Steve Thomas
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My thanks to Mark Valenti for pointing this out to me.
Is it possible that George Whitmeyer, of the motorcade pilot car fame, might have interacted with or maybe at least have been aware of Lee Harvey Oswald in the mid-1950's in Louisiana trough the Civil Air Patrol?
Lee Oswald joined the CAP in New Orleans in 1955.
George Whitmeyer was a “unit advisor” to the U.S. Army Reserves in Monroe, LA. at least from 1954 to 1956. By 1955, Captain Whitmeyer has been promoted to Major.
The Louisiana National Guard also had a military base at Selman Field.
Could their paths have crossed somehow?
The Monroe News-Star from Monroe, Louisiana · Page 7
April 13, 1954
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/90448363/
“Captain George L. Whitmeyer, local project officer for Armed Forces Day, said today that plans are already well advanced for Monroe participation in the annual observance honoring our young men and women in uniform. All veterans’ organizations, civic clubs, and other patriotic groups are invited to take part in the Armed Forces Day program. Representatives of organizations who wish to participate may contact Captain George L. Whitmever at building T-39-2 Selman Field or telephone 9960. In his forma! proclamation designating May 15 as Armed Forces Day in 1954, President Eisenhower said, “I call upon my fellow citizens, not only to display the flag of the United States on Armed Forces Day, but also to manifest their recognition of the sacrifice and devotion to duty of the men and women in the armed forces by attending and participating in the local observances of the day conducted by the armed forces and the civil authorities.” Local activities presently in the planning stage include a parade, open house, air display and participation by local well known former and present members of the armed forces Suggestions for projects which will best demonstrate Monroe's interest in the purposes of Armed Forces Day are welcomed by the project officer. Although coordinated by the department of defense. Armed Forces Day is endorsed and supported by leading national organizations whose cooperation in past years has assured the success of the occasion.”
The Monroe News-Star from Monroe, Louisiana · Page 5
March 25, 1955
https://newspaperarchive.com/monroe-news-star-mar-25-1955-p-5/
“Army Aviation Flight Training Men Are Lacking The commanding general, Fourth army, has announced that .there is a critical shortage of applicants for Army aviation flight training which has resulted in serious programming difficulties for the Army aviation program. The scope of the present Army aviation program and the increased emphasis toward combat employment of Army aviation re|quire maximum command support of this vital program. All company grade officers are eligible to participate in this program. The Army primary flight training course is conducted at Gary Air Force base, San Marcos, I I Texas and the Army aviation tactics course at Camp Rucker. Ala. Those reserve officers interested in this program are urged to contact Major George L. Whitmeyer at the office of the unit advisor, United States Army Reserve, building T-39-2, Selman Field, or phone 9960.”
The Monroe News-Star from Monroe, Louisiana · Page 3
September 21, 1955
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/89404823/
“...the opportunity of this type of enlistment throughout the entire United States and Major Whitmeyer states that any young man in the age group would be well advised to explore its possibilities thoroughly. The reserve armory office at Selman field is prepared to answer any inquries relative to the plan, and such inquiry, without obligation, is encouraged. Vacancies in the high school student draft deferment group still exist in the reserve army, Major George L. Whitmeyer, army reserve advisor, said Wednesday. This program, provided for in the new armed forces reserve act of 1955. provides that young men in the age group 17 to 18 years, may enlist in the army reserve and during the eight - year period of their enlistment remain in a draft - deferred status. During the eight - year period, they will be required to serve on active duty for a period of six months instead of the two years required by the draft. This will constitute their entire military obligation during their inlistment, except that they will be required to remain active in the reserve while not on active duty. This six - month perod of duty on active service will also be deferred while the enlistee is satisfactorily pursuing high school studies, is engaged in seasonal employment or until 20 years of age.”
The Whitmeyer's were still living in Monroe as of 1956.
The Monroe News-Star from Monroe, Louisiana · Page 3
October 23, 1956
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/84343273/
William F. Pipes, Jr. right, was promoted from first lieutenant to captain in the U. S. Army Reserves at ceremonies Monday night at the USAR training center, Selman Field. Looking on as Capt. Pipes reads his new commission is Major George L. Whitmeyer, unit advisor. (Staff photo by John I. Fogleman.)
OBITUARY of Frances Whitmeyer:
Whitmeyer, Frances Raby was born February 21, 1922 and passed away April 4, 2009. Frances was born in Athens, Alabama to S.W. and Donna Raby. She graduated from Alabama Women's College in Athens. She moved to New Orleans and worked for the Lykes Steamship Co. and also for the City of New Orleans helping to translate French law into English. She later married George Whitmeyer and they moved to Germany where he was stationed after the war. They moved to Fort Worth in 1961 and then to Dallas in 1963.
In his passport application of September 4, 1959 to attend college in Switzerland, Oswald said that intended to travel to Europe on the Grace Lines leaving on September 21, 1959.
When he left New Orleans on September 20, 1959, on the SS Maasden, he used the Lykes Shipping Line.
Why?
Steve Thomas
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16 hours ago, Evan Marshall said:
If maybe there was more than one team operating independently in Dealy Plaza? Might explain some of the conflicting observations by witnesses.
Evan,
And it's not just the witnesses.
I've often wondered where the "French gunman on the knoll" stories of William Reymond and Steve Rivelle came from. If you did have a triangle of fire scenario, It's my private opinion, that I can in no way prove, that there was one team on the knoll, and one team in the TSBD/Dal Tex location coming out of the anti-Castro Cuban exiles milieu. If there was a third team on the south knoll, I'm not sure what their background was.
If these teams were not acting independently, but, were in fact, put together by the same planners, then the plan to sew confusion by drawing them from different backgrounds was brilliant.
Steve Thomas
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28 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:
It seems to me that if you were going to do some shipping of crates from the U.S. to France, an import-export company would be the way to do it.
https://ia601209.us.archive.org/7/items/EmployeesOfGuyBannister/Employees of Guy Bannister.pdf
page 23 of a 25 page pdf file.
Steve Thomas
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https://archive.org/stream/EmployeesOfGuyBannister/Employees of Guy Bannister_djvu.txt
Full text of "Employees Of Guy Bannister"
MEMORANDUM TO FILE January 6, 1966 FROM: F. SEDGEBEER AND C. JONAU SUBJECT: MISS SHIRLEY BASILE, WF 25 Office 527-6559 Home 891-2506 Resides at 2833 St. CharloS/ Apt. 39 Worked part time for Guy Banister from 1960 to 1961, Also an investigator named Joseph Newbrough worked for Banister with Martin. Newbrough spent 5 years in Federal pen for cmbezzelment.
Steve Thomas
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The information being provided by Boxley on the munitions (from the Houma raid?) being destined for the OAS, was not coming from him based on first-hand knowledge, but as second-hand information possibly coming coming from a Hugh Ward, or Jerry Milton Brooks.
This an interesting website that contains info on Hugh Ward
https://isgp-studies.com/DL_1964_05_23_Hugh_Ward_Guy_Banister_associate_airplane_crash
This website also contains part of a January, 1968 Ramparts article by William Turner on the Garrison investigation that mentions Hugh Ward. In Turner's article, he also talks about the CMC and Permindex.
Steve Thomas
Steve Thomas
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Pvt. Eugene Dinkin wrote a letter to Jacqueline Hess of the HSCA in 1977.
In that letter, he said that his Security Clearance was revoked at the time that "Operation Seaflow" messages were beginning to flow over the teletype lines.
Has anyone ever heard of "Operation Seaflow"?
Steve Thomas
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1 hour ago, Gene Kelly said:
Steve
If you ready the Garrison transcript closely, it seems that Boxley (William Wood) interviewed Dinkin ... that is what fascinates me here, that he actually spoke to him in Brooklyn in 1968. I believe that this is where he gets the cipher clerk ('crypto work') legend from. Several Forum members have been asking how/where Garrison got the Dinkin/OAS connection from; I think it originated from Boxley's conversation with Eugene Dinkin. Curiously (but not surprisingly), Dinkin disavowed seeing any such traffic in a February 23, 1977 letter to HSCA member Jacqueline Hess, wherein he provided 23 exhibits ("media demonstrations") as evidence:
He noted to Hess that he had never decoded any illicit cryptographic message that appeared to relate to the JFK assassination.
In his 1977 letter to Hess, Dinkin told Hess that he had Top Secret and Crypto security clearances. See p. 14:
Curiously, in that same passage about not having decoded any "illicit cryptographic" messages, Dinkin also said that his security clearances "were revoked at the time as "Operation Seaflow" messages were going across the teletype lines." I've looked for any references to "Operation Seaflow", and haven't found any.
Have you ever heard of that? (I even looked for other spellings like Seafloat, or Seaflo.
If you read the accounts of service members in other Ordnance Groups in Germany at the time, like the 57th, or 59th; several of them held Top Security clearances.
https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/Ordnance/USAREUR_Ordnance%20Troop%20List.htm
At this time, I do not doubt that Dinkin did as well.
This a very, very interesting web page. It's a brief history of the 71st Ordnance Group:
Source: Email from Ed Donohue, 71st Ord Gp/AWSCOM, 1958-62)
1958:
"I enjoyed the TDY missions to various NATO installations, First French Army, British units and German units that worked with our U.S. weapons team. We ran convoys for the different units, 583rd (Ord Co) at Dahn, 529th (Ord Co) at Massweiler, 64th (Ord Co) at Fischbach. There were many convoys that year. It was very exciting being part of these convoys. MP teams were used to protect the missions and we were always heavily armed, carrying white phosphorus blocks to protect and if needed destroy secret crypto equipment and documents if we were placed in that position. NSA regulated our activities in regard to classified communications.
Steve Thomas
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5 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:
Steve
In a November 10, 2017 EF thread on Dinkin, you responded to Steve Hume with the following:
Here's a copy of the relevant pages from that New Orleans research conference. If they don't show up here as attached file, I'll try to copy and paste them.
Dinkin Garrrison Papers New Orleans Conference 9 21 1968 Pages 73 to 75.pdf
This captures a conversation amongst Garrison investigators (in September 1968) where Bill Boxley indicated that he interviewed Dinkin in Brooklyn NYC, and - while he seemed a bit crazy - Boxley thought that there was something to Dinkin's story. Boxley indicates that the Stars and Stripes explanation is a cover story that Dinkin "memorized" (i.e. 'they got to him') and that he had actually been monitoring OAS cable traffic, when he came upon the plot. Boxley believes that Dinkin was credible, and had been an NSA cipher clerk with significant clearance.
Gene
Steve Thomas
Gene,
Thank you so much. I had mistakenly deleted the original email the National Archives had sent me, and it got saved in some kind of temp\users\blah, blah, blah subdirectory. I haven't been able to find it again and have been disconsolate ever since.
I didn't know the "Box" in the transcript of this New Orleans Conference was this person Boxley (or Woods).
I would say this. In this transcript, "Box" says that, "Dinkin was a cipher clerk for NSA." I'm not sure where he got this.
Dinkin claimed to be a "cryptographic operator" with a Top Secret security clearance. Without seeing his service record, I can't know if that was Dinkin's MOS, or Military Occupational Specialty. but The 529th Ordnance Co., as part of the 71st. Ordnance Group, did do nuclear weapons assembly work under the Advanced Weapons Support Command (AWSCOM) which was activated in March, 1959. There were crytographic operators working with those units in the 71st who held Top Secret clearances.
His service number starts with RA, which is Regular Army. He wouldn't necessarily have to be with the NSA, or even the ASA (Army Security Agency) to be doing cryptographic work.
Thank you again for your help.
Steve Thomas
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1 hour ago, Gene Kelly said:
I recall some separate correspondence that Steve Thomas provided, indicating that Boxley had previously interviewed Dinkin in Brooklyn for Garrison, and described him as a bit nutty (he had 10 dogs).
B says the lead 'came from a DINKIN acquaintance at Ft. Hood. B talked to a Killien boy who provided him with the present whereabouts of the members of DINKIN's unit. Basically, they were military police.
Gene,
I'm sorry, that is not ringing a bell for me.
"B talked to a Killien boy who provided him with the present whereabouts of the members of DINKIN's unit. Basically, they were military police."
This would take you back to the 564th MP Co. in Massweiler that I referenced earleir.
Steve Thomas
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4 hours ago, Steve Thomas said:
I have always been intrigued by this entry in the Dallas Police tapes:
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/dpdtapes/tapes2.htm
1:26 Dispatcher 21 clear. 1:26. 9 (Inspector J.B. Jones) Yes, it will be done immediately. (1:26 p.m.)
550, car 2 (Sgt. G.L. Hill) 500/2.
Dispatcher Go ahead.
550/2 (Sgt. G.L. Hill) I'm at Twelfth and Beckley now. Have a man in the car with me that can identify the suspect if anybody gets him.
Dispatcher 10-4.
What was Hill doing way down there?
And who was the "man in the car with me that can identify the suspect..."
Who did Hill take from the crime scene?
Steve Thomas
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On 6/28/2014 at 10:30 AM, Robert Howard said:
I
On 12/3/63 at Dallas, Texas File DL 89-43
By Special Agent Robert E. Basham and James J Ward:jj Date dictated 12/4/63
Next page
Mr. Roberts advised that he had numerous friends on the police department and city council...
Roberts advised that since the above he had heard a few rumors and wondered whether
or not they had been checked out. He said that he learned from a Constable T. A. Vines,
offices in Oak Cliff Court House, Beckley and 12th Street that the woman was the night
manager of the Dobbs House, Beckley and Colorado, allegedly has claimed that Lee
Harvey Oswald and Jack Ruby used to come into her restaurant two or three times a
week during the early morning hours.
I have always been intrigued by this entry in the Dallas Police tapes:
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/dpdtapes/tapes2.htm
1:26 Dispatcher 21 clear. 1:26. 9 (Inspector J.B. Jones) Yes, it will be done immediately. (1:26 p.m.)
550, car 2 (Sgt. G.L. Hill) 500/2.
Dispatcher Go ahead.
550/2 (Sgt. G.L. Hill) I'm at Twelfth and Beckley now. Have a man in the car with me that can identify the suspect if anybody gets him.
Dispatcher 10-4.
If you look at a Google maps page, 12th and Beckley is about two blocks south and 4 blocks west of where Tippit's shooting took place.
The last known direction of the suspect at 1:23 PM, was that the suspect was in the 400 block of Jefferson, heading west.
What was Hill doing way down there?
Steve Thomas
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Just as an aside; according to the organizational chart, the 564th MP Co. was subordinate to the 529th Ordnance. I figure if Dinkin got in trouble at Massweiler, the MP's probably would have heard about it.
Steve Thomas
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1 hour ago, James DiEugenio said:
Do you want to explain what you think this all means Steve?
Jim,
I can't speak to the claim that Dinkin predicted Kennedy's assassination; but,
1) The identification of Dinkin belonging to the 599th Ordnance Group is wrong. Any CIA cables identifying him that way are misleading. Any identification of Dinkin having U.S. Army serial# RA 76710292 is wrong.
2) In 1977 Dinkin said he was a member of the 529th Ordnance Co. stationed in Massweiler, Germany. In 1967 a Richard Moltzon wrote to Jim Garrison and told him that he was stationed there with Dinkin. Moltzon was a real person.
3) As a supply depot, the 529th handled more than artillery shells. They assembled nuclear weapons and made them fail-safe.
4) Dinkin claimed to be a "cryptographic operator" with a Top Secret security clearance. Without seeing his service record, I can't know if that was Dinkin's MOS, or Military Occupational Specialty. but The 529th Ordnance Co., as part of the 71st. Ordnance Group, did do nuclear weapons assembly work under the Advanced Weapons Support Command (AWSCOM) which was activated in March, 1959. There were crytographic operators working with those units in the 71st who held Top Secret clearances.
5) In his letter to the SSCA in 1977, Dinkin said that someone "arranged" to leave out an American Rifleman magazine that had a picture of marksman,Thomas D. Smith III in it. In his letter, Dinkin said that he was interviewed by this man while he was incarcerated at Walter Reed Hospital. Did Dinkin just pick Smith's picture out of a magazine and claim that that person interviewed him at Walter Reed? I can't know, but Thomas D. Smith III was a real person.
Steve Thomas
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I've been doing a little research.
On October 19, 2017, Jim DiEugenio opened a thread on this Forum entitled, “Eugene Dinkin: The Saga of an Unsung Hero.” Jim's thread was predicated on an article of the same title written by a man named Ronald Redmon, and published on the website
https://kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/eugene-dinkin-the-saga-of-an-unsung-hero
Based on reasearch he had discovered in files that were recently released in the 1990's, Mr. Redmon wrote, “Regular Army Private First Class Dinkin was serving in Metz, France in the 599th Ordinance Group”
At the time, I expressed skepticism of Dinkin's story because I could find no record of a 599th Ordinance or Ordnance Group in Europe in the 1950's or 60's.
However, what I have learned in the meantime has caused me to change my thinking. I can't prove that what he claimed was true, but Dinkin was where he said he was. Without seeing his service record, I do not know if he was a “cryptographic operator”, but now, I don't see any reason to doubt it.
CD 943 is a memorandum from Richard Helms of May 19, 1964 to J. Lee Rankin which identified Pvt. Dinkin as having U.S. Army serial number RA 76710292
(I've learned that RA stands for Regular Army).
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=11339#relPageId=2&tab=page
CD 788 said that on February 18, 1964, local Army records in Metz, France correctly reported Dinkin's serial number as 16710292. However, in that same FBI Letterhead memo of April 9, 1964 which comprises CD 788, it says that, “Dinkin advised that he had been in trouble with the officers of his military group, the 599th Ordnance Group stationed in Germany...”
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=11186#relPageId=7&tab=page
See p. 4.
(Notice the difference in serial numbers).
On January 1, 2011 Bernice Moore opened a thread on the Deep Politics Forum entitled, “The strange tale of eugene dinkin..PRE KNOWLEDGE.”. In her thread, Bernice references an essay called “The Strange Tale of Eugene Dinkins” by a Robert Mitchell.
In Mary Ferrell's Database, it identifies Dinkin as having U.S, Army serial number as RA 76710292.
https://www.maryferrell.org/php/marysdb.php?id=3339
Dinkin List of CIA cables:
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=26509#relPageId=3&tab=page
see pp. 3, 4
CIA cable 22-531 is an interesting one. You can see a copy here:
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=50238&search="Michael_K.+Bowers"#relPageId=2&tab=page
Someone using Michael Bowers name was traveling in Switzerland. The person using Bowers' name did not match the physical description of Eugene Dinkin as provided by newsmen and ODIBEX. In other sources, ODIBEX appears to be the U.S. Army. The cable says that, “Description of Dinkin from ODIBEX and newsmen he contacted stated that he had heavy black mustache, wore horn rim glasses.”
CIA station in Bern wonders who this person could be.
On July 21, 2018, Jim Hargrove posted an entry in the Education Forum in a thread entitled, “Records release regarding intercepted messages.”
http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/25068-records-release-regarding-intercepted-messages/
In his entry, Jim referred readers to the John Armstrong Collection of materials on Dinkin at Baylor University here:
http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/po-arm/id/23494/rec/7
and quoted a letter on page 2 of those documents from a Richard Moltzon to Jim Garrison dated September 16, 1967. In his letter, Moltzon wrote that he had been stationed with Eugene Dinkin in the 529th Ordnance Company in Germany.
There was a 529th Ordnance Co.
529th Ordnance Co.
http://nikeordnance.nikemissile.org/unitSelect.php?tableSelector=529thOrdnanceCo
53 Names:
Name: Rick Moltzon
StartDate: 1962-02-01 00:00:00
EndDate: 03/64
Rank: SP5
MOS-Title: 304.1, Weapons Electronic Maint. TechThe 529th Ordnance Co. was stationed in Massweiler, Germany as part of the 71st. Ordnance Group, and did do nuclear weapons assembly work under the Advanced Weapons Support Command (AWSCOM) which was activated in March, 1959. There were crytographic operators working with those units in the 71st who held Top Secret clearances.
See a history of the 71st Ordnance Group here:
https://www.usarmygermany.com/Sont.htm?https&&&www.usarmygermany.com/Units/Ordnance/USAREUR_Ordnance%20Troop%20List.htm
On pp. 12-14 of the Armstrong collection of documents, there is a three-page handwritten letter from Eugene Dinkin to Jacqueline Hess of the Senate Select Committee on Assassinations (SSCA) dated March 10, 1977.
On pp. 12-13 of that letter, Dinkin wrote that, “T.D. Smith III (top photo) is known to me, as he, attired in the white tunic of a physician, interviewed me at Walter Reed Hospital in February, 1964.... Banta? Bantu? (Mayleigh Team photo) was in the 529th Ordnance Co., Massweiler, Germany with me. I did not know him on any personal basis and I did not know that he was a marksman until I saw this photo.”
On page 13 of that letter, Dinkin wrote, “I had been a cryptographic operator at the 529th Ord. Co., which assembles nuclear warhead missiles under Advanced Weapons Support Command.”
On page 13 of that letter, Dinkin wrote that, “My service number was RA 16710292, not 76710292. He also wrote that he had a red mustache.
Permissive Active Link or PAL
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_Action_Link
“A Permissive Action Link (PAL) is a security device for nuclear weapons. Its purpose is to prevent unauthorized arming or detonation of the nuclear weapon.[1] The United States Department of Defense definition is:
A device included in or attached to a nuclear weapon system to preclude arming and/or launching until the insertion of a prescribed discrete code or combination. It may include equipment and cabling external to the weapon or weapon system to activate components within the weapon or weapon system.
The earliest PALs were little more than locks introduced into the control and firing systems of a nuclear weapon, that would inhibit either the detonation, or the removal of safety features of the weapon. More recent innovations have included encrypted firing parameters, which must be decrypted to properly detonate the warhead, plus anti-tamper systems which intentionally mis-detonate the weapon, destroying it without giving rise to a nuclear explosion.”
59th Ordnance Brigade
Source: Email from Gary Smith, PAL Det, 1963-67)
“I was assigned to the USA PAL Det (Permissive Action Link) from 1963 to 1967. The unit was organized to install the Permissive Action Link devices throughout the European Theater. The unit spent its time in the early stages testing the devices before the program was fully implemented and then traveled throughout the theater installing the devices. I was with the unit almost from its inception until the program was fully implemented.”
“A later phase of the mission involved tested of the devices and became very boring. Can you imagine eight hours a day opening combination locks over and over? There were quite a few failures in the early days and this testing phase stretched out for quite a long time, but the devices had to work flawlessly. Much of the early testing was at the 529th Ordnance Company in tunnels dug during the Second World War by the Germans.”
In his letter to Jacqueline Hess, Dinkin refers to a T.D. Smith III and the Mayleigh Team.
The Mayleigh Team has something to do with the National Rifle and Pistol Matches held at Camp Perry, Ohio.
In 1963, Thomas D. Smith III won the General Custer Trophy in the Individual Pistol Match# 100.
http://www.wwmcmillan.info/natMatches_1963.html
National Trophy Individual Pistol Match No. 100
“General Custer Trophy”Rank
Name
Service Branch/Agency
Slow Fire
Timed Fire
Rapid Fire
Total
1
Wm W. McMillan, Jr.
U.S. Marine Corps
Quantico, Va.96-3X
99-5X
99-5X
294-13X
2
Robert E. Wilford
U.S. Army
96-4X
98-4X
99-6X
293-14X
3
Edwin L. Teague
U.S. Air Force
94-2X
99-5X
99-6X
292-13X
4
Richard F. Stengel
U.S. Army
98-2X
98-6X
96-2X
292-10X
5
Thomas D. Smith, III
U.S. Air Force
91-1X
100-8X
100-8X
291-17X
.22 Caliber Slow Fire Match
3rd Regular
Service
MasterThomas D. Smith, III
U.S. Air Force
Lackland AFB, Tex.195-12X
National .22 Caliber Team Championship
“High Standard Trophy”Rank
Team
Competitors
Score
1
U.S. Air Force 'Blue'
J. L. Mahan (295-12X), A. R. Merx (300-17X)
T. D Smith, III (296-17X) & F. C. Green (294-18X)1185-64X
International Pistol Team Match
"Mayleigh Challenge Cup"
Individual ScoresRank
Name
Service Branch/Agency
Score
1
Emil W. Heugatter
U.S. Army Europe
195-8X
2
Norman L. Banta
U.S. Army
193-6X
3
Thomas D. Smith, III
U.S. Air Force
Lackland AFB, Tex.192-5X
In 1964, Capt. T. D. Smith of the U. S. Air Force made a strong run at Blankenship on the last day of the big shoot when he cracked out a record setting 889 out of 900 with the .45 cal. pistol, but he fell three points short and finished second with a 2539.”
National Pistol Individual Championship Match No. 1
“Harrison Cup Trophy”Aggregate of Matches 2, 3 & 4
Rank
Name
Service Branch/Agency
.22 Caliber
Center-Fire
.45 Caliber
Total
1
Wm B. Blankenship, Jr.
U.S. Army
-
876-32X
-
2642-112X
2
Thomas D. Smith, III
U.S. Air Force
-
-
889-42X
2636-132X
http://www.wwmcmillan.info/natMatches_1964.html
Steve Thomas
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On 7/21/2018 at 6:47 AM, Jim Hargrove said:
Jim,
I thought you might a little confirmation of Moltzon's bona fides:
529thOrdnanceCo.
http://nikeordnance.nikemissile.org/unitSelect.php?tableSelector=529thOrdnanceCo
Name: Rick Moltzon
StartDate: 1962-02-01 00:00:00
EndDate: 03/64
Rank: SP5
MOS-Title: 304.1, Weapons Electronic Maint. TechSteve Thomas
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2 minutes ago, Paul Brancato said:
That’s the one. So do you think it is the same Robert E. Jones?
Paul,
Yes, based on what he told the HSCA. The 66th MI Group was based at Nurnberg (also spelled Nuernberg)
"Nürnberg, English conventional Nuremberg, city, Bavaria Land (state), southern Germany. Bavaria’s second largest city (after Munich), Nürnberg is located on the Pegnitz River where it emerges from the uplands of Franconia (Franken), south of Erlangen."
https://www.britannica.com/place/Nurnberg
Steve Thomas
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10 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:
It’s in the material you posted on the intercepted messages thread, the first one before you found links to the 71st.
Paul,
I wrote, "Can you give me a bibliographic citation or web address for the 511th. I'd like to read up on them."
Thanks, I found this little web page devoted to the 511th.
http://krookmcsmile.tripod.com/511thMICompany.html
Just as an aside, you might be interested in reading this Field Manual on Military Intelligence Units. It's only about 14 pages long.
'The General Section of this field manual provides some insight into the organization of theater army military intelligence units. Scan of the pages of Chapter 1 can be viewed by clicking on the Field Manual cover (Left)”
Click on the picture of the Manual cover about 2/3 of the way down the page of the USAEUR web site cited just above.
Steve Thomas
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21 minutes ago, Paul Brancato said:
Steve - bumping this because while browsing the military records you posted on the Intercepted messages thread I started looking at MI units in Germany. Curiously the 511th, in Furth, was headed by a Colonel Robert E Jones from 1962-63. Is this possibly the same Jones as the subject of this thread?
Paul,
Can you give me a bibliographic citation or web address for the 511th. I'd like to read up on them.
Steve Thomas
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12 minutes ago, Paul Brancato said:
Steve - bumping this because while browsing the military records you posted on the Dinkins thread I started looking at MI units in Germany. Curiously the 511th, in Furth, was headed by a Colonel Robert E Jones from 1962-63. Is this possibly the same Jones as the subject of this thread?
Paul,
I think so, yes.
See pp. 6-7 of his HSCA testimony here:
https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/unpub_testimony/Jones_4-20-78/html/jones_0007a.htm
Steve Thomas
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6 hours ago, David Boylan said:
Sorry Michael and Ron. I meant Vidal was WITH umbrella man. (Best Trumpian correction 🙂 )
The identification that Vidal was the radio man/Cuban guy came from James Richards. He had contacted Vidal's family and they confirmed that it was Felipe that was there. Most of the pictures you see of Vidal floating around were from James Richards who got them from Vidal's family members.
Vidal's good friend Hargraves was sitting next to him on the curb.
David,
Here's a CIA document on Felipe Vidal Santiago.
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=44232&search=Felipe_Vidal+Santiago#relPageId=1&tab=page
Page 6 has a physical description. He was born in 1926. In 1963, he would have been 37 years old.
Steve Thomas
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19 minutes ago, Steve Thomas said:
There is a record of a 529th Ordnance Company. They were part of the 71st Ordnance Group, and were based in Massweiler, Germany.
European Theater Ordnance Units & Activities, 1945 - 1989
Steve Thomas
This a very, very interesting web page. It's a brief history of the 71st Ordnance Group:
Source: Email from Ed Donohue, 71st Ord Gp/AWSCOM, 1958-62)
1958:
"I enjoyed the TDY missions to various NATO installations, First French Army, British units and German units that worked with our U.S. weapons team. We ran convoys for the different units, 583rd (Ord Co) at Dahn, 529th (Ord Co) at Massweiler, 64th (Ord Co) at Fischbach. There were many convoys that year. It was very exciting being part of these convoys. MP teams were used to protect the missions and we were always heavily armed, carrying white phosphorus blocks to protect and if needed destroy secret crypto equipment and documents if we were placed in that position. NSA regulated our activities in regard to classified communications. Some trips took us close to the Iron Curtain. The best part was returning to base using many different routes to confuse any adversary Intel units.
(Email from Tom Probst, HQ AWSCOM, 1959-61)
1959:
"I was at HQ AWSCOM in Pirmasens from Feb 59 to Feb 61. At that time we stored nuclear warheads for the 7th Army. We had many units under our command that worked with the (special) weapons. I was a top secret documents clerk. We also had an MP unit that guarded the third floor of HQ building which was highly classified; by today's standards, the security was very poor. I guess you know our mission, we controlled the nuclear warheads for USAREUR. Our troops had restricted travel in Europe because of our mission."
(Source: Email from Joe Phillips, 82nd Ord Bn and 541st Sig Co, 1958-1960)
1958
"Massweiler was more of the “James Bond” security post than any other I’d been associated with. There, it seemed to be pretty serious stuff. I read in one of our associate’s emails that security seemed a bit lax compared to what we see now in the films. I would agree except for the Massweiler post. By the way my recollection of Zweibrucken was eclectic. Stationed on our post was a U.S. Air Force unit. About a half mile away there was a West German basic training command. And in or near Zweibrucken were elements of the First French Army and a Canadian Air Force unit. Very NATO."
Steve Thomas
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There is a record of a 529th Ordnance Company. They were part of the 71st Ordnance Group, and were based in Massweiler, Germany.
European Theater Ordnance Units & Activities, 1945 - 1989
Steve Thomas
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4 hours ago, Jim Hargrove said:
At least some of Garrison’s material on Dinkin, including a hand-written three page letter from his mother also claiming he had prior knowledge of the assassination, can be read and downloaded from the John Armstrong Collection at Baylor University: CLICK HERE.
Jim,
That's the first time I've ever seen reference to a Russian embassy visit.
Steve Thomas
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1 hour ago, David Boylan said:
Steve,
These pics were the ones that Zabala gave to the FBI and posted by Bart in this thread. The guy in the front row with the brown suit jacket.
I'd love to see the pics Mrs. Castorr was talking about.
David,
Me too.
I've tried to narrow it down. If the picnic was in early September, I figure it probably would have been on the weekend, to give those guys who worked a chance attend. I did learn this:
September 08, 1963 - Page 6
Alice Daily Echo Newspaper Archives
https://newspaperarchive.com/alice-daily-echo-sep-08-1963-p-6/
Bv THE ASSOCIATED PRESS “Gusts of powerful winds struck in the Dallas area Saturday as a surprise rainstorm whipped into the roof of one residence and damaged another in Mesquite, a suburb just east of Dallas. State Police said no injuries resulted. The wind blew a wooden block through the windshield of a mobile news unit of Radio KBOX of Dallas while it was near White Rock Lake inside the Dallas city limits. On Dallas' North Central Expressway, the blast blew in the side of a service station. Tarpaulins protecting building construction work in downtown Dallas were whipped to shreds. The storm occurred during unexpected rain activity in Dallas and other parts of North Central and Northeast Texas. The rest of the state was unusually hot and nearly all places were dry.”
September 7, 1963 was a Saturday. The temperature was 102 degrees.
Steve Thomas
Whitmeyer and Oswald
in JFK Assassination Debate
Posted
Paul,
I don't have a service record for Whitmeyer, so I don't know where he was stationed in Germany, but I do have this:
The Mexia Daily News from Mexia, Texas · Page 1
November 7, 1957
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/11876796/
Mexia Man Receives Appointment Earl McKeilh, (center) is pictured with L. Robert Castorr, of Dallas, Southwestern division manager of the National Federation of Independent Business, and Si N. Meadow, district manager of the organization from Austin.
“Earl McKeith was coming out of a local bank Tuesday and came face to face with a man who was one of his fellow Army officers in the early thirties. Earl didn't recognize him but L. Robert Castorr, of Dallas, immediately grabbed Earl's arm and said "I know you." Mr. Castorr. who is now a- colonel in the Active Reserve serving as inspector and advisor to the 90th Division in Texas., and Mr. McKeith, a Reserve. Army captain, were first lieutenants when they served with each other in the Second Infantry Division. They last saw each other in 1930. Col. Castorr served with Merrill's Marauders in Burma during World War II.” “Mr. Meadow was accompanied to Mexia by L. Robert Castorr, the Southwestern division manager for the National Federation of Independent Business. Mr. Castorr formerly served in the U. S. Army with Mr. McKeilh.”
From: Brandy: Our Man in Acapulco:
“...in December, 1953 he (Brandstetter) and several other officers were attached to different units for the first three months of 1954 assigned as “Inspector/Advisors” "
Hood County News-Tablet from Granbury, Texas · Page 8
July 8, 1965
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/57597412/
“Gets Texas National Guard Commission Gary T. Grogan of Rising Star, technician with the local Soil Conservation Service office, received his commission as a second lieutenant in the Texas National Guard in ceremonies at the Municipal'. Auditorium in Austin Saturday evening, June 1). He was awarded his commission at the conclusion of a Texas Officer Candidate School which he attended at Camp Mabry, Texas. He was assigned to the 1st Bn,. 142nd Inf., Brown-wood, Texas, as battalion antitank platoon leader. Presentation of the diplomas was made by Maj. Gen. Thomas S. Bishop, Texas adjutant-general, Major. Gen: .. William. R. Calhoun commanding , general of the Eighth U.S. Army Corps, was the speaker for the evening.
Dallas Morning News 11-16-1965
10 Dallas reserve Units Included In Inactivation
By Gene Ormsby
Fourteen Army Reserve units in Dallas, including 10 in the 90th Infantry Division, are scheduled to be inactivated immediately, Major Gen. William R. Calhoun commander of the Eighth U.S. Army Corps said Monday in Austin.
Lt. Col. George L. Whitmeyer, deputy East Texas sector commander said the same units were listed more than a month ago by Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara as the ones to be disbanded.
Were these guys attached to the 90th Infantry Division of the Texas National Guard?
Steve Thomas