -- it is a question I would like to ask him today.

In another day or so I'll post Section Three (out of Four) in this series.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

The "Wanted for Murder" poster with Nikita Khrushchev:

http://www.maryferre...587&relPageId=4

The Khrushchev "Wanted for Murder" posters were discussed with Robert G. Klaus during his Warren Commission testimony. Volume V of WCH p.545:

http://www.maryferre...absPageId=17345

It's interesting that even though the poster was discussed with Robert Klaus during his testimony it was not included as a Commission Exhibit. Albert Jenner later said in a staff memo to Melvin Eisenberg that he was not going to include it because Klaus knew nothing about it:

http://www.maryferre...587&relPageId=2

This poster that should have been CE1053 was denied a place in the volumes as an exhibit and one has to ask why that happened. It was a single piece of paper and it would have taken up one page within the voluminous Warren Commission volumes. It instead became part of a Commission Document.

The Secret Service, in January 1964, was investigating the similarities between the "Wanted for Murder" and the "Wanted for Treason" posters. The Dallas Police investigation was headed by Jack Reville:

http://www.maryferre...1&relPageId=129

http://www.maryferre...bsPageId=343868

http://www.maryferre...351&relPageId=9

The posters also appeared in California:

http://www.maryferre...bsPageId=760514

The FBI in Dallas was investigating the Minutemen. SA James Hosty being at the center of proceedings. The FBI, in 1961-63, was under the impression that the Minutemen as an organisation did not exist in Dallas. One of their informers was William James Lowery whom I have written about before in connection with the JFK assassination. If there were no "Minutemen" in Dallas then who put the posters up?

http://www.maryferre...351&relPageId=2

Robert DePugh's statements on radio show regarding him receiving a plastic bullet casing through the mail with Patriotic Party slogan:

http://www.maryferre...bsPageId=290022

http://www.maryferre...2&relPageId=133

Thank you, Lee, for posting these items showing some of the extent to which the WANTED FOR TREASON handbills drew attention after the JFK slaying.

I noticed that on the Nikita Khrushchev WANTED poster there is a Warren Commission Exhibit number, namely, #1053. However, I was unable to locate that item in the Warren Commission Exhibits online. Odd.

Searching for that Commission Exhibit, however, I encountered this related item:

http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh20/html/WH_Vol20_0370b.htm

This is the John Birch Society article by WC witness Revilo P. Oliver, which accuses Moscow and Cuba of killing JFK. The idea (that so many rightists broadcast in the first two weeks following the JFK assassination) was that since the Communists killed our beloved JFK, the USA should invade Cuba right away.

The sappy story is made ridiculous by the fact that the right-wing hated JFK with a purple passion. Even the writer for the neo-Nazi newspaper in Germany (Deutsche-Nationalzeitung) that Walker called only hours after the JFK killing expressed his serious doubts -- "why would a Communist kill a Communist?"

Anyway, Revilo P. Oliver later admitted that he wrote this article with the help of ex-General Edwin Walker. Walker had his hand in so many aspects of the JFK circus.

I'm still looking for the WANTED FOR TREASON: EARL WARREN poster that I once saw in the Walker archives. I'll upload it as soon as I find it again.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Here is a continuation of Bernie Weissman's testimony to the Warren Commission on the morning of 23 June 1964. In this third section, Bernie informs the American public that his first suspect after the JFK assassination was ex-General Edwin Walker, which worried him, because he knew that CUSA could be connected with Walker through the John Birch Society and its black-bordered ad and through Robbie Schmidt who worked for Walker.

============================ BEGIN SECTION 03 ==========================

Mr. JENNER. When did you first hear the name Lee Harvey Oswald?

Mr. WEISSMAN. We were sitting in a bar, right after President Kennedy’s assassination.

Mr. JENNER. This was the 22nd of November 1963?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes; it was Bill Burley, myself, and Larrie. We had made – we were to meet Larrie and Joe Grinnan at the Ducharme Club.

Mr. JENNER. For what meal?

Mr. WEISSMAN. For luncheon. We were supposed to meet him at 12:30 or I o’clock, I forget which – about 1 o’clock. And I had a 12:30 on the button, as a matter of fact – I had an appointment to sell a carpet out in the Garland section of Texas – it was a 2:30 appointment. And I was in a hurry to get to meet Larrie and finish the lunch, and whatever business they wanted to talk about I didn’t know. So I looked at my watch. I remember specifically it was 12:30, because at that time Bill had been driving my car. He had quit the carpet company and was looking for another job. He had looked at a franchise arrangement for insecticides. He picked me up. He was waiting for me from 10 after 12 to 12:30. We got into the car. I am a great news bug. So I turned the radio on, looking for a news station. And they had – at that time, as I turned the radio on, the announcer said, “There has been a rumor that President Kennedy has been shot.” So we didn’t believe it. It was just a little too far out to believe. And after several minutes, it began to take on some substance about the President’s sedan speeding away, somebody hearing shots and people laying on the ground. In other words, the way the reporters were covering it. I don’t recall exactly what they said. And, at this time – we were going to go to the Ducharme Club through downtown Dallas. We were heading for the area about two blocks adjacent to the Houston Street viaduct. And then we heard about the police pulling all sorts of people – somebody said they saw somebody and gave a description. And the police were pulling people off the street and so forth. So Bill and I didn’t want to get involved in this. So we took a round-about route. We got lost for awhile. Anyway, we finally wound up at the other side of Dallas, and we were at the Ducharme Club.

Mr. JENNER. When you arrived there, was Mr. Schmidt there?

Mr. WEISSMAN. He was waiting for me. But Joe Grinnan wasn’t there. He had heard this thing and took off. I guess he wanted to hide or something.

Mr. JENNER. Why?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Well, because the way it was right away, the announcers, even before it was ascertained that President Kennedy was dead, or that he had really been shot, that it was a rightwing plot and so forth. And he had every reason to be frightened.

Mr. JENNER. Why did he have every reason to be frightened?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Because, let’s face it, the public feeling would suddenly be very anti-right-wing, and no telling what would happen if a mob got together and discovered him. They would tear him apart. Bill and I were frightened to the point because I knew about the ad. And I knew exactly what – at least I felt in my own mind I knew what people would believe. They would read the ad and so forth, and associate you with this thing, somehow, one way or another. So we went to another bar – I don’t remember the name of it – the Ducharme Club was closed, by the way, that afternoon.

Mr. JENNER. When you reached the Ducharme Club, it was closed, but you found Mr. Schmidt there?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Larrie was waiting on the corner. He got in the car. We sat and talked for a few minutes. We went to another bar a few blocks away. We drank beer and watched television. And we had been in the bar, I guess, about an hour when it come over that this patrolman Tippit had been shot, and they trapped some guy in a movie theater. And maybe half an hour, an hour later, it came out this fellow’s name was Lee Harvey Oswald. This is the first time I ever heard the name.

Mr. JENNER. What was said at that time?

Mr. WEISSMAN. By us?

Mr. JENNER. Yes. When it was announced it was Lee Harvey Oswald.

Mr. WEISSMAN. We were relieved.

Mr. JENNER. Anything said about it?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I don’t recall. First, what was said, like, I hope he is not a member of the Walker group – something like that – I hope he is not one of Walker’s boys. Because it is like a clique; and it is guilt by association from thereafter. So it came over later this guy was a Marxist. This was the same afternoon, I believe. It was found out this fellow was a Marxist. And then the announcers – they left the right-wing for a little while, and started going to the left, and I breathed a sigh of relief. After four hours in the bar, Bill and I went back to the apartment, and Larrie went to the Ducharme Club. He was afraid to go home.

Mr. JENNER. I thought the Ducharme Club was closed.

Mr. WEISSMAN. It was open at that time. We drove by. It was open. Larrie went in. We dropped him off there. And Bill and I went back to our apartment. We just waited. We knew we were going to get involved in this thing because of the ad. And we figured that if anybody at all in Dallas was on the ball, they know who we were and where we were. So we waited. Nothing happened. We waited there until we left. We barely left that house. As a matter of fact –

======================== End Section Three ===================

Bernie gave us comparatively few details, but then again, the Warren Commission did not press Bernie for many details. Why did he first of all suspect Walker? That would be the question I would ask Bernie today.

In another day or so I'll post Section Four (out of Four) in this series.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Here is my final installment of Bernie Weissman's testimony to the Warren Commission on the morning of 23 June 1964. In this fourth and final section, Bernie answered questions about the famous, "WANTED FOR TREASON: JFK" handbill that circulated on the night of the Adlai Stevenson heckling scandal and on the morning of the JFK assassination.

Bernie disavows any knowledge about it -- except -- except that he saw Robbie Schmidt riding around in ex-General Walker's automobile and this handbill was in the back of the car.

If I had been questioning Bernie for the WC on 23 June 1964, I would have delved much deeper into that fact. I would have not let that topic go until I had a list of names to question further. I would have called General Walker to witness, as well as the Schmidt brothers.

Yes, Robert Allen Surrey (the American Nazi Party member and publisher, and publisher for ex-General Walker) was questioned by the Warren Commission about the "WANTED FOR TREASON: JFK" handbill, and as one might expect of an extreme rightist, he took the 5th.

Where there's smoke there's fire.

============================ BEGIN SECTION 04 ==========================

Mr. JENNER. Mr. Weissman. I will show you Commission Exhibit No. 996. Have you ever seen a counterpart of that exhibit which is entitled “Wanted for Treason”?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Never directly.

Mr. JENNER. Tell us about your first acquaintance with that, with the circumstances, if you know, of how it came into existence, and who had anything to do with it.

Mr. WEISSMAN. Well, I can only go by hearsay on this – what I have seen and what I have heard from other individuals.

Mr. JENNER. Did this come to your attention before November 22, 1963, or after?

Mr. WEISSMAN. After.

Mr. JENNER. Tell what you know, please.

Mr. WEISSMAN. I had heard that these handbills were distributed somewhere in North Dallas, I believe, on the university campus I believe it was, the University of Dallas campus.

Mr. JENNER. From what source did you hear this?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Now, I think it was – I am not sure – I think it might have been Larrie or his brother Bob. I am not sure. Larrie declaimed any knowledge of this. I know he had nothing to do with this particular handbill.

Mr. JENNER. How do you know that?

Mr. WEISSMAN. He would have told me.

Mr. JENNER. That’s the basis for your supposition?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes; and I saw this handbill, or something similar to it, in the back of a station wagon used by Larrie’s brother Bob in transporting…

Mr. JENNER. When?

Mr. WEISSMAN. This was several days after the assassination. There was one crumpled up in the back. And I happened to look through the window and see it. This was in front of the Ducharme Club, as a matter of fact. It was one night. And I saw this. And I saw something “Treason” – I had heard about the handbills.

Mr. JENNER. From whom?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Excuse me?

Mr. JENNER. From whom, sir?

Mr. WEISSMAN. I think it was Larrie. I cannot be 100% sure. I did not take too much interest in it at the time. But in any case, I did see something resembling this, only it seemed to be a larger picture of President Kennedy. But in any case, it was in the back of a station wagon owned by General Walker, Edwin Walker, or by what – if incorporated, by the corporation he is with, or chairman of.

Mr. JENNER. How did you know that?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Well, I know that Bob was General Walker’s chauffeur, and by seeing this crumpled up in the back, behind the front seat on the floor of the car, I naturally assumed that it had something to do with General Walker. Exactly what or how, or if he had distributed it, I have no idea. I do not have the faintest idea. I did not go into it any further, because I felt that everything was past, and I was leaving Dallas anyway. I had made up my mind.

Mr. JENNER. When you say you had heard about this matter, that is the handbill, or handbill similar to it, had you heard about that before November 22, 1963?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Not to my recollection, no.

Mr. JENNER. Shortly after that?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. And before you left Dallas?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Did you have anything to do with the bringing into existence of this or similar handbills?

Mr. WEISSMAN. None; none whatsoever.

Mr. JENNER. Other than the possibility of Bob Schmidt having something to do with them under the circumstances you have related. Did any others of your group have anything to do with creating this type of literature and distribution of handbills?

Mr. WEISSMAN. None that I know of.

The CHAIRMAN. How about the names of those people who were in on it?

Mr. JENNER. On the handbill?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Did you become acquainted at any time with Robert A. Surrey?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No.

Mr. JENNER. With Robert G. Klause?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No.

Mr. JENNER. With J.T. Monk?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No.

Mr. JENNER. Did you become acquainted at any time with the Johnson Printing Co.?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No.

Mr. JENNER. Did you have any materials printed – and when I say you. I mean you or your group while you were in Dallas?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Not that I know of. I personally have no knowledge of anything being printed.

Mr. JENNER. Did you ever hear of the Lettercraft Printing Co.?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No; I have not.

Mr. JENNER. Did you ever hear of Ashland Frederick Birchwell?

Mr. WEISSMAN. No.

Mr. JENNER. Or have any contact with him?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Not that I know of. I guess I must have met two or three dozen people. For example, when we went up to Joe Grinnan’s office at various times, we would come down and eat in the cafeteria, and there would be somebody sitting with him, and there would be introductions. I never remembered

their names, because it was just in passing. I never had any personal contact, really.

Mr. JENNER. Did you meet General Walker at any time while you were in Dallas?

Mr. WEISSMAN. Never did.

============================= End Section Four ===================

I am astonished that the Warren Commission did not press Bernie for more details. Bernie volunteered his eye-witness connection between the "WANTED FOR TREASON: JFK" handbill on 22 November 1963, and ex-General Edwin Walker -- yet the Warren Commission played its hand calmly and mildly.

It seems to me that if the trail led to ex-General Edwin Walker, the Warren Commission did not wish to pursue the matter on record.

Today I would ask Bernie many more questions on this same topic. Bernie believed Larrie Schmidt when Larrie declaimed any knowledge about this notorious handbill, but Larrie had lied to Bernie about so many issues -- why believe him now? Bernie claims he never met Robert Allen Surrey, but Larrie Schmidt admitted to knowing Robert Allen Surrey very well -- it was Surrey who found Robbie Schmidt a job with ex-General Walker.

Yet the Warren Commission attorneys did not seem interested in chasing down this warm trail.

All right. Now that I've posted the four key sections in Bernie Weissman's WC testimony in which he mentions ex-General Edwin Walker (the only US General to resign in the 20th century), I will open the floor to questions about this testimony. I myself have a lot of questions.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited October 21, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Bernice Moore]

Paul; here is the Earl Warren impeachment poster.when you click it, it opens up...?.fwiw...b

Edited October 22, 2012 by Bernice Moore

[Karl Kinaski]

Thx for posting this, Bernice. IMO serving as head of the WC, puts Warren out of the line of fire. Ironically it was Gerald Ford, who brought forward a motion to impeach Warren just prior to the assassination of JFK.

kk

[Paul Trejo]

Thx for posting this, Bernice. IMO serving as head of the WC, puts Warren out of the line of fire. Ironically it was Gerald Ford, who brought forward a motion to impeach Warren just prior to the assassination of JFK.

kk

Karl, the movement to impeach Earl Warren goes back to the very origins of the John Birch Society. Aside from their changing goals over the decades, the JBS always had two primary goals -- Impeach Earl Warren and get the US out of the UN.

The problem with Earl Warren, of course, was his role in the Supreme Court decision on Brown v. the Board of Education. Under Earl Warren, the Supreme Court in 1954 decided (among other points) that all citizens' children had the right to public education at public institutions, without regard to race.

Yet even at this late date, the first year of Eisenhower's presidency, perhaps most American schools were still racially segregated. It came as a shock to many Americans, especially in the South, that the Federal Government would be so bold as to bypass States' rights and tell all public schools that they could no longer discriminate their public school roles based on race.

Eleanor Roosevelt chose to be at the forefront of this social movement. In the Walker archives at the Briscoe Center for American History, we can see a racist journal protesting the participation of Eleanor Roosevelt in this movement: http://www.pet880.co...Eleanor_Red.JPG

The right-wing rallied around the impeachment of Earl Warren. It was believed that if Warren was impeached, then his ruling on Brown v. the Board of Education would be automatically reversed.

This is still a big deal in rightist politics to this very day (even though Warren is long gone). In the viewpoint of the rightists, American schools have gone downhill fast since the Brown decision. We spend more money on our public schools, but we still get high-school graduates who can barely read.

The push toward private schools, or voucher schools, or other alternatives is very much alive and well.

So, it comes as no surprise that Gerald Ford would support this long-standing impeachment proposal against Chief Justice Earl Warren, since Ford represented to a conservative Michigan Republican constituency.

The JBS was consistently an opponent of the racial integration of public schools, but they were not alone in this sentiment in 1963. It was this sentiment, along with the hope that the US would get out of the UN (which was widely perceived as Communist in the wake of the Korean War), that gave many Americans the opinion that the JBS was a "conservative" political movement, instead of the reactionary movement that they actually have always been.

J. Edgar Hoover, for example, made a rule that no FBI agent could ever be a member of the JBS -- this is because the JBS taught that every US President since Franklin D. Roosevelt had been a Communist. In other words, they were not conservative, they were radical, because accusing the US Presidents of treason in that way, was really a call for the violent overthrow of the US Government.

The rightists in the US have often contemplated the violent overthrow of the US Government, and these two elements -- Earl Warren's Brown decision, and the US inside the UN -- have always been two planks of that subversive consciousness.

Yet for that very reason, LBJ chose Earl Warren to be the head of the President's Commission to investigate JFK's assassination. He was perceived by most Americans as conservative, and by the left as liberal -- that is, as sympathetic to the administration of JFK. He was -- and probably an iron-clad case was made by the FBI to Earl Warren to convince him that all the evidence about Lee Harvey Oswald could never be released "in our lifetime."

This is precisely why I favor a revival of the testimony of Bernie Weissman: Bernie's first impressions immediately after the assassination of JFK placed the JBS and ex-General Walker as prime suspects in his mind.

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo

Edited October 22, 2012 by Paul Trejo

[Paul Trejo]

Does anybody know how I can get a message through to Bernard Weissman?

With great respect and courtesy, I would like to ask him some questions -- not about himself so much, as about General Edwin Walker.

My questions would go somewhat like this -- Bernard Weissman:

(1) What were your thoughts about the events in the USA immediately preceding the Ole Miss riots of 30 September 1963?

(2) What were your thoughts about the Ole Miss riots themselves?

(3) Did you perceive at the time of the Ole Miss riots that ex-General Edwin Walker was one of the leaders of those riots?

(4) Did you believe -- as many Americans did -- that Edwin Walker should have been punished for leading those riots?

(5) What were your thoughts when Edwin Walker was arrested the next morning, and remanded to a psychiatric hospital?

(6) What were your thoughts when the ACLU and psychiatrist Thomas Szasz demanded the immediate release of Edwin Walker from the psychiatric hospital, on the grounds that mixing politics and psychiatry is a bad business?

(7) What were your thoughts when Edwin Walker returned to Dallas only seven days after the Old Miss riots?

(8) What were your thoughts about the Mississippi Grand Jury hearing about Walker's alleged insurrection at Ole Miss in November and December 1962 and January 1963?

(9) What were your thoughts when ex-General Edwin Walker was acquitted of all charges relating to the Ole Miss riots?

Best regards,

--Paul Trejo