Was Muchmore’s film shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on November 26, 1963?

[Paul Rigby]

“The first film showing the assassination of President Kennedy was telecast in New York on November 26. It was a UPI Newsfilm exclusive It was serviced to UPI Newsfilm subscribers the world over,”

UPI Newsfilm advertisement, Broadcasting: The Business Weekly of Television and Radio, December 2, 1963, p.69.

The circumstantial case for UPI Newsfilm’s possession of the first version of the Zapruder film is not without merit – in addition to it being a much more logical bidder for film rights, UPI representative Jack Klinge attended the Saturday, November 23 showing(s) of the film (1) – and would account for its appearance on Russian TV on the evening of November 25(2); and its distribution to US television stations belonging to such diverse, “independent” groups as Metropolitan Broadcasting Television (WNEW-TV, New York) (3) and Storer Broadcasting Co. (WITI-TV, Milwaukee) (4) by, at the latest, the following day. How so?

”UPI Newsfilm supplied coverage to 44 foreign countries as well as servicing 100 independent U.S. television stations and ABC,”

“Television’s largest audience,” Broadcasting: The Business Weekly of Television and Radio, December 2, 1963, p.57.

On the previous page, readers learned that “ABC, CBS, NBC and UPI Newsfilm sent countless hours of film covering all aspects of the presidential assassination via jet transport to countries on all continents.”

In its edition of December 9, 1963, Broadcasting magazine, ordinarily so diligent and prompt in informing its readership of significant industry developments, belatedly reported the ending of a relationship of relevance to this thread:

“In October, Fox dropped its association with United Press International, under which Movietone produced Newsfilms for TV stations for distribution by UPI. UPI has established its own Newsfilm operation which sources TV stations,”

“New Life in Old Film,” Broadcasting: The Business Weekly of Television and Radio, December 9, 1963, p.28.

Both the tardiness of the report, and the uncharacteristic vagueness of its dating of the severance of the UPI-Fox collaboration, owed something, one can’t feeling, to the following report on a much-neglected aspect of the Patman delvings into the mysterious foundations, that concerning their extensive behind-the-camera work in the television-film industry. Mr. Skouras and the Fox connection were of a sudden a potential liability to UPI, and, of course, anyone who had plans for UPI in the upcoming months:

Everyone dipped into Baird’s banks

Broadcasters were clients of tax-deductible foundations

Broadcasting: The Business Weekly of Television and Radio, 28 October 1963, pp.52-53.

A veteran pay TV promoter, some producers and distributors of television and theatre films and a few radio and television station owners were shown in a House of Representatives study released last week to have borrowed heavily from three tax-exempt foundations set up by a New York financier whose transactions have been under sub-committee scrutiny.

In many cases, the subcommittee charges in a lengthy, detailed report, the debtors paid back the loans by making tax-deductible, “charitable” donations to the foundations.

Representative Wright Patman (D – Tex.), chairman of the House Small Business foundations subcommittee and scourge of foundation-controlled enterprises since the early 1930s, blames the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service for permitting this type of tax-free business to go on unchecked. Accusing the government agencies of “apathy…nonfeasance” and failure to perform audits of foundation tax returns, Representative Patman points to the activity of six foundations given special attention in his subcommittee report.

“Their tax-free business transactions include operations as: securities dealers…business brokers, finders of credit…lending services…[and] trading in mortgages,” Representative Patman says. This activity is not confined to the six foundations, he says: they are typical of similar activity “on a substantial scale.”

Directed by H.A. Olsher, the study has been underway since last year and with the release of this second instalment of a planned three-part report, is heading towards public hearings, probably this spring, subcommittee sources said last week. The 406-page section just released, although documented with pages of business correspondence among the foundations and their “debtors” and “contributors” between 195—1964, in many cases makes no effort to explain the dealings. It is expected that some of the mystery would be dispelled once some of the principals are called for sworn testimony.

A wide range of business transactions in the entertainment field, real estate, banking and stocks is covered in this instalment, but most of the fire is turned on three foundations controlled by David G. Baird of Montclair, N.J., head of Baird & Co., a stock brokerage firm that is a member of the New York Stock Exchange. In the past three decades he set up the David, Josephine and Winfield Baird Foundation, the Winfield Baird Foundation and the Lansing Foundation. The three had total assets of $28 million at the end of 1960, Mr. Baird reported to the subcommittee.

The type of control Mr. Baird exercised over his foundations “affords boundless opportunities for lavishing favors upon business associates and friends,” Representative Patman charges. In a list of “unusual operations” of the Baird foundations, he cites “usurious interest rates…’contributions’ for services rendered…huge accumulations of income [and] loans without adequate security.”

Baird as ‘Angel’

The Baird foundations “have never received a screen credit, but they have played top financial roles in numerous movie and television deals, involving millions of dollars,” and have held mortgages “on a not-inconsiderable number of films,” the report says.

A spokesman for the Baird foundations said that by the end of the this year they will have given a total of more than $36 million to over 2,000 charities since the first one was formed in 1936. This has been for the benefit of the charities, not for Mr. Baird personally, the spokesman said, and Baird & Co. has donated back to the charities far more than it ever took from them.

The Lansing Foundation was said to have been inactive since 1954, and the other two are to be dissolved by 1965.

In a partial list of Baird foundation dealings in the “movie-television industry,” these names came up:

• Matthew Fox, former president of many companies in motion picture distribution and pay TV, including Skiatron TV Corp., is an organizer and original stockholder in Subscription Television Inc., a new pay TV venture hoping to raise $23 million to send programs by wire into Los Angeles and San Francisco TV homes (Broadcasting, August 26, et seq).

• C & C Super Corp., an organization which during the early development of television, was active in the bartering of programs for credits in time that it sold to advertisers. The firm was listed as in debt to the Winfield Baird Foundation for $1 million at the end of 1955. Mr. Fox was also involved in this company at one time.

• Louis Chesler, Eliot Hyman and the late David B. Stillman, executives in Seven Arts Productions Ltd., and its distributing subsidiary, Seven Arts Associated Corp., have dealt with Baird foundations in sums ranging from millions of dollars, the report shows.

• Spyros Skouras (5), board chairman of Twentieth Century Fox, Walt Disney of his own company, Nicholas Reisini of Cinerama Inc. and Serge Semenenko (6), film financier, were shown to have had extensive dealings with Baird foundations.

And there were some broadcasters:

• Stanley Warner Corp., licensee of WAST (TV) Schenectady, N.Y., had transactions running into hundreds of thousands of dollars with the Lansing Foundation and Winfield Baird Foundations.

• Joseph Harris, a New York insurance man who owns half of KELP-AM-TV El Paso, Tex., also owned Essex Universal Corp., a film distributor, and dealt with the Baird foundations to the extent of several hundred thousand dollars.

• Mr. Baird himself is shown by FCC records to have been an investor in only one broadcasting property. His one recorded venture was a three-month holding of 49 of 100 common voting shares of KFWB-FM Los Angeles. The other 51 shares were held by Harry Maizlish, who also was slowly acquiring control of KFWB at the time. Mr. Baird got out of FM in 1952.

Notes:

(1) “Photographer Sells Pictures of Assassination for $25,000,” Dallas Morning News, November 24, 1963: “Saturday, Dick Strobel of the Associated Press, Los Angeles; Jack Klinge of United Press International, Dallas, and Dick Strolle [sic], Los Angeles representative of Life Magazine, negotiated with Zapruder for still picture rights to his film.”

For Klinge’s obituary: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-52755123.htm

(2) http://www.assassinationresearch.com/v1n2/worldreaction.html

http://karws.gso.uri.edu/JFK/history/wc_pe...lmson%20TV.html

(3) “Herridge to produce dramas for Metropolitan,” Broadcasting: The Business Weekly of Television and Radio, December 30, 1963, p.41: “Metropolitan owns and operates: WNEW-TV New York; KMBC-TV Kansas City, Mo.; KTTV (TV) Los Angeles; WTTG (TV) Washington; KOVR (TV) Sacramento-Stockton, Calif.; WTVH (TV) Peoria, Ill., and WTVP (TV) Decatur, Ill.” Metropolitan was a division of Metromedia.

(4) Thomas W. Baggerman, in Structurally Unsound: The Changing State of Local Television (Univ. of Pittsburgh, 2006), p.46, n32, citing Robert H. Howard’s Multiple Ownership in Television Broadcasting (Ayer Publishing Co., 1979), “lists Storer Broadcasting Company as the most prominent of the independents.” By independent is meant nothing more than “without a network affiliation” (Baggerman, p.38).

According to a full page ad in Broadcasting’s edition of November 11, 1963, Storer’s TV stations included: WITI-TV Milwaukee; WJW-TV Cleveland; WSPD-TV Toledo; and WJBK-TV Detroit (p.12). For WITI-TV’s possession of the film, see AP, "Movie Film Depicts Shooting of Kennedy,” Milwaukee Journal, November 26, 1963, part 1, p.3: "The film also was being distributed by United Press International Newsfilms to subscribing stations. WITI-TV in Milwaukee is a subscriber, but will reserve judgment on whether to show the film until after its officials have viewed it."

Just how “independent” independent was can perhaps be best gauged by Storer’s appointment of Linton Wells as Washington News Bureau man in 1962 (or 1963?). Wells has CIA written all over him:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linton_Wells

(5) For more on “board chairman of Twentieth Century Fox,” Spyros Skouras, try these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spyros_Skouras

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/...11257-8,00.html

McClintick, David Indecent Exposure: A True Story of Hollywood and Wall Street (Collins Business Essentials) ISBN 0060508

(6) On Serge Semenenko:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/...,841002,00.html

The Invisible Art: The Legends of Movie Matte Painting by Mark Cotta Vaz, Craig Barron, George Lucas, Craig Barron, George Lucas (Chronicle Books, 2004), 288 pages, ISBN:081184515X

http://www.ciajfk.com/thelist.html

[Lee Forman]

An interesting thread - as I recall, the Muchmore film had been thrown in my face as irrevocable proof that no alteration was possible with the other films - the Nix which was 'seized' by the FBI, and the Zapruder, which was purchased and held by Time Life CIA - but the Muchmore was released later unscathed and no vale. Luckily, I don't trust my government - certainly not he FBI during the Queen's 50 year reign - unlike some stooges and sheeple. It should be the responsibility of citizens everywhere to question their 'elected' authority and make it accountable. I have always believed that the Muchmore film sequence on the stairs was bogus, and that the film would have had to have been synched to the altered Moorman, altered Nix and the altered Zapruder film to provide cover for the shot from the front and the man on the stairs, and now I feel a lot better about it after having read this thread. Thanks.

Wikipedia

Marie M. Muchmore (5 August 1909, Ardmore, Oklahoma – 26 April 1990, Dallas, Texas)[1] was one of the witnesses to the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963. A color 8 mm film that Muchmore photographed is one of the primary documents of the Kennedy assassination. The Muchmore film, with other 8 mm films taken by Abraham Zapruder and Orville Nix, was used by the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination and to position the presidential limousine in a forensic recreation of the event in May 1964.[2]

Muchmore was born Marie Mobley in Ardmore, Oklahoma. Her mother was half Chickasaw Indian.[3] One of her sisters, Aurelia, became a noted operatic soprano under the name Lushanya Mobley (1906–1990).[4] Marie had no children.

Muchmore was an employee of Justin McCarty dress manufacturers in Dallas (707 Young Street which was four blocks south of the Texas School Book Depository), and was in Dealey Plaza with five other employees, including Wilma Bond, who had a still camera. She set up her 8 mm Keystone movie camera near the northwest corner of Main Street and Houston Street and awaited the president’s arrival. The Muchmore film consists of seven sequences: six before the assassination, and one during the shooting. Muchmore began filming the presidential motorcade with her movie camera near the northwest corner of Main Street and Houston Street as the motorcade turned into Dealey Plaza. She then turned and went a few yards west to photograph the President's limousine as it went down Elm Street. After the car turned on Elm Street, the three gunshots were heard. Her film captures the fatal head shot, seen from about 135 feet (41 m) away.[5] The film ends seconds later as Secret Service agent Clint Hill runs to board the limousine.

Muchmore sold the undeveloped film to the Dallas office of United Press International on November 25, 1963 for $1,000. It was processed by Kodak in Dallas, and flown to New York City. It appeared the following day on local television station WNEW-TV.[6] The film now belongs to the Associated Press Television News, which restored it in 2002.[7]

While visiting her family in Oklahoma for Thanksgiving, Muchmore told them about the film she had taken of the assassination; her family then told the FBI about the film. The FBI initially interviewed Muchmore in December 1963, during which she admitted she had a camera with her but denied that she took any pictures of the assassination scene.[8] The FBI was unaware of the film's existence until a frame enlargement was published in the UPI book Four Days: The Historical Record of the Death of President Kennedy in January 1964.[9] A subsequent FBI interview in February 1964 says:

Mrs. Muchmore stated that after the car turned on Elm Street from Houston Street, she heard a loud noise which at first she thought was a firecracker but then with the crowd of people running in all directions and hearing the two further noises, sounding like gunfire, she advised that she began to run to find a place to hide.[10]

[Lee Forman]

An interesting thread - as I recall, the Muchmore film had been thrown in my face as irrevocable proof that no alteration was possible with the other films - the Nix which was 'seized' by the FBI, and the Zapruder, which was purchased and held by Time Life CIA - but the Muchmore was released later unscathed and no vale. Luckily, I don't trust my government - certainly not he FBI during the Queen's 50 year reign - unlike some stooges and sheeple. It should be the responsibility of citizens everywhere to question their 'elected' authority and make it accountable. I have always believed that the Muchmore film sequence on the stairs was bogus, and that the film would have had to have been synched to the altered Moorman, altered Nix and the altered Zapruder film to provide cover for the shot from the front and the man on the stairs, and now I feel a lot better about it after having read this thread. Thanks.

Wikipedia

Marie M. Muchmore (5 August 1909, Ardmore, Oklahoma – 26 April 1990, Dallas, Texas)[1] was one of the witnesses to the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963. A color 8 mm film that Muchmore photographed is one of the primary documents of the Kennedy assassination. The Muchmore film, with other 8 mm films taken by Abraham Zapruder and Orville Nix, was used by the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination and to position the presidential limousine in a forensic recreation of the event in May 1964.[2]

Muchmore was born Marie Mobley in Ardmore, Oklahoma. Her mother was half Chickasaw Indian.[3] One of her sisters, Aurelia, became a noted operatic soprano under the name Lushanya Mobley (1906–1990).[4] Marie had no children.

Muchmore was an employee of Justin McCarty dress manufacturers in Dallas (707 Young Street which was four blocks south of the Texas School Book Depository), and was in Dealey Plaza with five other employees, including Wilma Bond, who had a still camera. She set up her 8 mm Keystone movie camera near the northwest corner of Main Street and Houston Street and awaited the president’s arrival. The Muchmore film consists of seven sequences: six before the assassination, and one during the shooting. Muchmore began filming the presidential motorcade with her movie camera near the northwest corner of Main Street and Houston Street as the motorcade turned into Dealey Plaza. She then turned and went a few yards west to photograph the President's limousine as it went down Elm Street. After the car turned on Elm Street, the three gunshots were heard. Her film captures the fatal head shot, seen from about 135 feet (41 m) away.[5] The film ends seconds later as Secret Service agent Clint Hill runs to board the limousine.

Muchmore sold the undeveloped film to the Dallas office of United Press International on November 25, 1963 for $1,000. It was processed by Kodak in Dallas, and flown to New York City. It appeared the following day on local television station WNEW-TV.[6] The film now belongs to the Associated Press Television News, which restored it in 2002.[7]

While visiting her family in Oklahoma for Thanksgiving, Muchmore told them about the film she had taken of the assassination; her family then told the FBI about the film. The FBI initially interviewed Muchmore in December 1963, during which she admitted she had a camera with her but denied that she took any pictures of the assassination scene.[8] The FBI was unaware of the film's existence until a frame enlargement was published in the UPI book Four Days: The Historical Record of the Death of President Kennedy in January 1964.[9] A subsequent FBI interview in February 1964 says:

Mrs. Muchmore stated that after the car turned on Elm Street from Houston Street, she heard a loud noise which at first she thought was a firecracker but then with the crowd of people running in all directions and hearing the two further noises, sounding like gunfire, she advised that she began to run to find a place to hide.[10]

Great quote - from Cool Hand Luke- "Where are you now?" The man on the stairs that fired the fatal shot - hit me wth your best shot please. I am very content with the information I have gathered on my own and with plenty of assistance. If nothing else - anyone that wants to help me out can always get to me - lforman23@comcast.net.

The truth needs to be revealed finally. Time to get her done.

- lee

[Paul Rigby]

"The first film showing the assassination of President Kennedy was telecast in New York on November 26. It was a UPI Newsfilm exclusive It was serviced to UPI Newsfilm subscribers the world over.”

A quick survey of the few Brit newspapers I own from 27/28 Nov 1963 has so far failed to disclose any mention of the Muchmore film being shown on UK TV. This strikes me as odd because there is at least one reference to a film shot in the immediate aftermath. Surely a film of the actual shooting was more noteworthy?

The inevitable question: Has anyone any evidence that it was shown elsewhere on the planet on 26/27 November? Or in the days following?

And if so, how come the FBI wasn't aware of it and had to discover the existence of the film from the publication of a book in mid-December 1963?

Puzzling. Or perhaps not.

Paul

[Paul Rigby]

"The first film showing the assassination of President Kennedy was telecast in New York on November 26. It was a UPI Newsfilm exclusive It was serviced to UPI Newsfilm subscribers the world over.”

Here's UPI, courtesy of US News & World Report, seeking to rebind the fraying threads in mid-December 1963. Did all of the interpretation contained within really come from just the Muchmore and Nix films?

“As Warren Inquiry Starts – Latest on the Assassination,” U.S. News & World Report, 30 December 1963, pp.29-30:

“News films of the shooting remove any doubt about the actual sequence of shots.

United Press International, on December 16, gave this account of what happened in and around the Kennedy car, based on a study of UPI news film:

‘Here comes the shiny blue Lincoln, closely followed by the ‘Queen Mary,’ the limousine carrying Secret Service agents.

The first shot. Mrs Kennedy, smiling and waving in her bright pink suit and bright pink pillbox hat, abruptly leans toward her husband, seated on her right in the back seat.

Another shot. Governor John B. Connally…is hit. He raises up and falls toward Mrs Connally. She is facing the First Lady. Mrs Connally leans toward the Governor.

Clint Hill, a Secret Service man on the left running board of the ‘Queen Mary,’ sees it. He is running ahead. The ‘Queen Mary’ almost hits him as he cuts in front.

The third shot. The President’s head snaps to the left. His hair flies up. Mrs Kennedy leans closer toward him. Her right arm swings protectively around him.

Hill is at the rear of the car now, clutching. His groping left foot misses the foothold built into the rear of the limousine. He slips and is running behind the car, clinging to it. Four, five, six great steps, he hopes to keep up as the car picks up speed with a rush.

Mrs Kennedy wheels to her right.

She sees Hill is not aboard. Mrs Kennedy’s arm lifts from around her husband. She spins up and out, onto the trunk. She is on all fours, right hand out to Hill.

Their arms link. He is on the trunk now. The car is speeding off, pressing both of them back. He is on the trunk now and is pressing her back to the seat.’”

[Paul Rigby]

Mr. Shaneyfelt.

Our first knowledge of this came as a result of a review of the book "Four Days" which covers the assassination period, in which representatives of the FBI noted a colored picture taken from a motion picture film that did not match either the Nix film or the Zapruder film.

Once we established that, then we investigated and learned that it was made by Mrs. Mary Muchmore, and was at that time in the possession of United Press International in New York,

http://www.jfk-assassination.de/warren/wch/vol5/page140.php

So, let me see if I have this element of the anti-alterationist story straight: UPI had footage of the actual shooting of President Kennedy but withheld news of its existence from the FBI, the very organisation assigned the lead role in the official investigation, for a period of, what, two to three weeks?

Curious.

In addition, no one at WNEW-TV bothered to mention it to the FBI, nor any viewer.

Curiouser, and curiouser.

Broadcasting magazine “reviewed” – more accurately, recorded the bald facts of Four Days' publication and contents – in its “Book Notes” section, 16 December 1963, p.102:

”Four Days – The Historical Record of the Death of President Kennedy,” United Press International-American Heritage Magazine. $2-2.95. 144 pp.

A day-by-day account of the events surrounding President Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas and Washington, the book contains 116 black and white pictures, 15 color photos and a 16-page appendix that includes official eulogies and excerpts from some of the late President’s major addresses.

Radio, television and newspaper subscribers to UPI are eligible to sell the book to the public for a recommended price of $2. A bookstore edition will be sold by Simon & Schuster for $2.95.

[Paul Rigby]

So, let me see if I have this element of the anti-alterationist story straight: UPI had footage of the actual shooting of President Kennedy but withheld news of its existence from the FBI, the very organisation assigned the lead role in the official investigation, for a period of, what, two to three weeks?

Curious.

In addition, no one at WNEW-TV bothered to mention it to the FBI, nor any viewer.

Curiouser, and curiouser.

It gets stranger.

Here’s an extract from David R. Wrone’s The Zapruder Film: Reframing JFK’s Assassination (University Press of Kansas, 2003), pp.150-152:

“At nine o’clock on the morning of November 25, 1963, three days after the murder of President Kennedy – but early on the first working day after the murder – Walter Bent, sales service manager of the Eastman Kodak Company, the same firm that had developed Zapruder’s film, telephoned the Dallas FBI office and spoke to FBI special agent Milton L. Newsom (41). His company had just received film from Charles Bronson to be developed. In his package Bronson had included a note advising Kodak that the film may be of the assassin as he fired the shots. Would the FBI, said Bent, be interested in viewing the film? (42)

Newsom’s memorandum of the conversation reads as follows:

Mr. WALTER BENT, Sales Service Manager, Eastman Kodak Company, Processing Division, 3131 Manor Way, telephone FL 7-4654, Dallas, telephonically advised his company had received two rolls of 8 milimeter [sic] Kodachrome and one roll of 35 milimeter [sic] film in a package from Mr. CHARLES BRONSON, Chief Engineer, Zarel Mfg. Company, 9230 Denton Drive, Dallas, Texas.

Mr. BRONSON enclosed a letter with his film, stating that the film had been taken at the instant President KENNEDY was assassinated. BRONSON also advised in the letter that from the position he was stationed when he took the film, he feels quite certain the Texas School Book Depository Building was clearly photographed and he feels that the window from which the shots were fired will be depicted on the film. He stated for this reason he believes he may have a picture of the assassin, as he fired the shots.

Mr. BENT stated Mr. BRONSON’s letter indicated he desired to be cooperative regarding the film with proper authorities and BENT is of the opinion that BRONSON will have no objection to turning the film over to proper authorities in the event it is of value to the investigation.

Mr. BENT stated that he would make arrangements with Mr. BRONSON to view the film at the Kodak Processing Centre and would arrange this so that FBI agents could be present and at the same time interview BRONSON concerning his film of the scene.

Mr. BENT assured his full cooperation regarding all film received of a like nature that may possibly be connected with this matter and arrangements were made with him to immediately notify SA NEWSOM of any film of possible value.

The Eastman Kodak Processing Service Division receives all color film made by 8 milimeter [sic] Kodachrome in this area and also most other film for the area is processed by this division. Mr. BENT explained that his employees have not worked since Saturday and they are due back to work at 11:30 P.M., 11/25/63. When processing of recent film orders begins, he expects other films taken at the approximate time of President’s assassination.

He said that BRONSON’s film should be processed and ready for viewing by 3:00 P.M. He was told that SA NEWSOM would meet him at that time (43).

Bent then phoned Bronson and set up a meeting at the Kodak plant for 3:00 P.M.

At 3:00 Special Agents Milton Newsom and Emory Norton appeared at the plant and together with Bronson watched the films (44). Afterwards they did not ask for copies. When they returned to their office, they wrote up a memorandum on the films...

Notes:

(41) See Trask, Pictures of the Pain; George Lardner Jr., “Film in JFK Assassination Reissued,” Washington Post, November 11, 1978; “New Clue in JFK Slaying,” San Francisco Bulletin, November 26, 1978; Wendell Rawls Jr., “New Film Suggests an Oswald Cohort,” New York Times, November 27, 1978; Earl Golz, “JFK Film May Record Two Gunmen,” Dallas Morning News, November 26, 1978.

(42) FBI Agent Milton Newsom to SAC, 11/25/63, serial 62-109060-456.

(43) Ibid.

(44) Trask, Pictures of the Pain, 278-304, is a history of the film.

According to Richard Trask’s Pictures of the Pain (p.205), citing Maurice Schonfeld’s July-August 1975 Columbia Journalism Review piece, “The Shadow of a Gunman,” Muchmore’s film was developed at the same “Eastman Kodak in Dallas” on the same day as Bronson’s – but entirely unbeknownst, it seems, to Mr. Bent, either at 9am, when he rang the FBI, or at 3pm, when he met with the Bureau’s Newsom and Norton.

[Paul Rigby]

"In the meantime, sometime on Sunday in New York City, Life's publisher C.D. Jackson viewed with horror the images of the newly arrived film. According to secondhand sources, its shocking scenes convinced him that the magazine should acquire motion picture rights to the film as well to keep the its frightful death sequences out of the hands of exploiters and such gruesome images away from the public,"

David R. Wrone. The Zapruder Film: Reframing JFK's Assassination (University Press of Kansas, 2003), p.35.

C.D. Jackson’s papers at the Eisenhower Library in Kansas do not contain a detailed diary covering late November 1963, but they do offer a trip and speech log; and a desk calendar on which Jackson noted forthcoming meetings and appointments, things to be done, birthdays, etc. The film made such a profound impression on Jackson that neither contain any reference to an alleged viewing on either Monday, 25 November, or the previous day, Sunday, 24 November. Yet the desk calendar does contain clear evidence of Jackson noting changes to his plans as a consequence of Kennedy’s murder. No wonder Stolley changed his story on Jackson’s role!

A History of the Zapruder Film by Martin Shackelford, updated by Debra Conway

Nov. 24: While the original film was in Chicago where frames were selected for publication, the duplicate was shown to Time-LIFE executives in New York. C.D. Jackson concluded that it was too gruesome to allow showings on TV, and ordered all rights purchased. (Wainwright)

Stolley 1973 version: The film is shown to Time Inc. executives in New York. LIFE's publisher, C.D. Jackson "was so upset by the head-wound sequence that he proposed the company obtain all rights to the film and withhold it from public viewing at least until emotions had calmed. Zapruder seemed relieved when Stolley called again.

Stolley 1992 version: All decisions regarding the use or non-use of the Zapruder film were made by LIFE's editors, not by anyone (like C.D. Jackson, LIFE publisher, formerly of military intelligence) on the publishing side.

http://www.jfklancer.com/History-Z.html

1973 version: “The Greatest Home Movie Ever Made: What Happened Next…,” Esquire, November 1973

1992 version: “The Zapruder Film: Shots Seen Around the World,” Entertainment Weekly, 19 January 1992

Sadly, the Sixth Form Museum has not yet seen fit to inform readers of its website history of the film of Stolley’s heart-warming improvement in powers of recall:

LIFE publisher C.D. Jackson, after viewing a copy in New York, instructed Stolley to purchase remaining television and movie rights for a price that eventually reached $150,000 plus royalties. Zapruder donated the first $25,000 to the widow of Dallas Police officer J.D. Tippit, killed 45 minutes after the assassination after stopping Lee Harvey Oswald in the Dallas suburb of Oak Cliff.

A third color home movie, filmed by Marie Muchmore and showing the fatal shot from a different angle, was purchased by United Press International (UPI), processed in Dallas at Kodak and flown to New York City. It appeared the following day on WNEW-TV and was described in local newspapers that evening and the next day.

http://www.jfk.org/Research/Zapruder/Zapru...Film_Chrono.htm

I hereby resist all temptation to point out that if claim 1 is for the birds, what is the basis for trusting claim 2?

[Paul Rigby]

It is an article of faith among leading anti-alterationists that Mary Muchmore a) definitely did shoot film footage of President Kennedy’s execution (despite her explicit denial to the FBI); and that this brief film sequence was shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on Tuesday, 26 November 1963.

How easy is it to furnish a false account of an assassination film’s history? Is there a comparable example of a false/falsified dating for the first TV airing of an assassination film? The answers: very; and yes. And what a trivial example it is, too.

In book after book, on website after website, we meet the same confident insistence that the evening of 6 March 1975 saw the first showing on US television of the Zapruder film, courtesy of Geraldo Rivera’s weekly Good Night America talk show on ABC. One small problem – it’s untrue.

In fact, a copy of the Zapruder first aired on Los Angeles station KTLA on the evening of 14 February 1969. Pat Valentino’s recent interview with Len Osanic provides incontrovertible evidence:

http://www.blackopradio.com/archives2008.html

Show #368, 3 April 2008.

[Bill Miller]

How the foolishness starts ... A reporter sees some images and makes the mistake that they are from the Zapruder film ...

Edited May 5, 2008 by Bill Miller

[Paul Rigby]

How the foolishness starts ... A reporter sees some images and makes the mistake that they are from the Zapruder film ...

Research, Bill? The slippery slope...

But your point is?

Paul

[Bill Miller]

Research, Bill? The slippery slope...

But your point is?

Paul

The slippery slope ??? You haven't got even a foot-hold yet. But as I recall ... you were asking for any evidence a while back that showed that Muchmore's film had been publicly seen by the 27th of November and yet was mistakenly referred tos when it was referenced as the film that Abraham Zapruder had taken.

[Paul Rigby]

The slippery slope ??? You haven't got even a foot-hold yet. But as I recall ... you were asking for any evidence a while back that showed that Muchmore's film had been publicly seen by the 27th of November and yet was mistakenly referred tos when it was referenced as the film that Abraham Zapruder had taken.

Bill, pity the caption doesn't explicitly state the name "Zapruder," but one can't have everything. Still, for argument's sake, let's assume you're right. Where does this take us?

We now have two instances, on consecutive days, in geographically dispersed newspapers under different ownerships, of a photo or photos taken from the south side of Elm being passed off as (a) still(s) from the Zapruder film. The previous day saw the following example, one instanced earlier in this thread:

UPI (Dallas), “Movie Film Shows Murder of President,” Philadelphia Daily News, Tuesday, 26 November 1963, p.1:

Under the headline “Man Who Came to See JFK Makes Tragic Movie,” there is the following blurb above 4 stills: “These dramatic pictures are from an 8mm ‘home movie’ reel, shot by Dallas dressmaker Abraham Zapruder who went to see President Kennedy ride through cheering throngs in Texas city. His camera recorded one of the most tragic moments in American history. Story page 3.”

Below are 4 stills from…the Muchmore film!

Did two newspapers, in very different parts of the country and belonging to different proprietors, really make the same “mistake”? Did none of them read Life magazine (see below) or listen to CBS News (Dan Rather on 25 Nov)?

Or was this a centrally dictated “line” which amounted to a holding switch-cum-obfuscation, a stop-gap measure deployed while alterations to the original fraud where settled upon?

It may be objected that such a switch would be crass in the extreme, for was not Life magazine winging its way on to newsstands across the country on 26 November, with an edition containing stills from the Z film?

Quite true, but this is to ignore just how crass the film’s controllers demonstrably were – a later edition of the same magazine famously included an article by Paul Mandel* which contained a description of Kennedy’s movements in the limousine entirely contradicted by the very film Life itself had already printed stills from.

Subtlety was not always these boys forte. Nor did it need to be – they were above the law and they knew it.

* The pertinent extract from Mandel’s piece, “End to Nagging Rumors: The Six Critical Seconds,” in Life’s edition of 6 December 1963:

The doctor said one bullet passed from back to front on the right side of the President’s head. But the other, the doctor reported, entered the President’s throat from the front and then lodged in his body.

Since by this time the limousine was 50 yards past Oswald and the President’s back was turned almost directly to the sniper, it has been hard to understand how the bullet could enter the front of his throat. Hence the recurring guess that there was a second sniper somewhere else. But the 8mm film shows the President turning his body far around to the right as he waves to someone in the crowd. His throat is exposed–toward the sniper’s nest–just before he clutches it,”

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/mandel.htm

PS While you're in the mood to address my earlier questions, any sign of that New York paper's report on the alleged showing of Muchmore on WNEW-TV, 26 Nov? Surely it's been printed by now?!

Sherpa Rigby

[Bill Miller]

PS While you're in the mood to address my earlier questions, any sign of that New York paper's report on the alleged showing of Muchmore on WNEW-TV, 26 Nov? Surely it's been printed by now?!

Sherpa Rigby

Paul ... newspapers have deadlines, which in those days they were by midnight the night before ... some by 11PM. I learned this through Gary Mack. The newspaper data I am sharing with you was the morning edition, thus to have it on the stands ... those images were furnished no later than the day before on the 26th.

By the way ... Zapruder's name does appear on the caption and it appears that the person writing the article, who wasn't yet well versed in the details of the assassination, had simply thought the Muchmore images were from the Zapruder film.

Bill Miller

[Paul Rigby]

PS While you're in the mood to address my earlier questions, any sign of that New York paper's report on the alleged showing of Muchmore on WNEW-TV, 26 Nov? Surely it's been printed by now?!

Sherpa Rigby

Paul ... newspapers have deadlines, which in those days they were by midnight the night before ... some by 11PM. I learned this through Gary Mack. The newspaper data I am sharing with you was the morning edition, thus to have it on the stands ... those images were furnished no later than the day before on the 26th.

By the way ... Zapruder's name does appear on the caption and it appears that the person writing the article, who wasn't yet well versed in the details of the assassination, had simply thought the Muchmore images were from the Zapruder film.

Bill Miller

Fascinating, Bill.

First, I take it, then, the answer to my question re: Mack and the New York newspaper clipping is still "No"?

Second, "15 seconds" - how curiously common that figure was in the first week post-assassination.

Three, we seem to have an epidemic of newspapermen mistaking Muchmore for Zapruder, despite the best endeavours of Life magazine's first post-assassination edition (available on the evening of 26 November, well before deadlines for 27 November morning papers). Also, I wonder if the "error" ran both ways? If "error" it was, of course.

Paul