Sam Pate

[David Boylan]

Pate's statement to the FBI.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=58972&search=col_pate#relPageId=55&tab=page

[Ron Bulman]

On 4/1/2019 at 9:37 AM, Josh Cron said:

HSCA Final Report, 1/2/79 (pg. 65-66)

The Warren Commission had also employed scientific analysis in its investigation and had recognized that acoustics might be used to resolve some questions about the shots fired at the President. It had obtained a tape recording, an alleged on-the-scene account of the assassination made by Sam Pate, a Dallas radio newsman, but an FBI examination of the tape "failed to indicate the presence of any sounds which could be interpreted as gunshots." The FBI also informed the Commission that the newsman had stated that most of the tape was not recorded in Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination, but was recorded in a studio several days later after he had been dismissed by his station, KBOX.
The Commission independently submitted the tape for analysis to Dr. Lawrence Kersta of Bell Telephone Acoustics & Speech Research Laboratory. As reported in a letter from Kersta to the Commission on July 17, 1964, spectograms (visual representations of tonal qualities in the sounds) were made of a key 8-second portion of the tape. The spectograms indicated there were six nonvoiced noises - one nonvoiced "spike" (a scientific term for a graphic display of a noise) followed by three other nonvoiced spikes of different acoustical characteristics occurring .86 seconds, 1.035 seconds and 1.385 seconds after the first. These, in turn, were followed by two events apparently caused by sound and believed to have been related to the previous ones. Dr. Kersta did not indicate in his letter that he had found shots, and the results of his tests were not mentioned in the Warren Report.
The committee was unable to locate the Kersta spectographs in the National Archives until late 1978 (they had been misfiled), but it did obtain the tape recording made on November 22, 1963, by KBOX reporter Sam Pate. On May 11, 1978, the committee submitted the tape to an acoustical consultant for analysis, with these results:
While a portion of the tape was recorded on November 22, 1963, in the vicinity of Dealey Plaza, it was thought not to be contemporaneous with the assassination. Other portions of the tape, moreover, seemed to have been recorded, at least in large part, in a studio, since appropriate background noise was not present.
And even if the tape had been made during the firing of the shots and had recorded them, Kersta's spectographic analysis would not have found them. The committee's consultant advised that spectographic analysis is appropriate only for detecting tonal, or harmonic, sound. To identify a gunshot, the analysis must be able to portray a waveform on an oscilloscope or similar such device.

Sounds like they tried to convert Pate's tape to mumbo jumbo.  To discredit it?

[Ron Bulman]

12 hours ago, David Boylan said:

Pate's statement to the FBI.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=58972&search=col_pate#relPageId=55&tab=page

The FBI report appears pretty scant and scripted to what Bart posted.

[David Von Pein]

Ron Bulman said:

Sounds like they tried to convert Pate's tape to mumbo jumbo.  To discredit it?

You mean you've never heard about Pate's KBOX "re-creation"? ....

http://drive.google.com/KBOX-Radio Assassination "Re-Creation"

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2012/06/kbox-radio.html

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=CD1245

 

 

Edited April 3, 2019 by David Von Pein

[Jamey Flanagan]

This is fascinating stuff! Thank you all for this info!

[Denis Morissette]

I have the complete audio. This is an excerpt.

 

Edited February 28, 2021 by Denis Morissette

[Ron Bulman]

On 4/2/2019 at 9:19 AM, David Boylan said:

Pate's statement to the FBI.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=58972&search=col_pate#relPageId=55&tab=page

Thank you David.  If I read it at the time it went right over my head.  The 1970 interview found by Malcom Blunt and posted by Bart Kamp is quite informative.  But it does digress and speculate as well  as embellish on the point of leading the parade out of Dealy Plaza and seeing smoke from the curb behind him.

I tend to question anything from the FBI at the time but this sounds more legit regarding his observations at the time (relatively) in March 1964.

Edited March 2, 2021 by Ron Bulman

[Ron Bulman]

In the 1970 interview Pate talks about being at Elm and Houston when the parade turned off Main onto Houston, then taking off in front of them.  Seeing them in his rear view mirror as he went under the triple underpass, along with smoke from a gutter drain.  Hearing Curry on channel 2 on his police radio say to get men back into the railroad yard.  Speeding up to get ahead of them them making a u turn on Stemmons freeway, passing the limo going the wrong way with SS agents standing up with machine guns.  Entering the area behind the TSBD where fire trucks were arriving and they were roping it off, with rope.

In his March 1964 FBI statement he told them he was sitting at the Stemmons exit to the Trade Mart when he heard of a shooting.  He did not at the time know the shooting involved the President.   He made a u turn on Stemmons, passed the limo , got off at Continental, right on Lamar, right on (Ross) to Houston/Pacific where a unknown man moved a barricade for him to enter the area behind the TSBD parking 40 - 50' behind it.  He estimated he was there within 4 minutes of hearing of the shooting.  "He stated there were policemen entering the rear door of the TSBD."