The Collins Radio Connections

[William Kelly]

Per request of Miles Scull.

THE COLLINS RADIO CONNECTIONS to the Assassination of President Kennedy

By William E. Kelly – Revised from report originally published in Backchannels magazine and presented at the national conference of the Coalition On Political Assassination (COPA), October 10, 1994.

If the assassination of President Kennedy was the result of not only a conspiracy, but a covert action and coup d'etat, as some people believe, there should be evidence of this from both the scene of the crime(s) as well as from the highest echelons of power among those who took over the government. This would be especially so if the assassination was not the action of a lone-nut or a foreign attack by Cuban or Soviet intelligence service sponsors, but an internal manipulation of policy and control, an inside job.

As Edward Luttwack describes in his "How-To" book Coup d'etat – A Practical Handbook (Alfred A. Knopf, 1968, p. 117), "Control over the flow of information emanating from the political center will be our most important weapon in establishing… authority after the coup. The seizure of the main means of mass communication will thus be a task of crucial importance."

At the scene(s) of the crime, eyewitness testimony is always suspect. Homicide detectives prefer more solid leads that provide documented evidence that can be introduced in court, such as fingerprints, telephone records and automobile license numbers.

There are more than a few automobile license records of significance in regards to the assassination of President Kennedy, including the tampered photo among the possessions of Lee Harvey Oswald of the license on 1957 Chevy in General Walker's driveway, a Renault in Mexico City, plus the license numbers of cars seen in Dealey Plaza photos immediately before and after the assassination.

Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon.

A few weeks later, when Dallas radio reporter and later mayor of Dallas Wes Wise gave a talk at the Oak Cliff restaurant, the owner of the garage where Mr. White worked mentioned the suspicious Plymouth to Wise, who then met White. White reluctantly told his story, and didn't want to get involved, and Wise had to use all his powers of persuasion to convince White to share the information with him. Wise promised White he would not be brought into the investigation, but that he would handle it. "Do you have the piece of paper with the license number on it?" Wise asked, and sure enough, White had it right there in his pocket and gave it to Wise. It read: PP4537.

White told Wise that nobody knew who or what was really behind the assassination of President Kennedy and he really didn't want to get involved, but he handed over the paper to Wise, who passed it on to the police and FBI.

A quick check of the Texas plate #PP4537 indicated that it was assigned to Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas. When the FBI went out to the listed Garland address they found the two tone 1958 Plymouth right there in the driveway and knocked on the door. Mrs. Mather answered, acknowledged the car belonged to her husband, who was then away at work at Collins Radio, in nearby Richardson, Texas. When asked where her husband and the car was on Friday, November 22, 1963, she said that the car was in the parking lot at Collins Radio until sometime in the afternoon when her husband returned home and picked up the family to go to the Tippit residence to pay their respects to the widow and family of their good friend, who was murdered that day.

Instead of going out to Collins Radio to interview Mather however, the FBI went first to Mr. White, who Wes Wise had promised wouldn't be involved, and took additional statements from him, changing his story for the official reports and exchanging the two tone Plymouth to a red Ford Falcon. CBS News made a polite inquiry years later, leaving Carl Mather out of the documentary program they aired but listed Mrs. Mather in the programs credits. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) briefly looked into the affair, granted Mather immunity from prosecution to testify and then failed to question him under oath. The HSCA published a short report they titled "The Wise Allegation," when in fact Wes Wise made no allegations, and merely followed up on his reporter's instincts. He came up with an automobile license plate number that was seen near the murder of a Dallas policeman that was traced to one of the victim's best friends, Carl Mather, whose alibi was that he was at work at the time, at Collins Radio.

Documents later released under the JFK Act indicate that Mather was questioned by HSCA investigators and acknowledged that he worked on electronics at Collins, his specific job being the installation of the radio equipment aboard Air Force Two – the Vice President's plane.

That this lead was not properly investigated, and remains uninvestigated today, is because such an inquiry actually does lead to the heart of the plot to murder not only Dallas policeman J.D. Tippit, but as many believe, is tied directly to the assassination of President Kennedy. If the Tippit murder is connected to the assassination of the President, then the Tippit murder may be the "Rosetta Stone" that could explain the mysteries of both murders.

The significance of the Collins Radio connections becomes apparent with a quick review of the published record, and that:

• On November 1, 1963 the New York Times published a photograph of the ship the Rex, which Fidel Castro identified as the boat that dropped off a team of assassins in Cuba a few nights previous. The Rex was docked at Palm Beach, Florida, near the JFK family compound, and the Rex's Halloween eve mission was in clear violation of President Kennedy's March 1963 edict that no para-military raids against Cuba were to originate from U.S. shores. According to the article in the NYTs, the Rex had been sold by the Somoza regime in Nicaragua to the Belcher Oil Company, its dock fees paid by the CIA front company Sea Ship Inc., with the Rex then being leased to the Collins Radio Company of Richardson, Texas, "for scientific research."
  
• Founded by Arthur Collins, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Collins Radio first made news headlines when young Collins was an amateur radio buff with the only (home made) radio receiver that could pick up the radio transmissions of Navy Commander Richard E. Byrd from his polar exploration expedition. [Richard Byrd is the cousin of the founder of the Civil Air Patrol and owner of the Texas School Book Depository building].
  
• Collins Radio became a major defense contractor during World War II, and following the war, participated in Operation Paperclip, hiring Dr. Alex Lipisch, the former Nazi scientist who developed the Delta I glider and ME 163 Komet jet fighter. For Collins, Lipisch was assigned to the boat development program that worked with General Dynamics in attempting to build and refine a sleek, swift speedboat – the V20 - that could be used for Cuban infiltration missions like the Rex mission. It was later used in Vietnam.
  
• David Ferrie's telephone records reflect that in the weeks before the assassination he made frequent calls from the New Orleans law office of G. Ray Gill to the Belcher Oil Company of Dallas, Texas, the company that was the listed owner of the Rex.
  
• In the week before the assassination, a reservation was made at Jack Ruby's Carousel Club for a large party of Collins Radio employees.
  
• The Dallas P.D. Intelligence Division maintained a paid informant who worked at Collins Radio and reported on fellow employees who appeared suspicious or subversive, including one who was reported to subscribe to the leftist I.F. Stone Weekly.
  
• When Lee Harvey Oswald returned to Texas from Soviet Russia, George DeMohrenschildt introduced him to retired Navy Admiral Chester Bruton, an executive at Collins Radio, with the idea of Oswald getting a job there, as he had worked in a radio factory in Minsk, USSR. Oswald and Marina visited Bruton with DeMohrenschilt.
  
• At the time of the assassination Adml. Bruton was working on a top-secret nuclear submarine communications project for Collins, with the Navy's nuclear sub radar and communications HQ being based at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, close neighbors of Michael Paine's family island.
  
• In 1963 Collins Radio began receiving large military contracts including one for the construction of a microwave communications network in Southeast Asia, specifically Vietnam.
  
• After Oswald was murdered while in Dallas police custody by Jack Ruby, his widow Marina P. Oswald married former Collins Radio employee Kenneth Porter.
  
• In Miami, Florida, a Cuban exile, and former executive of Collins Radio, was murdered, assassinated in a still unsolved homicide.
  
• Collins Radio supplied and maintained the equipment used by the Voice of America, all manned NASA space flights, the Strategic Air Command (SAC), as well as all equipment used for the CIA's Guatemalan and Cuban operations. Most significantly, Collins Radio was responsible for installing and maintaining all radio equipment aboard Air Force One, Air Force Two and the Cabinet's plane.
  
• According to the Collins Radio Annual Report to stockholders for 1963-64, Collins Radio not only installed and maintained the radios aboard most military and executive branch planes, they also operated the station known as "Liberty" at their Cedar Rapids, Iowa headquarters, which served as a relay station for all radio communications between the White House, the Pentagon, Air Force One, Air Force Two, the Cabinet plane and Andrews AFB in Washington.
  

[This "Liberty" station is misidentified on most transcripts of the edited version of the radio transmissions from Air Force One on 11/22/63. "Air Force One, the Presidential airplane, was placed in service in 1962 using communications equipment developed and manufactured by Collins. The aircraft…was modified to meet special requirements…In 1962, the station many remember as "Liberty" was opened and operated from the new communications building….(in Cedar Rapids, Iowa)…Collins had a contract with the Air Force to serve as either the primary communications station or as a backup whenever Air Force One, the presidential aircraft, and other aircraft in the VIP fleet carried cabinet members or high ranking military officers. Over the airwaves the station's call word was 'Liberty.'" – From Collins Radio – the First 50 Years.]

In his book The Making of a President – 1964, Theodore H. White wrote: "There is a tape recording in the archives of the government which best recaptures the sound of the hours as it waited for leadership. It is a recording of all the conversations in the air, monitored by the Signal Corps Midwestern center 'Liberty,' between Air Force One in Dallas, the Cabinet plane over the Pacific, and the Joint Chiefs' Communications Center in Washington….On the flight the party learned that there was no conspiracy, learned the identity of Oswald and his arrest; and the President's mind turned to the duties of consoling the stricken and guiding the quick."

According to the analysis of E. Martin Schotz and Vincent Salandria (in History Will Not Absolve Us, 1996), "And yet the White House had informed President Johnson and the other occupants of Air Force One, all of them witnesses to the hail of bullets which had poured down on Dealey Plaza, that as of the afternoon of the assassination there was to be no conspiracy and that Oswald was to be the lone assassin. If White's report were correct this would mean that federal officials in Washington were marrying the government to the cover-up of Oswald as the lone assassin virtually instantaneously. This could have occurred only if those federal authorities had had foreknowledge that the evidence would implicate Oswald and that he would have 'no confederates.' An innocent government could not have reacted in such a fashion internally."

Unfortunately, there is no longer "a tape recording in the archives of the government," as the original, unedited, multiple tape recordings of the AF1 radio transmissions cannot be located despite an Act of Congress, the request of the Assassinations Records Review Board (ARRB) and numerous Freedom of Information Act requests. Our government seems to have simply lost the recordings, with no records being kept of their whereabouts or destruction, if in fact they were destroyed.

The Final Report of the ARRB (p. 116) notes:

"6. White House Communications Agency.

"WHCA was, and is, responsible for maintaining both secure (encrypted) and unsecured (open) telephone, radio and telex communications between the President and the government of the United States. Most of the personnel that constitute this elite agency are U.S. military communications specialists; many, in 1963, were from the Army Signal Corps. On November 22, 1963, WHCA was responsible for communications between and among Air Force One and Two, the White House Situation Room, the mobile White House, and with the Secret Service in the motorcade."

"The Review Board sought to locate any audio recordings of voice communications to or from Air Force One on the day of the assassination, including communications between Air Force one and Andrews Air Force Base during the return flight from Dallas to Washington D.C. As many people are now aware of, in the 1970s, the LBJ Presidential Library released edited audio cassettes of the unsecured, or open voice conversations with Air Force One, Andrews AFB, the White House Situation Room, and the Cabinet Aircraft carrying the Secretary of State and other officials on November 22, 1`963. The LBJ Library version of these tapes consists of about 110 minutes of voice transmissions, but the tapes are edited and condensed, so the Review Board staff sought access to unedited, uncondensed versions. Since the edited versions of the tapes contain considerable talk about both the forthcoming autopsy on the President, as well as the reaction of a government in crisis, the tapes are of considerable interest to assassination researchers and historians."

"Given that the LBJ Library released the tapes in the 1970s, the paper trail is now sketchy and quite cold. The LBJ Library staff is fairly confident that the tapes originated with the White House Communications Agency (WHCA). The LBJ Library staff told the Review Board staff that it received the tapes from the White House as part of the original shipment of President Johnson's papers in 1968 or 1969. According to the LBJ Library's documentation, the accession card reads: "WHCA?" and is dated 1975. The Review Board staff could not locate any records indicating who performed the editing, or when, or where."

"The Review Board's repeated written and oral inquiries of the White House Communications Agency did not bear fruit. The WHCA could not produce any records that illuminated the provenance of the edited tapes."

At the time I delivered my report on "The Collins Radio Connections" to the National COPA Conference in Washington in October, 1994, the Washington Post had just then exposed the true occupant of a new, mammoth, suburban Virginia building. It was not, as announced on a sign, the headquarters for Collins Radio/Rockwell International as had been previously reported in the media, but that was the cover company for the super secret National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). Even though there cover had been blown by the New York Times in November, 1963, Collins Radio when it served as a cover for the CIA in the operation of the Rex in Cuba in 1963, it was still serving in the same covert cover capacity thirty years later.

Then in the October, 1998 issue of John F. Kennedy, Jr.'s George Magazine, - David Wise reported on how the NRO had "lost" $6 billion in U.S. taxpayer's money, and specifically mentioned the fiasco surrounding the construction of the HQ building, for which Collins/Rockwell served as a cover company.

In following the Collins Radio trail from JMWAVE missions off Cuba to Dealey Plaza and Oak Cliff, it is clear that any secret intelligence network that can get away with killing the President and losing $6 billion, isn't going to sweat justice.

[William E. Kelly is a freelance journalist whose research into the assassination of President Kennedy is partially sponsored by the Fund For Constitutional Government Investigative Journalism Project. He can be reached at: bkjfk3@yahoo.com]

Edited March 1, 2007 by William Kelly

[Miles Scull]

Per request of Miles Scull.

Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon.

Thank you William Kelly for posting this very interesting article!

Just for the moment focusing on the two quoted paragraphs above, is it right to interpret White's observations as indicative that the individual in the Plymouth was a possible LHO impostor (who in fact might have slain Tippit)? Further, that the impostor was Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas, or someone (an impostor) who was operating Carl Mather's car?

You mention: "BEA gives details of the crew of the Rex,... and "Karl," a JMWAVE operative and LHO double who dies suspiciously (thrown from a helicopter)."

I believe that BEA has "Karl" mysteriously & amazingly throwing himself out of the airborne helicopter to his certain death. Can you shed any light on this coincidence: that "Karl" is similar in praenomen to "Carl" Mather? [For example, when did Mather die? I'd have to check Zenith & DEA on the time of Karl's leap, but it was at some remove from Nov. 22, 1963. There may have been several LHO impostors. No?]

Thanks again.

MS

Edited February 28, 2007 by Miles Scull

[Ron Ecker]

I'd have to check Zenith & DEA on the time of Karl's leap, but it was at some remove from Nov. 22, 1963.

According to his book Zenith Secret, Bradley Ayers, who witnessed Karl's fall, wrote a letter of resignation from the Army soon after, dated November 20, 1964.

[Miles Scull]

Documents later released under the JFK Act indicate that Mather was questioned by HSCA investigators and claimed that he worked on electronics at Collins, his specific job being the installation of the radio equipment aboard Air Force Two – the Vice President's plane.

Thx Ron Ecker.

So, Karl was not Carl, if Karl jumped before Nov. 1964. Did Carl bear a resemblance to LHO? Probably not. Ergo, an impostor, but not Carl.

[William Kelly]

Per request of Miles Scull.

Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon.

Thank you William Kelly for posting this very interesting article!

Just for the moment focusing on the two quoted paragraphs above, is it right to interpret White's observations as indicative that the individual in the Plymouth was a possible LHO impostor (who in fact might have slain Tippit)? Further, that the impostor was Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas, or someone (an impostor) who was operating Carl Mather's car?

You mention: "BEA gives details of the crew of the Rex,... and "Karl," a JMWAVE operative and LHO double who dies suspiciously (thrown from a helicopter)."

I believe that BEA has "Karl" mysteriously & amazingly throwing himself out of the airborne helicopter to his certain death. Can you shed any light on this coincidence: that "Karl" is similar in praenomen to "Carl" Mather? [For example, when did Mather die? I'd have to check Zenith & DEA on the time of Karl's leap, but it was at some remove from Nov. 22, 1963. There may have been several LHO impostors. No?]

Thanks again.

MS

First off, I don't believe and am not accusing Carl Mather, who is alive today, of being involved in any conspiracy to kill the President. I don't know what Carl Mather looks like or if he could be mistaken for LHO, and didn't put together the Carl and Karl connection that you have.

Nor am I convinced that the "Karl" described by Bradley Ayers was actually killed in the incident he describes, because I know of Operation Pheonix special ops guys who described to me an interrogation technique in which blindfolded prisoners were taken up in a helicopter and pushed out the door only a few feet from the ground in order to break their will. It seems like the incident in which BEA's "Karl" was killed was a scenario set up to blackmail BEA as the possible killer of "Karl," even if it was determined to be an "accident."

I think Carl Mather, from everything I know about him, is a good, honest citizen who, when called on to finally testify under oath about what he knows, will do so.

What can not be dissmissed as a coincidence, is the suspected assassin of the President and a Dallas policeman, seen in a car belonging to one of the victim's good friend, who works for a company involved in covert intelligence operations against Cuba.

There is no coincidence.

BK

Edited March 1, 2007 by William Kelly

[Miles Scull]

Per request of Miles Scull.

Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon.

Thank you William Kelly for posting this very interesting article!

Just for the moment focusing on the two quoted paragraphs above, is it right to interpret White's observations as indicative that the individual in the Plymouth was a possible LHO impostor (who in fact might have slain Tippit)? Further, that the impostor was Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas, or someone (an impostor) who was operating Carl Mather's car?

You mention: "BEA gives details of the crew of the Rex,... and "Karl," a JMWAVE operative and LHO double who dies suspiciously (thrown from a helicopter)."

I believe that BEA has "Karl" mysteriously & amazingly throwing himself out of the airborne helicopter to his certain death. Can you shed any light on this coincidence: that "Karl" is similar in praenomen to "Carl" Mather? [For example, when did Mather die? I'd have to check Zenith & DEA on the time of Karl's leap, but it was at some remove from Nov. 22, 1963. There may have been several LHO impostors. No?]

Thanks again.

MS

First off, I don't belive and am not accusing Carl Mather, who is alive today, of being involved in any conspiracy to kill the President. I don't know what Carl Mather looks like or if he could be mistaken for LHO, and didn't put together the Carl and Karl connection that you have.

First off, BK, I completely agree the you (BK) never accused Carl Mather of anything. It is a matter of elementary logic that neither have I done so. I only asked if a connection was reasonable. It is not, as Ron Ecker points out, as BK saw.

What can not be dissmissed as a coincidence, is the suspected assassin of the President and a Dallas policeman, seen in a car belonging to one of the victim's good friend, who works for a company involved in covert intelligence operations against Cuba.

This is not clear. Is BK saying that LHO or a LHO impostor was seen by White? Either way, what rational explanation is possible for the circumstance? Is it that a LHO impostor killed Tippit? Or did a LHO impostor serve as look out? What was such a person doing in Carl's Plymouth? What is the connection there, if there is one, as BK seems to be suggesting there may or may not be one.

[William Kelly]

Per request of Miles Scull.

First off, I don't belive and am not accusing Carl Mather, who is alive today, of being involved in any conspiracy to kill the President. I don't know what Carl Mather looks like or if he could be mistaken for LHO, and didn't put together the Carl and Karl connection that you have.

....

What can not be dissmissed as a coincidence, is the suspected assassin of the President and a Dallas policeman, seen in a car belonging to one of the victim's good friend, who works for a company involved in covert intelligence operations against Cuba.

This is not clear. Is BK saying that LHO or a LHO impostor was seen by White? Either way, what rational explanation is possible for the circumstance? Is it that a LHO impostor killed Tippit? Or did a LHO impostor serve as look out? What was such a person doing in Carl's Plymouth? What is the connection there, if there is one, as BK seems to be suggesting there may or may not be one.

Miles,

If it was clear, we wouldn't have to continue the inquiry. I'm not saying it was LHO or an imposter either way. I don't know. I don't believe there is an innocent rational explanation for these circumstances. This is just one of dozens of similar investigative leads that were thawarted and should be properly investigated, not by us, but by a proper, legal investigation, and is why we have been calling for a grand jury and/or congressional hearing into these things.

And I'd appreciate it if people don't cross post that Collins Radio Connection article until I clean up the typos and add sources and notes. It really hasn't been looked at in years. Thanks.

BK

[Antti Hynonen]

Is there a 1963 picture of Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas?

James Richards?

Just my 2 cents: If someone spots a car near the site of a murder with someone "acting suspiciously", writes down the license plate no. and it turns out he wrote it down correctly (as the car is the same, based on the witness' description), how can it be that the driver from that point in time remains unclear?

If there is a reasonable explanation, IMO the only options are that the eye witness indeed saw Mather, and for some reason thought it was Oswald, or someone used Mather's car with or without his consent.

Either way, some type of sensible explanation out to come out of Mather.

I do vaguely recall that there was a discrepancy regarding the vehicle description; the eye witness gave the description as white and green, when in fact the car turned out to be white and red....

If this is the case, someone may have used Mather's tags, or a copy of them, on a similar vehcile. => Dead-end investigation.

[William Kelly]

Is there a 1963 picture of Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas?

James Richards?

Just my 2 cents: If someone spots a car near the site of a murder with someone "acting suspiciously", writes down the license plate no. and it turns out he wrote it down correctly (as the car is the same, based on the witness' description), how can it be that the driver from that point in time remains unclear?

If there is a reasonable explanation, IMO the only options are that the eye witness indeed saw Mather, and for some reason thought it was Oswald, or someone used Mather's car with or without his consent.

Either way, some type of sensible explanation out to come out of Mather.

I do vaguely recall that there was a discrepancy regarding the vehicle description; the eye witness gave the description as white and green, when in fact the car turned out to be white and red....

If this is the case, someone may have used Mather's tags, or a copy of them, on a similar vehcile. => Dead-end investigation.

AH,

The bottom line is the license tage is evidence. The discrpency in the color of the car (and make) is attributable to the botched and aborted FBI inquiry (I can't call it an investigation). And there's no getting around the fact that the car belonging to a good friend of J.D. Tippit was seen at the scene of his murder being driven by the person accused of killing him and the president of the US. And the alibi for the car and the suspect is they were at a company actively engaged in cover activity for a CIA assassination mission against Fidel Castro three weeks earlier.

Dead end all right.

BK

[Miles Scull]

Is there a 1963 picture of Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas?

James Richards?

Just my 2 cents: If someone spots a car near the site of a murder with someone "acting suspiciously", writes down the license plate no. and it turns out he wrote it down correctly (as the car is the same, based on the witness' description), how can it be that the driver from that point in time remains unclear?

If there is a reasonable explanation, IMO the only options are that the eye witness indeed saw Mather, and for some reason thought it was Oswald, or someone used Mather's car with or without his consent.

Either way, some type of sensible explanation out to come out of Mather.

I do vaguely recall that there was a discrepancy regarding the vehicle description; the eye witness gave the description as white and green, when in fact the car turned out to be white and red....

If this is the case, someone may have used Mather's tags, or a copy of them, on a similar vehcile. => Dead-end investigation.

AH,

The bottom line is the license tage is evidence. The discrpency in the color of the car (and make) is attributable to the botched and aborted FBI inquiry (I can't call it an investigation). And there's no getting around the fact that the car belonging to a good friend of J.D. Tippit was seen at the scene of his murder being driven by the person accused of killing him and the president of the US. And the alibi for the car and the suspect is they were at a company actively engaged in cover activity for a CIA assassination mission against Fidel Castro three weeks earlier.

Dead end all right.

BK

"Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon." -- BK

Presumably the source of this information is Wes Wise, but how did BK come to find it? For example, what was the suspicious man doing behind the wheel that was characterized as suspicious? Was he attempting to hide his face behind his hand? Was he speaking to a walkie-talkie? What was so arresting that White would cross the street to investigate? One way to examine the possible implications of White's observations is to consider the timing. When did the police cars respond? How does that compare with LHO movements? How far was the filing station from Tippitt's location. Was it impossible for LHO to be in the Plymouth & does that mean an impostor was there? If an impostor was there, what would he have been doing? If he was a agent with an assignment, would he have been driving a traceable car? Was the driver actually Carl Mather who had innocently just finished a Mexican lunch & who had happened to resemble LHO in White's mind? Would Mrs. Mather know of her husbands true movements?

Since, at this remove, there is not going to be an official investigation of the matter, one is left with deduction.

[Steve Thomas]

Bill,

[*]At the time of the assassination Adml. Bruton was working on a top-secret nuclear submarine communications project for Collins, with the Navy's nuclear sub radar and communications HQ being based at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, close neighbors of Michael Paine's family island.

Do you know if Admiral Bruton's name surfaced in connection with the Thresher incident?

Steve Thomas

[Lee Forman]

Most significant however, is the Texas plate PP4537. This number was jotted down on a piece of paper by an elderly Oak Cliff mechanic T. F. White, who noticed a man acting suspiciously behind the wheel of a 1958 two tone Plymouth sedan shortly after the murder of Dallas Policeman J.D. Tippitt. The car was parked behind a billboard in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant, with the driver, like White, watching the flurry of Dallas police cars racing down the street with sirens blaring, called to the nearby scene of the shooting of Tippit.

White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon.

A few weeks later, when Dallas radio reporter and later mayor of Dallas Wes Wise gave a talk at the Oak Cliff restaurant, the owner of the garage where Mr. White worked mentioned the suspicious Plymouth to Wise, who then met White. White reluctantly told his story, and didn't want to get involved, and Wise had to use all his powers of persuasion to convince White to share the information with him. Wise promised White he would not be brought into the investigation, but that he would handle it. "Do you have the piece of paper with the license number on it?" Wise asked, and sure enough, White had it right there in his pocket and gave it to Wise. It read: PP4537.

White told Wise that nobody knew who or what was really behind the assassination of President Kennedy and he really didn't want to get involved, but he handed over the paper to Wise, who passed it on to the police and FBI.

A quick check of the Texas plate #PP4537 indicated that it was assigned to Carl Mather, of Garland, Texas. When the FBI went out to the listed Garland address they found the two tone 1958 Plymouth right there in the driveway and knocked on the door. Mrs. Mather answered, acknowledged the car belonged to her husband, who was then away at work at Collins Radio, in nearby Richardson, Texas. When asked where her husband and the car was on Friday, November 22, 1963, she said that the car was in the parking lot at Collins Radio until sometime in the afternoon when her husband returned home and picked up the family to go to the Tippit residence to pay their respects to the widow and family of their good friend, who was murdered that day.

Instead of going out to Collins Radio to interview Mather however, the FBI went first to Mr. White, who Wes Wise had promised wouldn't be involved, and took additional statements from him, changing his story for the official reports and exchanging the two tone Plymouth to a red Ford Falcon. CBS News made a polite inquiry years later, leaving Carl Mather out of the documentary program they aired but listed Mrs. Mather in the programs credits. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) briefly looked into the affair, granted Mather immunity from prosecution to testify and then failed to question him under oath. The HSCA published a short report they titled "The Wise Allegation," when in fact Wes Wise made no allegations, and merely followed up on his reporter's instincts. He came up with an automobile license plate number that was seen near the murder of a Dallas policeman that was traced to one of the victim's best friends, Carl Mather, whose alibi was that he was at work at the time, at Collins Radio.

Bill,

Do you have additional details which support this claim, or is this your assumption? Plate swapping for an op is 'standard tradecraft' I was told. I recall having read this account and the associated reports, which seemed to point towards the car as having possibly belonged to Igor Vaganov - as per a Tippit or Vaganov thread. His Thunderbird model was a unique one, and could have been mistaken for a Falcon. He could have been mistaken for Oswald. He was in Oak Cliff at the time. He was associated with radios. Do you have more information that confirms that there was an intentional switch made in the description of the vehicle? For example:

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/jfkinfo4/jfk12/hscalojt.htm

X. THE WISE ALLEGATION

The committee also learned of an allegation about the assassination involving an associate and friend of J.D. Tippit's which was not reported in the Warren Commission Report. Interviews were conducted by the FBI in December 1963 about that allegation, and were furnished to the Warren Commission, but the substance of those interviews was not included in the report made public by the Commission.

In February 1977, the committee received information from Wes Wise, a reporter with KRLD-TV in Dallas at the time of the assassination and later mayor of Dallas, that he had received information about a car near the scene of the Tippit shooting that was traced to Carl Mather, a close friend of Tippit's. According to Wise, on December 4, 1963, he was giving a speech at the Ol Chico Restaurant in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas.(31) After the subject of the speech had turned to events surrounding the assassination, a man in the audience named Pate approached Wise and said a mechanic who worked for Pate had observed a car in the parking lot of the El Chico Restaurant on the afternoon of November 22 after radio reports were being broadcast about the shooting in Dealey Plaza.(32)

Wise went to Pate to discuss the story with the mechanic.(33) The mechanic told Wise that after the assassination there were sirens blaring and police cars "all over the area" near the garage.(34) He noticed a man sitting in an irregularly parked car in the restaurant parking lot; the car was slightly hidden by a billboard.(35) The man in the car appeared to be hiding, according to the mechanic.(36) All of the circumstances seemed so suspicious that the mechanic went across the street to get a better look.(37) When he was about 10 or 15 yards from the car, the man turned around.(38) The mechanic was able then to get a good look at his face; he saw also that the man was wearing a white T-shirt.(39) He made a note of the license number of the car.(40)

When the mechanic saw news accounts of the assassination that night on television, he saw Lee Harvey Oswald and recognized him as being the man he had soon in the car that afternoon.(41) The mechanic had been afraid of reporting the incident.(42) Nevertheless, after Pate brought Wise to meet him, Wise was able to convince the mechanic that he should report the incident to the FBI.(43) The mechanic took with him the note paper on which he had jotted the license number.(44)

Wes stated also that he later took employees of CBS to meet the owner of the license number.(45) Wise said that during that meeting, which was arranged as a dinner between the owner and his wife and the person from CBS, the man appeared "so upset" and "agitated" that he was unable to eat.(46) At that time, the man explained his plate number was noticed under the suspicious circumstances and that he was a friend of Tippit, who had been killed at almost the same time very nearby.(47)

Wise told the committee that he jotted down the information he received from Pate and the mechanic on a piece of paper he was carrying in his pocket at the time of his speech at the El Chico Restaurant.(48) He turned that paper over to the committee. Wise also told the committee that he thought he was still in possession of the slip of paper containing the license number that had been written by the mechanic. Wise told the committee that after several attempts he has been unable to locate that slip of paper among his records at his home.(49)

The license number appearing on the paper provided by Wise from his conversation with Pate and the mechanic was Texas license PP 4537. The car was only described on the paper as a 1957 Plymouth 4-door, with no further description.(50)

The FBI interviewed Wes Wise about this allegation on December 4, 1963. At that time, Wise said the mechanic, whom he refused to identify for the FBI, claiming he did not want to reveal the identity of his source, told him the car he saw in the restaurant parking lot was a red 1957 Plymouth with the license PP 4537.(51)

In an FBI report dated December 14, 1963, Milton Love of the Dallas County Tax Office advised that the 1963 Texas license PP 4537 was issued for a 1957 Plymouth automobile in the possession of Carl Amos Mather, 4309 Colgate Street, Garland, Tex.(52) In a report dated December 14, 1963, FBI special Agent Charles T. Brown reported that he observed a 1957 Plymouth with 1963 Texas license PP 4537 parked in the driveway of the house at 4309 Colgate Street, Garland, Tex.(53) Brown reported that car was light blue over medium blue in color.(54)

Mrs. Carl A Mather was interviewed by FBI agent Charles T. Brown on December 5, 1963, at the Mather home at 4303 Colgate Street in Garland, Tex. She identified the 1957 Plymouth with Texas license PP 4537 as belonging to her and her husband.(55) Mrs. Mather told the FBI that her husband was at work on November 22, 1963, at Collins Radio, Co., in Richardson, Tex., until approximately 2 p.m., when he came by their home to the the family to the Tippit home to offer their condolences.(56) Mrs. Mather said the two families were friends.(57) According to Mrs. Mather, Carl Mather was with them at the Tippit home from about 3:30 p.m. until about 5 p.m., when he took the two Mather children home.(58) Mrs. Mather did not state in the interview which car her husband was driving that day at the time of the assassination of the Tippit shooting. No FBI report of an interview or contact with Carl Mather was located.

On December 9, 1963, Wes Wise told FBI Special Agent Brown that he could at that time reveal the identity of the person who had provided him with the information about the car and license number.(59) He identified the mechanic as T.F. White, who worked at the Mack Pate Garage at 114 West Seventh Street in Dallas.(60) Wise advised it would be permissible for the FBI to interview White to get further details of the allegation.(61)

T.F. White was interviewed by Special Agent Brown on December 13, 1963. In the interview, White said he saw a red car in the parking lot of the El Chico Restaurant at approximately 2 p.m. on November 22, 1963.(62) At the time of the interview, White said he believed the car to be a red 1961 Falcon with 1963 Texas license PP 4537.(63) White said he saw the man in the car from the side, and that when he saw pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald that night on television, he was identical with the man he had seen in the car that afternoon.(64) White said that after he saw the man sit in the car for a short time, the man left in the car at a high rate of speed, going west of Davis Street.(65)

During the interview, Special Agent Brown advised White that the car to which the license number was traced was a 1957 Plymouth that was light and medium blue in color.(66) Brown also told White that Oswald had been apprehended at approximately 2 p.m. on November 22, 1963, in the Texas Theater.(67)

According to the interview report, when confronted with those facts, White reiterated that he had correctly copied the number of the car and that after seeing the news reports of Oswald, he thought Oswald was possibly identical with the man White had seen in the car.(68)

Carl Mather and his wife were interviewed by the committee on March 28, 1978. Mather stated that his family had been close friends with the Tippits since 1958 when the two families lived on Glenfield Street in dallas.(69) The Mather family moved away to Garland, Texas, in 1961.(70) The relationship between the two families consisted of visits together to "family-type" clubs and babysitting.(71)

Mather said that on November 2, 1963, he worked all day at the Collins Radio Co. in Richardson.(72) Mather said his boss at the time at Collins was J.A. Pickford.(73) The Mathers said that they were familiar with the allegation about the car with their license tag parked in the restaurant parking area.(74) Barbara Mather said she talked to FBI agents about their car twice, but that Carl Mather was never interviewed.(75) The Mathers said they attached no further particular significance to the incident since the FBI apparently dropped the issue.(76)

During the committee interview, Barbara Mather stated that she and her husband never owned any kind of red car.(77) She stated that at the time of the assassination they owned a Ford station wagon, which was white over blue, in addition to the blue 1957 Plymouth which carried the license number reported by T.F. White.(78)

Mather described his background as including a security clearance for electronics work.(79) He has been employed with Collins Radio Co. for 21 years.(80) One assignment involved work in Brandywine, Md., at Andrews Air Force Base, where he did electronics work on then Vice President Johnson's airplane Air Force Two.(81)

[William Kelly]

......

Since, at this remove, there is not going to be an official investigation of the matter, one is left with deduction.

Miles, You have not been paying attention. It is not worth jumping through those hoops on the internet. There is a new Congerssional Oversight Committee responsible for holding hearings on the government response to the JFK Act, we have a Federal Grand Jury peition that when ready, will try to get a district attorney to conveine a grand jury that will try to answer all of your questions and determine if there is ground for indictments. And the Collins Radio Connections are not even close to the more specific evidence that will be introduced in court, though it is part of the puzzle.

Also, consider that any intelligence network that can kill the president and lose $6 billion isn't concerned about justice or us determing the truth.

BK

[William Kelly]

Bill,

[*]At the time of the assassination Adml. Bruton was working on a top-secret nuclear submarine communications project for Collins, with the Navy's nuclear sub radar and communications HQ being based at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, close neighbors of Michael Paine's family island.

Do you know if Admiral Bruton's name surfaced in connection with the Thresher incident?

Steve Thomas

Steve, I don't believe so, but there might be a connection with a former Captain of the Thresher.

And Lee, I don't know about plate swapping. That's more like street gang stuff than tradecraft. Robert Howard also speculated along those lines.

But if the witness says its a 58 two tone blue and white Plymouth with set license numbers, and the FBI gets in the picture and it suddenly becomes a red Ford, I don't know. Maybe Vaganov's red Ford is there too.

There may be dozens of possible scenarios, based on what we know, but it only happened one way, so instead of trying to figure out all the possibilities and picking one you like, I like adding more pieces to the puzzle until it figures it self out.

BK

[Miles Scull]

......

Since, at this remove, there is not going to be an official investigation of the matter, one is left with deduction.

Miles, You have not been paying attention.

Also, consider that any intelligence network that can kill the president and lose $6 billion isn't concerned about justice or us determing the truth.

BK

BK, I ratcheted up my attention, following your instructions & I proceeded to have a look-see at White's evidence because if that is suspect or wobbly, then the house of cards may come tumbling down all over the place.

Now your article says, quote:

"White walked across the street to get closer and exchanged glances with the man, who quickly drove away. White wrote down the license tag PP4537 on a piece of paper and forgot about it until later that day when he saw Lee Harvey Oswald on television and recognized him as the man he saw acting suspiciously in the Plymouth earlier that afternoon."

"... and exchanged glances with the man,..."

Here's the problem: I could not find in:

OSWALD-TIPPIT ASSOCIATES

Staff Report of the Select Committee on Assassinations

U.S. House of Representatives

Ninety-fifth Congress Second Session

March 1979

any evidence that White & the man had actually exchanged glances . This is important, even critical, to the reliability & soundness of White's contention that he had seen LHO.

Here're the relevant passages:

17. Wise went to Pate to discuss the story with the mechanic.(33) The mechanic told Wise that after the assassination there were sirens blaring and police cars "all over the area" near the garage.(34) He noticed a man sitting in an irregularly parked car in the restaurant parking lot; the car was slightly hidden by a billboard.(35) The man in the car appeared to be hiding, according to the mechanic.(36) All of the circumstances seemed so suspicious that the mechanic went across the street to get a better look.(37) When he was about 10 or 15 yards from the car, the man turned around.(38) The mechanic was able then to get a good look at his face; he saw also that the man was wearing a white T-shirt.(39) He made a note of the license number of the car.(40)

26. T.F. White was interviewed by Special Agent Brown on December 13, 1963. In the interview, White said he saw a red car in the parking lot of the El Chico Restaurant at approximately 2 p.m. on November 22, 1963.(62) At the time of the interview, White said he believed the car to be a red 1961 Falcon with 1963 Texas license PP 4537.(63) White said he saw the man in the car from the side, and that when he saw pictures of Lee Harvey Oswald that night on television, he was identical with the man he had seen in the car that afternoon.(64) White said that after he saw the man sit in the car for a short time, the man left in the car at a high rate of speed, going west of Davis Street.(65)

White contradicts himself: first he sees the man's face & then he changes his story to that he saw the side of the man's head.

No where is there any statement that White & the man exchanged glances. BK, do you have a source for your statement that they "exchanged glances," or is this your invention or interpretation? I don't think we should exaggerate without solid proof. Regrettably, White's evidence is very questionable & impeachable.