Jim Hargrove

I agree entirely with John B. If the Deep Politics participant has the time to examine the Blair papers in Madison, it might be really helpful. Is this fellow knowledgeable about the report of the anonymous phone call to the Tippits and the Gardos family questions we have posed here? If there is a big volume of correspondence, he hopefully knows what to look for. If we made a list of suggested references to watch for, would that be helpful to the fellow, or would that be unnecessary? For example, Any reference to Oswald, obviously, and Any reference to John Gardos, son of Emil and Grace, Any reference to any other young boy living with or often in the company of Emil (or Grace) Gardos. Also, I sent a note to the reference department of the New York Public Library yesterday asking this:

Fascinating! Is it possible that John Caesar Grossi and Albert Osborne/”John Bowen” of the infamous Flecha Roja bus ride allegedly with Oswald aboard are one and the same? Do we know enough about the ages of these people (or person) to see if this is possible? The Dial Ryder connection is also fascinating. There are already too many coincidences here.

Question for John Kowalski.... Can you remind me why you suspect John Gardos might have attended the Ramaz School if and when he lived at 217 E. 86th St. in Manhattan? Today, at least, it appears to be a Jewish-oriented private school. To everyone, I plan to send the following question to the research department of the New York Public Library and ask how much it would cost to research this query: Can you tell me what public elementary school a child would have attended in 1946 if he was born in 1939 and lived at 217 E. 86th St. in Manhattan? Any suggestions for improvement would be appreciated.

Here, from Google Maps, are the public schools currently nearest to Grace Gardos’ apparent address at 217 E. 86th St. in Manhattan. Google says it is just a four minute walk from the apartment house to PS 37, but for some reason I can’t pull up an image of the school building. PS 290 and PS 151M also seem like possibilities for young John Gardos, if he was living with his mother at 217 E. 86th.

Sorry to be so slow responding, Paul. Even when he was meeting with her in the 1990s, John A. has told me that he couldn’t help but notice that Marina was still a very attractive woman. And I agree with you entirely about her credibility on many matters, although its impossible not to feel sympathy for her plight after 11/22/63. Still, I respectfully disagree that it was likely she knew the other LHO. As indicated earlier, despite the Furniture Mart interviews, I don’t think the two women would have necessarily seen through a sophisticated and deliberate impersonation. One of the women did say Marina didn't appear as attractive at the store as she did later. More significantly, my bet is that at least some of people who ran and/or knew about the Oswald Project and the false defection of 1959 were the same people who set up “Oswald” as the patsy for the Kennedy assassination. There was only a relatively short time between Marina’s arrival in the U.S. with her husband and the time when the assassination plans were clearly in the works. These plotters, like us, surely thought of the possibility that Marina was a Soviet intel asset of some sort. From purely a sources and methods perspective, wouldn’t these handlers want to keep Marina completely unaware of the other half of the project? Same thing for the assassination, which even people who don’t believe H&L mostly concede included an obvious and continuing “Oswald” impersonation. If you’re plotting another false defection in 1963, or plotting to set up a patsy for the hit, or both, would you want Marina to know your secret? The plotters had to know that Marina would be placed under a legal microscope following the patsification of her husband. Would you not make every effort to keep her unaware of the other LHO?

John Ramaz School, at least today, is some sort of Jewish-oriented private school. If it was essentially the same 70 or 80 years ago, I doubt John Gardos would have attended it. My bet is that from both his parents’ economic standing and their communist beliefs, he would have attended a public school In NYC, public schools are most commonly called by their PS #s. I walked from the back entrance (on Claremont Ave (sp?) of 440 Riverside Drive to PS 165, a few blocks away. I think the schools usually have a secondary name from a politician or someone, but I always thought of my school as PS 165. If John Gardos was still alive and in NYC, my bet is he started going to one of those Public Schools in 1945 or 1946, probably close to 217 E. 86th St. (Congrats on that discovery of the address for Grace.) Also, I’ll send a note to DJ and ask him if I can send you a copy of his timeline. I’m sure he’ll have no objection, and it is an invaluable resource. Would you prefer the spreadsheet or pdf version? (For some reason, I like the spreadsheet format much better.)

John B, Your work on this is VERY MUCH appreciated, but my understanding is that after leaving John Pic’s Manhattan apartment, Marguerite and Lee went to 1455 Sheridan in the Bronx. Forgive me if I’ve missed something (very little free time lately), but I don’t know where you’re getting those additional NYC addresses. Neither 155 Riverside Dr. nor an 88th St. address appears in John A’s book, although John Pic allegedly told the FBI that his brother (the kid born as Lee Harvey Oswald) attended a school on “East 88th, 89th, or 90th Street, between 2nd and 3rd Avenue, in New York City….” If so, these records have completely disappeared. With help from David Joseph’s H&L-based timeline, here are the NYC addresses I can quickly compile for both Oswalds: American-born Lee Oswald: 325 E. 92 St. in Manhattan (John Pic’s apartment) and 1455 Sheridan in the Bronx. For Russian-speaking Harvey Oswald, we have: 825 E. 179th, just three or four block from the Bronx Zoo. I may have missed one or two, but can you say where you got the Riverside Dr. and 88th St. addresses? (BTW, for the first ten years of my life, I lived at 440 Riverside Dr. in Manhattan. Your picture above might be the back of the building at 155 Riverside Dr., but it certainly isn’t the front, which faced the very wide Hudson River and, I think, Riverside Park. It was a nice area of the city.)

The "Student Records and Transcripts" page from the NYC Department of Education web page says (emphasis added by me): Transcripts help schools, students, and families track student progress in school. Students, parents, and guardians are allowed to view and get copies of student records, including transcripts. This is stated in the New York City Department of Education’s (DOE) Parents’ Bill of Rights and Student Bill of Rights. The instructions for requesting records by mail order require a copy of a photo ID.

Absolutely! The "Circus Maximus" find is fascinating. The whole thread has been really interesting lately, and it is hard to keep up with you guys! I'll try to contribute something better soon.

My guess is that data from this site is being collected by an automated web crawler called AlphaSeoBot. It could be an attack. See: http://alphaseobot.com/bot.html If this is an attack, the hosting service might be able to help.

I talked to John Armstrong yesterday evening and again this morning. He said that his friend, a long time researcher in NYC, looked into the Gardos issue recently and discovered that there was a John Gardos living at 631 Rockaway(sp?) St. in Queens (a borough of New York City) in 1940. This John Gardos’s parents were listed as Joe and Josephine Gardos. Their two sons were Frank (7 years old) and John, 7 months old, suggesting that this John Gardos may also have been born in 1939, just like the son of Emil and Grace. Gardos is not a very common name, and so this is quite a coincidence assuming it is true. I haven’t been able to duplicate the results John’s friend (a very well known researcher) got in two quick searches of Census database front ends. John also said that on one of his many visits with Marina she told him she didn’t believe there was a second Lee Harvey Oswald, but that they discussed the anonymous telephone call to the Tippits and John talked about the possible Hungarian connection. Marina said nothing about her husband owning a book by a Hungarian author, and nothing was said about a possible Hungarian connection for her former husband. John has long believed that Marina knew nothing about the other LHO.

Just for reference, here are the results I get when searching for "John Gardos" in the U.S. Census database around 1940. I've yet to find a solid post-1940 reference to the John Gardos born in 1939 to Emil and Grace Gardos anywhere, including on free, paid and international databases. Sorry about the formatting. Results 1 - 15 of 15 SORT BY RelevanceOldest Publication DateNewest Publication Date NAME RELATIONSHIPS EVENTS VIEW John Gardos Son 1930 U.S. Census father: Mike Gardos Sr. mother: Mary Gardos brothers: Andrew Gardos, George Gardos, Clarence Gardos sisters: Marie Gardos, Katherine Gardos, Elizabeth Gardos, Margret Gardos, Corrine J Gardos residence: Cle Elum, Kittitas, Washington, United States birthplace: Washington birth year: 1910 John Gardos Son 1920 U.S. Census father: Andrew Gardos mother: Mary Gardos sisters: Susie Gardos, Julia Gardos, Helen Gardos, Veronica Gardos, Teresa Gardos... residence: Scranton Ward 4, Lackawanna, Pennsylvania, United States birthplace: Pennsylvania birth year: 1900 John Gardos Son 1940 U.S. Census father: Stanley Gardos mother: Anna Gardos brothers: Theodore Gardos, Florence Gardos residence: North Tarrytown, Mount Pleasant Town, Westchester, New York, United States birthplace: New York birth year: 1924 John Gardos Head 1940 U.S. Census wife: Anna Gardos daughter: Margaret Gardos son: John Gardos residence: Charleroi Borough, Washington, Pennsylvania, United States birthplace: Pennsylvania birth year: 1899 John Gardos Son 1940 U.S. Census father: John Gardos mother: Anna Gardos sister: Margaret Gardos residence: Charleroi Borough, Washington, Pennsylvania, United States birthplace: Pennsylvania birth year: 1932 John Gardos Head 1920 U.S. Census wife: Marie Gardos son: Mike Gardos daughter: Rose Gardos residence: Linden, Union, New Jersey, United States birthplace: Austria birth year: 1865 John Gardos Self 1880 U.S. Census wife: Catherine Gardos daughter: Mary Gardos son: Frank Gardos residence: Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts, United States birthplace: Ireland birth year: 1825 John Gardos Son 1940 U.S. Census father: Emil Gardos mother: Grace Gardos residence: Ironwood, Ironwood City, Gogebic, Michigan, United States birthplace: Michigan birth year: 1939 John Gardos Brother 1900 U.S. Census others: Mike Gardos, Annie Gardos, Marey Ganolk, Jno. Markowitz, Peter Yanowitch residence: Precinct 1 Allegheny city Ward 11, Allegheny, Pennsylvania, United States birthplace: Austria John Gardos Head 1940 U.S. Census wife: Lillian Gardos residence: Assembly District 19, Brooklyn, New York City, Kings, New York, United States birthplace: Hungary birth year: 1888 John Gardos Head 1920 U.S. Census wife: Ottilie Gardos residence: Linden, Union, New Jersey, United States birthplace: New Jersey birth year: 1895 John Gardos Boarder 1910 U.S. Census others: Paul Puskas, Anna Puskas, John Puskas, Steven Deske, John Georgio... residence: Clarkstown, Rockland, New York, United States birthplace: Austria birth year: 1865 John Gardos Lodger 1930 U.S. Census others: Mike Boytin, Anna Boytin, Martha Boytin, Mike Boytin Jr., George Macuja residence: Cleveland (Districts 1-250), Cuyahoga, Ohio, United States birthplace: Pennsylvania birth year: 1911 John Gardos Lodger 1920 U.S. Census others: Christo Manosaky, Labebee Manosaky, George Manosaky residence: Cleveland Ward 9, Cuyahoga, Ohio, United States birthplace: Greece birth year: 1882 John Gardos Roomer 1910 U.S. Census others: John Larsen, William Larsen, Otto Fingervitz, Geo O Muskos, Olarf Christison... residence: Seattle Ward 5, King, Washington, United States birthplace: Finland birth year: 1876 John Gardos Boarder 1900 U.S. Census others: George Bihar, Mary Bihar, Annie Bihar, Susie Bihar, John Sic... residence: Fayette City borough, Fayette, Pennsylvania, United States birthplace: Hungary

John, I think we all agree that there was probably something significant to that anonymous call. As Paul J. suggested, why else did the FBI fail to recognize the names of people it had supposedly been hounding for years, and why was the report buried for so long? John Butler did a nice job summarizing the possibilities above. I’d just add a couple of things. First, there was a well known communist paper called “Worker’s World,” which sure sounds a lot like “Woman’s World,” perhaps corrupted unintentionally by the Tippits or deliberately by the FBI. Second, the seeming certainty of the caller suggests that the child might have been using the name “Lee Harvey Oswald” or something very close to that when the woman knew him and the Gardoses. If that is the case, it *MAY* set the start date of the “Oswald Project” to earlier even than 1947. Phony Marguerite was very much in the picture during the full time Harvey Oswald is known to have attended school in New York City in the 1950s, so I doubt the caller was referring to that time frame, but it is hard to be sure. There is probably no way to prove it, but my bet is that the majority of so-called communists active in the U.S. during the 1930s onward were probably some sort of FBI informants or assets. The number of times Emil Gardos was ordered to leave the country, and the fact that he maintained a NYC address after all those orders sure seems suspicious to me. I’m still looking for a reference to John Gardos in familysearch.org that would disqualify him as Harvey Oswald, and still have found nothing other than the 1940 U.S. Census. Wish I had more free time.

John A has been traveling lately and I haven’t spoken with him in two or three weeks, but he got home recently and called me today. I told him about Emil and John Gardos and our recent Ed Forum research, and he seemed interested. He told me that he is and always was convinced that there was something to that call from the anonymous woman to the Tippits of Westport, Connecticut. Just for the record, here’s the whole FBI internal teletype from 11/30/1963 again: The following FBI document, an internal teletype from 11/30/63, was withheld from public view for three decades.

Hi, DJ, We've discussed this before, and I don't mean to start a lengthy debate, but can you point me to a thread or post here that summarizes the evidence that "it was ACIS/JCS and Military Intel who seems to have coordinated the assassination"? As you know, I think a half dozen or so people from the Agency organized the hit, but it wouldn't surprise me one bit if some military people were involved. I've just never seen compelling evidence.

John, One of the first things John Armstrong taught me when I began working with him more than two decades ago was that research into “Lee Harvey Oswald’s” background has to be done extremely quietly. We were working with some IRS W-2 forms from three different companies allegedly covering Oswald’s teen-aged employment that all appeared to be prepared on the same typewriter or very similar typewriters. I sent some very clear copies of the forms, all copied at the National Archives, to a typewriter font specialist at IBM. John cautioned me, though, to be certain to black out the name “Lee Harvey Oswald” before mailing the documents. He indicated that when doing research like this, it is best, if at all possible, to hide the fact that the subject is Lee Harvey Oswald. When that becomes known, he said, everything almost always gets weird. As Paul J suggested, it would be even more informative to compare DNA tests from either of Marina’s children (June and Rachel) with Robert Oswald’s daughter Cathy or Son Robert, Jr. However, such tests would best be done in what scientists call a “double-blind” procedure, in which neither the test administrators nor the participants knew the identity of the samples. Otherwise, everything might get weird. BTW, this is in response to your suggestion that if John Gardos was, in fact, Classic Oswald®, there should be no record him after Classic Oswald was killed on November 24, 1963. I’d add that, since John A. found evidence for the second Oswald dating back all the way to 1947, there should be no evidence of our John Gardos after 1947. And I haven’t found any so far, which, of course, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.

John and Paul, I was also thinking of John A’s 1947 evidence for the second Oswald, but I’m not so sure this totally disqualifies young Gardos, although I’ve always thought it was a long shot. From what we can determine, Emil began getting deportation rulings dating back to the 1930s. The March 7, 1936 Cleveland Plain Dealer indicated that the “immigration and naturalization service of the Department of Labor” ordered that Emil Gardos “must be deported to Roumania, whose territories include Gardos’ birthplace, formerly in Hungary,” or “to any country of his choice” if he “wishes to depart voluntarily….” However unlikely it might seem, could these Communist organizers clearly targeted by the Feds have been desperate enough to make some sort of deal to keep their son in America? I’m going to keep trying to see if there some way to disqualify John Gardos as Harvey Oswald using online resources. John Butler’s discovery about ancestry.com’s coverage was a disappointment, but a big database called familysearch.org may turn out to be useful, although surely not definitive. I set up a free account there (all you need is a username, password, and a legitimate email address). A search instantly produced the 1940 U.S. census record for John Gardos, and there’s even an icon to click to see the handwritten census form. Even better, familysearch.org has international databases also, including what appears to be a whole lot of data from Hungary. Selecting Hungarian records, I searched for surname Gardos born in 1939 and found… nada. But the results produced a number of Hungarian Gardos born around 1939, including a Peter Gardos born in 1940, Maria Gardos born in 1941, Mor Gardos born in 1935 Edit Gardos born in 1935, and an Istvanne Gardos who died in 1911. My search technique may have precluded getting results for people born in 1939 outside of Hungary, but I don’t know. I’m just getting started with this database. It seems to me its worth taking a look at for anyone interested in searching for John Gardos in Hungary or anywhere else. I *THINK* all the databases can be searched simultaneously. It took me just a few minutes to set up an account and do my first searches. This appears to be a powerful database provider for a freebie. I’ll keep working with it.

John, I used Google’s Translate app on my cell phone last year in Estonia, Finland and many times in Russia (where far fewer residents seemed to speak English). The back and forth instant voice translations often made all parties laugh, but the results usually seemed pretty comprehensible... and those were on-the-fly voice translations. Using Google’s print translation service SHOULD be better, although I’ve used it only a few times. If the international section of ancestry.com isn't too expensive, my vote is for you to give it a try. If it is too expensive, we could try passing the hat or looking for an English speaking person who already had access to the international section. Thanks for the correction on Uncle Fred (Blair).

Now that the break between holidays is giving us a little free time again, I was just wondering if we had done everything possible to eliminate John Gardos, son of the Communist activists Emil and Grace Gardos, as a candidate for the Russian-speaking “Oswald.” John B. points out that John Gardos is not listed as a resident of the Ironwood (Michigan) household of Emil and Grace Gardos in the 1940 Census, and he should have been. However, I have found a separate listing in the same census for John: Here’s the full 1940 census data on John Gardos: John Gardos United States Federal Census, 1940 Name: John Gardos Census Year: 1940 Gender: Male Age: 1 Marital Status: Single Race: White Relationship: Son Father: Emil Gardos Mother: Grace Gardos Residence: Ironwood, Ironwood City, Gogebic, Michigan, United States Birthplace: Michigan Birth Year: 1939 Gogebic County is the westernmost county in the Upper Peninsula in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the population was 16,427. Ironwood is a city in Gogebic County in the U.S. state of Michigan, about 18 miles south of Lake Superior. The population was 5,387 at the 2010 census. It is the westernmost city in Michigan. For a fellow like Emil Gardos, active in places like New York City, Chicago and Milwaukee, tiny Ironwood, MI must have seemed remarkably rural. Just for convenient reference, here are excerpts from the 11/30/1963 FBI internal teletype describing the report from Mr. and Mrs. Jack D. Tippit about the phone call they received from the anonymous woman caller who they believed spoke with a foreign accent: THE WOMAN SAID SHE KNEW OSWALD-S FATHER AND UNCLE WHO WERE HUNGARIANS AND COMMUNISTS. THE WOMAN CONTINUED THAT OSWALD-S FATHER AND UNCLE HAD LIVED AT SEVENTY SEVENTH AND SECOND AVENUE, YORKVILLE, NYC, THAT WHILE LIVING THERE BOTH WERE UNEMPLOYED, GOT THEIR MONEY FROM COMMUNISTS AND SPENT ALL THERE TIME IN COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES. THE WOMAN THEN BEGAN SPEAKING INDISTINCTLY, DISJOINTEDLY, AND NERVOUSLY. SHE STATED SHE HAD TWO NAMES TO GIVE AND MENTIONED THE NAME EMILE KARDOS AND SAID SOMETHING ABOUT A BROTHER IN LAW. According to the Milwaukee Journal, Mar 20, 1949, p. 3: John’s father Emil was “Born in Hungary… had come to the United States in 1922. He had lived for a time in New York and in New Jersey before moving to the midwest…. He was naturalized in New York June 28, 1928…. When Gardos was first cited for denaturalization in 1932, he was educational director of the Communist party in Chicago. He had previously been an organizer in Milwaukee and had run in the 1932 elections, claiming Milwaukee as his legal residence.” A number of newspaper articles, including the March 7, 1936 Cleveland Plain Dealer, indicate that the “immigration and naturalization service of the Department of Labor” ordered that Emil Gardos “must be deported to Roumania, whose territories include Gardos’ birthplace, formerly in Hungary,” or “to any country of his choice” if he “wishes to depart voluntarily….” The Cleveland Plain Dealer and several other papers reported he was ordered out of the country in March 1936. John B. found a Congressional Record reporting him ordered to leave (again) in April 1948. And yet in 1949 he apparently had an address on Eighty-sixth St. in New York. Was there more to Emil Gardos than meets the eye? In his letter to the Milwaukee Sentinel published in the November 19, 1976 edition (p. 22), Emil’s uncle Fred Blair wrote “I have just received a postcard from my sister, Grace Blair Gardos, and her husband, Emil Gardos, who have lived in Budapest the past 28 years….” As John Kowalski pointed out, if John Gardos was “Harvey, then there should be no evidence that he was alive after Harvey's murder by Jack Ruby on November 24 1963.” Just before Thanksgiving, I did a search on a genealogy and newspaper database and found nothing for our “John Gardos” after 1963. The most likely explanation for all this is that John followed his parents Emile and Grace to Budapest or thereabouts, probably in the late 1940s, but to study this more would require access to European databases. Anyone have any ideas about where to go from here?

Remember, though, that Marina may have been trying to hide her fluency in English at around the time she met "Oswald" in the USSR. Robert Wesbster, the Rand Corporation worker who "defected" to Russia about the same time as "Oswald," told Dick Russell in a 1997 interview that when he (Webster) met Marina in Russia, they spoke together in English for hours. Webster said Marina spoke English well but had a heavy accent. I can't prove it, but my bet is that Marina and "Oswald" spoke English, at least during their earliest meetings. Harvey Oswald tried to hide his command of Russian from most of the people he met in Moscow and Minsk. What convoluted tales our protagonists told!

Paul, I’ve wondered for many years about the Alice, TX pantomime. It served, as you say, no discernible purpose whatsoever for framing our patsy-to-be, so why the heck was it done? My best guess is that it was a mind game, the type of cognitive dissonance you sometimes hear about in intel games. Little about “Lee Harvey Oswald” makes a bit of sense, so just give up researchers! I really can’t think of anything else. Can you? I’ll have to think some more about the Furniture Mart.

Jake, You're not alone thinking the photographic evidence for "Lee Harvey Oswald" has been compromised. John A. and I both agree that it has and I'm sure many other researchers feel the same way. The evidence is not bad indicating Harvey didn't wear a white jacket from the TSBD but a blue one, which later was placed back in the building to be "discovered." The original police broadcast about Tippit's killer described a man in a white jacket and white shirt.

Great idea, John! I did a quick search on a genealogy and newspaper database and found nothing for “John Gardos” after 1963 except for several death notations for “John J. Gardos” who died on July 6, 1985. Since this John Gardos, however, was born in 1893, he is obviously not our man. We also need to consider the strong possibility that John Gardos, son of Emil, left the country for good on one of the several times that his father was deported. I haven’t much expertise in searching Hungarian or Romanian databases.

Interesting. My take is that there was, on several occasions, an entire phony family established for the “Oswald” set-up. No doubt Gertrude Hunter, especially, identified Marina, but I’m not sure it was the kind of observation that would stand up to a deliberate impersonation. John A. wrote: When Mrs. Hunter was asked about Marina, whom she saw on television after the assassination, she seemed less able to identify her. Mrs. Hunter said, "The first time I seen her, she looked just common, just like she did down there at the store that day, and I guess it was when they fixed her up--it must have been after the funeral and she was meeting with these people or something, because it was quite a discussion about how pretty she was and why she let herself go before, because we had discussed it that maybe he didn't want her to fix up or something…. She's pretty now. She looked awful down there in that store."53 [H&L, p. 750] Do you think it was Marina who also visited KOPY in early October and was seen by several of the other witnesses in and around Alice, Texas? At that time, Harvey was in Dallas, nearly 400 miles away.

John, I’m quite certain that Marina only knew Russian-speaking Harvey Oswald. I doubt she even know about American-born Lee. Just my two cents worth.