Oswald's Coke

[Robert Prudhomme]

In many cases, the merchant who has the Coke machine on his premises had to buy the Coke machine, as well as but the product from Coca-Cola. BUT they weren't necessarily prohibited from putting other brands in the machine, as long as the top 2,3,or 4 rows were strictly Coca-Cola. So in 1963 you could theoretically go to buy a Coke, and end up with a Sprite, a Pepsi, a Barqs root beer, or the hot new drink that the youth were making popular, Mountain Dew [a Pepsi product]. In the town where I grew up, if it came from the Coke machine, it was a "coke"...not a "pop," not a "soda," sometimes a "soft drink"...and sometimes it was actually a Coca-Cola.

I recall Seven-Up from 1963 but, didn't Sprite come out a few years later? Or was it on the market in the USA earlier than in Canada?

[Mark Knight]

Wikipedia says Sprite was introduced in the US in 1961.

[Robert Prudhomme]

That would make sense. We always got things in Canada a few years after they came out in the States. Do you recall "Hires" Root Beer in the brown bottles?

[William Kelly]

Of course hot dogs are best with root beer, and coke was one of the first American companies to go international, thus branding America with the coke logo.

To bring the thread back on topic, I'd like to refer to the three soda pop bottles that should be in evidence but are not - Oswald's coke - what happened to that bottle when he got finished drinking it? - the Dr. Pepper found just outside the Sniper's Lair that was dusted for fingerprints and should be in the evidence locker but isn't, and the soda pop bottle - what kind was it again? - that the black couple had sitting on the bench on the knoll that broke when they knocked it over when startled by the gunshots.

Also recall that Chauncey Holt said that one of the handlers directing his actions worked for the orange soda company owned by Pepsi, and that the biggest convention in Dallas at the time of the assassination was the carbonated bottlers association - which included Donald Kendell, Nixon and Ed Meyers, brother of Ruby's great friend from Chicago Larry Meyers.

Ed Meyers owned the Pepsi bottling company in Brooklyn, and with his wife, before attending the Dallas convention, visited their son Ralph in Mexico City. Ralph was working as a journalist in Mexico City after having been a bus driver in Chicago (with Homer Echivara) and before that serving as a Crypto cleared technician at a U2 base in Turkey where he worked for the Army Security Agency.

I like the photo of the limo driving down a Dallas street with Jackie looking and apparently reading the poster on the side of the bus that promoted the soft drink bottlers convention - and i wonder what she was thinking?

Edited September 25, 2013 by William Kelly

[William Kelly]

Thanks to Dave, for calling attention to Jean Davison's observation re: the Sept. 23, 1964 Baker statement to the FBI - that was requested by Alfred Goldberg, the US military historian whose Warren Commission work was paid for by the Dept. of Defense. Goldberg actually wrote most of the Warren Report narrative, and also wrote a history of the Pentagon - the building, and the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon. He is still alive, and in a telephone conversation on his last day on the job a few years ago, Goldberg told me that he is working with Max Holland, who is writing the definitive account of the Warren Commission.

I suspect that Goldberg, who requested Baker and Truly furnish the statements, is the author of the Second Floor encounter, and belatedly recognizes that it exonerates Oswald.

Dave VP, why, on your web site, did you include that mud slinging internet forum exchange, when all you really needed to do was to quote Jean Davison? Why muddy the waters?

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

Jean merely said that Burnett had possibly heard some incorrect through-the-grapevine information about Oswald's "Coke", and he (Burnett) incorporated that incorrect information into the statement he wrote up for Officer Marrion L. Baker to sign on September 23, 1964.

http://s217.photobucket.com/user/David_Von_Pein/media/MISCELLANEOUS JFK-RELATED PHOTOS/MarrionBaker9-23-64AffidavitAsSeenI.png.html?t=1277192153

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?s=888f941f5d45616302513bb83d77312f&showtopic=20456

"The agent imo included the Coke not because Baker said it, but because it was "established myth" by 9/64 and the agent included it as part of the narrative. He probably didn't give it a second thought and neither did Baker when he crossed it out. It wasn't important to them." -- Jean Davison; January 10, 2010

And, sure enough, there is. I found the cover letter in question at the Mary Ferrell website. It's located in Warren Commission Document #1526.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11921&relPageId=2

CD1526 includes a letter that was sent from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission (dated September 25, 1964):

"Reference is made to a telephone conversation between Mr. Alfred Goldberg of your [Warren Commission] staff and Mr. J. R. Malley of this Bureau [FBI] on September 23, 1964. During this conversation Mr. Goldberg requested that signed statements be obtained from Mr. Roy S. Truly and Officer Marrion L. Baker of the Dallas Police Department. Enclosed are the original signed statements obtained from these individuals and a Xerox of each. Sincerely yours, /s/ J. Edgar Hoover"

----------

So, it appears that Jean Davison could very well be correct when she said this in an earlier Internet message:

"Baker's affidavit of Sept 23, 1964 and a similar one from Truly were dated only one day before the Warren Report was officially released, and both their statements were, unlike all the other FBI documents I'm aware of, *handwritten*. IOW, they were prepared in a big hurry. Their statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald. (Neither Baker or Truly had been specifically asked this in their testimony. Their 9/64 affidavits supplied the explicit answer: no one else was in the lunchroom.) I surmise that someone at the WC realized at the last minute that they needed a "cite" for this statement."-- Jean Davison; 01/10/10

Dave VP, why, on your web site, did you include that mud slinging internet forum exchange, when all you really needed to do was to quote Jean Davison? Why muddy the waters?

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

Jean merely said that Burnett had possibly heard some incorrect through-the-grapevine information about Oswald's "Coke", and he (Burnett) incorporated that incorrect information into the statement he wrote up for Officer Marrion L. Baker to sign on September 23, 1964.

http://s217.photobucket.com/user/David_Von_Pein/media/MISCELLANEOUS JFK-RELATED PHOTOS/MarrionBaker9-23-64AffidavitAsSeenI.png.html?t=1277192153

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?s=888f941f5d45616302513bb83d77312f&showtopic=20456

"The agent imo included the Coke not because Baker said it, but because it was "established myth" by 9/64 and the agent included it as part of the narrative. He probably didn't give it a second thought and neither did Baker when he crossed it out. It wasn't important to them." -- Jean Davison; January 10, 2010

And, sure enough, there is. I found the cover letter in question at the Mary Ferrell website. It's located in Warren Commission Document #1526.

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=11921&relPageId=2

CD1526 includes a letter that was sent from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission (dated September 25, 1964):

"Reference is made to a telephone conversation between Mr. Alfred Goldberg of your [Warren Commission] staff and Mr. J. R. Malley of this Bureau [FBI] on September 23, 1964. During this conversation Mr. Goldberg requested that signed statements be obtained from Mr. Roy S. Truly and Officer Marrion L. Baker of the Dallas Police Department. Enclosed are the original signed statements obtained from these individuals and a Xerox of each. Sincerely yours, /s/ J. Edgar Hoover"

----------

So, it appears that Jean Davison could very well be correct when she said this in an earlier Internet message:

"Baker's affidavit of Sept 23, 1964 and a similar one from Truly were dated only one day before the Warren Report was officially released, and both their statements were, unlike all the other FBI documents I'm aware of, *handwritten*. IOW, they were prepared in a big hurry. Their statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald. (Neither Baker or Truly had been specifically asked this in their testimony. Their 9/64 affidavits supplied the explicit answer: no one else was in the lunchroom.) I surmise that someone at the WC realized at the last minute that they needed a "cite" for this statement."-- Jean Davison; 01/10/10

Edited September 26, 2013 by William Kelly

[David Von Pein]

I suspect that Goldberg, who requested Baker and Truly furnish the statements, is the author of the Second Floor encounter, and belatedly recognizes that it exonerates Oswald.

Oh good! Now we've got someone else for a conspiracy theorist to label as a xxxx without a single solitary shred of proof to back it up--Mr. Alfred Goldberg. Lovely.

Edited September 26, 2013 by David Von Pein

[William Kelly]

I suspect that Goldberg, who requested Baker and Truly furnish the statements, is the author of the Second Floor encounter, and belatedly recognizes that it exonerates Oswald.

Oh good! Now we've got someone else for a conspiracy theorist to label as a xxxx without a single solitary shred of proof to back it up--Mr. Alfred Goldberg. Lovely.

Hey Dave, whose calling Goldberg a xxxx? Not me. And I resent your implication that I am a conspiracy theorist if it is me who you are referring to.

As the facts are known, - thanks to Jean Davison - Goldberg - on September 23, 1964, after his Warren Report narrative was printed and about to be released to the public, called the FBI and had them - I'm sure reluctantly - locate Roy Truly and Marrion Baker and have them sign a statement regarding the Second Floor Lunchroom encounter, which they did.

In fact, I had a very pleasant telephone conversation with Mr. Goldberg, a real gentleman and professional military historian - a civilian himself - and he was proud of his role in writing a readable and convincing narrative of the assassination - and had I known about the belated request for the Baker-Truly affidavits, I would have asked him about them. And while I don't believe Max Holland will ask Goldberg the question, he is still alive and can be questioned, as he had no hesitation in talking to me.

And I politely request that you refrain from accusing people of being CTs or calling other people liars - when that in fact is not the case.

BK

Edited September 26, 2013 by William Kelly

[David Von Pein]

Bill, you said:

"I suspect that Goldberg...is the author of the Second Floor encounter."

That sure sounds like you're accusing Goldberg himself of just MAKING UP the encounter on the second floor. But I suppose maybe you just meant that Goldberg wrote the section in the WR about the second-floor encounter (but didn't MAKE UP anything about it). Is that what you meant? If so, I apologize. But words like "I suspect that Goldberg is the author..." certainly have a sinister ring.

And you can't be serious about being angry with me for calling you a "conspiracy theorist" (or CTer).

You believe in a conspiracy. Ergo, you are a CTer. So why pretend otherwise?

BTW, it wasn't Jean Davison who mentioned Alfred Goldberg. It was me. I dug up CD1526 and quoted the passage with Goldberg's name in it after Jean first posted on the subject. But I don't think she ever brought up Goldberg's name at all.

Edited September 26, 2013 by David Von Pein

[William Kelly]

Bill, you said:

"I suspect that Goldberg...is the author of the Second Floor encounter."

That sure sounds like you're accusing Goldberg himself of just MAKING UP the encounter on the second floor. But I suppose maybe you just meant that Goldberg wrote the section in the WR about the second-floor encounter (but didn't MAKE UP anything about it). Is that what you meant? If so, I apologize. But words like "I suspect that Goldberg is the author..." certainly have a sinister ring.

And you can't be serious about being angry with me for calling you a "conspiracy theorist" (or CTer).

You believe in a conspiracy. Ergo, you are a CTer. So why pretend otherwise?

BTW, it wasn't Jean Davison who mentioned Alfred Goldberg. It was me. I dug up CD1526 and quoted the passage with Goldberg's name in it after Jean first posted on the subject. But I don't think she ever brought up Goldberg's name at all.

No Dave, I'm not accusing Goldberg of making anything up, I'm accusing him of writing that part of the Warren Report narrative, and recognizing the importance of it, and whether it has a sinister ring or not, that's what's happening.

And while I have the highest respect for Jean as a researcher and analyst, but reject her conclusions, I will give you credit for discovering that Goldberg requested the FBI obtain the belated statements from Baker and Truly. Good going guy.

Now if we could only get Goldberg to join the forum and answer a few questions.

[David Von Pein]

No Dave, I'm not accusing Goldberg of making anything up, I'm accusing him of writing that part of the Warren Report narrative, and recognizing the importance of it, and whether it has a sinister ring or not, that's what's happening.

Huh??

So, in essence, you're "accusing" (??) Mr. Goldberg of simply telling the truth about the second-floor encounter. Is that correct?

Should the word "accusing" be a part of your above quote then? If he's not "making up" anything, then what is he being "accused" of?

I'm stumped. ~shrug~

It appears to me as if Bill Kelly is manufacturing an "accusation" that even he doesn't believe in.

Edited September 26, 2013 by David Von Pein

[William Kelly]

No Dave, I'm not accusing Goldberg of making anything up, I'm accusing him of writing that part of the Warren Report narrative, and recognizing the importance of it, and whether it has a sinister ring or not, that's what's happening.

Huh??

So, in essence, you're "accusing" (??) Mr. Goldberg of simply telling the truth about the second-floor encounter. Is that correct?

Should the word "accusing" be a part of your above quote then? If he's not "making up" anything, then what is he being "accused" of?

I'm stumped. ~shrug~

It appears to me as if Bill Kelly is manufacturing an "accusation" that even he doesn't believe in.

You're only confused because you have a muddled head Dave. Didn't you take logic in college?

Okay, I'm accusing Alfred Goldberg of writing the Warren Report narrative that includes the Second Floor Lunchroom encounter and the coke, but I don't know whether it is the truth or not. I believe it, but other parts of the Warren Report have been proven wrong (Odio's visitors, etc.)

What did I manufacture again? I didn't manufacture anything.

You're the one who provided the document that clearly indicates Goldberg had the FBI get the statements from Baker and Truly after the report was already written and printed, why do you think he did that?

Are you accusing yourself of being stupid?

And Goldberg had help in writing the Warren Report narrative - a guy named Winnicker - or something like that - I think he was a German who came in with Paperclip crew.

BK

[David Von Pein]

You're only confused because you have a muddled head Dave. Didn't you take logic in college?

Okay, I'm accusing Alfred Goldberg of writing the Warren Report narrative that includes the Second Floor Lunchroom encounter and the coke, but I don't know whether it is the truth or not. I believe it, but other parts of the Warren Report have been proven wrong (Odio's visitors, etc.)

Talk about muddled. I think your post above qualifies as being that. Because this stuff you're coming up with regarding Goldberg is just goofy. And placing the sinister word "accusing" in your posts concerning Goldberg defies all logic, since you previously said you don't think Goldberg made up anything relating to the lunchroom encounter for the Warren Commission:

"I'm accusing Alfred Goldberg of writing the Warren Report narrative that includes the Second Floor Lunchroom encounter and the coke..."

"I don't know whether it is the truth or not."

But...

"I believe it."

And, of course, any sensible person would have to believe an encounter took place on the second floor involving Oswald, Baker, and Truly -- because ALL THREE of those people (including the murderer himself, Mr. Oswald) confirmed that the encounter took place. So Alfred Goldberg's input on this matter amounts to NOTHING. Nada. So why even bring him up at all? Just to muddy the very clear waters surrounding the obviously true second-floor lunchroom encounter?

You're the one who provided the document that clearly indicates Goldberg had the FBI get the statements from Baker and Truly after the report was already written and printed, why do you think he did that?

Is your memory failing you badly, Bill? You know the answer to that question you just asked, because you've been talking about that article that's on my website for several days now. (Didn't you even read it?) Let me quote from it.....

"After reading Jean Davison's 1/10/10 post regarding this matter, I decided to dig into it a little further, with the thought in my mind that there is probably a "cover letter" from the FBI associated with those Baker and Truly affidavits from September of 1964.

And, sure enough, there is. I found the cover letter in question at the Mary Ferrell website. It's located in Warren Commission Document #1526.

CD1526 includes a letter that was sent from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to J. Lee Rankin of the Warren Commission (dated September 25, 1964):

"Reference is made to a telephone conversation between Mr. Alfred Goldberg of your [Warren Commission] staff and Mr. J. R. Malley of this Bureau [FBI] on September 23, 1964. During this conversation Mr. Goldberg requested that signed statements be obtained from Mr. Roy S. Truly and Officer Marrion L. Baker of the Dallas Police Department. Enclosed are the original signed statements obtained from these individuals and a Xerox of each. Sincerely yours, /s/ J. Edgar Hoover"

So, it appears that Jean Davison could very well be correct when she said this in an earlier Internet message:

"Baker's affidavit of Sept 23, 1964 and a similar one from Truly were dated only one day before the Warren Report was officially released, and both their statements were, unlike all the other FBI documents I'm aware of, *handwritten*. IOW, they were prepared in a big hurry. Their statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald. (Neither Baker or Truly had been specifically asked this in their testimony. Their 9/64 affidavits supplied the explicit answer: no one else was in the lunchroom.) I surmise that someone at the WC realized at the last minute that they needed a "cite" for this statement." -- Jean Davison; 01/10/10

The 9/25/64 letter from Hoover to Rankin doesn't mention anything about the specific reason(s) as to WHY Goldberg and the Warren Commission wanted the additional statements from Baker and Truly, but Hoover's letter certainly DOES tell us that the Baker/Truly statements were taken because of a direct request by the Warren Commission itself.

But Jean is definitely correct about these three things:

1.) Both of the 9/23/64 statements mention the fact that Oswald was ALONE in the second-floor lunchroom when Baker and Truly saw LHO on 11/22/63.

2.) The 9/23/64 statements obtained from Baker and Truly "were prepared in a big hurry" [Jean Davison; 1/10/10]. This is fairly obvious because of the date of the telephone call from Alfred Goldberg to the FBI--September 23, 1964--the exact same date when the statements were signed by both Marrion Baker and Roy Truly.

3.) "Their [baker's & Truly's] statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald" [Jean Davison; 1/10/10]. Jean, once again, is 100% correct. In Appendix XII of the Warren Commission Report (entitled "Speculations and Rumors"), the following text can be found on Page 648:

"Speculation. -- There were other people present in the lunchroom at the time that Baker and Truly saw Oswald there.

"Commission finding. -- Baker and Truly have both stated that there was no one in the lunchroom other than Oswald at the time that they entered. No other witness to this incident has been found." "

-- DVP; January 2010

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

Edited September 26, 2013 by David Von Pein

[Robert Prudhomme]

"And, of course, any sensible person would have to believe an encounter took place on the second floor involving Oswald, Baker, and Truly -- because ALL THREE of those people (including the murderer himself, Mr. Oswald) confirmed that the encounter took place. So Alfred Goldberg's input on this matter amounts to NOTHING. Nada. So why even bring him up at all? Just to muddy the very clear waters surrounding the obviously true second-floor lunchroom encounter?"

Wen did Oswald say he encountered Baker and Truly on the 2nd floor?

[Ken Davies]

It was probably during those many hours of interrogation that were not recorded by the police.

It may have been the crime of the century, but they were using 19th century procedures.

Bill is right about root beer and hot dogs, while David VP is certainly the go to guy for KFC!

[David Von Pein]

[When] did Oswald say he encountered Baker and Truly on the 2nd floor?

In the Hosty/Bookhout report, which details their interrogation of Oswald on November 22

[WR; Page 613]. And in another of FBI agent Bookhout's reports, which also details Oswald's statements [WR; Page 619]. Oswald didn't mention the encounter with Baker in the first report

linked above, but he does in the second one. But he says he was on the second floor in each instance.

Edited September 27, 2013 by David Von Pein