Prayer Man is a Man

[Andrej Stancak]

I will post the updated 3D model-based height estimates after fixing some of the figures which I think deserve more care. In the meantime, it is possible to learn about the body heights of different people using Mr. Frazier's body as a measuring stick. Mr. Frazier was 6'0'' or just tiny bit taller (6'1''). As the people of interest (Mr. Shelley, Mrs. Stanton) stood on the same platform as Mr. Frazier and the depth differences were small, the horizontal lines led through the top of heads of Mr. Shelley and Mrs. Stanton inform about their approximate body height.

In the figure below, the horizontal top blue line crosses the top of Mr. Frazier's head and therefore,  this provides 6'0 - 6'1'' level relative to the surface of the top landing. The bottom blue line crosses the lower aspect of Mr. Frazier's chin. The dimension (14) in the look-up table below shows that a tall person falling into the top quartile of the male population would have a head sized 10'' or just a tiny bit less. I count 10'' for the sake of simplicity as this is only an approximate method to learn about the body heights of different people in the doorway. This line, incidentally, crosses the top of Prayer Man's head, so his body height could only be 5'2'' if Frazier was 6' or 5'3'' if Frazier was 6'1''. 

The top of the grey blob sitting on top of Mr. Shelley's head corresponds to the blue line crossing Mr. Frazier's root of the nose or eyes. The dimension (9) equaling 5'' corresponds to the distance between this blue line and the top of Mr. Frazier's head. 6' - 5'' is 5'7'' and 6'1'' - 5'' is 5'8''. Thus, Mrs. Stanton's body height was 5'7'' (Frazier = 6') or 5'8'' (Frazier = 6'1''). Finally, the line crossing the top of Mr. Shelley's head appears to align with Mr. Frazier subnasale point. To measure the height of this line, we need to subtract the dimensions (14-16) from 6' or 6'1''. This would give 6'- 6' 1/2 = 5'5'' 1/2 (Frazier = 6.0') or 6'1- 6'' 1/2 = 5' 6'' 1/2 (Frazier = 6.1). 

The look-up table with facial landmarks and dimensions were reproduced from "Human Head" chapter at wikipedia.org.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Andrej Stancak

[Andrej Stancak]

While it is possible to estimate approximate body heights of people standing close to Mr. Frazier using his known body height and known dimensions of certain facial features, there is an alternative and a more accurate method. It consists in creating an accurate 3D model of the doorway, orienting the doorway to match Darnell's camera view, and reading the body heights from the model.

The figure below shows the inner doorway with five measuring sticks placed on the western wall (2), on the side frames of the glass door (2) and at the front edge of the top landing (1). The height of the doorway is known: it was measured by Bart Kamp in autumn 2017 and Bart was kind enough to share his measurements with me. At that time I was almost abandoning the doorway project being frustrated by seeing inaccuracies in the alignment of my model and Darnell' still which could not be resolved without using hard data. The doorway height is 288 cm or 9'5'' 4/10. 

 

Besides the five measuring sticks, there are also three horizontal planes in the doorway: the blue plane is at the height of 6' which is the known body height of Buell Wesley Frazier. The yellow plane is at 5'2'', the height at which Prayer Man's head appeared above the top landing according to the provisional analysis explained in my last post. The red plane is at 5'4'' which is the lower limit of the range of body heights given by members of Mrs. Stanton's family.

Please check in the figure below the accuracy of how the three planes would cross the measuring sticks.

 

I have delineated Prayer Man's head in Darnell still with a yellow line and copied the 3D model with the three planes and the measuring sticks on board onto Darnell still. The yellow line touches the bottom of the three planes.

 

Here the same in detail:

 

A better method to check which of the planes was touched or crossed by Prayer Man's head is to overlay also Prayer Man's mannequin. The figure below shows the three planes and Prayer Man's and Mr. Frazier's figures at the blending rate of 80% (more of Darnell background seen at this blending ratio). Please note that both Prayer Man's and Mr. Frazier's mannequins match their originals accurately.

And the same with a 65%-percent blending ratio:

The next figure confirms that Mr. Frazier, as depicted in Darnell, was indeed 6' tall. Please note that the red 5'4'' plane would cross Mr. Frazier's mouth and the yellow 5'2'' plane would cross the neck just below his chin.

 

Finally, the detail of Prayer Man's head.

 

Prayer Man's head crosses the yellow 5'2'' plane with an excess of 1.2 cm (a bit less than 1/2 inch), however, it is far from the red 5'4'' plane. This analysis excludes Mrs. Stanton as Prayer Man as her body height of 5'6'' (or more) was far above what it should be (5'2'' 1/2). It is not only the lack of thick grey hair in Prayer Man's head but also her large body which discards Mrs. Stanton as a Prayer Man candidate.

In contrast, Prayer Man's body height of 5'9'' 1/2 fully conforms with the possibility of Lee Oswald, 5'9'' according to his autopsy report (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337932/m1/1/) , being  Prayer Man. The extra less than half an inch was certainly related to the differences between autopsy-reported body height which was determined on a naked body and the body height captured in a dressed person wearing shoes. This was also the likely reason for seeing Mrs. Stanton's hair about at the height of 5'7'' which exceeds by about 1 inch the upper limit of her body height 5'6'' reported by her family.

Question: would you agree that it is possible to estimate with a high level of certainty Prayer Man's body height?

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 15, 2019 by Andrej Stancak

[Sandy Larsen]

Great work, Andrej. I agree with you that there is somebody standing behind Shelley who can be seen in both Darnell and Altgens 6. Probably Sarah Stanton given that Frazier said she was standing there and the height matches hers.

The only thing I disagree with you on is your claim that  Shelley remained on the steps for a minute before going anywhere. Sure he said that, but he also said he stayed there for "three or four minutes," at which time Gloria Calvery arrived. His and Lovelady's stories changed multiple times and they conflict with each other. I choose to believe 1) what Shelley said in his first-day affidavit, and 2) what we see in Darnell. In his affidavit Shelley said he immediately crossed over to the concrete island after the shooting where he bumped into Gloria Calvery, and then crossed back over before going back inside. That is 100% consistent with what Darnell shows.

Based on first day affidavits and the Darnell film, it's easy to conclude that Shelley and a few others left the steps (probably down the west side of the handrail) immediately after the shots. Shelley bumped into Gloria Calvery there on the concrete island. The two them ran back to the steps where Shelley resumed his original position (probably after climbing the steps on the west side of the handrail).

Darnell begins too late to show Calvery's run to the TSBD steps, and Shelley's run to the island and back. But we know they had time to do it because in Darnell we see Calvery talking to Lovelady on the steps just as Office Baker runs across the street. Calvery had time, so Shelley certainly did too.

(To others reading this... what I am saying here does not disagree with Andrej's analysis.)

 

Edited May 16, 2019 by Sandy Larsen

[Andrej Stancak]

To follow up with Prayer Man's body height analysis. I lifted the lowest (5'2'') yellow plane by half an inch so that it now aligns with the top of Prayer Man's head. The horizontal yellow line is at 5'2'' 1/2 and the line touches the lower aspect of Buell Wesley Frazier's chin, exactly as we see it in Darnell. I do not know how to make things better and more transparent than this, so I leave the plane issue by saying that the top point of Prayer Man's head was 5'2'' 1/2 above the plane of the top landing. 

Of course, Prayer Man could not be so short. However, he stood one step below, on the second step, and therefore, it is necessary to add the height of one riser which was 7 1/8'' according to Bart Kamp's measurements. Thus, Prayer Man net height was 5'2'' 1/2 + 7 1/8'' = 5' 9'' 5/8. 

This body height breaks down into 5'9'' which represents the body height of Lee Oswald without shoes and 5/8''  (1.6 cm) which accounts for the height of a shoe heel. I checked the height of heel in all my shoes and it varied between 1.5 cm and 2.5 cm. If someone has a trip to the NARA in the near future, can you please take measurements of Lee Oswald's shoes.

 

 

Edited May 16, 2019 by Andrej Stancak

[Andrej Stancak]

 

 

 

 

3

23 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:

Great work, Andrej. I agree with you that there is somebody standing behind Shelley who can be seen in both Darnell and Altgens 6. Probably Sarah Stanton given that Frazier said she was standing there and the height matches hers.

The only thing I disagree with you on is your claim that  Shelley remained on the steps for a minute before going anywhere. Sure he said that, but he also said he stayed there for "three or four minutes," at which time Gloria Calvery arrived. His and Oswald's stories changed multiple times and they conflict with each other. I choose to believe 1) what Shelley said in his first-day affidavit, and 2) what we see in Darnell. In his affidavit Shelley said he immediately crossed over to the concrete island after the shooting where he bumped into Gloria Calvery, and then crossed back over before going back inside. That is 100% consistent with what Darnell shows.

Based on first day affidavits and the Darnell film, it's easy to conclude that Shelley and a few others left the steps (probably down the west side of the handrail) immediately after the shots. Shelley bumped into Gloria Calvery there on the concrete island. The two them ran back to the steps where Shelley resumed his original position (probably after climbing the steps on the west side of the handrail).

Darnell begins too late to show Calvery's run to the TSBD steps, and Shelley's run to the island and back. But we know they had time to do it because in Darnell we see Calvery talking to Lovelady on the steps just as Office Baker runs across the street. Calvery had time, so Shelley certainly did too.

(To others reading this... what I am saying here does not disagree with Andrej's analysis.)

 

Sandy:

I do not pretend that I know the answer for the discrepancies in Shelley's (and Lovelady's) testimonies and you raised valid points regarding Shelley's movements. At present, I conjecture that Shelley remained at his post for the duration of Darnell film and at some point later he walked out of the doorway in direction to the railroad tracks together with Billy Lovelady. Their walk to the Tripple underpass is unclear as the timing is concerned, however, I would be able to accept that they returned back into the building about 3 minutes after the last shot.

In Shelley's case, we have his Warren Commission testimony and Darnell stills which both say that he was still there at his central spot some 30 seconds after the last shot. I agree with your previous analysis that Lovelady stepped down to the sixth step (counted from top) and he is seen as the man facing the lady in dark.

Here is what Shelley told the Warren Commission:

Mr. SHELLEY - Sounded like a miniature cannon or baby giant firecracker, wasn't real loud.
Mr. BALL - What happened; what did you do then? 
Mr. SHELLEY - I didn't do anything for a minute.
Mr. BALL - What seemed to be the direction or source of the sound:? 
Mr. SHELLEY - Sounded like it came from the west. 
Mr. BALL - It sounded like it came from the west? 
Mr. SHELLEY - Yes.

Billy Lovelady told the Warren Commission when shown Altgens6 that he stood on the top landing, however, he was wrong. His location at that time was on the second step. This is how witnesses contributed with their inaccurate testimonies contributed to the mess which makes the case so hard to crack.

 

 

[Andrej Stancak]

Right, coming back to the location of Mrs. Stanton on the top landing, I looked at the late frame of Darnell film which shows a short lady standing in the eastern part of the top landing and close to the glass door, Mrs. Sanders. 

I have analysed this frame intensely in my blog article on https://thejfktruthmtters.wordpress.com , dated January 31, 2018. The picture below shows the original frame and the section in the middle of the doorway which was subject to the present analysis. The only operation made was resizing the cropped region to 200 dpi.

 

Here is the 3D surface plot of the region of interest prepared using ImageJ program. Similar ton one of my previous post in this thread, the white contour at the surface is the figure of Otis Williams , leaning toward his right and shielding his eyes with his left arm. The yellow-orange portion of the image is Bill Shelley. The blue-purple part of the image corresponds to the person standing behind Bill Shelley, Mrs. Stanton. Please note that Bill Shelley had his left arm bent with his forearm at about 90-degree angle relative to his upper arm.

 

Finally, an overlay of the original flat picture and the coloured relief seen in the left-hand panel in the picture above. 

 

The value of this frame is that is shows all three critical persons, Prayer Man, Mrs. Stanton and Mrs. Sanders each standing at a different location in one single frame. Therefore, there cannot be a mistake that Prayer Man could not be either Mrs. Stanton or Mrs. Sanders.

 

 

[Chris Davidson]

Andrej,

Here's what I would double-check:

Can I take the original frame, determine the correct aspect ratio for that 16mm frame and size it accordingly. (Crop width to black bars and reduce height to a 1.37/1 ratio)

Once the aspect ratio is correct, can I properly correct for horizontal/vertical accuracy. Use the photographic center. (.75° clockwise is pretty good.)

Do I know the height of Frazier's head?

If I straddle one step am I stepping down the total height of that step or am I not quite at that height. (A half inch difference comes to mind.)

This is not what I did to your graphic since I do not know where you started from.

But, analogous to the previous suggestions, it looks like this:

The top of Prayer Persons head touches the chin bottom of Frazier.

I'm 72.5" tall, just as Frazier and JFK were.

My head height is 8.5".

Variables!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Andrej Stancak]

Chris:

thanks for your comments. I will come back to you when (and if) I am able to understand all your points. It seems you have your own estimate of Prayer Man's body height, and I am more than happy to compare our estimates. and methods.

[Andrej Stancak]

I would like to come back to the CE151, light-red shirt which Lee Oswald wore during the morning hours of that fateful Friday and which he changed, together with his pants, after arriving at his rooming house at about 1PM.

We have a black-and-white photograph of CE 151 (and also a coloured version of this shirt arranged by Pat Speer) which seems to be photographed with a flash. I took a clean spot on that shirt and applied Gaussian filter to average the grey levels, and the resulting mean level of grey in the red rectangle was 154.

I then took a list of 215 colours from https://www.december.com/html/spec/color1.html with their decimal RGB codes and constructed a matrix of all 215 colours and their greyscale representation. The picture below shows in the left-hand panel all 215 colors and in the middle panel the grey representations of all colours. I then looked through the 215 grey values and identified the colours which would match grey=154 after being converted into greyscale. The right-hand panel shows the result: one grey rectangle (this should be of no surprise) and one reddish colour. 

 

It looks maybe trivial, however, it is sort of encouraging that not too many colours would match the grey tone of CE151. 

 

 

 

 

[Andrej Stancak]

I then evaluated how much would the shadows change the original grey colour of Prayer Man's shirt. To this end, I measured in 12 good frames of Darnell film the level of grey on Prayer Man's shirt on the right facing below the shadow cast by Prayer Man's forearm and avoiding, if possible, the dark spot which we know existed on shirt CE151. 

The picture below shows the spot of interest and an additional 4 pairs of rectangles. The rectangles are on a surface which was clearly divided into a dark part due to shadow and a light part. I then applied Gaussian filter to these rectangles and measured the level of grey in each dark and light rectangle in all four pairs. The resulting matrix was 12 stills x 4 locations x 2 pairs, and of course 12 measurements of Prayer Man's shirt.

The mean grey level of Prayer Man's shirt was 83 (standard error of the mean = 1.3). The histogram below shows the distributions of the differences in 48 pairs (12 pictures, 4 locations). The differences were normally distributed, and the mean difference in grey levels due to shadow was 71.4 (standard error of the mean 2.4).

 

I then added 83 (Prayer Man's shirt) and 71 (rounded difference in grey levels caused by shadow) and ended up with a value of 154. To recall, the grey level of CE151 was also 154.

The figure below shows the matrix of 215 colours and their greyscale representations as in my previous post and the colours which matched the calculated grey level of Prayer Man's shirt after correcting for the shadow under four different levels of errors. Of course, if the error would be assumed to be zero, we have the two-colour situation as in CE151. If a larger and larger error is admitted (and it should be because the difference due to the shadow is only a statistical estimate), we get further colours as possible candidates for the colour of Prayer Man's shirt, especially some green colours and two khaki colours. It is interesting that Charles Givens reported the colour of Oswald's shirt on Friday morning (and on other days) as green. Clearly, the shirt colour had spectral properties allowing to confuse its reddish colour for green. This anomaly in red-green vision is not that rare in males (deuteranopia). 

While this analysis cannot unequivocally claim that a reddish colour was the only colour which the shadow-corrected grey of Prayer Man's shirt would yield, it is important that the reddish colour was on board. There was a limited number of colours which could give the level of grey of Prayer Man's shirt. It is now possible to calculate the probability with which Prayer Man's shirt would match the colour of CE151.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Andrej Stancak]

Chris:

a person measuring 72 inches (6') would have his/her head of 9' 6/10''. First, there are standard proportions between body parts in human being. Tall and short people will differ in the heights of their heads, however, the proportions between their body height and the height of their heads will always be the same. This rule is known as a 7 1/2 rule and it is used by artists to achieve normal proportions in their human figures: https://www.artistsnetwork.com/art-techniques/drawing-proportions-human-body-ameral/ . 

Applied to Buell Wesley Frazier: 72/7.5 = 9.6. However, I used in my work the head height estimate acquired from real human beings. These are published e.g., on wikipedia.org in the chapter "Human Head". Here are the values:

 

Dimension 14 refers to head heights. There are 5 columns in the table above. The columns correspond to head heights (from short to large - left to right) in people divided into 5 quintiles based on their body heights. Thus, 9' 1/10' would correspond to a person of average body height. Buell Wesley Frazier was taller than average and that was the reason for selecting the two right-most values in my preliminary estimates.

Anyway, we have three values to compare for Buell Wesley Frazier's head:

The estimate according to the 7 1/2 rule:    9' 6/10''.

My estimate from comparing the plane 5' 2 1/2'' and 6':  9' 6'' .

The estimate that was given by wikipedia.org:     9' 7/10'' .

They are all three very close and make a strong case for Buell Wesley Frazier's head to measure 9' 6''. 

While it looks trivial to measure own head, it is actually not that trivial because the chin and the top of the head are not parts of a perfect cube. These measurements are usually made using simple but standardised tools.

Please do not believe people who already lost their case for good. If you wish to make a case for Mrs. Stanton being Prayer Man, you need to answer not only how her body height 5'4'' - 5' 6'' (the higher estimate is correct according to the comparison of her figure with the figure of her son Larry who was 6' -6'1'') but also the question where is her thick grey hair in Prayer Man's figure. Where is it?

I will go through the rest of your points carefully although I may not understand some very technical aspects in your post. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 19, 2019 by Andrej Stancak

[Andrej Stancak]

Chris:

please have a look at the family photograph of Mrs. Stanton and her son Larry. Larry was 6' or 6'1'', similar to Mr. Frazier's and your body height. Can you see how high the top of Mrs. Stanton's head reaches relative to Larry's figure? Do you see that her head would align with his shoulder as it is evidenced in Frazier-Prayer Man in Darnell?

I have a friendly request which I hope you would be able to respond to in order to resolve the issue. If you are 6' 1/2, would you please make three marks on some wall: 5'2 1/2'', 5'4'' and 6'. Then, can you please ask someone to make a photograph with yourself and the three marks next to your figure. It should be photographed with a camera at about your neck level. You can always blur the face on your photograph to avoid spreading your details over the internet.

 

 

 

Edited May 19, 2019 by Andrej Stancak

[John Butler]

Andrej,

It has been a while since I have posted on your Prayer Man analysis.  I think you have clearly made your case.  Criticism from others should be looked at for something that might be helpful but in the main should be dismissed.  You have worked and reworked you analysis to the point that anyone who reads it should fine that analysis easily understandable.  The facts and figures you use are IMO dead on and not subject to a fact based criticism.  You can stand proudly behind your work.

With that said I find your color analysis of CE 151 extremely interesting.  Your greyscale to color analysis suggest that CE 151 is a color that may be between a light (pink) to medium color of red.  Not exactly pink or light red but the shirt is several shades up from there.  I have something I would like for you to look at if you can find the time and think this might be interesting.

I have long contended that Prayer Man was on the Elm Street curb filming the assassination as it happened.  He has time to return to the doorway of the TSBD before Weigman shows up to film the doorway and we see Prayer Man there.  If Officer Marion Baker could make his run to the doorway in 4 seconds Prayer Man had about 3 times that amount of time to make it there.

To the point, Prayer Man on Elm Street in the John Martin film has on a red shirt.  This is a red that is darker than the CE 151 photo.  This may be due to the color intensification of older film types and age.  If you have time take a look at this montage and see if the color of the shirt of the figure on Elm would match your work if adjustment for film color of an old film.  There is about 4 or 5 seconds (about 70 frames) of this type of imagery on John Martin.

   

I've added Andrej's shirt photos to strengthen the idea for comparison.

Edited May 19, 2019 by John Butler

[Andrej Stancak]

John:

I will analyse your suggestion for a Prayer Man candidate carefully.

 

[Andrej Stancak]

Still pursuing the possibility to learn as much as possible about Prayer Man's shirt in Darnell. The composite picture below shows Prayer Man (after resizing) in the red scale. This is a simple operation when the red channel is boosted and the green and blue channels suppressed. Since the shirt, I suspect, was of reddish colour, maybe the shirt may reveal better contrasts when analysed in the red channel. I have increased the contrasts in the red-converted picture below.

The top two pictures show Prayer Man in red. The shirt shows very dark spots at three regions: below the right forearm, around the left groin, and on the right chest, above Prayer Man's right forearm. In contrast, the brightest regions on Prayer Man's shirt are on the left and right lateral parts above the waist. In the bottom left, CE151 is shown as original and after converting to red and enhancing the contrast. You are the judges if I ask if you see any similarity in the distribution of the light and dark spots on CE151 and Prayer Man' shirt.

I was amazed, however, not to find the same very dark spot on the right upper chest in CE151 which NARA sent to Pat Speer. The region on the shirt to the right of the two top buttons is dirty in CE151 retrieved from the Warren Commission exhibits but very clean in the picture of the shirt sent by NARA in 2016. The shirt in the original record appears to be badly battered (e.g., the right sleeve seems to be perforated). Of course, the shirt was folded differently in both pictures, yet the lack of dirt in the upper right chest in the 2016 version is troubling.

From the two pictures, the original CE151 from the Warren Commission exhibits matches Prayer Man's shirt better than the 2016' one (two bottom right panels in the picture below). 

 

 

Are these photographs enough to say that Prayer Man wore CE151? This is difficult to say as an affirmative answer basically clinches the Prayer Man's identity problem with far-reaching consequences. I would say this finding gives me, and I hope that to someone else too,  strong reasons to pursue the reddish shirt CE151 case further. Actually, I have embarked with a few friends on the project to revive Tom Wilson's image analysis method. Prayer Man's shirt would be an ideal specimen to analyse using Tom Wilson's method given the possibility that there are dark and light spots on that shirt and Tom' method was able to resolve subsurface anomalies in materials and photographs. 

What I would give to the Sixth Floor Museum for one single high-resolution still from Darnell film...