Paul Jolliffe
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Posts posted by Paul Jolliffe
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John and Jim,
We agree on the basics: namely that our "Oswald" almost certainly had some connection to Yorkville and Emil Gardos.
None of us know whether "Oswald" really was indeed the biological son of Emil Gardos (and the nephew of Gardos's brother-in-law, Fred Blair) or perhaps instead an Eastern refugee somehow placed with Gardos/Blair/Weinstock, but we all agree that the FBI/Warren Commission suppression of the mysterious call to Mrs. Jack Tippit is very significant.
Further, we all agree (I hope) that the FBI's colossal failure to investigate this lead in November of 1963 was NOT because the FBI had no idea who these men were. No, to the contrary, the FBI knew exactly who the mysterious woman caller meant: the Federal Government had been engaged in deportation proceedings against these men for decades! No, the FBI didn't follow up on this tip because they didn't want the American public to look into any connection between "Oswald" and the (apparent) communists in Yorkville. So they buried this phone call for three decades.
Meanwhile, in 2013, Marina put "Oswald's" copy of the Hungarian cartoonist Tibor Kajan's "Circus Maximus" (published in 1962 in Berlin!) (plus "Oswald's" copy of the Communist Manifesto) up for sale. No idea what (if anything) she got for these, but I find it mighty interesting that our man "Oswald" took the time and effort in 1963 to buy a collection of cartoons by a Hungarian Jew, one considered by many Hungarians to be a national hero (a multiple Kossuth award nominee.)
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To clarify:
The push to examine these records is to see if a trace of John Gardos turns up somewhere, correct? The assumption being that while it's unlikely that John Gardos grew up to become our "Oswald", we can't be 100% sure, and we'd like to nail it down, right?
Fair enough.
Might I point out, though, that faint hints of a second Oswald (and even a second "Marguerite") began to appear by 1947, a year in which both Emil and Grace Gardos were apparently still living in New York - not yet "voluntarily" self-deported to Hungary? If these hints are real (and they merit serious consideration), then I find it extremely unlikely that little John Gardos grew up to become our "Oswald." (See the links excerpted at the bottom of this post.)
As I mentioned in a previous post, I can't conceive of a mother voluntarily abandoning her 8-year old to someone else to be raised under a false identity while she (and the father) then move to a different hemisphere, never to see their son again. Not to mention that after that son was scapegoated and killed in 1963, both mother and father remained completely silent for the rest of their lives.
Dedicated communists the Gardos parents may (or may not) have been, but the above defies human nature at its most basic, instinctual level.
No, if these hints of two LHO's in 1947 are correct (discovered by John Armstrong and explored at length on Jim Hargrove's website), then I reject the notion that John Gardos later assumed "Oswald's" identity.
From John Armstrong's essay "Early Years":
"Tarrant County land records also confirm that Marguerite C. Ekdahl purchased 101 San Saba on July 7, 1947. Shortly after purchasing this property, the short, heavy-set Marguerite Oswald impostor and young HARVEY moved in and stayed until Thanksgiving. According to Otis Carleton, who later purchased this house, young Oswald (HARVEY) attended first grade at the Benbrook Common School (located at the intersection of Old Benbrook Rd. and Winscott Rd.) where Carleton's daughter taught the 5th and 6th grades. At the same time LEE Oswald was enrolled in the second grade at the Lilly Clayton Elementary in Ft. Worth. Carleton said the Oswald's moved in either 1946 or 1947. Mr. Cartwright, a supervisor with the Benbrook Water Department, recalled that the Oswald's lived in the house next door to where the water department eventually located . . . "
"The tall, nice-looking Marguerite C. Ekdahl purchased 101 San Saba in July, 1947, but she may have never lived at this address. I (John Armstrong) showed Georgia a photo of the "Marguerite Oswald" impostor standing in front of a kitchen sink. Georgia said, "That's her, short and fat just like I remember her. She was not a very nice person." I (John Armstrong) then showed Georgia a photo of tall, nice-looking Marguerite Oswald standing next to Edwin Ekdahl on their wedding day, taken only two years earlier. She replied, "I don't know who that is." Georgia remembered buying groceries for the short, fat, Mrs. Oswald, taking her to the store, and remembered that the young boy played with neighborhood children. She remembered that a neighbor, Lucille Hubbard, drove Mrs. Oswald to pick up some clothes from another house when she got a job as a nurse. Mrs. Hubbard confided to Georgia that Marguerite had furniture and lots of clothes stored at this house which was located "across from Stripling School." We shall soon see that this may be the same house in which 15 year old HARVEY and Marguerite were living in the fall of 1954, while HARVEY was attending Stripling Junior High. This was also the house where the short, fat Marguerite Oswald impostor was living on November 22, 1963."
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1 hour ago, Anthony Mugan said:
Hello all.
I've been attempting to locate a review of the extent to which the search of the TSBD on the afternoon the 22nd November 1963 was thorough or not, but not really getting a clear picture of it.
On the one hand there are pictures of officers looking into various nooks and crannies and various individual accounts but against that a lot of officers seem to have left the area after news of the Tippit shooting came through.
In particular I am interested in if there is a documentary record anywhere as to what was or wasn't searched and perhaps in particular if the larger wooden crates (as opposed to the smaller book boxes) that get referred to were opened up and searched. The reason for asking is that, after concluding from my previous post (The Third Shooter) that there were two shooters in the TSBD based on the absence of a shockwave on the shot at Z204, the question arises as to why only one weapon was recovered and where the second one went.
Does anyone know anything about that side of things?
Thanks
Anthony said: "the question arises as to why only one weapon was recovered and where the second one went."
Anthony, are you sure that more than one rifle was fired at the motorcade from the TSBD?
(Your question about official records for the TSBD search is legitimate. No, I haven't seen any, but I haven't looked either.)
We all agree that there were multiple shooters from multiple locations, but I've never been persuaded by the theory of multiple gunmen firing from multiple locations within the TSBD itself.
Therefore, any search of the TSBD, no matter how meticulous, would not turn up any other weapon. Only the "throw-down" gun, of course.
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2 hours ago, Jim Hargrove said:
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.
Jim,
I agree with you that the Alice area sightings of the "Oswald" family from early October, 1963 would seem to indicate an impersonation of the "Oswald: family. I think you and I agree that that LHO couldn't be our "Oswald" (Harvey.) And nor is it very likely that the real Marina - 8 months pregnant! - accompanied the impersonator of "Oswald" 400 miles to south Texas. However, since those witnesses were far, far less specific about the Marina they encountered than were Gertrude Hunter and Edith Whitworth, I don't think we can rule it out completely. (Mighty unlikely, but not 100% certain.)
However, as was noted long ago, whatever was going on in south Texas in early October with these apparent LHO family impersonations did not seem to have anything to do with framing "Oswald" for the impending Dallas assassination.
Yet on the other hand, the Furniture Mart early November impersonation directly tied "Oswald" to the rifle - from the Furniture Mart to the Irving Sports Shop to the TSBD. And, unlike the Alice sightings, this 30 minute visit was complete with Marina and both girls in plain view of the two witnesses at very close range. This "Oswald" impersonation was specific and deliberate.
Finally, the Furniture Mart in Irving was only a very short drive from Ruth Paine's house, where, of course, the real Marina and her daughters were living at that very moment!
I believe that the real Marina - unwitting of the impending assassination - knew and accompanied someone who impersonated her husband on this occasion. It's likely that impostor was the real Lee Harvey Oswald.
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10 minutes ago, John Butler said:
From Steve and David's comments one can rationalize the notion that Harvey didn't care much for this mother. I wonder why? Lack of parental bonding at an early age?
My guess: "Marguerite" wasn't his real mother, merely a caretaker who had been stuck with him.
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11 minutes ago, Jim Hargrove said:
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.
Jim,
I must respectfully disagree. I think there is a good chance that Marina knew Lee and accompanied him on the infamous visit to the Furniture Mart on Irving Blvd in the presence of Gertrude Hunter and Edith Whitworth on November 6 or 7.
I don't think there can be any doubt that the visit involved Marina. She tried to lie about it, but even at the end of her deposition with Wesley Liebler she admitted that she might have been there. The two older women were insistent about it, and at one point during Marina's testimony, Marina virtually admitted it!
Further, it was impossible according to the Warren Commission (and our understanding of "Oswald's" whereabouts) for "Oswald" to have been on that Tuesday or Wednesday midday trip to Irving.
"Oswald" was at work at the Texas School Book Depository. Further, on the visit to the Furniture Mart, both Hunter and Whitworth stated that Lee Harvey Oswald drove away the two-tone 1956 or 1957 two tone blue and white Ford or GM!
Lee drove.
Harvey may been learning to drive, but he didn't take a pointless trip to the Furniture Mart during the day in the middle of the week. That was Lee.
Marina went with Lee on at least this occasion. We believe the purpose of that visit to the Furniture Mart was to set up the (bogus) sighting work done on a rifle in "Oswald's" name at the Irving Sports Shop, by Dial Ryder. All of this was to set up "Oswald", although I doubt that Marina fully understood what was going on.
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I tell you what, if that fabled (but never seen by mere mortals) OSS file from WWII (it mentioned "Mrs. M. Oswald", "Nazi's", New Jersey and it had entries dating back to 1941) ever does surface, I'll bet this guy is in the thick of it:
Carl N. Freyman; FBI Spy Recruiter, Handler
By JON THURBERJUNE 11, 200112 AMTIMES STAFF WRITER"Carl N. Freyman, an FBI agent who in the 1950s recruited a leading member of the U.S. Communist Party as an informant and began one of the most successful spy operations of the Cold War, has died. He was 85.
Freyman died June 3 at a hospital in Hoffman Estates, a Chicago suburb.
That informant, Morris Childs, became one of the key figures in Operaton SOLO, a covert mission that lasted nearly 20 years.
Fluent in German and Spanish, Freyman’s initial posting was to Newark, N.J., where he questioned European immigrants for information on Axis troop and ship movements.
He also proved adept at counterintelligence work and agent handling.
Transferred to Chicago at the end of the war, Freyman continued his intelligence gathering work and also showed talent as a recruiter of FBI agents.
It was during the early 1950s, at the height of the Communist Red Scare, that Freyman came in contact with Childs, who had been a leading member of the U.S. Communist Party and was, for a time, editor of the party’s newspaper, The Daily Worker . . ."
So the FBI's most successful Communist spy was also the editor of "Oswald's" favorite newspaper, "The Daily Worker".
New Jersey and Yorkville keep coming up on this thread.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2001-jun-11-me-9149-story.html
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11 minutes ago, David Josephs said:
David,
Absolutely right. That further proves my earlier point that Edwin Ekdahl worked, moved and lived in powerful circles, not only in Texas, but in NYC and Boston. Ekdahl was undoubtedly the key link between Marguerite Oswald's youngest son, Lee, and the east coast establishment spooks who made use of Lee's coincidental resemblance to a recently arrived refugee with some language skills.
The internet did not exist then, so the only way for U.S. intelligence to spot potential doppelgangers was to actually put eyes on boys who (somewhat) resembled each other.
Ekdahl would seem to be the only person in a position to notice the resemblance between Lee and "Oswald."
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4 minutes ago, Jim Hargrove said:
Jake,
My guess (and John A’s) is that Lee Oswald met up with Westbrook soon after he shot Tippit and handed the captain his wallet, revolver, and jacket. Harvey was already in the theater.
The map idea sounds intriguing. There are a number of graphics on the Nov 22 pages of my website that might help a bit. Good luck!
Jim,
It is plausible that Lee met Westbrook and gave him his wallet, revolver and jacket. But a few questions arise:
1. If Lee - after shooting Tippit - did meet up somewhere with Westbrook and gave him his wallet, then Westbrook must have returned to the Tippit scene in time to be filmed showing it to FBI agent Barrett. Exactly when, then, did Westbrook have time to drive Lee to the Texas Theater? Before or after he returned to the Tippit scene?
2. Why would Westbrook drive Lee to the Texas Theater at all? What possible purpose could it serve if, as you and I agree, "Oswald" (Harvey) was already in the Texas Theater AND IF Westbrook already had Lee's incriminating wallet, revolver and gun? You and I agree that Westbrook could have (and may have) substituted Lee's murder weapon for whatever gun was taken from Harvey. But that could have happened at any point on Friday afternoon, back at the DPD.
3. There is evidence - not proof beyond a reasonable doubt - but evidence nonetheless, that Lee really was in the Texas Theater. I can think of no reason for his risky presence except to get the actual murder weapon into unwitting "Oswald's" hands. Otherwise, why would he be there at all? If Butch Burroughs is correct, then Lee was damn near arrested and the whole thing almost blew up right there!
Lee did not go to the Texas Theater to induce Johnny Brewer to get the chase going. You and I agree that was done by someone else (Tommy Rowe? "IBM men"? Someone else?) So why did Lee go at all if not to get the murder weapon into Harvey's hands?
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1 hour ago, John Butler said:
Thanks Paul,
1953 and maybe as far back as 1947. That's 14 years from the birth of Lee Harvey Oswald and Harvey Oswald. They were roughly the same age. John Gardos was born in 1939 and that would make him 14 in 1953. That is the only record that can be found for John Gardos, the son of Emil and Grace Gardos. At this point there is absolutely no firm connection between John Gardos and Harvey Oswald. What info that is available is circumstantial at best. So, what I am trying to do is narrow the age range from Harvey Oswald back towards 1948 when the Gardos family was still in the US and John Gardos would be with his family, Emil and Grace.
Emil Kardos, more than likely Emil Gardos, is mentioned in the Mrs. Jack Tippit phone call. The mysterious woman caller said she knew Lee Harvey Oswald's father and uncle. They were Hungarian communists.
This must be Emil Gardos and Fred Blair. John Gardos' uncle was Fred Blair. Fred was not a Hungarian. The mysterious caller could have just lumped Fred and Emil together. The mysterious caller also talks about the brother-in-law. This has to be Fred Blair. Fred is Grace's brother. This data is firm, backed up by clear Census records.
With this information in hand and if the information is true one can logically conclude that John Gardos could be Harvey Oswald. Then again maybe not. There is that 6 year gap between 1948 when John, aged 10, is probably with his parents and Harvey is unknown until 1953 at age 14. We don't know if Emil and Grace took John to Hungary of they left him in the states with relatives or friends or the Oswald Project.
I'm sure others can pick more holes in this contention. I would be glad to hear those.
John,
While it is barely possible, I suppose, that little John Gardos grew up to be our "Oswald", I find that extremely unlikely. Simply put, his parents were both living in 1963, yet if John Gardos were posing as "Oswald", that means this little boy had been abandoned by his birth parents at the age of (6? 8? 10? 14?)!!!
Grace Blair Gardos was the mother of John Gardos (as far as we know.) As a parent, I can't conceive of a mother abandoning her child to the custody of strangers in a strange city (NYC) to be raised for some undefined political purpose. If the suggestion is that, well the parents (or at least Emil Gardos, the father) did it out of political expediency or to save his own skin, well again: it just doesn't ring true with what I've seen of the parent/child bond, especially when the kids are little.
I realize that none of my feelings about this are evidence, but still: any theory that little John Gardos grew up to be our "Oswald" must somehow account for the stunning abandonment by his own living birth parents, especially his own mother.
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8 minutes ago, John Butler said:
Paul,
This is very interesting. I have one other speculation on the Gardos pension. This probably has very low probability. Would The Worker have paid a pension to Emil Gardos? I wouldn't think so. The Worker may have been a low circulation paper and not making much money.
David Josephs has just posted material showing that the earliest record has Harvey mentioned in 1955.
David has worked extensively with John Armstrong. I wonder if he would care to post any records of Harvey Oswald earlier than 1955 if any exist.
John,
It is clear from the conflicting junior high school records published by the Warren Commission itself for the fall of 1953 that there were two "Lee Harvey Oswald's" : one in Public School 44 in the Bronx and the the other at Beauregard Jr. High in New Orleans.
The WC chose to ignore their own records from New Orleans and pretend that only one "Oswald" attended school that fall in NYC. John Armstrong has written extensively on this on the website "Harvey & Lee". Also, the entire Frank Kudlaty story from 1954 - for a brief bit in the fall of 1954 (perhaps 6-8 weeks) one "Oswald" attended Stripling Jr. High in Fort Worth while the other attended Beauregard in New Orleans. The videotaped interview with Kudlaty is striking and one of the more interesting pieces of evidence for the existence of two LHO's.
Actually, if one cares to really get into the housing records, Armstrong has traced problems in the addresses for "Oswald" going back to 1947. This whole angle is not definitive, but clearly something is amiss.
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6 minutes ago, John Kowalski said:
Has anyone done any research on Harvey's mother and how they were paired together?
John,
John Armstrong has speculated privately for several years about the possible origins of "Marguerite", but has reached no firm conclusions that I am aware of. There have been repeated references on this site and others (including "Harvey & Lee") to a file that apparently originated with the OSS during WWII which mentioned M. Oswald, Nazi's and New Jersey. HUAC in the 1950's seemingly had that file yet amazingly, the AARB under John Tunheim was somehow denied access to that file.
Whether that mysterious "M. Oswald" has any connection to our "Oswald" is uncertain.
Personally, I would bet serious money that the real Marguerite Oswald's third husband, Edwin Ekdahl (married 1945, divorced 1948) was the key to connecting the real Lee Oswald with the spook establishment out east. Ekdahl had to have noticed personally the physical resemblance between his wife's youngest son (Lee) and some kid recently arrived from Eastern Europe ("Oswald"), a kid who could speak at least a little Russian. (And maybe some German and Yiddish, too.)
Any doppelganger project in those pre-computer days had to have relied on personal observation - somebody had to have seen both kids in person. That person would be Ekdahl, whose high-powered job took him all over the east coast. I suspect that Ekdahl was not a U.S. intelligence agent per se, but was personally and professionally friendly with some. Ekdahl was probably used as a source or a low-level contact or a minor asset or something. His role may have been nothing more than to note the likeness between young Lee in Texas and some young refugee in New York. Ekdahl may have had no idea that his acquaintances at the CIA would later take advantage of that similarity between the boys.
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1 hour ago, John Butler said:
This is reposted from Steven Gaal from 2015. It will help on understanding the Grace/Emil Gardos story.
At one time this was a Top Secret document excluded from declassification.
Speculation: Was this why Harvey always reading the Worker? Was he keeping up with Mom and Dad?
Here's another speculation based on Emil Gardos' pension. Who paid it? Did the Soviets pay his pension based on his good work as a dedicated communist leader for decades in the US? Or, did the US pay it for his work as an informant/spy for the US.
It might be the later since his wife, who had been living in Hungary since 1948, was living at the US Embassy in Budapest when she died.
John,
Your question "who paid Gardos a pension?" is a good one.
Why would any Communist regime pay a "Communist Organizer" who was so incompetent as to get himself deported from the United States?
(Were we paying him a pension over in Hungary for services rendered here in the U.S.?)
Here's a curious one: in my link to the similar but not identical document you posted earlier, (linked below the Wiki entry), the key last sentence about Emil talks about "retired jstatus"
Retired jstatus? (Is it just a typo? Or did it originally read J status?)
From Wikipedia:
The United States introduced the J-1 Exchange Visitor Visa Program under the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act (Fulbright–Hays Act of 1961). The J-1 visa was administered by the U.S. Information Agency (USIA) to strengthen relations between the US and other countries. It fell under the purview of the USIA and not the Immigration and Naturalization Service because its main purpose is to disseminate information; its goal is to give people training and experience in the U.S. that they can use to benefit their home countries.[10] These exchanges have assisted the Department of State in furthering the foreign policy objectives of the United States.
https://archive.org/stream/FBI-Operation-Solo/100-HQ-428091-Serial5842-5915_djvu.txt
Grace Gardos is a United States citizen who had gone to Hungary a number of years ago when her hus- band voluntarily ^accepted deportation from the United States. Up to the present time, Grace Gardos has been acting as ^c o r i^ esp0ndent_for "The Worker, " United States East Coast communist newspapeTT ia IB 5£ BuWpest . Her husband Emil is living in Budapest in a retired jstatus and on pension,
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10 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:
Paul,
You have me confused.
In the post I quote above you appear to be arguing that there might be a connection between Harvey Oswald and Gardos and Blair, because otherwise why was the report on the phone call altered and then suppressed. And yet a couple days ago, in the quote below, you appear to be saying the opposite... that there is "considerable doubt" of that connection.
Please clarify.
Sandy,
I should have been more precise a few days ago: I do (and did) believe there is a likely connection between "Oswald" and Gardos/Blair. I am not at all sure that connection is biological - young "Oswald" may well have been in their custody/care/orbit for a brief bit in Yorkville at some point, especially if (as I and others have long suspected) young "Oswald" was actually a refugee from some Eastern European nation.
Yorkville was a hotbed for Hungarian Jewish Immigrant resettlement activity: (see page 14 of this pdf)
Note the language diversity in particular:
https://www.josai.ac.jp/jices/common/pdf/2.pdf
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5 hours ago, John Butler said:
Paul,
"2. The FBI report about Mrs. Jack Tippit's conversation with the mysterious woman caller was suppressed until 1993 - the HSCA in the 1970's had it, but it was not until the ARRB released it that we got to see it. "
And, if the ARRB didn't release it more time would have passed maybe until the Trump release.
From what you say in that sentence, I find reason to think the Tippit call is credible. The woman who called knew the background of the two and possibly their family. If that is so then she knew about John Gardos.
Emil Gardos was denied citizenship in 1934. As far as I know he was not deported. Maybe the denial of citizenship and non-deportation led Emil Gardos into becoming a government informer. He had been tracked as a communist for years before by the government.
I don't have any information on Fred Blair, but I would assume he was a fellow traveler as deep into Marx and Communism as Emil Gardos.
John,
This article from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel helps to fill in the gaps on Fred Bassett Blair. As the headline states, Blair was a Red Menace in the eyes of no less a figure than J. Edgar Hoover.
The article notes that Hoover testified before the U.S. Senate specifically about Blair's bookstore in the spring of 1965. The idea that somehow Hoover's FBI had been unable to identify the two men of the mysterious phone call to Mrs. Jack Tippit in November of 1963 is not worthy of discussion.
Of course the FBI knew immediately the identities of the two men, yet absurdly, they pretended otherwise!
Why?
Because a public revelation of their true identities would have revealed the real background of the dead patsy, something J. Edgar Hoover was determined to avoid at any cost.
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2 hours ago, John Kowalski said:
Does anyone want to speculate about why she made the call, was it to reinforce the idea that Oswald was communist by leaking this information to the Tippits?
Could this woman have known about the short fat Marguerite Oswald? If this woman was reading the papers everyday to obtain updates on JFK's assassination, Marguerite must have been mentioned in the 8 days that elapsed from November 22 to November 30, the date of the FBI report. If she had read in the papers about Marguerite and believed that Oswald's relatives were Hungarian communists did she know or suspect something about the Oswald doppelganger project?
John,
Good questions. Yes, I suspect that the mysterious woman caller may have had some awareness of "Marguerite". The argument that a young "Oswald" - presumably some sort of future intelligence asset - would have needed a mother figure is compelling to me. This is not to say I think "Marguerite" was necessarily "Oswald's" biological mother, or even related to him. I doubt she was.
This caller may not have known of the doppelganger project, but she clearly believed she had inside information about "Oswald's" background, information which she believed connected "Oswald" to some nefarious communist conspiracy that led to the assassination. We know that wasn't so, but she did not.
"Oswald" knew at least some Yiddish. He did not learn it in Texas, nor in New Orleans. He learned it in Yorkville, New York City.
From the testimony of Nelson Delgado:
Mr. LIEBELER - Did you know whether Oswald spoke any other language. You mentioned before he spoke Russian.
Mr. DELGADO - Russian.
Mr. LIEBELER - Did you think that he was proficient in Russian at that time or highly proficient?
Mr. DELGADO - Yes; I imagine he would be, because he was reading the paper, and basically if he can read it, you know, I imagine he could speak it also.
Mr. LIEBELER - Did you hear him speak Russian?
Mr. DELGADO - Well, like I say, he tried to teach me Russian, but then another time I had some thought that what he was speaking to me was German; but according to the agent, he messed me all up, and I couldn't figure whether it was Hebrew or German. I tried to tell him that some of the words he had mentioned to me at the time I didn't recognize them, but when I came back from Germany some of those words I do remember, you know.
Mr. LIEBELER - It seemed to you like it was German?
Mr. DELGADO - Like German; yes.
Mr. LIEBELER - But you only came to that conclusion after you had been to Germany?
Mr. DELGADO - Right. At the time it could have been Yiddish or German, you know.
Mr. LIEBELER - Could it have been Russian?
Mr. DELGADO - No; different gutteral sounds altogether.
Mr. LIEBELER - But you did not know whether Oswald spoke this other language to any extent; he just used a few words?
Mr. DELGADO - No; I just remember his particular language, which I am in doubt about, had a "ch" gutteral sound to it [indicating], you know; and I could only assume it was Jewish or German, and later on when I was in Germany, I think, I am pretty sure it was German that he was speaking.
Mr. LIEBELER - Did he speak it well or did he just use a few words?
Mr. DELGADO - He speaks it like I speak it now, you know, like, just phrases, you know. Where he picked them up, I don't know. -
2 minutes ago, John Butler said:
Paul,
Your sound reasoning makes John Gardos = Harvey Oswald more plausible.
Emil Gardos and Fred (Caroll) Blair were real people. The woman who made the call to the Tippits knew these people. And, she knew their background. If this is correct she probably knew John Gardos at one point in time. If so this makes the John Gardos=Harvey Oswald more acceptable.
Jim Hargrove's newspaper articles, the Census and other data flesh the two out and establish their reality. Real people and not someone made up by the woman or the FBI.
More research is need on why Grace Gardos last residence was in the US Embassy in Budapest. Was she living there as an employee? What was her connection there? If she was an employee there why was she, with so many communism associations, there?
Based on current evidence Emil Gardos never became a citizen. He was subject to deportation since 1934. It might be possible that in order to remain in the US with his wife he began to cooperate with the FBI or some other government agency like he CIA or its predecessor the ONI in the 1930s and the OSS during the 1940s. I am not sure, but I think the only dedicated intelligence agency during 1930s was the ONI. Once cooperating he would not want to be exposed to his fellow travelers. There could have been drastic results of such an exposure.
Presumptions, assumptions, and speculations are important in giving one a sense of what to look for, or a direction to take. At some point circumstantial evidence begins to become meaningful.
Deported he may have been, but Emil Gardos had an address in Yorkville (217 East Eighty-sixth Street, New York, New York) according to page 854 of the 1949 Hearings before the Subcommittee on Immigration and Naturalization of the Senate Judiciary Committee ("Communist Activities Among Aliens and National Groups")
Further down page 854 we find "Louis Weinstock, 24 Metropolitan Oval, New York, New York."
Again, this further emphasizes my earlier point: the FBI knew exactly who these men were when they got the call from Mrs. Jack Tippit in 1963! The United States Government had been keeping tabs on these men for decades!
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11 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:
Thanks Jim. Yeah, given your explanation, I can see where Paul was coming from.
I guess the reason that Paul's point didn't occur to me is because I've always been of the opinion that the woman who called Mrs. Tippit was mistaken about Gardos and Blair being Harvey's father and uncle. It made little sense to me that the USG would take their young son/nephew for a future secret mission. It made a lot more sense that the boy was not related to the men at all and was merely in their custody at some point in time. And that the woman merely assumed he was the men's son/nephew.
I'm willing to speculate that far to make the story fit my CT because the story rings true to me. However, an alternate possibility is that it's merely a case of mistaken identity. Maybe Harvey's photos looked just like Gardos's son to the woman, and she -- knowing that these men were "evil" communists -- figured that the son had been sent to kill Kennedy.
Sandy and John Butler,
Yes, I agree that it is at least possible that the mysterious woman caller MAY have mistakenly identified a young "Oswald" (instead of Emil Gardos's real son, John) as the son/nephew of Gardos and Blair in Yorkville.
That's plausible.
However, there are two powerful counterarguments, and they both involve the behavior of the FBI:
1. In 1963, when Mrs. Jack Tippit reported her mysterious conversation with the unknown woman to the FBI, the FBI would have known instantly to whom the woman referred!
By 1963, Emil Gardos and Fred Bassett Blair had "commie" files a mile thick at the FBI! The FBI knew damn well exactly who the woman meant!
Instead, the FBI deliberately garbled the names - Emil Gardos became "Emile Kardos" (with a very suspicious and prominent handwritten asterisk right over the name!), the longtime FBI target Fred Blair was reduced to anonymity, and the longtime editor of the "Worker's World" (Louis Weinstock, another FBI target) became the more nebulous FNU Weinstock of a nonexistent publication, "Woman's World".
(The FBI's outrageous history of purposely obscuring sensitive names and information has a long, fine tradition, so much so that Harold Weisberg insisted 50 years ago that one needed a special dictionary to translate "FBI-ese.")
Therefore, I find it impossible to believe the FBI's seeming incompetence about identifying the two men mentioned the in phone call was genuine. They pretended they did not know to whom the woman referred.
2. The FBI report about Mrs. Jack Tippit's conversation with the mysterious woman caller was suppressed until 1993 - the HSCA in the 1970's had it, but it was not until the ARRB released it that we got to see it.
http://harveyandlee.net/Harvey Who/Tippit-FBI_Graphical.htm
If this was really a simple case of mistaken identity in 1963, WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD BOTH THE WARREN COMMISSION AND THE HSCA HAVE HIDDEN IT FOR DECADES?
No, the fact this report was suppressed tells us there is something sensitive here. It does not tell us that "Oswald" was truly the biological son of either Gardos or Blair, merely that the woman caller apparently thought so.
But it does tell us that young "Oswald" probably had some kind of Yorkville connection to these men, however brief, a connection that was noted and remembered by this mysterious caller.
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4 minutes ago, Bart Kamp said:
Leavelle was full of it. Not even Fritz took notes. During the first interrogation it was only Hosty.
And Leavelle was only present during the 7th and final interrogation, unlike his claim he interrogated Oswald before Fritz.
Leavelle said this himself during his WC testimony. And his report makes no mention on any interrogating at all on the 22nd or 23rd.
As bogus as anything claimed by Brian Doyle.
I refer to my paper Anatomy Of Lee Harvey Oswald's Interrogations. Pages 30-37.
Thanks, Bart. I agree that Leavelle's WC testimony and his report make no mention of any interrogation notes. Since Leavelle was a staunch believer (at least publicly) in "Oswald's" guilt, why would he open that speculative door by asserting decades later that he did indeed take notes?
I am not insisting that he did. I am just curious why he would state that if it was total baloney.
On a separate note, what do you make of Leavelle's insinuation that Jack Ruby was a regular contact (source?) for Leavelle?
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10 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:
Interesting. Cops are trained to make notes after interrogations are they not? Have we been fed a line of BS for all these years regarding very limited notes of Oswald's interrogations? Wouldn't surprise me.
I agree, Ron. Leavelle's notes disappeared because they conflicted with the emerging "no conspiracy" narrative in the mainstream media and from the FBI. Remember that Jesse Curry was much more circumspect about the possibility of conspiracy when asked. Curry implied that the Dallas Police had NOT ruled out help for "Oswald", but the national press (the NYT, the New York Herald Tribune, etc.) were insisting on the "Oswald did it all by himself and he was a nut" scenario!
Even J. Edgar Hoover admitted in a phone call to LBJ on 11/23/63 that "the evidence against this man ("Oswald") is not very good."
Of course, as soon as Jack Ruby murdered "Oswald" that all changed. Now Hoover was certain that the case against "Oswald" was sound - never mind that the murder of the chief suspect should have forced a total reconsideration of the case against him! Nope, now that "Oswald" was dead, why J. Edgar Hoover could now close the books and declare to the world that "Oswald" did it all by himself, just as the national media had been loudly proclaiming for almost 48 hours!
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In a recently published interview with Russ Baker of "Who, What and Why", retired Dallas Police Detective James Leavelle claimed that, contrary to his 1964 Warren Commission testimony, he, Leavelle did indeed take contemporaneous notes during an interrogation of "Oswald"!
Further, Leavelle claimed that other members of the DPD did as well!
Finally of note, Leavelle and Jack Ruby had known each other for years before 1963.
Russ Baker wrote that "Leavelle said he knew Ruby dating back to his first days on the force — when, as a patrolman, his beat included the Dallas neighborhood of Oak Cliff. Ruby at that time owned a nightclub (Leavelle called it “a dance hall”) in Oak Cliff, and interacted with Leavelle on many occasions.
“They put out an order that all those places would close at midnight,” Leavelle said. “I went in and talked to him and got to know him pretty well. He promised to shut at midnight, and he kept his word.”
Significantly, Leavelle said that Ruby — who two years after his arrest would claim that a conspiracy surrounded Oswald’s, and perhaps Kennedy’s, death — was reliable.
“He was the best I had,” Leavelle said, comparing Ruby to the myriad proprietors on his beat. “I don’t think he ever lied to me.”
Relationships between law enforcement and those on the seamier side of the track were notably informal in those days."
Leavelle's statement "I don't think he (Ruby) ever lied to me" would seem to imply that Ruby was some sort of confidential source of information for Leavelle.
Is it possible that Leavelle's interrogation notes may yet exist somewhere deep in the heart of Texas?
https://whowhatwhy.org/2019/11/21/jfk-assassin-death-scene-witness-exclusive-interview/
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22 minutes ago, Jim Hargrove said:
Fascinating!
Megathanks for the “Emil Gardos” clarification. This is news to me. The “Woman’s World” magazine referred to in the FBI report was surely the communist “Worker’s World.” Gardos was said to be a magazine editor as well.
The “New Masses” article Paul linked mentioned that Gardos had run for Congress in Wisconsin, and I found this about him in the Milwaukee Journal, Mar 20, 1949, p. 3:
Jim,
Your linked article provides further proof that the "Emile Kardos" of the mysterious woman caller's description and Emil Gardos are one and the same: the mysterious woman caller mentioned "brother-in-law" and "Kardos" and Communist activity (organizing, apparently) repeatedly.
Near the top of the second column of the article we learn that Gardos's brother-in-law was indeed a prominent Communist organizer (and longtime FBI target!): Fred Bassett Blair.
There can be no doubt: the mysterious woman caller was referring to Gardos and Blair when she made her call to Mrs. Jack Tippit.
Now, whether the mysterious woman caller was correct about some kind of connection between these men and "Oswald", well of that, there is no evidence and considerable doubt.
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15 hours ago, John Kowalski said:
Have read the story about the telephone call. Did some research on Weinstock and his obituary is below. Obituary says he was a communist but then again many members of the communist party were working for the FBI.
https://archive.org/details/louisweinstockobituary
Pursuant to House Resolution 220 of 1953, the Investigation of Communist Propaganda Report from the Select Committee on Communist Activities in the United States (Hamilton Fish, Chair) says on page 14 that "Emil Gardos" was the organizer for the Communist Party's district number 3, headquartered in Philadelphia. District 3 included Washington D.C.; Delaware; eastern Pennsylvania; Maryland; and western New Jersey.
Further, here on top of page four of the 1934 publication "New Masses" is an article defending Emil Gardos "Communist Party member and a leader in a number of strikes" (and a native of and subject to deportation to "fascist" Hungary after having his citizenship revoked!) against what the writer believed were unfair charges.
Whether or not the mysterious caller to Mrs. Tippit was correct in her belief that "Oswald" was biologically related to this man, there is no doubt that the mysterious woman caller had this Emil Gardos in mind. Gardos did indeed spend time in New York City, he was absolutely a prominent Communist activist and he certainly was Hungarian.
Could Gardos have been co-opted after 1934 by the FBI as a source or an informant?
Possibly, although he may have been deported briefly later, but not until sometime after 1940. (Whether he actually ever left the country at any point is not clear. Perhaps someone here can dig that out.)
Why do I say that? Because he and his wife and his son (born in 1939) were all listed in the U.S. Census of 1940, living in Ironwood Michigan.
https://www.ancestry.com/1940-census/usa/Michigan/Emil-Gardos_2xgn7w
Did Gardos have any connection, biological or not, to "Oswald" (Harvey)?
Well, certainly the mysterious woman caller believed so, but whether she was completely correct needs much more research.
https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-masses/1934/v10n11-mar-13-1934-NM.pdf
It seems to me that the mysterious woman caller who mentioned "Kardos" (as recorded by the FBI) may have been mistaken. We know Emil Gardos was the person to whom she referred, and we know that Emil Gardos (a native Hungarian Communist Jew) had a son (John) born in 1939 making him the same age (ostensibly) as "Oswald" so a case of mistaken identity is plausible, but not proven.
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1 hour ago, Ron Ecker said:
Contrast that with the extreme emotion of General Maxwell Taylor, one two occasions, when the subject of the assassination arose. According to the biography An American Soldier by his son John M. Taylor (pp. 290-291), in a 1964 interview for the Kennedy Library's oral history series, when the assassination came up, Taylor "broke down." He couldn't speak for "several minutes." And more than a decade later, during a family dinner, "his voice broke" on the subject of Kennedy.
How would you interpret such behavior by an Army general, a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff? It suggests to me an extremely guilty conscience.
Ron,
Professor James K. Galbraith (son of JFK confidant and legendary diplomat John Kenneth Galbraith) argued two decades ago Maxwell Taylor had already approved steps to undermine JFK's "Exit Strategy" at the infamous Honolulu conference on 11/20/63:
"7) At Honolulu, a preliminary plan, known as CINCPAC OPLAN 34-63 and later implemented as OPLAN 34A, was prepared for presentation. This plan called for intensified sabotage raids against the North, employing Vietnamese commandos under U.S. control—a significant escalation.5 While JCS chief Taylor had approved preparation of this plan, it had not been shown to McNamara. Tab E of the meeting’s briefing book, also approved by Taylor and also not sent in advance to McNamara, showed that the withdrawal ordered by Kennedy in October was already being gutted, by the device of substituting for the withdrawal of full units that of individual soldiers who were being rotated out of Vietnam in any event."
I don't see how anyone can interpret that as anything but evidence (proof?) that Taylor disagreed with President Kennedy's plans to get us out of Vietnam, come hell or high water.
EVIDENCE FOR HARVEY AND LEE (Please debate the specifics right here. Don't just claim someone else has debunked it!)
in JFK Assassination Debate
Posted
John,
To me, a much more interesting and simple DNA test would prove devastating to the conventional narrative: compare the DNA from either June or Rachel Oswald ("Oswald's" biological children) with DNA from any of Robert Oswald's biological children (his daughter Cathy or his son, Robert Jr.)
According to the implied mainstream narrative, Robert Oswald and our "Oswald" were biological brothers and therefore, their children ought to be first cousins. If Robert and "Oswald" were not biological brothers (as we all suspect), then their children will not be related.
A simple DNA test may yet completely unravel the cover-up.
(John Armstrong first proposed this in a phone conversation with me many years ago.)