I Was a Teenage JFK Conspiracy Freak

[Fred Litwin]

From the autopsy:

Quote

CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM: The scalp is reflected and the calvarium is removed in the usual manner. There are no contusions in the scalp. There is no fracture of the calvarium. The dura is stretched tightly over the left cerebral hemisphere and a large subdural hematoma is visible beneath the dura at this area. The right cerebral hemisphere is markedly compressed and flattened. The total volume of the subdural hematoma on the left side is measured at 95ml. The brain is removed and weighs 1480 grams. Dissection of the Circle of Willis demonstrates a small berry aneurysm at the anterior communicating artery between the two anterior cerebral vessels. This ansurysm measures 1/8 in. in maximum diameter. There is a frim blood clot adherent to it, and a much larger fresh blood clot lying between the frontal lobes communicating with the area of the aneurysm. Multiple sections through the brain show no evidence of contusion foci in the contex. The white matter is normal. The basal ganglia shows no changes. The lateral ventricles are slightly compressed. There is a marked edema and flattening of the right cerebral convolutions. There is uncinate herniation on the left side. There are numerous hemorrhages in the rostral pons and thalamic region. Therse hemorrhages lie mostly in the tegmental area of the pons but some are in the basilar substance in the midline. The medulla and cerebellum show no changes. The dura is stripped from the base of the skull and no fractures are found.

David Ferrie did not commit suicide. He died by natural causes. The notes that were found were NOT suicide notes.

[W. Tracy Parnell]

It is amusing to read the attacks on Fred Litwin, the majority of which are by people who have not read his book and do not intend to. I have not read the book yet, but I will and plan to do a review to be published at my website. But my understanding is that this book is as much or more a coming-of-age story than it is an analysis of the assassination. And at only 272 pages, it is unrealistic for such a book to address the myriad issues regarding JFK's death. It seems to me that many people here are afraid that others may read a book written by a former conspiracy believer and find that his reasons for "switching sides" make sense.

[Fred Litwin]

Here is what Blackburst (the best expert on David Ferrie) wrote on the supposed suicide notes:

Quote

 

The assassment of the notes as "suicide notes" is subjective. They can also be construed as Farewell notes of a dying man.

Ferrie suffered from severe headaches all his life, and his autopsist believed he suffered a non-fatal burst aneurysm at some point. Beginning in 1966, Ferrie began telling friends he thought he was dying [which proved to be an accurate assessment]. He told this to Jimmy Johnson, for example. In July, 1966, he signed a new will. By early 1967, he was fearing that he had encephalitis or cancer of the neck, whose symptoms are not unlike those of a growing aneurysm. He was unable to keep food down, and told many (such as Garrison investigators Sciambra and Ivon) that he was very sick.

There is little to support a suspicion of suicide, but much to suggest that Ferrie was slowly dying from what ultimately killed him.

Ferrie drifted from moments of hopelessness to moments of strength. In his final days, he was planning to sue Garrison's office and Jack Martin. Ferrie told friends that he had been hounded by Martin's allegations for three years, and that he was too sick and tired to fight.

 

Ferrie did not commit suicide and the notes were not suicide notes.

[Denny Zartman]

https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Featured_The_Bay_of_Pigs_Thing.html

Quote

On June 23, 1972, six days after the arrests of the "burglars" who broke into the Watergate hotel, President Nixon's taping system captured a conversation on what would come to be known as the "smoking gun tape."

[CIA officer E. Howard] "Hunt knows too damn much", Nixon told his chief of staff H.R. "Bob" Haldeman. He instructed Haldeman to approach Richard Helms of the CIA and have the Agency intervene with the FBI's investigation of the Watergate break-in. Nixon told Haldeman to tell Helms that "it's likely to blow the whole Bay of Pigs thing which we think would be very unfortunate for CIA and the country at this time, and for American foreign policy."

Helms refused to use CIA to obstruct justice, but Haldeman in his memoirs wrote that Helms was unnerved and had shouted back at him "The Bay of Pigs had nothing to do with this. I have no concern about the Bay of Pigs."

What was going on? The Bay of Pigs nominally refers to the failed 1961 invasion of Cuba by CIA-backed Cuban exiles, something that was hardly a secret. The phrase was clearly a coded one; Haldeman later wrote that he believed the two men were "actually referring to the Kennedy assassination."

 

[Joe Bauer]

4 hours ago, Fred Litwin said:

CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM: The scalp is reflected and the calvarium is removed in the usual manner. There are no contusions in the scalp. There is no fracture of the calvarium. The dura is stretched tightly over the left cerebral hemisphere and a large subdural hematoma is visible beneath the dura at this area. The right cerebral hemisphere is markedly compressed and flattened. The total volume of the subdural hematoma on the left side is measured at 95ml. The brain is removed and weighs 1480 grams.

OMG...my apologies.

How I could mix up Ferrie's brain state autopsy report with JFK's is beyond me.

Has to be beginning dementia.

Edited September 18, 2018 by Joe Bauer

[Micah Mileto]

16 minutes ago, Joe Bauer said:

Is the above quote from JFK's official autopsy report?

I just searched the average weight of men's brains. The most repeated answer by far was 1300 to 1400 grams.

Since we know that enough brain matter was blown out of JFK's head the instant he was shot there that everyone from Kellerman, Greer, Jackie Kennedy, the two trailing motorcycle policemen and even Clint Hill stated they were sprayed with at least some of this, some of JFK's brain matter was found in and on different parts of the limo's interior, some Parkland staff that were within feet and inches of JFK's head while he was treated in their ER described seeing parts of his brain matter oozing out of the massive wound in the back-side of his head, Bethesda Hospital Navy Corpsman Paul O'Conner stated under oath he never saw but a small handful of JFK's brain matter.

Was the normal medical procedure to remove someone's brain as described by O'Conner ( whose job it was to do this normally ) used by anyone at Bethesda on JFK?

His skull sawed opened, peeled back, dura matter peeled away, temporal muscles cut, eye nerves cut, etc?

If not, how could anyone have removed a 1400 gram weighing brain out of JFK's head otherwise?  Did they simply reach into the massive hole wound in JFK's head and pull out his brain that way? 

Or, did the author of this brain weight info just gather up chunks of JFK's brain and and weighed them together?

O'Conner also said what he saw of JFK's brain matter was mascerated. Half a handful's worth.

But even a separate handful of JFK's brain matter not part of a larger mass would lessen the weight to a degree that would make it less than 1,400 grams.

 

The brain removal problem is crucial for lone-assassin theorists trying to explain the skull photographs.

[David Josephs]

4 hours ago, Fred Litwin said:

David Ferrie did not commit suicide. He died by natural causes. The notes that were found were NOT suicide notes.

"To leave this life is, for me, a sweet prospect. I find nothing in it that is desirable, and on the other hand everything that is loathsome"

Fred...  "TO LEAVE THIS LIFE IS, FOR ME, A SWEET PROSPECT"

Not exactly a "desire to live forever" note.... 

"Dear Al:

When you read this I will be quite dead and no answer will be possible....

.... All I got in return in the end was a kick in the teeth. Thus I die alone and unloved."

 

What parts of these notes leads you to believe they are NOT suicide notes... 

 

If a person is ill and DOESN'T take their medicine on purpose... and die...  

Suicide or not?  (and no, an autopsy would not be able to tell)

----

I believe the autopsy discussed is FERRIE's....

Edited September 18, 2018 by David Josephs

[David Boylan]

3 hours ago, Fred Litwin said:

Here is what Blackburst (the best expert on David Ferrie) wrote on the supposed suicide notes:

Ferrie did not commit suicide and the notes were not suicide notes.

Blackburst was Stephen Roy. Stephen was a forum member for years.

 

 

[Joe Bauer]

My apologies.

How I could mix up JFK with David Ferrie in this Ferrie autopsy brain report is ...well...beyond words negligent.

How embarrassing.

Another reason to consider using a sleep apnea CPAP machine I guess.

Although, wasn't JFK's brain registered in his autopsy report as weighing 1,500 grams?

I know this JFK brain weight issue is not appropriate for this thread. However, can someone send me a link to another thread that is centered on this specific issue? 

Thanks.

Edited September 19, 2018 by Joe Bauer

[Fred Litwin]

33 minutes ago, David Josephs said:

"To leave this life is, for me, a sweet prospect. I find nothing in it that is desirable, and on the other hand everything that is loathsome"

Fred...  "TO LEAVE THIS LIFE IS, FOR ME, A SWEET PROSPECT"

Not exactly a "desire to live forever" note.... 

"Dear Al:

When you read this I will be quite dead and no answer will be possible....

.... All I got in return in the end was a kick in the teeth. Thus I die alone and unloved."

 

What parts of these notes leads you to believe they are NOT suicide notes... 

 

If a person is ill and DOESN'T take their medicine on purpose... and die...  

Suicide or not?  (and no, an autopsy would not be able to tell)

----

I believe the autopsy discussed is FERRIE's....

As I posted earlier, this is what Stephen Roy (Blackburst) wrote about those notes:

Quote

 

The assassment of the notes as "suicide notes" is subjective. They can also be construed as Farewell notes of a dying man.

Ferrie suffered from severe headaches all his life, and his autopsist believed he suffered a non-fatal burst aneurysm at some point. Beginning in 1966, Ferrie began telling friends he thought he was dying [which proved to be an accurate assessment]. He told this to Jimmy Johnson, for example. In July, 1966, he signed a new will. By early 1967, he was fearing that he had encephalitis or cancer of the neck, whose symptoms are not unlike those of a growing aneurysm. He was unable to keep food down, and told many (such as Garrison investigators Sciambra and Ivon) that he was very sick.

There is little to support a suspicion of suicide, but much to suggest that Ferrie was slowly dying from what ultimately killed him.

Ferrie drifted from moments of hopelessness to moments of strength. In his final days, he was planning to sue Garrison's office and Jack Martin. Ferrie told friends that he had been hounded by Martin's allegations for three years, and that he was too sick and tired to fight.

 

He did not commit suicide. We KNOW that. And so, those notes are not suicide notes.  

[David Josephs]

11 minutes ago, Fred Litwin said:

Ferrie drifted from moments of hopelessness to moments of strength.

This sounds a lot like bi-polar disorder....

The depths of those depressions is unfathomable by those who have not been exposed....   

Nothing you've offered suggests these were not suicide notes... everything you've said can be used for either side of the argument...

and therein lies the rub...

[Joe Bauer]

22 hours ago, Fred Litwin said:

As I posted earlier, this is what Stephen Roy (Blackburst) wrote about those notes:

He did not commit suicide. We KNOW that. And so, those notes are not suicide notes.  

  37 minutes ago, David Josephs said:

"To leave this life is, for me, a sweet prospect. I find nothing in it that is desirable, and on the other hand everything that is loathsome"

Fred...  "TO LEAVE THIS LIFE IS, FOR ME, A SWEET PROSPECT"

Not exactly a "desire to live forever" note.... 

"Dear Al:

When you read this I will be quite dead and no answer will be possible....

.... All I got in return in the end was a kick in the teeth. Thus I die alone and unloved."

 

What parts of these notes leads you to believe they are NOT suicide notes... 

We can clearly deduce from these notes that Ferrie "wanted" to die. "To leave this life is a sweet prospect."

Did Ferrie in any way "facilitate" his death to occur sooner than natural processes would have made this happen?

If so, that falls into the suicide realm.

 

 

 

Edited September 19, 2018 by Joe Bauer

[David Josephs]

5 minutes ago, Joe Bauer said:

Did Ferrie in any way "facilitate" his death to occur sooner than natural processes would have made this happen?

If so, that falls into the suicide realm.

Exactly....

the bottom line is that we truly do not know nor have anything definitive on which to hang our hats...

and most likely his death was aggravated by "outside forces"...

[Fred Litwin]

1 hour ago, David Josephs said:

This sounds a lot like bi-polar disorder....

The depths of those depressions is unfathomable by those who have not been exposed....   

Nothing you've offered suggests these were not suicide notes... everything you've said can be used for either side of the argument...

and therein lies the rub...

Except that the autopsy was perfectly clear. Ferrie died from a berry aneurysm. He died from natural causes - and the coroner had

seen the notes as well. He wasn't swayed by them.

[Denny Zartman]

Here's my review, take it as you will.

-

I suppose that I’ve read worse JFK books, and I can definitely say it’s shorter than “Reclaiming History.” But “I Was A Teenage JFK Conspiracy Freak” is ultimately a shallow, superficial examination of the JFK assassination that I doubt I’ll be returning to as a reference work, even if just to examine the viewpoints of those people that believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.

It seems that there is no index to the current edition. Until an index is hopefully included in a future edition, I would recommend to anyone interested to purchase the electronic version over the printed version in order to be able to search the text.

I didn’t get a good first impression with the sample downloaded from Amazon. The opening chapter is a bit of a conservative political polemic with very little in regards to facts about the JFK assassination itself. There are a few jabs at “leftists” throughout the book, but not as many as I expected from something that begins with such a strong political slant.

The book can essentially be split into three main sections: The first is a recounting of the Jim Garrison investigation and Garrison’s homophobia. The second section mainly concerns the homophobic content of Oliver Stone’s 1991 film “JFK”. The third criticizes the Canadian Broadcasting Company for… I’m not sure. Producing multiple specials on the JFK assassination on a semi-regular basis?

The author believes Oswald acted alone, so naturally he disagrees with the conclusions of much of the CBC’s work. Yet the information presented here isn’t new at all and in my opinion has been showcased better and in greater detail in other books that support the lone gunman thesis.

The author appears to put a lot of credence in the work of the HSCA as he often seems to cite their evidence and research as authoritative, while simultaneously dismissing their ultimate verdict of probable conspiracy – the conclusion that stands as of this writing in 2018 as the official opinion of the United States government regarding the death of John F. Kennedy.

Two clearly false statements in the text (claiming that Oswald was the only Texas School Book Depository warehouseman missing, and that Jack Ruby didn’t ask Earl Warren to be taken back to Washington, D.C. to testify further) make me suspicious about the author’s dedication to accuracy.

It seems the author says that there are no problems with the chain of evidence for CE 399, a.k.a. the so-called “Magic Bullet.”

The question of Lee Harvey Oswald’s motive is neatly skipped over near the beginning, in a footnote, and, from what I could tell, was never addressed again.

Location 324 and 335:

Quote

We will never know exactly why Oswald killed Kennedy. Jean Davidson, author of Oswald's Game, offers a persuasive explanation. Oswald most probably read the New Orleans Times-Picayune story of September 9, 1963 in which it was reported that Fidel Castro said that if US leaders "are aiding terrorist plans to eliminate Cuban leaders, they themselves will not be safe." Oswald had made attempts to infiltrate pro-Castro groups in New Orleans and he might have been aware of plots against Castro. In late November 1963, it was announced that Kennedy's motorcade route would pass right in front of the building in which he worked. Strictly by chance, Oswald was able to strike a blow for the revolution.

That's it. Those are the hard facts that Mr. Litwin accepts as realistic regarding Oswald's motivation.

He seems to believe that the entire case for Oswald's act of presidential assassination likely lies in a newspaper he "most probably" read, and anti-Castro plots he "might have been aware of." "Strictly by chance" he struck a blow for the revolution...  a blow which he cleverly denied with every breath.

What kind of revolutionary strikes a blow so great and significant as the death of a US president, and then decides to try and keep it a secret? Someone who cleverly made it known to acquaintances and investigators before and after the assassination that he held no special animosity for the president, that's who.

httNothing irritated me about the Presidentp://www.maebrussell.com/Mae Brussell Articles/Last Words of Lee Oswald.html

Quote

...Nothing irritated me about the President...

...John Kennedy had a nice family...

 ...I had nothing personal against John Kennedy...

...Since the President was killed, someone else would take his place, perhaps Vice-President Johnson. His views about Cuba would probably be largely the same as those of President Kennedy...

Moving on...

In the book, there were no references that I could see about Umbrella Man or Dark Complexioned Man.

There’s but one mention of George de Mohrenschildt’s name, and that is only in reference to a Warren Commission document. There’s absolutely no discussion at all about de Mohrenschildt and his significance in Oswald’s life. Of the many omissions in this book, I believe this is one of the most significant.

There seem to be no mention of apparent incidences of foreknowledge by such figures as Sylvia Odio, Joseph Milteer, Rose Cheramie, Richard Case Nagell, Lillian Spingler, or Eugene Dinkin.

It appears that witnesses such as Julia Ann Mercer and Acquilla Clemons are mentioned once each, and only in passing. None of their observations are summarized, much less challenged.

From what I can see, there is no mention of other important assassination figures like Seth Kantor, Charles Givens, Jean Hill, Dave Powers, Kenneth O’Donnell, Helen Markham, Domingo Benavides, Dr. Charles Carrico, Dr. Charles Crenshaw, Dr. Kemp Clark, Dr. James Humes, Dr. Thornton Boswell, Lt. Col. Pierre Finck, or Admiral George Burkley.

I believe the reader can determine for themselves what the absence of these witnesses says about the depth of research and information presented in this book.

I think I learned one new tidbit of ultimately meaningless information regarding a censored telegram, but otherwise I can’t think of anything that was truly new.

The worst part is that the author never articulates what made him believe in a conspiracy when he was younger, and then he never describes how his thinking evolved into believing that Oswald acted alone. That was a part I was interested in reading about, and most disappointed to find wasn’t really there.

So, if you’re the type of person that feels the need to grind your axes against Jim Garrison, Oliver Stone, and the CBC, this is the book for you. If you’re really looking for something substantial and fair-minded about the JFK assassination, you might want to consider some other options first.