Jim Hargrove

In a series of searches of a large newspaper database this morning, I found no evidence of published reports of “Jack Ruby” ties to organized crime in any U.S. newspaper published from 1930 to 11/21/63. The specific results the search were: Before the assassination: 1930-11/21/63; “Jack Ruby” --155 hits 1930-11/21/63; “Jack Ruby”; crime – 0 hits 1930-11/21/63; “Jack Ruby”; mafia –0 hits After the assassination: 1964-2020; “Jack Ruby” – 25,016 hits 1964-2020; “Jack Ruby”; crime – 5,324 hits 1964-2020; “Jack Ruby”; mafia – 1,026 I’ll do a similar search for “Jacob Rubenstein” as time permits. The 155 “Jack Ruby” hits prior to the assassination were mostly about the man who killed Oswald, but a few were odd combinations of the two names. Some of the stories provided information about Ruby I’d never heard before. One, for example, indicated that in 1956 Ruby was managing from Dallas a child star with a national reputation named Ben (“Little Daddy”) Braddix. Not one of these stories that I can find published prior to the assassination of JFK ties Ruby to organized crime. Can anyone here point to something I’ve missed? Was this whole mafia business a smoke screen created by the FBI to direct attention away from what appears to have been Ruby’s CIA-protected gun running efforts in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean?

Oh, that's funny. Megathanks for noting this, James. It does go to show how we all need to be so careful with photos!

According to the “Evolution of Lee Harvey Oswald” poster, the photo above left was taken on December 22, 1962 in a Dallas bus station photo booth. I’m not sure about the right-hand shot. If you are pointing out differences in the earlobes, I simply can’t tell the difference (though I’ve often admitted here that I’m not good with faces). What is noticeable to me, though, is that the Oswald on the left image above has what John Pic and one or two others called a “bull neck.” In the right image above, Oswald SEEMS to have a much thinner neck. If this isn’t just a matter of lighting and shadows or camera angles or lenses, if there really is a difference in the necks, it would suggest the photo at left is LEE and the photo at right is HARVEY. Does that agree with your analysis? That said, I’ve always believed that you cannot rely merely on photos to make judgments about facts in this case. It is simply too easy to mess with photos and to misrepresent them. Which is why I suggested you might want to provide details of the Landesberg/Rizzuto comments about the post cards from Russia and the Steenbarger interview, which I’m not familiar with. These were hardly intended to be “gotcha” questions, but if you want to take offense about them, so be it....

John, You and Steve Thomas seem to be the ones with a handle on the possibility of another Oswald in Russia, or at least an Oswald persona. I do recall point 1 in your post above, but points 2 and 3 don’t ring any memory bells at all. (Helsinki and Germany are at opposite ends of the Baltic Sea, though, as you imply, I’m pretty sure that there is no record of Oswald—either Oswald—being in Germany). Why don’t you dig up the appropriate documents and quote them, along with a brief bibcite? This would go a long way toward supporting what you believe the images might show. I have to disagree with you on point 5 above. The whole idea of the “defection,” I think, was to send a young man to the Soviet Union who understood the Russian language but pretended he didn’t so he could overhear conversations and read documents no one suspected he could comprehend. The fact that Lee knew more about the U2s than Harvey was an added benefit. If the Soviets decided to torture Harvey instead of giving him a cushy job and an apartment in Minsk, he really wouldn’t have had much to say about the U2.

What a fascinating document (reproduced above by John Butler)! According to the CIA pseudonyms database at the Mary Ferrell site, Thomas Casasin was a pseudonym of Jacques Richardson, who “served the CIA in Japan during the period that Lee Harvey Oswald was a radar operator and transferred to Soviet Russia Division prior to when Oswald defected.” James Wilcott also served at the CIA station in Japan. Among several interesting aspects of this note was Richardson’s description of a “pattern” of a “number of Soviet women marrying foreigners, being permitted to leave the USSR, then eventually divorcing their spouses and settling down abroad without returning ‘home’.” Marina’s behavior in the U.S. certainly seemed to follow this “pattern.” There was never a single indication that Lee Harvey Oswald harmed or abused Marina in the Soviet Union. Nor was there an indication that he harmed or abused her at Robert Oswald's house or "Marguerite Oswald's" apartment in Fort Worth in the summer of 1962. But soon after the young couple moved into the apartment on Mercedes Street, and were alone, Marina began to complain that her husband was beating her. [Harvey and Lee, p. 412] Calling it the “Harvey story” also is interesting. Almost all of the references in the U.S. that I’ve seen to “Harvey Lee Oswald” seem to refer to the Russian-speaking Oswald killed by Ruby, not to the American-born Oswald. Thanks for this, David. I don’t recall seeing it before.

John, You make a good case for Lee’s USMC training, and John A. certainly agrees with you about which Oswald Ransberger interacted with in 1956. I just got a little concerned when I checked the FBI report, because I doubt John thought a thing about the timing significance of a PFC vs private classification and so he didn’t describe that aspect. I didn’t think about it either until you started talking about it. I know the tonsillectomy/tonsillitis situation is less than definitive, but, if memory serves, most people who have their tonsils removed don’t have tonsillitis within 12 years or so later, though some clearly do, and, second, it just enrages H&L critics who work so hard to manufacture great umbrage about this and the trainload of other evidence for two Oswalds. It’s hard not to be amused by the outrage. Getting back to the Landesberg story, the significance of the claim by Rizzuto/student Landesberg that he met Oswald in the summer of 1956 at Camp Lejeune probably escaped the notice of many JFK researchers. If Rizzuto/Landesberg was right, it just HAD to be Lee, sort of confirming the Ransberger report suggesting that LEE entered the Marine Corps well before Harvey. What did not escape the notice of many researchers were the NYC newspaper articles indicating, to use Joachim Joesten’s phrase, that a “false Oswald” was active as a political provocateur on the East Coast at the very time Classic Oswald® was in Russia. We can add this observation to the Bolton Ford incident, the testimony of Marita Lorenz, and many more incidents, including trips to Cuba during during the very same time frame. For example: FROM: SAC (New York) TO: Director FBI Enclosed for each recipient is one copy of a self-explanatory Army communication dated 12.30.63 captioned Harvey Oswald. Enclosed Army communication alleges that Oswald was in Cuba in the company of Robert Taber, former head of Fair Play for Cuba Committee (FPCC), approximately three weeks after the April 1961, Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba. Let’s not forget Hoover’s remark, written on the very day of the assassination, that Oswald “went to Cuba on several occasions but would not tell us what he went to Cuba for." I’ll bet that memo would have been deep-sixed within days if Hoover hadn’t sent it to so many people! One thing I don’t recall involves your statement from the other day that “Another controversial aspect of this [the Lanesberg] story puts Lee Oswald in Russian in 1960.” Are you sure of that?

John, Let’s be careful with this. John A’s source for the Ransberger interview was WC Document 140, p. 3; FBI interview of David Wallace Ransberger by SA Harold E. Newpher, 12/5/63. Here’s a link to WCD 140, p. 3. As you can see, at least according to the FBI, Ransberger “recalled that OSWALD was either a Private or a PFC who was ‘always alone.’” Doesn’t sound very definitive, unless you see something I don't. OTOH, just a couple of months later, on Jan. 7, 1957 we learn that “Oswald,” who had a tonsillectomy on 1/17/45, was diagnosed with tonsillitis. H&L critics tell me this sort of thing happens all the time, but it seems to me it mostly happens to “Oswald.”

John, It’s been a long time since I looked at the Landesbergs page, but it remains fascinating. The first JFK researcher to write in any depth about Landesberg, L’eandes, Oswald and the rest of the crew was apparently Joachim Joesten, who wrote The Case Against J. Edgar Hoover more than half a century ago. It's pretty telling that way back then he described what he called “a false Oswald” operating as a political provocateur on the East Coast at the very time Classic Oswald® was in the Soviet Union. Fascinating, too, that he decided the “false Oswald” was Larry Craford, just as Laura Kittrell theorized. Click here for an excerpt from Mr. Joesten’s book. If “Rizzuto” (Landesberg the student) did indeed meet Lee Oswald at Camp Lejeune in the summer of 1956, any surviving records of that apparently escaped John A’s detection. The problem, though, is that John may not have had his radar attuned to references to Lejeune during his years of most intensive research. Harvey and Lee has only two or three pages devoted to the Landesbergs, and they don’t mention Lejeune. John’s more extensive research into the Landesbergs came after the publication of his book and the completion of all his research at the National Archives, Dallas Archives, etc. Tragically, Baylor U. basically ruined the search facilities at it’s online JFK/John Armstrong Collection when it redesigned it’s entire online database service, and so now we can no longer search it in detail for any possible references to Camp Lejeune in the extensive USMC records John assembled. The dates you set for Lee’s USMC service sound pretty reasonable to me but I forget--does Lee’s PFC rank in fall 1956 help establish an enlistment date for him around March of that year? Below is the Village Voice article on the L’eandes/Oswald and the FBI that John included on the H&L CD:

Joe, Thanks for that thoughtful post. I’ve thought a lot over the years about the very issue you raised above. My take on this is that before “Oswald” had a wife and family, the prospect of adventure was often, but not always, sufficient pay. After he returned to the States and had a family, though, he would surely be looking for more income than he apparently had. At the same time, as 11/22/63 grew ever closer, it would be absolutely imperative to avoid any kind of money trail leading to him from anyone involved in his handling. The best solution for this might well be setting up, or pretending to set up, some sort of escrow account promising payment in the not too distant future. This solves both the problem of motivating him to keep working and following your instructions for little more than peanuts while, at the same time, avoiding any possibility of a money trail to the patsy-to-be. I’m aware of no evidence whatsoever for this scenario, but I still think it is reasonably likely.

That's interesting, John, and I meant to comment on this earlier. It's always a possibility that the Russian-speaking Oswald acquired his Minox camera through similar channels, but, if so, you have to wonder why the FBI tried so hard to turn it into a light meter. Even more significantly, why would the Bureau go through the obviously suspicious action of filling it with glue--or whatever made that camera in the National Archives so heavy--just to make it impossible to see the serial number? Something about that number must have been pretty disturbing. Don't forget to give John A. some credit. DJ based his timeline mostly on John's book, although he questioned him incessantly on the phone while preparing it. Doubly interesting, and I can't recall a thing about it. I searched John's write-up on the Landesbergs on my website and didn't find "Paris." Can you point me to the source? EDIT: Oh, wait! Is that the Marine Corps Recruit Depot at Parris Island, SC? If so, I still can't find John's reference to it on my website.

John, Yeah, that is surely the most likely explanation. The USG absolutely embarrassed itself when the HSCA had the audacity to ask them how LHO could have been in Ping-Tung Taiwan and Japan simultaneously! Making an entire life disappear is tricky business. I know you mentioned this before, but could you explain the Paris Island, SC reference to me again? Also, I know this goes way back, but do you recall when you were in the service if the your superiors encouraged you to fill out IRS reports whenever you were not in a combat zone?

Thanks, Ray. I was pressed for time yesterday and only posted two of the three bogus W-2 forms allegedly for 1956. Here are all three: Years ago, when John A. got high quality images of these W-2s directly from the National Archives, he had professional transparencies made of them. I have those transparencies now and lined up all three as best as I could around the “126 Exchange” notation you mentioned. Although there is a bit of blooming on the “126” due to less than perfect registration, you can see how the numerals align in this scan I just made of the transparencies. One of the reasons the FBI created all the false 1956 tax information for Lee Harvey Oswald is that they had learned from Palmer McBride, who also worked at Pfisterer Dental Lab, that the Oswald he worked with was there in late 1957 and early 1958, when the other Oswald was in the Marines, not 1956. This, of course, threatened to expose the two Oswald project. Mr. McBride, who for decades worked as a NASA mechanic, summarized this information on the second page of a 1999 letter he wrote to David Lifton. As I said above, Linda Faircloth, President of Pfisterer Dental Labs, confirmed that “Oswald” worked for her firm not in 1956 but in late 1957 and early 1958, when the other LHO was serving in the Marine Corps. See and hear Ms. Faircloth’s interview here.

Yes, we would all like to see them. But can we trust them if they are ever truly released in readable form? The one 1040 form that we have seen for more than half a century is demonstrably false. There are many things wrong with this form, but the most obvious is the fact that Oswald's 1956 Marine Corps income is not shown on it. It should have shown USMC income from the last two and a half months of 1956, but it doesn't. Why? Probably because the U.S. Navy took so long to untangle the Legend of Lee Harvey Oswald that it couldn’t “certify” his military pay records “starting 24 October 1956” until September 15, 1964, long after the bogus 1956 tax form was created.

Credible claims? The FBI altered, destroyed, and invented PHYSICAL EVIDENCE as well as witness testimony. Unlike you or me, John A. spent weeks at the National Archives examining all the so-called possessions of “Lee Harvey Oswald.” Wearing white evidence gloves, he held in his own hands the Minox “spy camera” allegedly found in the Paine’s garage (you know, the one the FBI tried to change to a light meter) and noted how it was much heavier than an identical model of the camera that John had purchased. It had been filled with a substance making it impossible to slide open the camera, required to check the serial number. Impossible to trace that camera! And then there is that infamous 1956 IRS Form 1040. The FBI wanted us to believe that Lee Harvey Oswald kept with him for seven years his 1956 tax return which was not discovered or initialed by the Dallas cops but magically appeared while the Bureau secretly took possession of “Oswald’s possession” hours after the assassination. The bogus 1040 form altered the employment specifics recalled by coworkers and employers interviewed by John. Listen, for example, to this YouTube interview John conducted with Linda Faircloth, President of Pfisterer Dental Labs, who said “Oswald” worked for her firm not in 1956 but in late 1957 and early 1958, when Classic Oswald® was in the Marines. Speaking of the Marines, we’re told that Oswald, in October, November, and December of 1956 was a proud member of the U.S. Marine Corps. Isn’t it remarkable, then, that no Marine Corps income is shown on his 1956 tax form? Why? Because the U.S. Navy took so long to untangle the Legend of Lee Harvey Oswald that it couldn’t “certify” his military pay records “starting 24 October 1956” until September 15, 1964, long after the bogus 1956 tax form was created. And what about those fine 1956 W-2 forms for “Lee Harvey Oswald?” Here are two of the three:  Data on these forms match the employer data on the 1956 form 1040, so John and I must be wrong, eh? At John’s suggestion, in the late 1990s I sent high quality copies of these forms to Dawn Stanford, an IBM archivist and a specialist in typewriter fonts and I spoke to her at length on the telephone a week or so later. Ms. Stanford indicated she kept thousands of samples of typewriter impressions and that, on close inspection, the W-2 forms data was entered with an unusual font that she did not have in her collection. In her opinion, the W-2 forms were typed on the same machine! What are the chances of three different employers using the same unusual typewriter to create these forms? Like the bogus 1040 form they were created to support, they are FBI creations! Why were they created? Because a true record of the teenage employment of “Lee Harvey Oswald” would expose the fact that two youngsters were sharing that identity. From the Magic Bullet® itself to the uncashed Magic Money Order® that allegedly paid for the Magic Carcano® that fired it, this case is filled with false evidence oftentimes created directly by the FBI or at least uncritically accepted by it. It is well-known that, for decades, the FBI faked the entire field of hair follicle analysis. Pseudoscience in the Witness Box: The FBI faked an entire field of forensic science. In this 3-minute video, watch the FBI lie about three witnesses to the murder of JFK. I could go on and on for pages, but I’m running out of time this morning. Do you really think it is “far-fetched” to think the Hoover’s outfit would fake evidence for a mastoidectomy? Really? I mean, they were so honest, right?

Paul, I hope you’re right, but it worries me when Mr. Simpich publishes brilliantly detailed descriptions of Agency activities around Oswald and then says: Oswald “was a spy in his own mind” and that Oswald “wanted to be involved in espionage” but “As many have pointed out, he didn't have the credentials.” These are direct quotes from Mr. Simpich's recent writings. Perhaps I'm not as well informed as Mr. Simpich, but in my own simple way I think Oswald was a spy paid by U.S. Intel, and it looks to me like he was a good one. Here is a list of reasons to believe this that I've been compiling for several years. 20 Indications the Oswald Project Was Run by the CIA 1. CIA accountant James Wilcott testified that he made payments to an encrypted account for “Oswald or the Oswald Project.” Contemporaneous HSCA notes indicate Wilcott told staffers, but wasn't allowed to say in Executive session, that the cryptonym for the CIA's "Oswald Project" was RX-ZIM. 2. A 1978 CIA memo indicates that a CIA operations officer “had run an agent into the USSR, that man having met a Russian girl and eventually marrying her,” a case very similar to Oswald’s and clearly indicating that the Agency ran a “false defector” program in the 1950s. 3. Robert Webster and LHO "defected" a few months apart in 1959, both tried to "defect" on a Saturday, both possessed "sensitive" information of possible value to the Russians, both were befriended by Marina Prusakova, and both returned to the United States in the spring of 1962. 4. Richard Sprague, Richard Schweiker, and CIA agents Donald Norton and Joseph Newbrough all said LHO was associated with the CIA. 5. CIA employee Donald Deneslya said he read reports of a CIA "contact" who had worked at a radio factory in Minsk and returned to the US with a Russian wife and child. 6. Kenneth Porter, employee of CIA-connected Collins Radio, apparently left his family to marry (and perhaps monitor) Marina Oswald after LHO’s death. 7. George Joannides, case officer and paymaster for DRE (which LHO had attempted to infiltrate) was put in charge of lying to the HSCA and never told them of his relationship to DRE. 8. For his achievements, Joannides was given a medal by the CIA. 9. FBI took Oswald off the watch list at the same time a CIA cable gave him a clean bill of political health, weeks after Oswald’s New Orleans arrest and less than two months before the assassination. 10. Oswald’s lengthy “Lives of Russian Workers” essay, or whatever we call it, reads like a pretty good intelligence report. 11. Oswald’s possessions were searched for microdots. 12. Oswald owned an expensive Minox spy camera, which the FBI tried to make disappear. 13. Even the official cover story of the radar operator near American U-2 planes defecting to Russia, saying he would give away all his secrets, and returning home without penalty smells like a spy story. 14. CIA's Richard Case Nagell clearly knew about the plot to assassinate JFK and LHO’s relation to it, and he said that the CIA and the FBI ignored his warnings. 15. LHO always seemed poor, at least until it was time to go “on assignment.” For his Russian adventure, we’re to believe he saved all the money he needed for first class European hotels and private tour guides in Moscow from the non-convertible USMC script he saved. In the summer of 1963, he once again seemed to have enough money to travel abroad to Communist nations. 16. To this day, the CIA claims it never interacted with Oswald, that it didn’t even bother debriefing him after the “defection.” What utter bs.... 17. After he “defected” to the Soviet Union in 1959, bragging to U.S. embassy personnel in Moscow that he would tell the Russians everything he knew about U.S. military secrets, he returned to the U.S. without punishment and was then in 1963 given the OK to travel to Cuba and the Soviet Union again! 18. Allen Dulles, the CIA director fired by JFK, and the Warren Commission clearly wanted the truth hidden from the public to protect sources and methods of intelligence agencies such as the CIA. Earl Warren said, “Full disclosure was not possible for reasons of national security.” 19. CIA's Ann Egerter, who worked for J.J. Angleton's Counterintelligence Special Interest Group (CI/SIG), opened a "201" file on Oswald on December 9, 1960. Egerter testified to the HSCA: "We were charged with the investigation of Agency personnel....” When asked if the purpose was to "investigate Agency employees," she answered, "That is correct." When asked, "Would there be any other reason for opening up a file?" she answered, "No, I can't think of one." 20. President Kennedy and the CIA clearly were at war with each other in the weeks immediately before his assassination, as evidenced by Arthur Krock's infamous defense of the Agency in the Oct. 3, 1963 New York Times. It sure looks to me that “Oswald” was the CIA’s pawn.

John, Every one of the "Harvey Lee" items you list in the lengthy post three or four above this one is referring to Russian-speaking Lee HARVEY Oswald, with the probable exception of the Jan. 29-Mar. 1, 1969 entry (describing fall 1962 events) which may refer to American-born LEE Harvey Oswald or no one in particular. This is hardly surprising since, after the assassination, every effort was made to erase the existence of LEE.

Ron, A Ruby employee named Odell “James” Estes told the FBI he saw Lee Oswald at the Carousel Club many times during his employment there, including in Jack Ruby’s office. He said he once drove Oswald to Love Field and even took two overnight fishing trips with Oswald to a lakeside cabin near Mineral Wells. He described lengthy talks with this Oswald. Since he (Estes) stopped working at the Carousel Club on Sept. 2, he was quite certain that the two fishing trips, just a week apart, were both in August 1963. This, of course, was the same time frame that Classic Oswald® was in New Orleans pretending to be a Castro-loving commie. From looking at Google Maps, Mineral Wells appears to be about 70 miles west of Grapevine. Despite this depiction of Oswald being in New Orleans and Dallas simultaneously, an FBI cover memo states that Estes was “willing to submit to a polygraph examination” and “talked very coherently and did not evidence the mannerisms frequently associated with a mentally disturbed individual.” It should be noted that although the 1977 FBI report indicated Estes was “80 percent blind,” in 1963 he could see well enough to drive a car. I just posted this in another thread, but it appears to be quite relevant here. A 10-page report on Odell Estes’ FBI interview can be read on the Mary Ferrell site at the link below: Odell Estes Interview

This is an interesting read. Thank you for posting the link, but I do have a couple of very simple questions. In the preface, Mr. Simpich writes: “Oswald was different in another way - he wanted to be involved in espionage. As many have pointed out, he didn't have the credentials.” Similarly, in the opening pages of State Secret, Mr. Simpich wrote several times that Oswald was “a spy in his own mind,” or words very close to that. Is this not a remarkable assumption if we even come close to accepting Jefferson Morley’s statement that the biography of LHO “is one of the most contested stories in U.S. history”? If “Lee Harvey Oswald” was not trained as a spy, how did he learn to read, write, and speak Russian before ever traveling to the USSR? Are we really to believe that Oswald, always ostensibly as poor as a church mouse, had the money he needed for first class European hotels and private tour guides at the start of his Russian Adventure, all paid by his savings of non-convertible USMC script? CIA's Ann Egerter, who worked for J.J. Angleton's Counterintelligence Special Interest Group (CI/SIG), opened a "201" file on Oswald on December 9, 1960. Egerter testified to the HSCA: "We were charged with the investigation of Agency personnel....” When asked if the purpose was to "investigate Agency employees," she answered, "That is correct." When asked, "Would there be any other reason for opening up a file?" she answered, "No, I can't think of one." Am I missing something here? Oswald’s lengthy “Lives of Russian Workers” essay, or whatever we call it, sure reads like a pretty good intelligence report to me. There are many other reasons to suspect that “Lee Harvey Oswald” was far more than just a “spy in his own mind.” These are just a few. I can’t imagine why Mr. Simpich dismisses Oswald’s possible intelligence connections so blithely.

As I’ve told Mr. Bojczuk at least three or four times now, I disagree with my friend John about the mastoidectomy. I think it was Russian-speaking Lee HARVEY Oswald all along who had the procedure done to him, that Hoover found out about it (perhaps when English translations were made of the Moscow Botkinskaya Hospital reports) and altered a document or two, just as he provably falsified so much else. Although this seems to me to be the most likely explanation, there are certainly others. Again, one of the doctors who participated in the exhumation, Dr. Vincint Di Maio, admitted that “many World War II-era kids bore the same scar,” referring to the hole drilled into the mastoid process near the ear of the exhumed body. Yet another possibility is that the procedure was done deliberately on the young Lee HARVEY Oswald under the direction of the LSD-mad CIA in late 1952 or early 1953 to make health records match between him and the American-born LEE Harvey Oswald. It was "Marguerite's" housekeeper in New York City who said the child was getting mental tests at Jacobi Hospital, at the very time he was so often truant from PS 117. She, or the FBI agent describing her remarks, obviously meant the hospital that pre-dated Jacobi at the same location. Do you think it is impossible that American Intel would order an unnecessary medical procedure on a child? Try Googling “MKULTRA and children,” and see the results for yourself. It is truly shocking. Mr. Bojczuk, instead of directly debating any other evidence for two Oswalds, simply hopes the mastoidectomy will prove his point, steadfastly ignoring the fact that there are a number of explanations for it. Time and time again, he hides behind a series of links to sites that he claims debunk the Harvey and Lee evidence, but which do no such thing. He won’t even briefly summarize the so-called debunkings here because he knows how lame they are. And one more thing…. Since Mr. Bojczuk is apparently unable to step beyond the mastoidectomy and debate any other points of evidence for two Oswalds that I’ve summarized above, let me introduce a new one. Perhaps he’ll actually debate this one here, though he’ll probably just say that someone somewhere else has debunked it. In the summer of 1963, when the Russian-speaking Lee HARVEY Oswald was in New Orleans pretending to be a pro-Castro commie, a lot of people saw American-born LEE Harvey Oswald hanging around with Jack Ruby in Dallas. Among these people were Dorothy Marcum, Francis Irene Hise, Helen Smith (“Pixie Lynn”) , Dixie Lynn, Kathy Kay, and others. Journalist Dorothy Kilgallen wrote in the New York Journal American (June 6, 1964): “It is known that 10 persons have signed sworn depositions to the Warren Commission that they knew Oswald and Ruby to have been acquainted.” A few months ago Gary Shaw sent John A. a 10-page FBI report on a 1977 interview with a Ruby employee named Odell “James” Estes. Estes told the FBI he worked at the Carousel Club from the last week in June until Sept. 2, 1963. Estes said he saw “Lee Oswald” at the Carousel Club many times during his employment there, including in Jack Ruby’s office. He said he once drove Oswald to Love Field and even took two overnight fishing trips with Oswald to a lakeside cabin near Mineral Wells. He described lengthy talks with this Oswald. Since he (Estes) stopped working at the club on Sept. 2, he was quite certain that the two fishing trips, just a week apart, were both in August 1963. Of course, in August 1963, Classic Oswald® was still in New Orleans. Despite this depiction of “Oswald” being in New Orleans and Dallas simultaneously, an FBI cover memo states that Estes was “willing to submit to a polygraph examination” and “talked very coherently and did not evidence the mannerisms frequently associated with a mentally disturbed individual.” It should be noted that although the 1977 FBI report indicated Estes was “80 percent blind,” in 1963 he could see well enough to drive a car. A 10-page report on Odell Estes’ FBI interview can be read on the Mary Ferrell site at the link below: ODELL ESTES FBI REPORT

Since Mr. Bojuczuk is opening up this thread for his usual attacks on some of the evidence for Harvey and Lee, I'll ask him, for the 11th time now, to finally debate here the following issues. Or will he just say, as always, that someone else has successfully debunked these points and hide behind a flurry of links? None of the issues below are debunked by any of the links Mr. Bojczuk has previously provided. For the fall semester of the 1953-54 school year, one Oswald attended Beauregard JHS in New Orleans for 89 school days while the other was enrolled in Public School 44 in New York City, where he was present for 62 full days and 5 half days, was absent 3 full days and 8 half days, for a total accounting of 78 days. For the next semester, one Oswald was at Beauregard JHS in New Orleans while the other Oswald attended Stripling School in Texas. The Social Security Administration did not include ANY of “Lee Harvey Oswald’s” teen-aged employment income in his “Lifetime Earnings Report” indicating in a cover letter it was including “Copies of three pages of the Warren Commission Report re employment of Lee Harvey Oswald prior to service in the Marine Corps.” One Oswald departed for Taiwan aboard the USS Skagit on Sept. 14, 1958 and was stationed in Ping Tung, Taiwan on Oct. 6, 1958, at the very same time the other Oswald was being treated for venereal disease at Atsugi, Japan, nearly 1500 miles away. One Oswald appeared at the Bolton Ford dealership in New Orleans while the other was in the Soviet Union. One Oswald had a driver’s license and was seen by many witnesses driving a car, and the other Oswald could not drive. On November 22, 1963, one Oswald left the Texas School Book Depository on a bus and then a taxi, and the other left in a Nash Rambler. Here, again, is what real evidence looks like. 1. The IMPOSSIBLE 1953 school scenario: Lee HARVEY Oswald attending Beauregard JHS in New Orleans for 89 school days during the fall 1953 semester, all the while Lee has good attendance for the very same period at PS 44 in New York City. The New York City Board of Education record below shows that LEE Harvey Oswald attended Public School 44 starting 3/23/53 and extending through mid-January 1954. In New Orleans, the 1953 Beauregard JHS record below shows that Lee HARVEY Oswald attended 89 days of school during the fall semester of 1953, at the same time LEE Oswald attended PS 44 in New York City. Both the documents above were published in the Warren Volumes. 2. The refusal of the Social Security Administration to corroborate the official story of "Oswald's" pre-1962 income, offering instead "Copies of three pages of the Warren Commission Report regarding employment of Lee Harvey Oswald prior to service in the Marine Corps." ------------------ For all the evidence on this, click here. 3. The Marine Corps records are a gold mine: my favorite chronicles Harvey Oswald's trip to Formosa (Taiwan) while Lee was being treated for VD in Japan. HARVEY Oswald Departed for Taiwan Aboard the USS Skagit (AKA 105) on Sept. 14, 1958. Note "AKA 105" Under "Record of Events" near top left of this document: The Unit Diary below shows that HARVEY Oswald was in Ping Tung, Taiwan, on Oct. 6, 1958. Here’s a 1953 image of the ship Harvey Oswald took . Note the “K.A. 105” lettering by the bow. During this very same time Harvey was aboard the USS Skagit and stationed in Taiwan, LEE Oswald was being treated for V.D in Atsugi, Japan. From September 14 through October 6 HARVEY Oswald was in Taiwan. At the same time, from September 16 through October 6, LEE Oswald was in Japan. Medical records for NAS Navy 3835 (Naval Hospital), located in Atsugi, Japan, show numerous medical entries for LEE Oswald recorded on Sept 16, 20, 22, 23, 29, and Oct 6. HARVEY Oswald's assignment in Taiwan, while LEE Oswald made numerous visits to the Naval Hospital in Japan, are an obvious "smoking gun." 4. While Harvey Oswald was in Russia, Lee Oswald was working in Florida and Louisiana with anti-Castro Cubans and their handlers. Perfect examples are the HSCA testimony of Marita Lorenz and the infamous Bolton Ford visit. ----------------- For much more on this, see an article I wrote on my website: The Bolton Ford Incident 5. The impossible answer(s) to the simple questions: Could “Lee Harvey Oswald” drive a car? Did he have a Texas drivers license?

It wasn't a scar that proved that Oswald's exhumed body had undergone a mastoidectomy, but a lack of bone, according to the pathologists' report (http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/parnell/norton2.htm) : Mr. Bojczuk begins his attempted rebuttal by claiming that Dr. Di Maio, when he wrote “many World War II-era kids bore the same scar” in this article, was not referring to bone. It is obvious, though, that he was. The same paragraph containing the quote above begins: “As we examined the skull, the small hole in the left mastoid process leapt out. Its manmade edges were rounded and smooth, healed but not natural.” Why does Mr. Bojczuk misrepresent this simple fact? Since he, as always, brings up the 1981 exhumation, let me point out once again how it proves our point about two Oswalds. Mr. JENNER. But you do remember that you attempted to help him when he was struck in the mouth on that occasion; is that right? Mr. VOEBEL. Yes; I think he even lost a tooth from that. I think he was cut on the lip, and a tooth was knocked out. Here is the famous photo, and some blow-up details, as it appeared in LIFE magazine As if this wasn’t enough proof, Sandy Larsen discovered confirmation of the missing tooth in a Marine Corps dental record indicating that the PROSTHESIS “FAILED 5-5-58.” Here is how www.medicine.net defines “Prosthesis:” Prosthesis: An artificial replacement of a part of the body, such as a tooth, a facial bone, the palate, or a joint. A prosthesis may be removable, as in the case of most prosthetic legs or a prosthetic breast form used after mastectomy. Can there be any doubt that Lee Harvey Oswald lost at least one tooth at an early age? H&L critics have to try and create doubt, because the body exhumed in 1981 clearly had these teeth intact. Below is a high quality copy of an ORIGINAL exhumation photo Marina Oswald Porter handed to John Armstrong during one of their meetings in the 1990s.

Thanks for the boost, John! My guess is that Russian-speaking Harvey Oswald did his job well, submitted his Excellent Russian report to the appropriate Agency, but someone at that Agency in late 1963 got ticked off that their bosses killed JFK, and they made Harvey's report public, and all the rest is a Cover Story. Just my guess....

From a post I made a few years ago.... Did the Warren Commission Publish Oswald’s Intelligence Report? [On June 18, 1962] Oswald walked into Pauline Bates' office in the Burk Burnett Building in Fort Worth. He introduced himself and said, "I saw your name in the phone book, can you do some typing for me?" Bates, a public stenographer, asked Oswald what he wanted typed and he replied, "Notes I made in Russia of con­- ditions there." Bates told him she would do the work for $1.00 per single-spaced page. Oswald accepted her offer and handed Bates numerous handwritten notes. Bates recalled that Oswald was very protective of his many notes, some of which were written on scraps and pieces of paper and stuffed into a manila envelope. Oswald never left Bates alone with his notes and took all typewritten pages and carbons with him when he left her office. Oswald sat in Bates's office for 3 days and helped her read the notes as she typed. She remembered the notes reflected Oswald's account of his life in Russia where he had worked 12 hours a day at a factory in Minsk, with no coffee breaks and no vaca­- tions. He kept voluminous notes on everything, including the price of various foods which he said tasted monotonous and were not very good. On June 20, as Bates finished typing the lOth page, Oswald stopped her and said, "Ten dollars is all I've got," and handed her a $10.00 bill. Bates offered to complete the work and allow Oswald to pay her later, but he declined her offer and left. She es­- timated that the project was only 1/3 complete. Oswald then visited the Criner Career School, a business school located in the Bewley Building in Fort Worth, and asked if someone could do some typing. Virginia Valle was a former student who returned to the school to practice typing and shorthand, and agreed to help. After a few hours Virginia had managed to type four or five sheets, and Oswald gave her a small sum of money and then left.45 NOTE: The Warren Commission interviewed Bates but never gave her any typewritten pages to identify as the work she produced for Oswald. They did, however, publish a 31- page typewritten manuscript, with handwritten notations and corrections, on pages 287- 336 of Volume 16. --from Harvey and Lee, pp. 395-396, Copyright © 2003 by John Armstrong Many people here are no doubt aware of this document, but if there are any who aren't, it may come as a surprise. In an era before widespread communication and spy satellites, before personal computers and the Internet, it's easy to imagine how helpful to American Intel the information in this report would have been. The whole Bates story may have been part of a cover story, but Oswald's lengthy manuscript is nevertheless fascinating. Here's the first part of Part I: ------------------------------------------------- The lives of Russian workers is governed, first and foremost, by the "collective," the smallest unit of authority in any given factory, plant, or enterprise. Sectional and shop cells form a highly organized and well supported political organization. These shop committees are in turn governed by the shop and section party chiefs who are directed by the factory or plant party secretary. This post carries officially the same amount of authority as the production director or president of the plant, but in reality it is the controlling organ of all activities at any industrial enterprise, whether political, industrial, or otherwise personal relations. The party secretary is responsible for politiical indoctrination of the workers, the discipline of members of the Communist party working at the plant, and the general conduct and appearance of all members. The Minsk Radio and Television plant is known throughout the Union as a major producer of electronics parts and sets. In this vast enterprise created in the early 50's, the party secretary is a 6'4" man in his early 40's -- has a long history of service to the party. He controls the activities of the 1,000 communist party members here and otherwise supervises the activities of the other 5,000 people employed at this major enterprise in Minsk, the capital of the 3rd ranking Republic Belorussia. This factory manufactures 87,000 large and powerful radio and 60,000 television sets in various sizes and ranges, excluding pocket radios, which are not mass produced anywhere in the U.S.S.R. It is this plant which manufactured several console model combination radiophonograph television sets which were shown as mass produced items of commerce before several hundreds of thousands of Americans at the Soviet Exposition in New York in 1959. After the Exhibition these sets were duly shipped back to Minsk and are now stored in a special storage room on the first floor of the Administrative Building -- at this factory, ready for the next international Exhibit. I worked for 23 months at this plant, a fine example of average and even slightly better than average working conditions. The plant covers an area of 25 acres in a district one block north of the main thoroughfare and only two miles from the center of the City with all facilities and systems for the mass production of radios and televisions; it employees 5,000 full time and 300 part time workers, 58% women and girls. This factory employs 2,000 soldiers in three of the five mainshops, mostly these shops are fitted with conveyor belts in long rows, on either side of which sit the long line of bustling women. 500 people, during the day shift, are employed on the huge stamp and pressing machines; here sheet metal is turned into metal frames and cabinets for televisions and radios. Another 500 people are employed in an adjoining building for the cutting and finishing of rough wood into fine polished cabinets. A laborer's process, mostly done by hand, the cutting, trimming, and the processes right up to hand polishing are carried out here at the same plant. The plant also has its own stamp making plant, employing 150 poeple at or assisting at 80 heavy machine lathes and grinders. The noise in this shop is almost deafening as metal grinds against metal and steel saws cut through iron ingots at the rate of an inch a minute. The floor is covered with oil used to drain the heat of metal being worked so one has to watch one's footing; here the workers' hands are as black as the floor and seem to be eternally. The foremen here looks like the Russian version of "John Henry," tall and as strong as an ox. He isn't frilly, but he gets the work out. The plant has its electric shop, where those who have finished long courses in electronics work over generators, television tubes, testing experiment of all kinds. The green work tables are filled high here. Electric gadgets are not too reliable, mostly due to the poor quality of wires, which keep burning out under the impact of the ususal 220V____ voltage. In the U.S. it is 110V. The plastics department is next. Here 47 women and three physically disabled persons keep the red hot liquid plastic flowing into a store of odd presses, turning out their quota of knobs, handles, non-conducting tube bases, and so forth. These workers suffer the worst condition of work in the plant, an otherwise model factory, for the Soviet Union, due to bad fumes and the hotness of the materials. These workers are awarded 30 days vacation a year, the maximum for workers. Automation is now employed at a fairly large number of factories, especially the war industry. However, for civilian use, their number is still small. At this plant at least one worker is employed in the often crude task of turning out finished, acceptable items. Often, one worker must finish the task of taking the edge of metal off plastic and shaving them on a foot driver lathe. There is only so much potentiality in presses and stamps, no matter what their size. The lack of unemployment in the Soviet Union may be explained by one of 2 things. Lack of automation and a Bureaucratic corps of 16 workers in any given factory. These people are occupied with the tons of paperwork which flow in and out of any factory. Also the number of direct foremen is not small to the ratio of workers in some case 1-10, in others 1-5, depending on the importance of the work. These people are also backed by a small array of examiners, committees and supply checkers and the quality control board. These people number (without foremen) almost 300 people, total working force 5,000 -- 3-50 without foreman. To delve deep into the lives of the workers, we shall visit most of the shops one after another and get to know the people. The largest shop employs 500 people; 85% women and girls; females make up 60% of the work force at this plant. Here girls solder and screw the chassis to the frame attaching, transistors, tubes and so forth. They each have quotas depending upon what kind of work they are engaged in. One girl may solder 5 transistors in four minutes while the next girl solders 15 wire leads in 13 minutes. The pay scales here vary but slightly with average pay at 80 rubles without deductions. Deductions include 7 rubles, general tax, 2.50 rubles for bachelors and unmarried girls and any deductions for poor or careless work the inspectors may care to make further down the line. They start teams of two mostly boys of 17 or 18, turning the telvisions on the conveyor belts right side up, from where there has been soldering to a position where they place picture tubes onto the supports. These boys receive for a 39 hour week, 65-70 rubles, not counting deductions. Further on, others are filling tubes and parts around the picture tube itself, all along the line there are testing apparatus with operators hurriedly afix shape type testing currents, and withdrawing the snaps that fitting out a testers card, pass the equipment back on the conveyor, speed here is essential. The full text of this report can be read at John McAdams' website at this address: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/thecollective.htm

John, ABSOLUTELY! It was Russian-speaking Lee HARVEY Oswald who was stationed at the small, MACS 9 facility at Santa Ana at the very same time American-born LEE Harvey Oswald was just 10 miles away at the much larger base at El Toro. It was at Santa Ana that Harvey suddenly became the U.S. Marine Corp’s loudest pro-Castro, pro-commie, pro-Russian soldier. Erwin Donald Lewis said, "It was a matter of common knowledge that Oswald could read, write, and speak Russian.” Less than a year later, Russian-speaking Lee HARVEY Oswald boarded the SS Marion Lykes to begin his “defection” to the Soviet Union. P.S. I sure hope Steve Thomas can eventually come up with a theory that at least enables the “Harvey Lee Oswald” references to make sense. In a case with as much conflicting data as this one, my inclination is always to look for a theory that at least explains things simply, and then to test it against the so-called “facts.” What makes it so difficult, of course, is the amount of pure disinformation now solidly ensconced in the official record.

Denny, You’re in good company suspecting that both “Oswalds” encountered by Laura Kittrell were impostors. Dr. James Norwood, a major contributor to HarveyandLee.net, thinks the same thing. I tend to disagree, but I’m hardly certain. There is a lot of evidence that two young men were sharing the identity of “Lee Harvey Oswald” going back to elementary school, and the Marine Corps, and during the era of the Russian “defection,” for example. And there is a lot of evidence for two Oswalds in 1963, as Sylvia Meagher noted more than half a century ago. One major question, though, one that John Armstrong was not able to prove either way, is this: Was the second Oswald active in Dallas in the summer and fall of 1963 one of the Oswalds from the earlier years? My suspicion is that it was, but I’m aware of no direct evidence to support it. The Laura Kittrell encounter bears a major impact on this significant question. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, the second Oswald Ms. Kittrell encountered, the one she called “the Teamster,” laughed and talked in a loud way similar to the way the real Marguerite Oswald’s closest friends described him. Not much to go on, other than the additional issue of asking why the plotters would bring more “impostors” than necessary into the plot, all of whom would have to be silenced somehow.