How did Hosty expect to talk to Marina?

[Ron Bulman]

7 minutes ago, Chris Newton said:

I think this is a key item that could unravel whatever was really going on with Oswald, the Paines and the FBI post assassination. I don't know what the true story is yet but there are so many really odd coincidences and discrepancies that it's difficult for an objective researcher not to "smell smoke".

Ruth Paine admits that she never saw or read either Oswald's draft or the letter he typed in her kitchen, yet she "knew" the handwritten letter she found in her living room and later stole, was in fact, the draft of the letter Oswald typed.

How many letters did Oswald type? A careful reading of Ruth Paine's testimony reveals that she blurted out that "it wasn't the only time he borrowed the typewriter". This revelation was subsequently ignored by counsel and went unexplored.

What of the "furniture moving" story that culminated in Ruth actually acquiring Oswald's draft? Why make this up? If this is an elaborate fiction, as I believe, then you can toss any notion that there is a true provenance for this "evidence".

 

Welcome back Chris.  

[Gene Kelly]

Chris/Steve

I know this is not very scientific or rigorous, but my instincts and initial read of James Hosty (someone whom I've never looked at too deeply) are that he comes across as a straight arrow, earnest FBI agent, and family man. I have a difficult time placing him in some more sinister role (square per/round hole).  Admittedly, his background and affiliations bias my judgment, but perhaps he simply stumbled into a bee's nest of intrigue, not knowing where it would take him.  Putting myself into his shoes - and considering his role/responsibility - I would certainly have been suspicious of Marina and Mrs. Paine (who wouldn't?).  His  comment about Marina being a "snake in the grass" and the true spy in the family is telling.  The entire affair certainly put a monkey wrench into his career, and caused undue notoriety.  But he stayed on with FBI for 16 more years (in Kansas City) and remained loyal to the Bureau (which should not be surprising).  Perhaps the infamous note from Oswald was meant as a friendly/protective warning, to shield him from what was to come. 

Regarding the Kostin/Soviet Embassy letter - which took many forms - it does appear to provide an excuse for Hosty regarding his destruction of the Oswald note.  But it too seems to live a double life, and presents itself in one too many forms:

• an alleged original  draft 'stolen' by Ruth Paine (11/9)
• Mrs. Paine's handwritten copy of the original draft (11/9-11/10)
• an HTLINGUAL report of intercepted letter (11/18)
• the original typed copy supplied by the Russian Embassy (postmarked 11/2 rec'd 11/20).

I concur that the story about how Ruth acquired the original and made a copy does not add up ... as dos the story offered about the license plate number in Oswald's address book.

Gene

[Steve Thomas]

From James Hosty:

"I might add that it is the practice of the FBI to interview immigrants from behind the Iron Curtain on a selective basis, and she was so selected to be one of these persons to be interviewed."

 

I have never been fully satisfied with this seemingly off-the cuff and innocuous answer.

On what basis was she "selected"? What were the criteria?

 

The emphasis early on was Marina, not Lee.

 

The WC testimony of Paul Raigorodsky is very interesting reading.

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/raigorod.htm

 

It can be a little boring, but if you read it, and read it again, and read it again, you begin to get a feeling for some of the undercurrents at play, e.g. the hostility and suspicion between the Russians and Ukrainians, for example (which we still see in play today); or the ultra-right, anti-communist Eastern Greek Orthodox Church of George Bouhe vs. the more liberal St. Seraphim.

When the Oswalds came to Ft. Worth, they were taken in by the more Orthodox group, but when Marina went to have June christened, she had it done at St. Seraphim's:

Mr. JENNER. And that caused what?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. That caused them to think and to know, as they understood it, that she did it practically at the peril of her life.
Mr. JENNER. She did what?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. She did it at the peril of her life----
Mr. JENNER. You mean they objected?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Because he told her she cannot do that, she had to sneak out with that child to be christened...

The hard liners saw the other Church as being sort of commie pinkos that might have all kinds of people : " Serbians, Sicilians, or Lebanese..."

 

I can't really what this all means, except to say, look at Marina first before you look at Lee to see where peoples' suspicions lay.

 

PS: Just as an aside, and totally off-topic, when Marina first met Lee, wasn't she supposed to have thought he came from the Baltics or something?

They have a distinct accent that we Americans might not pick up on.

Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Well, from what I understand, George De Mohrenschildt comes from what we call by-the-Baltic Germans.
Mr. JENNER. What is--by-the-Baltic Germans?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. The by-the-Baltic Germans are Germans that lived by the Baltic Sea and they were Russians or rather, Russiafied Germans.

Mr. JENNER. Does he speak Russian?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Oh, yes; he speaks Russian quite well with a by-the-Baltic German accent.

 

Steve Thomas

[Thomas Graves]

18 hours ago, Chris Newton said:

I think this is a key item that could unravel whatever was really going on with Oswald, the Paines and the FBI post assassination. I don't know what the true story is yet but there are so many really odd coincidences and discrepancies that it's difficult for an objective researcher not to "smell smoke".

Ruth Paine admits that she never saw or read either Oswald's draft or the letter he typed in her kitchen, yet she "knew" the handwritten letter she found in her living room and later stole, was in fact, the draft of the letter Oswald typed.

How many letters did Oswald type? A careful reading of Ruth Paine's testimony reveals that she blurted out that "it wasn't the only time he borrowed the typewriter". This revelation was subsequently ignored by counsel and went unexplored.

What of the "furniture moving" story that culminated in Ruth actually acquiring Oswald's draft? Why make this up? If this is an elaborate fiction, as I believe, then you can toss any notion that there is a true provenance for this "evidence".

 

Chris,

By thinking in an open-minded, "detective" kind-of-way, one could say that Ruth reasonably intuited that the folded-up stationary/writing-paper thingy she spied (pardon the pun) in an area not terribly far from where she had seen Oswald laboriously composing and typing something the day before, was somehow connected to said writing project, and was, therefore -- since it was the same kind of paper, was in Oswald's distinctive handwriting, and lying next to Oswald's little dictionary -- very probably the final draft he had been typing from.

--  Tommy 

PS  What significance do you ascribe to Ruth's blurting out "It wasn't the only time he borrowed the typewriter"?

Edited January 26, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[Joe Bauer]

Steve, I just read the entire Raigorodsky testimony...deposition?

Whew, had to take many breaks in so doing.

A lot of interesting stuff.

My injured body mind can't come up with anything substantial to say about it all right now. However, will comment later when I can do so.

George DeM.  What a character. His fellow Russians were sure bent on portraying his personality negatively. Constantly mentioning him as an immature man in that he told jokes at parties and laughed a little too much.

In my view, DeM was a person you'd "want" at a social gathering to keep things light. Those other Russians seemed far too serious and maybe DeM just had to knock them over a little bit to lighten them up.

The Dallas Russians seemed extremely "class conscious." Always citing their own higher education and corporate accomplishments. Judging others and dismissing them as lower class if they didn't have the right breeding. 

I have to assume that in his regular visits to Houston that DeM had to have interacted with oil man G.H.W. Bush. Weren't there a lot of dots connecting George and Herman Brown to Bush?

Edited January 26, 2018 by Joe Bauer

[Chris Newton]

1 hour ago, Thomas Graves said:

Chris,

By thinking in an open-minded, "detective" kind-of-way, one could say that Ruth reasonably intuited that the folded-up stationary/writing-paper thingy she spied (pardon the pun) in an area not terribly far from where she had seen Oswald laboriously composing and typing something the day before, was somehow connected to said writing project, and was, therefore -- since it was the same kind of paper, was in Oswald's distinctive handwriting, and lying next to Oswald's little dictionary -- very probably the final draft he had been typing from.

--  Tommy 

PS  What significance do you ascribe to Ruth's blurting out "It wasn't the only time he borrowed the typewriter"?

Tommy,

The timeline is this per RP:

1. Oswald borrows the typewriter and uses it in the kitchen sometime after breakfast on Saturday morning.

2. After returning to the house from the drivers license testing facility and shopping, Ruth notices a folded hand written note in her living room on top of the "small secretary" desk.

3. It remains there, on top of the desk, until Sunday morning when she reads it, copies it and returns it to that location while Oswald is in the shower.

4. Sunday evening after dinner, she slips it inside the desk and then asks Michael and Lee to swap the locations of that desk and the couch in the living room.

 

She says she noticed it because the writing above the fold was obviously Lee's. No explanation given or offered as to how she knows this handwriting. No explanation how Marina doesn't notice the paper during the day and a half it sat there. It's curious that Marina immediately recognized it as Lee's handwriting when shown the note by the FBI (also the FBI noted her surprise and shock that it was in RP's possession). No explanation how Lee does not notice the paper despite the extraordinary amount of time he spent in that tiny living room that weekend playing with the kids, watching football and movies. David Lifton suggests that Lee left it there on purpose as a "provocation" but doesn't explain why Lee would need to "provoke" this simple Irving housewife that is providing shelter to his wife and children.

 

As far as Lee using the typewriter on different occasions... when did this allegedly occur? I assume the "window of opportunity" would have been some weekend after Oswald returned to Dallas and before the weekend of the "Embassy Letter". Would this/these incident(s) allow for a typewritten letter with a postmark of "NOV 2"? Has any other typewritten Oswald correspondence been identified from that time period?

 

 

 

[Chris Newton]

11 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

I know this is not very scientific or rigorous, but my instincts and initial read of James Hosty (someone whom I've never looked at too deeply) are that he comes across as a straight arrow, earnest FBI agent, and family man.

I'm not to the point yet where I want to call Agent Hosty out but...

It is against FBI policy to interview a female suspect alone without another Agent present. These FBI protocols are clear and absolute. I recommend a read of the testimony of the other FBI Agents involved in the post assassination investigation to understand how far "out there" Hosty's Nov. 1st visit to the Paines actually was (i.e. Church Committee). This "protocol" does not apply to visiting a female "informant" to discuss the weather and current events.

[Thomas Graves]

31 minutes ago, Chris Newton said:

Tommy,

The timeline is this per RP:

1. Oswald borrows the typewriter and uses it in the kitchen sometime after breakfast on Saturday morning.

2. After returning to the house from the drivers license testing facility and shopping, Ruth notices a folded hand written note in her living room on top of the "small secretary" desk.

3. It remains there, on top of the desk, until Sunday morning when she reads it, copies it and returns it to that location while Oswald is in the shower.

4. Sunday evening after dinner, she slips it inside the desk and then asks Michael and Lee to swap the locations of that desk and the couch in the living room.

 

She says she noticed it because the writing above the fold was obviously Lee's. No explanation given or offered as to how she knows this handwriting. No explanation how Marina doesn't notice the paper during the day and a half it sat there. It's curious that Marina immediately recognized it as Lee's handwriting when shown the note by the FBI (also the FBI noted her surprise and shock that it was in RP's possession). No explanation how Lee does not notice the paper despite the extraordinary amount of time he spent in that tiny living room that weekend playing with the kids, watching football and movies. David Lifton suggests that Lee left it there on purpose as a "provocation" but doesn't explain why Lee would need to "provoke" this simple Irving housewife that is providing shelter to his wife and children.

 

As far as Lee using the typewriter on different occasions... when did this allegedly occur? I assume the "window of opportunity" would have been some weekend after Oswald returned to Dallas and before the weekend of the "Embassy Letter". Would this/these incident(s) allow for a typewritten letter with a postmark of "NOV 2"? Has any other typewritten Oswald correspondence been identified from that time period?

 

 

 

Chris,

Thanks for the timeline.

Personally, I think Oswald's handwriting was so distinctively bad, that even if Ruthie had only just sneaked a peak at it while putting her child it the highchair (or whatever), that she could have recognized the "mysto paper" as having been written by the same awful hand.

And besides, who else's could it logically have been?  An unfinished letter (in English) by Marina to her local KGB handler?  (LOL)

--  Tommy 

PS  Do you think the postmark says "NOV 2" or "NOV [1]2"?

If the former, then how could the bad guys have been so careless as to be so far off, date-wise?

 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[Chris Newton]

1 hour ago, Thomas Graves said:

Chris,

Thanks for the timeline.

Personally, I think Oswald's handwriting was so distinctively bad, that even if Ruthie had only just sneaked a peak at it while putting her child it the highchair (or whatever), that she could have recognized the "mysto paper" as having been written by the same awful hand.

And besides, who else's could it logically have been?  An unfinished letter (in English) by Marina to her local KGB handler?  (LOL)

--  Tommy 

PS  Do you think the postmark says "NOV 2" or "NOV [1]2"?

If the former, then how could the bad guys have been so careless as to be so far off, date-wise?

Tommy,

It's a possibility that Ruth was so observant that she became an authority on LHO's handwriting with a peak. My own experience is that I learn about someone's handwriting after they have written me a few things and I read them. It's far more likely she became an "expert"on his handwriting when she very carefully made her own flawless copy while LHO was using the bathroom. Let's be honest, the event that Ruth offers as proof of her initial suspicions is that LHO shielded the draft from her view and she could not see it. She also denied seeing the typed document. LHO had a lot of papers and notebooks in the garage, if she had access to this material and snooped through it then obviously she'd have had some experience identifying it.

How long do you think it would have taken to steal the note, return to your room, copy it flawlessly and then return it to the living room? An hour?

I don't have a definitive feeling about the date. I do remember reading about some researcher, (can't recall atm),  who had handled the actual envelope in evidence and stated that the reflection of the ink when examined indicated no traces of a mis-struck "1". I lean towards believing that it's therefore more likely a "2" than a "12". November 2, 1963 was a Saturday.

If Ruth Paine's timeline is false then I think there is a whole range of new possibilities.

 

Maybe it's simply a coincidence that Oswald was at the Post Office on Saturday Nov. 2nd, 1963?

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=40391#relPageId=259&tab=page

 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Chris Newton

[Ron Bulman]

 

[Thomas Graves]

50 minutes ago, Chris Newton said:

Tommy,

It's a possibility that Ruth was so observant that she became an authority on LHO's handwriting with a peak. My own experience is that I learn about someone's handwriting after they have written me a few things and I read them. It's far more likely she became an "expert"on his handwriting when she very carefully made her own flawless copy while LHO was using the bathroom. Let's be honest, the event that Ruth offers as proof of her initial suspicions is that LHO shielded the draft from her view and she could not see it. She also denied seeing the typed document. LHO had a lot of papers and notebooks in the garage, if she had access to this material and snooped through it then obviously she'd have had some experience identifying it.

How long do you think it would have taken to steal the note, return to your room, copy it flawlessly and then return it to the living room? An hour?

I don't have a definitive feeling about the date. I do remember reading about some researcher, (can't recall atm),  who had handled the actual envelope in evidence and stated that the reflection of the ink when examined indicated no traces of a mis-struck "1". I lean towards believing that it's therefore more likely a "2" than a "12". November 2, 1963 was a Saturday.

If Ruth Paine's timeline is false then I think there is a whole range of new possibilities.

among

Maybe it's simply a coincidence that Oswald was at the Post Office on Saturday Nov. 2nd, 1963?

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=40391#relPageId=259&tab=page

 

Chris,

I was going to say that another way Ruthie could have recognized Oswald's handwriting is if she'd done some previous snooping around in his possessions, or if he'd shown her something he'd written.

Regarding his alleged being at the Irving post office on Saturday November 2, did he send his changes of addresses in my mail, or did he physically turn them in at the P.O. on 11/02/63?

--  Tommy 

I reiterate: Who other than Oswald, as far as Ruthie was concerned, could have left that mysto, English-language paper there?  Marina?

Edited January 27, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[Gene Kelly]

Chris/Steve:

Are you suggesting that the real reason for Hosty to be there is Ruth?   I'm unsure where this all leads, but one thing that strikes me is that, he started this "surveillance" in March, and eight months is a long time to keep a case open for a routine random check of an immigrant/alien.  Hosty by then is at bell, and asking about Michael, plus visiting Ruth's school (St. Mark) where she teaches Russian part-time (for two students).  Hosty's attention seems to transcend Marina by that point in time.

Gene

[Chris Newton]

2 hours ago, Thomas Graves said:

I reiterate: Who other than Oswald, as far as Ruthie was concerned, could have left that mysto, English-language paper there?  Marina?

I believe that the entire story about how RP came to acquire Oswald's draft is probably untrue.

As a part of that, I believe the portion of her story that occurred in the living room is fraught with untruths and distortions. To this point directly, I don't think the letter ever "resided" on that desk. I think it was acquired by other means.

 

To answer your question; Until Sunday afternoon, the only adults in the house are Lee, Marina and Ruth.

 

My original question was how did Ruth "know" this draft was the letter LHO typed that morning, according to her story?

[Thomas Graves]

45 minutes ago, Chris Newton said:

I believe that the entire story about how RP came to acquire Oswald's draft is probably untrue.

As a part of that, I believe the portion of her story that occurred in the living room is fraught with untruths and distortions. To this point directly, I don't think the letter ever "resided" on that desk. I think it was acquired by other means.

 

To answer your question; Until Sunday afternoon, the only adults in the house are Lee, Marina and Ruth.

 

My original question was how did Ruth "know" this draft was the letter LHO typed that morning, according to her story?

Chris,

Are you denying the possibility that Ruth recognized the paper as being the same kind Oswald had tried to hide from her on the kitchen table, and that she recognized Oswald's handwriting "above the fold," and that she realized that, whatever it was, it was written in the English language (thereby eliminating Marina as the writer)?

Oh yeah, and what about the dictionary?  Don't you think she would have noticed it on the kitchen table while Oswald was writing / typing, and then when she saw it the next day next to the draft, it's being there would, combined with all the other stuff, above, indicate to her that "mysto paper" must be his final draft? ? 
 

--  Tommy 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[Chris Newton]

6 minutes ago, Thomas Graves said:

Chris,

Are you denying the possibility that Ruth recognized the paper as being the same kind Oswald had tried to hide from her on the kitchen table, and that she recognized Oswald's handwriting "above the fold," and that she realized that, whatever it was, it was written in the English language (thereby eliminating Marina as the writer)?

--  Tommy 

I'd have to re-read her testimony to find her exact wording but off the top of my head, she testified that a phrase she read above the fold is what drew her attention to the paper to begin with. How she ID'ed it as Oswald's and how she determined it was the draft of the letter he typed is not discussed.

I can't rule out, if the story is factual, that she could have identified a piece of paper, despite not having read it, at a later time the same day.

I don't think Marina was ever considered a possible source of the draft.