Prayer Man is a Man

[Andrej Stancak]

2 hours ago, John Butler said:

Prayerman is Oswald

🥇    ... and the rest is your battle, good luck in it!

[Jonathan Cohen]

3 hours ago, John Butler said:

There is only one problem with this.  Who is the Doorway Man in Altgens 6.  It sure isn't Billie Lovelady.  I have a hard time thinking of a third Oswald as Doorway Man.  The photo altering of Doorway Man is poor due to rushing the photo to the public.  Doorway Man is someone who the assassination cover up artists didn't want known so they covered his face with a Lovelady mask.  He is an individual who would have blown the cover up.  So, who was he?  I don't know.

"A Lovelady mask" ?? Does ANY serious researcher believe this nonsense? Where did the forgers get the "Lovelady mask" from? They magically had it ready in advance and knew that James Altgens would come rushing in the door with his undeveloped film, and, voila ?? How did they know what clothing Lovelady would be wearing that day? It's just absurd.

[John Butler]

[John Butler]

[John Butler]

More:

The upper left-hand frame is Zapruder 002.  The right-hand upper photo crop is from Altgens 6.  And, the bottom photo crop is Altgens 5.

This will need to be magnified for better viewing.  Jack White said that if you compared the crowd at the east crosswalk of Elm in Altgens 5 with the crowd in the east crosswalk of Elm in Zapruder you would not find the same person in both Altgens photo and Zapruder frame.  That is true.  If you add Altgens 5 then you can say there is a possibility of one character being in both Altgens 5 and 6, but not Zapruder.

There were 3 Dallas policemen assigned to monitor and supervise the intersection of Houston and Elm.  These were Welcome Barnett, Joe Marshall Smith, and Edgar Leon Smith.  If memory serves, these men were assigned to various locations there.  Officer Barnett was in the center of Houston and Elm at the north crosswalk between the TSBD and the Dal-Tex building.  Officer Joe Smith was in the middle of the Elm crosswalk between the Dal-Tex building and the Court Records Building.  Officer Edgar Smith said he was leaning against or just below a set of widows at the Court Records Building. 

The Dallas Police officer seen in Altgens 5 and Altgens 6 may be Officer Joe Smith.  With what little you can see of the crowd in Altgens 6, and with a wider view in Altgens 5 that is the only person I can identify as possibly being the same.  With Zapruder 002 through in that is still the only policeman that can be identified.  No policeman is seen in Zapruder 002 except 3 motorcycle policemen.

There is a white van with “CLEAN” on the side.  This vehicle is not seen in Zapruder or Altgens 6.

But, folks none of these alterations are possible due to the photo being faxed to AP wire service in New York with ½ hour of it being taken.  There was no time for alterations.  So, how did the alterations such as Doorway Man’s mask get into the photo?

Here’s one more alteration just for the heck of it:

This argument was the first I read about on another site concerning Altgens 6 validity.

The shorter shadow was supposed to be the shadow of Jean Hill and the longer shadow that of Mary Moorman. The perspective in this is certainly strange.  The p. limo’s position is supposedly equal to Zapruder frame 255.  Jean Hill is not seen until Z 287.  Painted shadows and strange perspective. 

In this photo we can see a portion of the people I call Manniken Row, maybe 4 people in the eastern part at the beginning of the row.  There are roughly 19 people there in Zapruder.  Well, in Zapruder, but not others.  Stange perspective again asks shouldn’t we see the Stemmons Sign if this truly is the p. limo’s position at Z 255.  We first see the p. limo come out from behind the Stemmons sign at Z 213 or so. And, we should see that sign if we seen Hill and Moorman’s shadows beginning at Z 287.  That’s about 60 feet between the two, Stemmons Sign and Hill/Moorman shadows.

Strange perspective or alterations.  

[Greg Doudna]

Andrej Stancak -- After studying through again your your research on this thread I am convinced your detailed case for Prayer Man being Oswald is as strong as it can be absent a sharper photograph to give facial recognition. Point after point checks out and matches, as you bring out. Height, 5'9". The Type 2 male pattern hairline true of ca. 25% of males. The grayscale of the shirt in the black-and-white in agreement with the maroon/reddish color of the shirt Oswald was wearing, CE151. The identification of Sarah Stanton as to Wesley Frazier's left, as Frazier himself said. The body language analysis is interesting. The lack of any other identification of PM, including from Frazier. The agreement with Oswald's own claims of where he was at the time of the assassination, according to the various versions of the notes taken of Oswald after his arrest.

Even the timing you work out, in which Prayer Man's time in that rear NW corner of the front doorway area started a few seconds after the shots and he was only there for ca. 30 seconds or so, agrees with Kelley's notes that Oswald said he did not see the parade, yet at the same time Oswald telling Hosty and Bookhout that upon hearing commotion he went out front "with Shelley". 

I think the second-floor encounter of Oswald and Baker ca. 90 seconds after the shots, happened (because three witnesses tell of it, four if Oswald himself is counted), but I think some confusion can be cleared up by a better reconstruction of Oswald's movements. Here is what I think: Oswald on the first floor for lunch went up and bought his coke before the parade/shots. Then he came back down to the first floor again. This was normal and expected, to eat with his lunch. He then came out unobtrusively to the front landing as PM. He learns that JFK has been shot, and goes into flight mode. (I don't think his flight was seeking to escape law enforcement, or because he was the assassin.) He wants to leave without being noticed, which cannot be done by walking out through the front with all those people. He goes back to the domino room, gets his gray jacket, then walks up the front stairway at the SE corner of TSBD, to the second floor, intending to cross to the stairway at the rear to descend and out a rear door as little seen as possible. His intent (not to get a coke but to exit the building in that manner) did not succeed because he saw himself about to run into an officer (Baker and Truly), whereupon he suddenly reversed, which Baker saw as suspicious and accosted him. Oswald then crossed the second floor back the way he came, passing Mrs. Reid who told him JFK was shot and saw him with a coke. This post-shots second visit to the second floor was not for the purpose of getting a coke for lunch or after lunch, but was Oswald's sudden explanation of why he was there (he does not say that he had gone up to the second floor in order to descend to the first floor in order to leave the building--the true reason; instead he cites the coke reason). Oswald then descended again by the SE stairway, slipped out the front door telling the "secret service" man/ or reporter where a phone was, and slipped around the corner of the TSBD north on Houston, out of sight. Geneva Hines on the second floor told of being away from her desk, at the Southwestern Publishing Company's offices looking out the window at that time, so did not see Oswald pass through either way on the second floor.

Frazier who is out on the sidewalk talking and looking the other way does not see him slip out the front and go around the corner of the building. Oswald crosses the street to the east side of Houston and heads south on Houston again, and when Frazier does see him (as he told later) it looked to Frazier like Oswald had come out from the rear of the TSBD. Oswald was simply exiting and getting to Oak Cliff on his own as evasively as possible.

I think the rifle had been Oswald's, was in Ruth Paine's garage, was removed by Oswald from his belongings in Ruth Paine's garage to have its original scope put back on, on Nov. 11, 1963 at the Furniture Mart and Irving Sports Shop, with Lee taking Ruth's car without Ruth's knowledge that day (the only occasion Lee did that). It was not a different rifle or a different scope or no rifle and no scope that happened at the Irving Sports Shop, but Oswald's Mannlicher-Carcano with the original scope reinstalled which had come with the rifle, which he had taken off but now was getting put back on, prepping it for resale or conveyance not for his own use. I think the rifle then went with Oswald to his rooming house in Oak Cliff where he had it there for nine days, unseen by housekeeper Earlene those nine days, before selling or conveying the rifle approximately 10 am Thu Nov 21, at a meeting location near his rooming house. The rifle was then conveyed by the receiver to Dealey Plaza at about 10:30 am that morning and, sometime later that day or night, surreptitiously introduced into the TSBD unknown to Oswald, for use by a "noisy" shooter, not Oswald, the next day firing at JFK and intending to be seen doing so, with the rifle which up to the day before had been in the possession of Oswald, and would be traced to Oswald after the shooting. The shooter did not run down the stairs, did not take the elevator down, did not rappel down an empty elevator shaft et al, nobody saw him--the only logistics that make sense is that the shooter remained on the sixth floor (corroborated by visual eyewitnesses and by the fifth floor TSBD workers who heard no running upstairs or anyone coming down the stairs), and blended in with the law enforcement and reporters who were soon swarming the sixth floor, and by that means exited with them. 

The quiet way Oswald moved around and went about his work not talking to anyone unless spoken to (many witnesses said that) and the brief amount of time he was PM in the doorway--not more than ca. 30-40 seconds?--and the inability of Frazier to remember who PM was, says to me Frazier, like everyone else in those moments riveted by the shock of hearing shots fired at the presidential limousine, did not notice Oswald's presence. That Oswald did not blurt out to reporters Fri night at the press conference that he was out front, is because he only belatedly and to his surprise realized he was being seriously accused of killing JFK. He did tell his interrogators he was out there, and with a good lawyer would have made that defense in court. As for his visiting family members--his brother, Marina, his mother--he told them don't believe the so-called evidence against him but he also believed all his conversations were being monitored so he did not go into telling his visiting family members specifics. 

So that is a theory of the case in which Oswald as Prayer Man is not only correct but could become possibly more comprehensible.

But now I have a question (and please forgive if this has already been answered elsewhere): according to the Sixth Floor Museum, statement from Gary Mack of March 25, 2015 via Darrell Hastings, there is a first-generation copy of the Darnell film in their custody. I understand you believe better-quality information could be obtained from that film than presently accessible. Yet for some reason there is no access for research purposes to that film, citing "copyright". I see this from Gary Mack:

"NBC took the original Wiegman and Darnell films from the Dallas NBC affiliate to New York following the assassination weekend. Whether the network still has the original Darnell film is unknown, but as a former employee I know the affiliate does not have it or a copy. Nor does Jimmy Darnell.

"Fortunately, a first-generation 16mm copy print was made in Dallas over that weekend and it is in the Museum's collection; however, the Museum cannot do anything with it until copyright issues are resolved. It'll happen, and sooner rather than later." (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/20354-oswald-leaving-tsbd/page/109/)

 

When I see this, I think, whoooah! What is going on?

Obviously, for starters, "sooner rather than later" has turned out, now in 2021 six years later, unfulfilled.

All I can say is: it is just customary and basic protocol in fields of scholarship working on primary materials or archaeological artifacts, that qualified researchers are to be allowed access, by permission. That is just normal and supported by professional ethics statements of scholarly societies.

So my question is very simple, in two parts: (a) who owns the copyright on that film? and (b) has a qualified researcher sought formal permission from the copyright owner (not the Sixth Floor Museum or Gary Mack), and been formally refused, directly by the copyright owner? 

I see reference to an ROKC petition, etc. but that is not quite an answer directly to the "a" and "b" of my question. 

If this has not been done, I have a modest suggestion: have a legal firm research and identify and establish who is the legal copyright owner, and write a letter on behalf of you (Andrej Stancak) to that legal copyright owner, asking for the access you need, for research purposes. Get an answer. 

If the answer is "no", publicize it to high heaven. I have been through this whole issue of lack of access to valuable research materials, with the Dead Sea Scrolls. I was filmed on a Nova television program in the fall of 1991 as the first student in the world to view heretofore-inaccessible microfilms of the unpublished Dead Sea Scrolls which had just been publicly released by the Huntington Library in California to the world. The action of the Huntington Library broke the access issue in that case.

But back to the Darnell film sitting in the Sixth Floor Museum. Maybe the answer--if the copyright owner is NBC, if the copyright owner, NBC, was asked--might be yes.

Could this access issue with the Darnell film be as simple as: a request to the copyright owner has not yet been made?

Is it possible it would be as simple to get access as that?

[John Butler]

1 hour ago, Greg Doudna said:

But back to the Darnell film sitting in the Sixth Floor Museum. Maybe the answer--if the copyright owner is NBC, if the copyright owner, NBC, was asked--might be yes.

Could this access issue with the Darnell film be as simple as: a request to the copyright owner has not yet been made?

Is it possible it would be as simple to get access as that?

Greg,

If you did get access, then you would find that their copy of Darnell is the same as what we see on the internet or Groden's films.  Nothing new here, move along would be what you would probably find at the 6th floor museum.  They can't afford to have something different.  Someone might see a difference filmed by Couch and Darnell.  In particular the Darnell film was ruined because it might have shown something diffferent.

Oswald/Prayerman was out on Elm Street during the shooting of President Kennedy.  This can be seen in the John Martin film.  He filmed the p. limo as it passed his spot under the trees when shooting occurred. Then, he took cover in the TSBD doorway.  There he continued to take photos as demonstrated by the gif provided by Chris Davidson.  The camera flash of Oswald can be seen on Elm Street and later in the doorway of the TSBD as Prayerman in Couch/Darnell.  The two are connected by the flashing camera.

Many witnesses in the TSBD described the sounds of shooting coming from the west of the TSBD.  Others closer than 40 feet away from the Sniper's Nest window on the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th floors did not hear any sounds of shooting coming from the 6th floor sniper's nest.  They were directly under the Sniper's Nest or just off by several windows.  Two witnesses on the 5th floor said they heard shooting directly above them coming from the Sniper's Nest.  These witnesses are Bonnie Ray Williams and Harold Norman.  Junior Jarman changed his story later indicating he heard shooting sounds coming from the left and below.  This would be either the Dal-Tex or the Court Records Building.

Norman and Williams are believed to be the best witnesses even when many more witnesses say something different.  Their version of shooting from the Sniper's Nest is the one favored by the official story and not the other witnesses.  It is a shame that Bonnie Ray had to make 4 witness statements to get his testimony right and Junior simply changed his when talking to Gerald Ford.

So, this version of Oswald was not in the TSBD to fulfill many of the things you discuss.  This type of thinking leads to a second Oswald in the TSBD.  This is Harvey and Lee thinking.  The second Oswald is demonstrated by there being people who saw him in the TSBD at about the time of the shooting or just before.  Two different escape stories of how Oswald left the TSBD to return to his room indicates more than one Oswald.   

   

[Jake Hammond]

On 4/1/2021 at 4:23 AM, John Butler said:

John, How do you reconcile Buell Fraziers consistent, relaxed and detailed account of Billy Lovelady standing exactly where he was and the shirt matching Lovelady's shirt and not matching Oswalds ?

Edited November 27, 2021 by Jake Hammond

[Jake Hammond]

edit

Edited November 27, 2021 by Jake Hammond

[Jake Hammond]

2 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Andrej Stancak -- After studying through again your your research on this thread I am convinced your detailed case for Prayer Man being Oswald is as strong as it can be absent a sharper photograph to give facial recognition. Point after point checks out and matches, as you bring out. Height, 5'9". The Type 2 male pattern hairline true of ca. 25% of males. The grayscale of the shirt in the black-and-white in agreement with the maroon/reddish color of the shirt Oswald was wearing, CE151. The identification of Sarah Stanton as to Wesley Frazier's left, as Frazier himself said. The body language analysis is interesting. The lack of any other identification of PM, including from Frazier. The agreement with Oswald's own claims of where he was at the time of the assassination, according to the various versions of the notes taken of Oswald after his arrest.

Even the timing you work out, in which Prayer Man's time in that rear NW corner of the front doorway area started a few seconds after the shots and he was only there for ca. 30 seconds or so, agrees with Kelley's notes that Oswald said he did not see the parade, yet at the same time Oswald telling Hosty and Bookhout that upon hearing commotion he went out front "with Shelley". 

I think the second-floor encounter of Oswald and Baker ca. 90 seconds after the shots, happened (because three witnesses tell of it, four if Oswald himself is counted), but I think some confusion can be cleared up by a better reconstruction of Oswald's movements. Here is what I think: Oswald on the first floor for lunch went up and bought his coke before the parade/shots. Then he came back down to the first floor again. This was normal and expected, to eat with his lunch. He then came out unobtrusively to the front landing as PM. He learns that JFK has been shot, and goes into flight mode. (I don't think his flight was seeking to escape law enforcement, or because he was the assassin.) He wants to leave without being noticed, which cannot be done by walking out through the front with all those people. He goes back to the domino room, gets his gray jacket, then walks up the front stairway at the SE corner of TSBD, to the second floor, intending to cross to the stairway at the rear to descend and out a rear door as little seen as possible. His intent (not to get a coke but to exit the building in that manner) did not succeed because he saw himself about to run into an officer (Baker and Truly), whereupon he suddenly reversed, which Baker saw as suspicious and accosted him. Oswald then crossed the second floor back the way he came, passing Mrs. Reid who told him JFK was shot and saw him with a coke. This post-shots second visit to the second floor was not for the purpose of getting a coke for lunch or after lunch, but was Oswald's sudden explanation of why he was there (he does not say that he had gone up to the second floor in order to descend to the first floor in order to leave the building--the true reason; instead he cites the coke reason). Oswald then descended again by the SE stairway, slipped out the front door telling the "secret service" man/ or reporter where a phone was, and slipped around the corner of the TSBD north on Houston, out of sight. Geneva Hines on the second floor told of being away from her desk, at the Southwestern Publishing Company's offices looking out the window at that time, so did not see Oswald pass through either way on the second floor.

Frazier who is out on the sidewalk talking and looking the other way does not see him slip out the front and go around the corner of the building. Oswald crosses the street to the east side of Houston and heads south on Houston again, and when Frazier does see him (as he told later) it looked to Frazier like Oswald had come out from the rear of the TSBD. Oswald was simply exiting and getting to Oak Cliff on his own as evasively as possible.

I think the rifle had been Oswald's, was in Ruth Paine's garage, was removed by Oswald from his belongings in Ruth Paine's garage to have its original scope put back on, on Nov. 11, 1963 at the Furniture Mart and Irving Sports Shop, with Lee taking Ruth's car without Ruth's knowledge that day (the only occasion Lee did that). It was not a different rifle or a different scope or no rifle and no scope that happened at the Irving Sports Shop, but Oswald's Mannlicher-Carcano with the original scope reinstalled which had come with the rifle, which he had taken off but now was getting put back on, prepping it for resale or conveyance not for his own use. I think the rifle then went with Oswald to his rooming house in Oak Cliff where he had it there for nine days, unseen by housekeeper Earlene those nine days, before selling or conveying the rifle approximately 10 am Thu Nov 21, at a meeting location near his rooming house. The rifle was then conveyed by the receiver to Dealey Plaza at about 10:30 am that morning and, sometime later that day or night, surreptitiously introduced into the TSBD unknown to Oswald, for use by a "noisy" shooter, not Oswald, the next day firing at JFK and intending to be seen doing so, with the rifle which up to the day before had been in the possession of Oswald, and would be traced to Oswald after the shooting. The shooter did not run down the stairs, did not take the elevator down, did not rappel down an empty elevator shaft et al, nobody saw him--the only logistics that make sense is that the shooter remained on the sixth floor (corroborated by visual eyewitnesses and by the fifth floor TSBD workers who heard no running upstairs or anyone coming down the stairs), and blended in with the law enforcement and reporters who were soon swarming the sixth floor, and by that means exited with them. 

The quiet way Oswald moved around and went about his work not talking to anyone unless spoken to (many witnesses said that) and the brief amount of time he was PM in the doorway--not more than ca. 30-40 seconds?--and the inability of Frazier to remember who PM was, says to me Frazier, like everyone else in those moments riveted by the shock of hearing shots fired at the presidential limousine, did not notice Oswald's presence. That Oswald did not blurt out to reporters Fri night at the press conference that he was out front, is because he only belatedly and to his surprise realized he was being seriously accused of killing JFK. He did tell his interrogators he was out there, and with a good lawyer would have made that defense in court. As for his visiting family members--his brother, Marina, his mother--he told them don't believe the so-called evidence against him but he also believed all his conversations were being monitored so he did not go into telling his visiting family members specifics. 

So that is a theory of the case in which Oswald as Prayer Man is not only correct but could become possibly more comprehensible.

But now I have a question (and please forgive if this has already been answered elsewhere): according to the Sixth Floor Museum, statement from Gary Mack of March 25, 2015 via Darrell Hastings, there is a first-generation copy of the Darnell film in their custody. I understand you believe better-quality information could be obtained from that film than presently accessible. Yet for some reason there is no access for research purposes to that film, citing "copyright". I see this from Gary Mack:

"NBC took the original Wiegman and Darnell films from the Dallas NBC affiliate to New York following the assassination weekend. Whether the network still has the original Darnell film is unknown, but as a former employee I know the affiliate does not have it or a copy. Nor does Jimmy Darnell.

"Fortunately, a first-generation 16mm copy print was made in Dallas over that weekend and it is in the Museum's collection; however, the Museum cannot do anything with it until copyright issues are resolved. It'll happen, and sooner rather than later." (https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/20354-oswald-leaving-tsbd/page/109/)

 

When I see this, I think, whoooah! What is going on?

Obviously, for starters, "sooner rather than later" has turned out, now in 2021 six years later, unfulfilled.

All I can say is: it is just customary and basic protocol in fields of scholarship working on primary materials or archaeological artifacts, that qualified researchers are to be allowed access, by permission. That is just normal and supported by professional ethics statements of scholarly societies.

So my question is very simple, in two parts: (a) who owns the copyright on that film? and (b) has a qualified researcher sought formal permission from the copyright owner (not the Sixth Floor Museum or Gary Mack), and been formally refused, directly by the copyright owner? 

I see reference to an ROKC petition, etc. but that is not quite an answer directly to the "a" and "b" of my question. 

If this has not been done, I have a modest suggestion: have a legal firm research and identify and establish who is the legal copyright owner, and write a letter on behalf of you (Andrej Stancak) to that legal copyright owner, asking for the access you need, for research purposes. Get an answer. 

If the answer is "no", publicize it to high heaven. I have been through this whole issue of lack of access to valuable research materials, with the Dead Sea Scrolls. I was filmed on a Nova television program in the fall of 1991 as the first student in the world to view heretofore-inaccessible microfilms of the unpublished Dead Sea Scrolls which had just been publicly released by the Huntington Library in California to the world. The action of the Huntington Library broke the access issue in that case.

But back to the Darnell film sitting in the Sixth Floor Museum. Maybe the answer--if the copyright owner is NBC, if the copyright owner, NBC, was asked--might be yes.

Could this access issue with the Darnell film be as simple as: a request to the copyright owner has not yet been made?

Is it possible it would be as simple to get access as that?

Great read and ideas, I have just one point to make to possibly refute prayer man being Oswald.... didn't witnesses on the bus and Whaley all say that he was wearing light grey or khaki trousers ? PM seems to be wearing very dark. I think in the ultra high contrast film of PM anything light would look white. 

[Jake Hammond]

I think that Mrs Blesdoe refuted the shirt issue in her statement where she very accurately describes seeing him board the bus in the shirt he was arrested in. She specifically says that it had a torn right elbow and all the buttons tore off. 

 Below is taken from ' Harvey and Lee' and includes JA'S note as I believe it adds to the statement. 

On 1/11/2021 at 6:19 PM, Andrej Stancak said:

Sandra Styles was interviewed by authors Zachry and Peterson for their book: The Lone Star Speaks: Untold Texas Stories about JFK Assassination" on July 3 and 12, 2016 (Chapter 27).

The quotes below denote an authentic statement by Mrs. Styles:

Styles recalled years later: “The workers [like Oswald] all wore jeans and work shirts with their shirt sleeves rolled up. Some would wear khakis or other kinds of work pants.”

I have underlined the most relevant part of Styles' statement. So, Oswald was a worker and he wore a shirt with sleeves rolled up. Let us check how Prayer Man would match a description of a "worker" such as an order filler handling book boxes.

Here is a zoomed view of Prayer Man with yellow line spanning the length of his bare forearm due to the shirt sleeve being rolled up and the purple line highlighting approximate transition from bare forearm to shirt.

 

The shirt CE150 shows striations on the right sleeve due to sequencing of darker and lighter strips with more proximal dark strips being darker than the distal dark strips. This would be consistent with the sleeve being rolled up at variable heights; the distal parts of the sleeve would be almost always folded and therefore less likely to be covered with dirt. The part of the sleeve at elbow region would be almost always exposed to the dirt such as dust or black ink from the inscriptions on cardboard boxes. In the picture below, the light strips are delineated with yellow rectangles and dark strips with black rectangles. The picture of the shirt CE150 was darkened to visualise the striations better.

 

Of course, the fact that Prayer Man had his shirt sleeves rolled up does not prove that Lee Oswald was Prayer Man. However, it is another important match between Prayer Man and a description of a Depository worker by an eye witness, and possibly a match with the shirt CE150.

Why do we not see just one feature in Prayer Man's appearance that would not match Lee Oswald?

 

 

On 9/13/2020 at 8:48 PM, Andrej Stancak said:

To follow up on the problem of shirt CE151, the maroon shirt with button-up collar, here is a preliminary analysis of the Darnell still using a method similar to Tom Wilson's method. Briefly, a very large copy of Darnell doorway (45 x 60 cm) made on a heavy matte paper is photographed using a near-infrared sensitive camera (Basler Ace2) in the light spectrum including invisible light (>780 nm) and registered at 12-bit resolution. During the recording, the photograph is being excited using 10 Hz flashes produced by a xenon bulb. Images are recorded at 30 Hz. The whole purpose is to excite the photograph to include both reflected and scattered light that is visible in near-infrared or infrared band in hope to extract some more information. As I am pursuing the shapes and distributions of the dark spots on Prayer Man's shirt, extracting more information about the gradation of dark tones (those are getting warmer when illuminated and could therefore stand up from the background in near-infrared light spectrum) using this approach appears promising.

The work is ongoing and I still do not understand all aspects of the method as I would like to (and did not test all possible variations of the method), therefore, I decided to show at least some intermediate images before this mammoth project is eventually completed.

 

In the composite above, the top left panel is an average of a 40-second recording (1200 images) that is used as an input for ImageJ analysis (top right). The "original" picture already shows some interesting features, such as much better separation of Prayer Man's figure from the background, especially on the left side of his body. The 3D scaled image (top right) shows the contours of Prayer Man body even better. His hairline and dark hair are visible quite clearly. The middle panel is the CE151, the one which is contained in Warren Commission Exhibits. it was converted into grey scale and the contrasts were enhanced. 

There are quite large dark spots on the right front facing on CE151, and one triangular spot in the lower left part of the front facing. I have highlighted a spot on Prayer Man's shirt which I believe could be at identical location as in CE151. Further, the spot appears to be bent to the front and left as if the shirt was following the extended left thigh. 

The comparison of the dark spots on shirt CE151 and the spots on Prayer Man's shirt is not trivial as Prayer Man is standing parallel to the western wall and therefore, we cannot see the shirt face as a flat surface, it is rounded and vanishing as the shirt is wrapped around the trunk. One of the next steps will be preparing the copy of CE151 (basically, to modify a shirt which is already quite similar to CE151), and create all folds and dark spots as in original CE151 and use that shirt to photograph Prayer Man under the conditions similar to Darnell's still.

 

Late edit: the composite picture below highlights in the lower panels the similarity between the large dark spots on Prayer Man's shirt and on shirt CE151. Of course, it is difficult to evaluate how accurately would the shapes of the spots in both shirts match because of folds in shirt CE151, flat vs. convex surface in CE151 and Prayer Man's shirt, and the slightly different relationships between left and right front facings in both shirts (due to the lower one or two buttons missing, there was considerable freedom in how exactly were the lower parts of the shirt aligned). 

 

 

 

 

Mrs. Bledsoe. “After we to past Akard, at Murphy....Oswald got on....He looks like a maniac. His sleeve was out here. His shirt was undone....Was a hole in it, hole, and he was dirty, and I didn't look at him.” while Bledsoe said he was wearing “a brown shirt with holes in the elbows” and “ragged grey work pants.” 

Mr. Ball. Where did he sit?

Mrs. Bledsoe. He sat about half way back down....On the same side I was on....He had on a brown shirt....Hole in the sleeve right here.

Mr. Ball. Which elbow of the sleeve.

Mrs. Bledsoe. Right....Yes, all of the buttons torn off.

Mr. Ball. Was the shirt tucked beneath the belt in his pants, or outside the belt?

Mrs. Bledsoe. No. It was tucked in.

NOTE: at this point Mr. Ball had not yet shown CE 150 (the shirt Oswald was wearing when arrested) to Mrs. Bledsoe. (HARVEY) Oswald's shirt (below), when tucked in below the belt, would look like all of the buttons were “torn off.” This shirt also had a hole in the sleeve at the right elbow. If Mrs. Bledsoe's memory was correct, then the shirt she saw (HARVEY) Oswald wearing on the bus is the same shirt he was wearing when arrested at the Texas Theater—dark brown long-sleeve, buttons above the belt missing, hole in the right sleeve near the elbow.  

[Eddy Bainbridge]

3 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

Andrej Stancak -- After studying through again your your research on this thread I am convinced your.. 

Hi Greg. I think your proposal is fascinating and from your previous posts I know you will have given this serious consideration. Can I ask about the acquisition of the rifle: It strikes me you are saying Oswald voluntarily lost control of his rifle and other actors took advantage of this. If the big event took planning, are you saying this was a lucky break for the planners? and does this exonerate Oswald? 

[Greg Doudna]

6 minutes ago, Jake Hammond said:

I think that Mrs Blesdoe refuted the shirt issue in her statement where she very accurately describes seeing him board the bus in the shirt he was arrested in. She specifically says that it had a torn right elbow and all the buttons tore off. 

Jake this is one of those disputed points of witness testimony, but Mary Bledsoe had been shown the shirt with the torn elbow in which Oswald was arrested, C150, the brown shirt, by FBI agents before her Warren Commission testimony. At her Warren Commission testimony she was pressed on her memory of that shirt and insisted it was what Oswald had worn. When pressed had had she seen it she said no but that's what he was wearing, meaning she knew it from the FBI agents previously. In short Mary Bledsoe is not the most reliable witness, though she tried to be helpful. In addition, for separate reasons argued elsewhere I consider it certain that Oswald left the TSBD wearing his gray jacket (not the blue one) and would have been wearing it on the bus, meaning if she did see a tear in the elbow it could have been in that gray jacket which would not be implausible given that Oswald had had it since before going to Russia, so could have worn through an elbow. Per reconstruction, Oswald abandoned that gray jacket after leaving the cab but before getting to his rooming house and its whereabouts are lost at that point, so there is no way to check whether it had a worn-through elbow. (My analysis of the jackets, "The Jackets as Exculpation of Oswald as the Tippit Killer: an analysis", is here: https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/27367-an-argument-for-actual-innocence-of-oswald-in-the-tippit-case/page/2/.) The positive argument for Oswald wearing the maroon-reddish shirt, C151, that morning is it was Oswald's claim; the shirt was found at his rooming house exactly where Oswald said it was; and his whole changing of pants and jacket in keeping with other behavior for purpose of evasiveness would predict he would not make an exception and not change his shirt as well, which is in keeping with his saying that that is what he did.

Here is from Mary Bledsoe's Warren Commission testimony:

Mr. BALL - Now, I have got a piece of clothing here, which is marked--- 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - Commission Exhibit 150. 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - This is a shirt. 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - What do you mean by "that is it?" 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Because they brought it out to the house and showed it. 
Mr. BALL - I know. What do you mean by "that is it?" 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Well, because I can recognize it. 
Mr. BALL - Recognize it as what? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes, sir; see there? 
Mr. BALL - Yes. You tell me what do you see here? What permits you to recognize it? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - I recognize---first thing I notice the elbow is out and then I saw---when the man brought it out and let me see it? 
Mr. BALL - No, I am talking about---I am showing you this shirt now, and you said, "That is it." You mean---What do you mean by "that is it"? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is the one he had out there that day? 
Mr. BALL - Who had it out there? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Some Secret Service man. 
Mr. BALL - He brought it out. Now, I am---you have seen this shirt then before? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes. 
Mr. BALL - It was brought out by the Secret Service man and shown to you? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes. 
Mr. BALL - Had you ever seen the shirt before that? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Well--- 
Mr. BALL - Have you? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - No; he had it on, though. 

In an earlier Dec 4, 1963 FBI interview report the agents reported "when the shirt [C160] was removed from an envelope in which it was contained, Mrs. Bledsoe at first said, 'No, no. That is not his shirt.' She then inquired as to whether the shirt had a ragged elbow. Upon further examination of the shirt, she observed a hole in the right elbow of the shirt, at which time she quickly stated, 'Yes, yes. This is the shirt.'" She also claimed in her testimony that the shirt on Oswald at that time had all of its buttons torn off, which no other witness said of Oswald's shirt prior to his arrest and which makes little sense prior to the arrest. It looks like a witness who was suggestible, trying to give the agents what they wanted to hear, conflating the shirt she was shown by the agents and thereby understood Oswald had been wearing, with what she said she saw on Oswald on the bus. As Pat Speer I think noted, unconscionably the FBI did not show Mrs. Bledsoe, or any other of the witnesses from that morning, C151 the reddish-maroon shirt that Oswald said he had been wearing (even though FBI had it and could have shown it), to let witnesses compare with C150 the brown shirt of the arrest. If that had been done, what would witnesses' reactions have been? That will never be known.

On your other point on Oswald's gray pants and do they agree with the shade of Prayer Man's pants in the photos, I have to defer to Andrej on that but as I recall Andrej said the gray scale (not color itself) of the pants of PM was roughly equivalent to the gray-scale of the shirt of Prayer Man (= maroon-reddish C151 on gray scale), and both shirt and pants of Prayer Man were in shadow. I suppose the relevant question would be what specific gray pants did Oswald wear that morning and what gray scale were they. 

 

[Jake Hammond]

14 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

Jake this is one of those disputed points of witness testimony, but Mary Bledsoe had been shown the shirt with the torn elbow in which Oswald was arrested, C150, the brown shirt, by FBI agents before her Warren Commission testimony. At her Warren Commission testimony she was pressed on her memory of that shirt and insisted it was what Oswald had worn. When pressed had had she seen it she said no but that's what he was wearing, meaning she knew it from the FBI agents previously. In short Mary Bledsoe is not the most reliable witness, though she tried to be helpful. In addition, for separate reasons argued elsewhere I consider it certain that Oswald left the TSBD wearing his gray jacket (not the blue one) and would have been wearing it on the bus, meaning if she did see a tear in the elbow it could have been in that gray jacket which would not be implausible given that Oswald had had it since before going to Russia, so could have worn through an elbow. Per reconstruction, Oswald abandoned that gray jacket after leaving the cab but before getting to his rooming house and its whereabouts are lost at that point, so there is no way to check whether it had a worn-through elbow. (My analysis of the jackets, "The Jackets as Exculpation of Oswald as the Tippit Killer: an analysis", is here: https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/27367-an-argument-for-actual-innocence-of-oswald-in-the-tippit-case/page/2/.) The positive argument for Oswald wearing the maroon-reddish shirt, C151, that morning is it was Oswald's claim; the shirt was found at his rooming house exactly where Oswald said it was; and his whole changing of pants and jacket in keeping with other behavior for purpose of evasiveness would predict he would not make an exception and not change his shirt as well, which is in keeping with his saying that that is what he did.

Here is from Mary Bledsoe's Warren Commission testimony:

Mr. BALL - Now, I have got a piece of clothing here, which is marked--- 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - Commission Exhibit 150. 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - This is a shirt. 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is it. 
Mr. BALL - What do you mean by "that is it?" 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Because they brought it out to the house and showed it. 
Mr. BALL - I know. What do you mean by "that is it?" 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Well, because I can recognize it. 
Mr. BALL - Recognize it as what? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes, sir; see there? 
Mr. BALL - Yes. You tell me what do you see here? What permits you to recognize it? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - I recognize---first thing I notice the elbow is out and then I saw---when the man brought it out and let me see it? 
Mr. BALL - No, I am talking about---I am showing you this shirt now, and you said, "That is it." You mean---What do you mean by "that is it"? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - That is the one he had out there that day? 
Mr. BALL - Who had it out there? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Some Secret Service man. 
Mr. BALL - He brought it out. Now, I am---you have seen this shirt then before? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes. 
Mr. BALL - It was brought out by the Secret Service man and shown to you? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Yes. 
Mr. BALL - Had you ever seen the shirt before that? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - Well--- 
Mr. BALL - Have you? 
Mrs. BLEDSOE - No; he had it on, though. 

In an earlier Dec 4, 1963 FBI interview report the agents reported "when the shirt [C160] was removed from an envelope in which it was contained, Mrs. Bledsoe at first said, 'No, no. That is not his shirt.' She then inquired as to whether the shirt had a ragged elbow. Upon further examination of the shirt, she observed a hole in the right elbow of the shirt, at which time she quickly stated, 'Yes, yes. This is the shirt.'" She also claimed in her testimony that the shirt on Oswald at that time had all of its buttons torn off, which no other witness said of Oswald's shirt prior to his arrest and which makes little sense prior to the arrest. It looks like a witness who was suggestible, trying to give the agents what they wanted to hear, conflating the shirt she was shown by the agents and thereby understood Oswald had been wearing, with what she said she saw on Oswald on the bus. As Pat Speer I think noted, unconscionably the FBI did not show Mrs. Bledsoe, or any other of the witnesses from that morning, C151 the reddish-maroon shirt that Oswald said he had been wearing (even though FBI had it and could have shown it), to let witnesses compare with C150 the brown shirt of the arrest. If that had been done, what would witnesses' reactions have been? That will never be known.

On your other point on Oswald's gray pants and do they agree with the shade of Prayer Man's pants in the photos, I have to defer to Andrej on that but as I recall Andrej said the gray scale (not color itself) of the pants of PM was roughly equivalent to the gray-scale of the shirt of Prayer Man (= maroon-reddish C151 on gray scale), and both shirt and pants of Prayer Man were in shadow. I suppose the relevant question would be what specific gray pants did Oswald wear that morning and what gray scale were they. 

 

Thanks for that, clearly a subject I'm a little behind on. It just stuck in my head having just read JA's ' Harvey and Lee leave the TSBD' article . He does clearly state there that she wasn't shown the shirt previously and the section of testimony he uses is quite different to yours. The issue I find with him is that he is very knowledgable and persuasive and I think he has at times persuaded himself of things via selection and exaggeration. However, his point on the grey khaki trousers still stands I think, at present. 

 This may also be one of those times where police or FBI ' police work ' ( fitting evidence up to simplify a prosecution and get their achieved goal) may come across as shady and nefarious pre planned conspiracy. I.e... It could well be the case that Mrs Bledsoe was coerced, but quite likely that it was relatively innocent, in order to confirm that she had seen LHO that day in the clothes he was seen wearing later by the general public.... Hope that makes sense. !

Edited November 27, 2021 by Jake Hammond

[Greg Doudna]

1 hour ago, Eddy Bainbridge said:

Hi Greg. I think your proposal is fascinating and from your previous posts I know you will have given this serious consideration. Can I ask about the acquisition of the rifle: It strikes me you are saying Oswald voluntarily lost control of his rifle and other actors took advantage of this. If the big event took planning, are you saying this was a lucky break for the planners? and does this exonerate Oswald? 

Eddy, yes, I think Oswald voluntarily gave up control of the rifle just before the assassination, and I think Oswald was innocent of both Tippit and JFK. If the argument for a pre-assassination sale or conveyance of the rifle is substantial, that would change the narrative to a focus on whose rifle was it on Nov 22. As for how that might or might not play a role in an assassination plot whose planning began earlier, I do not know answers to that. In my own understanding I am sure Oswald was not a shooter in the JFK assassination, and I strongly doubt he would have knowingly been party to assisting anyone else to kill JFK. There are many variables and ambiguities so all must be argued and weighed, but that is how I see it.