David Von Pein

Well, Drittal certainly isn't spelled with an "LE" (Drittle) as William Kelly suggested in an earlier post. It looks like DRITTAL to me (via CE790). What's it look like to you, Tom Scully?

Hi Bill, Good to talk with you again. I don't have a definitive answer to your question there, Bill. But I will offer up this possibility (which I think is a reasonable answer to this mystery): I think it's quite possible that Oswald mailed the order forms for both the rifle and the revolver at about the same time--possibly mailing them on the very same day (March 12, 1963). Just because the Seaport Traders order form has a "January 27" date written in by Oswald, that doesn't necessarily have to mean he mailed that order form on that exact day in January. Maybe he waited and mailed it in March. We can never know for sure. Oh, come now, Bill. You're tugging at my lower extremities here, aren't you, you jokester you? You and I both know that "D.F. Drittal" is another invented name that was created out of thin air by Lee H. Oswald. Just as "A.J. Hidell" was created out of thin air. So, Drittal and Hidell were pals with nobody--except their inventor, Lee Harvey. I doubt very much that Oswald could have walked into any store in Texas and bought a gun without any record being left behind. I'm pretty sure that's Conspiracy Myth #884, and is one that Oliver Stone propped up as the truth in his 1991 fantasy film too. Just recently, Jean Davison posted THIS INFORMATION, which deals with this very subject regarding tracing guns that were purchased in brick-and-mortar stores in Texas in 1963. Albert Yeargan's July 1964 affidavit (which is referenced by Davison in the post linked above) certainly indicates that RECORDS WERE KEPT of the sale of firearms at the H.L. Green Sporting Goods store in 1963. This whole topic is something that I very recently started thinking about more and more, and via Jean Davison's post linked above, it certainly looks to me as though Oliver Stone (and other CTers) have been peddling a myth regarding Texas gun shops, circa 1963. I first brought up this topic just last month in fact, in this post (excerpted below): "I'd like to know if conspiracists are right when they say that Oswald could have walked into any gun shop or department store in Texas in 1963 and bought a gun that could never be traced? "No paperwork was required at a gun shop in Texas in '63? No signature from the purchaser? Nothing? Just grab the gun and run? "I'm not saying that perhaps that wasn't how it worked in Texas gun stores, circa 1963, but I'm just wondering if it really was that cut-&-dried--even back in '63? I've never really ever seen that confirmed anywhere (that I can think of). "Could that be just another of the many conspiracy myths that we've been saddled with since the JFK assassination--with Oliver Stone giving it a handy push in his blockbuster movie too? I just wonder. "~~Thinking about the "Benavides' Brother" myth that was destroyed recently, with Domingo's brother really being killed in 1965, not 1964~~" -- DVP; July 21, 2010

Good lord! What a load of crap this is. There are actually conspiracy theorists here at this forum who think Oswald DIDN'T OWN A REVOLVER?? Even with Commission Exhibit No. 790 available for everybody to see (which, of course, has Oswald's writing all over it)? Was his handwriting supposedly "planted" on this order form too?: Plus: To believe that the gun was "planted" on Oswald in the Texas Theater, you've got no choice but to call civilian witness Johnny Brewer a xxxx. Brewer saw Oswald pull out a gun and attempt to shoot policemen with it. Is Brewer lying here?: http://dvp-potpourri.blogspot.com/2010/07/johnny-brewer.html And a whole bunch of different police officers would have to go into the "liars" pool too, who each testified that Oswald pulled out a gun and grappled with the police as he tried to shoot cops with that gun. Are Nick McDonald and Paul Bentley telling one lie after another here too?: http://dvp-potpourri.blogspot.com/2010/06/nick-mcdonald-and-paul-bentley.html Is there any end to the number of people that conspiracists are willing to call liars and cover-up agents? Or is the sky truly the limit?

The answer to that question can never be known. You know that. Everybody knows it's an unanswerable question, and different people will have different opinions about it. My own "opinion" is that he probably made the decision to try to make an attempt on JFK's life sometime on Wednesday evening, November 20th. He then asks Wes Frazier for the unusual ride to Irving on Thursday morning and LHO invents his "curtain rod" lie at that time. So it's pretty clear that by Thursday AM, he had it in his mind to make an attempt on JFK's life. But on Thursday night, per Marina, LHO says that he would get an apartment in Dallas "tomorrow" if she would agree to come back to Dallas with him to live right away. So it's highly unlikely he would have taken that rifle to work with him on Friday if Marina had said "Yes". The rest is history, of course. LHO took his rifle to work on Nov. 22 and got extremely lucky when he found himself completely alone on the sixth floor at exactly 12:30. If Bonnie Ray Williams (or other employees) had been up there on the sixth floor at 12:30, there is no way, IMO, that Oswald would have fired a single shot at JFK. So, yes, Oswald was one LUCKY Presidential assassin on November 22, 1963. No question about that. But he WAS a Presidential assassin that day. There's no question about THAT either.

MY DEBATE PROPOSAL: On May 8, 2010, I sent the following e-mail to James DiEugenio. If he is willing to debate me on these terms, then I'm ready, willing, and very eager (and these terms regarding the format should positively appeal to DiEugenio too; there's every reason in the world for him to love this type of format just as much as I do): ========================================= Subject: Attn.: James DiEugenio (Re: Debate With DVP) Date: 5/8/2010 1:31:55 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: David Von Pein To: James DiEugenio --------------------------- ATTN. JAMES DiEUGENIO: Hi Jim, If you are still willing to debate me about the JFK assassination, I am now ready and eager to participate in such a radio debate with you. The most convenient times in the near future for me to engage in such a debate would be anytime between the dates of June 1 and June 15, 2010. As for the format of any such radio debate (which I assume would take place on the "Black Op Radio" program, with Len Osanic serving as moderator/host), I have an idea that I think should probably appeal to you as well: Instead of taking questions from third parties (such as from "Black Op" listeners who write in questions via e-mail, etc.), I'd prefer a format where each of the two debaters (you and I) present various questions to the other person. That way, you can put together several questions that you would like an LNer like me to answer, and I can ask you various questions that I'd like to hear you answer. Each of us would ask the other party the same number of questions, to keep things fair from a "numerical" standpoint. To give you a heads-up on the number of questions I would like to present at any such debate, I have already put together a total of 23 questions [it's now up to 33] regarding the JFK case (plus a couple of follow-up questions within those 23 [33]) that I would like to ask you. Therefore, for the sake of fairness and "equal time", you would get to ask me the same number of questions. If Len Osanic (or others) wanted to add a few questions too, I think that would be okay as well. But for the bulk of the debate, I would much prefer the format I just outlined--with you and I deciding what questions we want the other person to answer. I don't favor the idea of the parties being shown the questions in advance, however. That would dilute the debate severely, in my opinion. I won't know what questions you'll be asking me; and, conversely, you won't know what questions are going to be coming from my side of the fence either. Sound fair to you? If you have other ideas on the debate format, let me know. We can probably work out something. But I feel that the format I just outlined should appeal to both of us, inasmuch as it would keep the "softball" type questions from being asked in the first place. Let me know if you are agreeable to this proposition. Thank you. Regards, David Von Pein http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/dvp-vs-dieugenio-part-34.html =================================== A FOLLOW-UP POST AFTER JIM DiEUGENIO SCOFFED AT MY PROPOSED DEBATE FORMAT: It's true that I declined to debate Jim D. in 2009 when I most certainly could have done so. But after preparing over 30 questions for Jimbo in the months since the 2009 debate between Jim and John McAdams, I decided to step up and challenge DiEugenio to a different kind of JFK debate--one that would have the debaters asking the questions, instead of relying on other people for the questions. And that type of format regarding the questions, as I've said numerous times since my initial challenge to Jim in early May of 2010, is a format that I simply cannot believe DiEugenio would be AGAINST. Because he could ask me any questions he wanted, and as many as he wanted. And DiEugenio's excuse of not wanting me to ask my own questions because he's concerned that I will simply "make stuff up" is just nuts. Why? Here's why: Because from Jim's utterly crazy "Oswald Didn't Shoot Anybody" point- of-view, it's quite obvious that my own CORE BELIEFS about the whole JFK case (including J.D. Tippit's murder) are beliefs that DiEugenio, in effect, thinks were just "MADE UP" in the first place. The facts about Lee Oswald's guilt weren't "made up" by me personally, of course, but they certainly are core "Oswald Is Guilty" facts that Jimbo believes are dead wrong and were literally MADE UP by somebody along the way. Heck, Jim thinks this whole case is "made up" against poor Patsy Oswald. The entire case, per Jim D., is nothing but one great-big lie and cover-up and "made up" fact after another. Plus: Again from DiEugenio's POV, what difference would it make to him if I did just "make stuff up"? He would simply tell the listening audience during our debate that I was making nonsense up, right? And Jim would go on to explain the reasons he knows that I was making stuff up. Isn't that kinda what a DEBATE is all about--to tell the audience why your opponent is wrong and why you're right (even if it means having to tell the audience why your opponent just MADE SOMETHING UP out of thin air)? Good heavens, if the shoe were on the other foot, and I were to back out of a debate with James DiEugenio (or any of the many "Anybody But Oswald" conspiracy [theorists] who regularly post on the Internet) merely due to the fact that I was of the opinion that my opponent would be inclined to "make stuff up" concerning JFK's assassination during a radio debate with that person -- good gosh, then I'd never be able to debate anyone like DiEugenio....because I KNOW he's going to simply "make stuff up" himself! That's a given. A great example being: Jim's current belief that Lee Oswald carried NO LARGE PACKAGE WHATSOEVER into the Book Depository Building on November 22, 1963. Jimbo, you see, now believes that BOTH Buell Wesley Frazier AND Linnie Mae Randle lied their asses off when they each said they saw LHO carrying a long brown paper parcel on the morning of Nov. 22nd, with Buell and Linnie being strong-armed by the evil Dallas Police Department into making up from whole cloth their individual stories about having seen Sweet Lee with a large package. Now, if that wholly unsupportable and (frankly) pathetic theory about Buell Frazier and Linnie Randle doesn't qualify as "making stuff up", then I don't know what would qualify. In short, James DiEugenio doesn't want to be forced to answer specific questions written by a lone-assassin advocate like myself in a public debate. And that's because those questions about the PHYSICAL EVIDENCE which proves Lee Harvey Oswald to be the murderer of both John F. Kennedy and J.D. Tippit will be far too much to handle from Jim DiEugenio's "Oswald Shot Nobody" viewpoint. Jim would be made to look so silly and foolish when answering my dozens of questions focusing on EVERY LAST PIECE OF EVIDENCE that hangs Oswald, he has decided it would be best to reject my proposed debate format, and stick with the questions coming from other people instead (even though many of those questions aren't very challenging at all, which was precisely one of Jim's complaints about the first half of his Black Op Radio debate against John McAdams from last September 24th). But when given the opportunity to write his own questions (which could potentially make me crawl under my computer desk in fear, from Jim's POV), Mr. DiEugenio says, 'No thanks'. I can't say I blame Jim, though. If I knew I was going to have to admit to the four Black Op listeners that I believed that every single piece of evidence against Lee Oswald was fake, phony, manipulated, planted, or otherwise worthless, I think I might have a few reservations about doing so in a public place too. David Von Pein July 5, 2010 http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/dvp-vs-dieugenio-part-40.html

2009 Black Op Radio Debate--- John McAdams Vs. Jim DiEugenio: CLICK HERE

I was recently watching the 1978 Mel Stuart-directed television movie "Ruby And Oswald", which is a film that does a very nice job of sticking to the known facts in evidence regarding the timeline of events surrounding President Kennedy's assassination and the days that followed 11/22/63, and I took note of something quite interesting during the scene which has Lee Harvey Oswald (played by Frederic Forrest) rushing into the roominghouse on Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff at approximately 1:00 PM CST on November 22: During the re-created scene of Oswald's probable movements and actions while inside his small rented room (which is a re-creation that can be seen in the video embedded above), actor Forrest hurriedly goes into the bedroom, closes the door, takes a light windbreaker jacket (like Oswald's) out of a closet, puts the jacket on, adjusts the collar of the jacket a little bit, zips the jacket up about halfway (which is something, btw, that housekeeper Earlene Roberts said that Oswald didn't do until after he came out of his room or just as he was coming out of the room), opens a dresser drawer, pulls a revolver out of the drawer, closes the drawer, stuffs the gun into the waist of his pants, pulls the jacket back down over his waistband to hide the gun, opens the bedroom door, exits the room, and closes the door behind him. The total time that it took for Forrest to accomplish all of the above actions -- 22 seconds. The only thing that director Mel Stuart probably should have had Forrest do differently while he was performing this bedroom re- creation is to have the actor grab a handful of extra bullets from a dresser drawer when he was also retrieving the revolver, because it's doubtful whether the real Oswald was carrying a bunch of bullets in his pants pocket when he went to work with Wesley Frazier from Irving on the morning of the assassination (seeing as how he didn't have his revolver with him that morning at all). Another thing that might have added a few more seconds to the total time that Oswald spent in his room is the possible need to physically load his .38 Smith & Wesson revolver with some bullets. Although it's quite possible, of course, that the gun was already loaded with bullets before Oswald ever entered the room that day. No one can know that detail for certain. So, even if we were add a total of 10, 20, or even 30 full seconds onto Frederic Forrest's roominghouse re-creation to account for some additional time required for him to grab a handful of bullets from a drawer (or elsewhere in the room) and to possibly put a few bullets in the chamber of the gun, the total time that Forrest would have spent inside that bedroom would still have been less than 1 minute (and only 32 seconds, total, if we were to add only 10 seconds, which seems like a reasonable amount of time for a man to pick up a few bullets and put them in his pocket). Now, granted, this "re-creation" performed by Frederic Forrest in Mel Stuart's 1978 TV-movie doesn't "prove" a darn thing with respect to the real Oswald's actions in November 1963. I'll readily admit that fact. But what it does do is to place on film a reconstruction of an event that is purported to have taken place on November 22, 1963, by Lee Harvey Oswald....an event that I don't think anyone has re-created on film elsewhere in other movies or TV shows or documentaries. And, IMO, Forrest's re-creation of Oswald's alleged movements and post- assassination actions after arriving at the Beckley roominghouse are probably very close to the precise movements made by the real Lee Oswald on 11/22/63. And the key, IMO, is the fact that all of those actions that Oswald needed to perform after going into his bedroom could easily be accomplished in well under one minute (and probably well under 45 seconds, even when adding a few more seconds for Oswald's needed bullet-grabbing), as proven by actor Frederic Forrest, who did perform such an approximate re-creation of LHO's actions in less than 25 seconds. The "How Long Was Oswald In His Room On November 22nd?" topic has come up at various Internet forums many times in the past, and I have added my two cents to the debate on several occasions, such as the following examples: "The best guess is that [Lee] Oswald left his roominghouse at approx. 1:03 or 1:04 PM (CST). My guess is it was even earlier than that; because there's no way in hell he was fiddling around in that shoebox of a room for "3 or 4 minutes", per Mrs. [Earlene] Roberts' account. There would be absolutely no reason (logically-speaking) for Oswald to have been in that room for more than 30 seconds at most. Was Earlene Roberts lying? Of course she wasn't. But people have a habit of stretching out time estimates to (incorrect) lengthier guesses when they're asked to re-create "timelines"." -- DVP; 06/30/2006 "I'd still be willing to bet that Oswald was not in that tiny room for "3 to 4 minutes" either. One minute tops. I don't KNOW this to be so, quite obviously. But, as stated before, people are notoriously rotten at gauging precise times and timelines. And Mrs. Roberts certainly didn't have a stopwatch on Oswald; nor would she have had any particular REASON to take note of exactly how long Oswald stayed in his room. Her "3 to 4 minutes" is an estimate, and nothing more. Next up from Walt I fully expect to see him claiming that J.D. Tippit was shot at 12:50 PM, or maybe 12:55. It seems to get earlier with each passing hunk of kookxxxx he spouts." -- DVP; 08/16/2006 "The walk back to LHO's roominghouse was re-created by WC counsel members, and it took 5 minutes and 45 seconds....which would have placed Oswald back home at approx. 12:59:45 PM. He was probably in that shoebox of a room for no more than 1 minute (tops), and probably (IMO) closer to only 30 seconds (Earlene Roberts' "3 to 4 minutes" testimony notwithstanding), which would have given Oswald ample time to travel the 0.85 of a mile to Tenth Street to kill Officer Tippit. The trip from 1026 Beckley to the Tippit murder site on 10th St. has been re-created several times by different people (with varying results, depending upon the pace, of course), and the excursion has taken as little as 11 minutes." -- DVP; 11/08/2007 ------------------- And while it's true that housekeeper Earlene Roberts testified to the Warren Commission on April 8, 1964, that Oswald "went on to his room and stayed about 3 or 4 minutes" [6 H 438], it's also a fact that Mrs. Roberts also said that Oswald was in his room "just long enough, I guess, to go in there and get a jacket and put it on" [6 H 440]. David Von Pein October 2008 Revised February 2010 My JFK Blogs

A fellow by the name of Brendan (who originally posted this information at the JFK-Lancer forum) made a very good video recently about the general operation of a Mannlicher-Carcano rifle (equipped with the exact same type of cheap Japanese telescope that was on Lee Oswald's rifle). I don't know if Brendan is a conspiracy believer or not, but this video is quite good at showing some of the basic properties of the MC rifle. Brendan gets a few facts wrong in the video (the head shot was at 88 yards, not 77), but overall I was impressed by the things I saw in this video presentation:

My list of best JFK assassination books includes: "Reclaiming History" by Vincent T. Bugliosi (2007) "Oswald's Game" by Jean Davison (1983) "With Malice" by Dale K. Myers (1998) "Kennedy And Lincoln" by Dr. John K. Lattimer (1980) "November 22, 1963: You Are The Jury" by David W. Belin (1973) "The JFK Myths" by Larry M. Sturdivan (2005) "Pictures Of The Pain" by Richard B. Trask (1994) "That Day In Dallas" by Richard B. Trask (1998) "The Death Of A President" by William Manchester (1967) "Case Closed" by Gerald Posner (1993) "National Nightmare On Six Feet Of Film" by Richard B. Trask (2005) "The Warren Commission Report" (1964) "The Day Kennedy Was Shot" by Jim Bishop (1968) "Conspiracy Of One" by Jim Moore (1990) "The Memories: JFK: 1961-1963" by Cecil Stoughton, Chester V. Clifton, and Hugh Sidey (1973) -- This book isn't really a book about the assassination, but I put it on my "favorites" list anyway. "The Killing Of A President" by Robert J. Groden (1993) -- This book is recommended only for the great pictures it contains. I certainly wouldn't recommend it for anything else, particularly the outlandish theories presented in the book, which include Mr. Groden's shot-by-shot shooting scenario, where Groden says it's very likely that ZERO shots (out of up to TEN!) came from the "Oswald" window on the sixth floor of the TSBD, even though Groden thinks Oswald was being framed and set up as the proverbial "patsy" from the sixth-floor window that Groden thinks it's likely nobody was firing from. (See Pages 20 through 40 of TKOAP for additional robust laughs.)

My name is David Von Pein. I was born in Richmond, Indiana, on December 27, 1961 (which was President Kennedy's 342nd day in office). I first became interested in JFK's assassination in 1981, when I read David Lifton's book "Best Evidence". (Thank heavens I didn't buy into Mr. Lifton's impossible theories.) I also have a deep interest in the media coverage surrounding JFK's life and death. I have a large collection of video and audio programs relating to John F. Kennedy. Also See: http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com / DVP Interview