Those Front Steps

[Roger Odisio]

1 hour ago, Alan Ford said:

Yep, alas.

I say alas, because when I first saw this image I was very disappointed. The PM-in-Darnell=LHO seemed so promising!

It was a false dawn--------BUT (here's the important bit) a gloriously productive false dawn. For it motivated some good people to redouble their efforts to establish the real story of Mr. Oswald's movements & whereabouts around and at the time of the motorcade. This intense research effort built on some really fine work over the years from i.a. Mr. Richard Bernabei, Mr. Don Willis, Mr. Greg Parker, Mr. Robert Prudhomme and Mr. Sean Murphy.

The single most glorious production to come out of this massive research effort was Mr. Kamp's unearthing, in 2019, of the Hosty draft report on the first interrogation:

It contains not one but THREE game-changing revelations:

1. Mr. Oswald claimed he "went outside to watch P. Parade"

2. Mr. Oswald claimed he visited the second-floor lunchroom for a Coke before the motorcade

3. His claims were distorted outrageously by the 'investigators' who reported officially on them.

Having Agent Hosty's draft report allowed us to trace exactly how Mr. Oswald was deprived of his alibi.

**

Where does the collapse of the PM-in-Darnell=LHO claim leave us?

Well, I say let's take a leaf out of the book of those still pushing that claim. They say that the whole claim is about 'more than a fuzzy picture'. I agree!

So............. I have a simple question for them:

IF it were to be established to your full satisfaction that PM-in-Darnell is not LHO, where would that leave all the evidence you have amassed pointing to his having gone out front for the motorcade?

Here's the question in even simpler form:

IF Mr. Oswald is NOT PM-in-Darnell, is he still somewhere in that doorway?

Simplest version:

IF so, then WHERE?

I say we already have the answer to that last question-----------------------

----------------------and cordially, humbly invite the good folks still clinging on to PM-in-Darnell=LHO to take immense pride in their role in having kept 'LHO Out Front' in the forefront of research consciousness, and to stop investing all their faith in this woman's somehow turning out to be a man:

That would be the royal way to prove they really mean it when they say that Prayer Man is 'more than a fuzzy picture'.

Prayer Man was the name given by Sean Murphy to the figure on the steps. Bart never liked the name.  But with Bart's book and the work of others, the term has come to mean a lot more than the identity of that figure.  PM now refers to the whole body of evidence that exonerates Oswald and shows the Warren Report is a fraud. Much of which Bart lays out in the book. Hence the title of the book: PM is more than a fuzzy picture.

 

It follows that if PM turns out to be someone else, that evidence remains unaffected.  Such a finding doesn't even mean Oswald was *not* on the steps or somewhere outside, at some other time before, during, or after the shots were fired.  Darnell and Wiegman captured only a couple of seconds during those minutes.

 

PM researchers understand this; they really believe PM is about a lot more than the picture.  None of the ones I know are "investing all their faith in this woman's somehow turning out to be a man".

 

PM has reached such importance (rightly so) because if the figure can be clearly shown to be Oswald. it destroys the WR *by itself* and opens the way for a serious discussion of who actually did it.

 

Likewise, if you can show Oswald was actually somewhere else as you hint (I assume you mean somewhere out front), that will perform the same function. Please proceed. 

 

As to access to Darnell and Wiegman I assume you know it's a part of the MFF lawsuit against NARA and Biden. I also believe NBC Universal is violating the FCC license of its local Dallas affiliate by refusing to let anyone see the originals of both films. Both films are JFKA records under the JFK Act.  Know any lawyer who could pursue that ?

[Alan Ford]

1 hour ago, Roger Odisio said:

It follows that if PM turns out to be someone else

Ah, but it's already happened, Mr. Odisio:

Let me remind you that the above image was posted not by some diehard Warren Gullible enemy of the 'Oswald Out Front' claim but by Mr. Bart Kamp himself, who posted it without feeling any need to cast aspersions on its authenticity or provenance.

Unless Mr. Oswald is wearing drag, that ain't him.

The PM-in-Darnell=LHO claim is dead.

The claim that Mr. Oswald was out front for the P. Parade has never been more alive.

It's time to uncouple the two claims, pronto. Unless, that is, we want another AltgensDoorwayman-style fiasco for the research community.

[Alan Ford]

2 hours ago, Charles Blackmon said:

You would think that would work, but it doesn't. It may have something to do with my Internet filter.

Is it just my images you're not seeing, Mr. Blackmon?

[Sandy Larsen]

8 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

10 hours ago, Charles Blackmon said:

You would think that would work, but it doesn't. It may have something to do with my Internet filter.

Is it just my images you're not seeing, Mr. Blackmon?

 

Seriously Charles, try another browser. If that doesn't work, try another computer. If that doesn't work, try another wifi connection. If that doesn't work, try my browser on my computer on my wifi connection. I guarantee that one will work.

 

 

[Charles Blackmon]

10 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

Is it just my images you're not seeing, Mr. Blackmon?

Yes Alan it is and like I said I had the same problem viewing your images on the other JFK Forum.

The problem exists on both pc and iphone browser.

Edited October 26, 2023 by Charles Blackmon

[Alan Ford]

53 minutes ago, Charles Blackmon said:

Yes Alan it is and like I said I had the same problem viewing your images on the other JFK Forum.

The problem exists on both pc and iphone browser.

Can you see the image below, Mr. Blackmon (of Officer Baker & Mr. Roy Truly)?

How about this image of Mr. Buell Wesley Frazier?

[Sandy Larsen]

12 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

12 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

Unless Mr. Oswald is wearing drag, that ain't him.

The PM-in-Darnell=LHO claim is dead.

 

I don't think so Alan.

The frame above was shot when Darnell was panning from one scene to another, an action that blurred the image. Where Darnell was aiming his camera directly at the TSBD (not panning), the frames are sharper. And without the panning blur, you can see the true shape of Prayer Man's shirt collar.

Here's a frame when Darnell wasn't panning:

 

Click on the image a few times till it quits zooming in. And then press <Ctrl>+ several times to zoom in more. Note the non-feminine collar-line on Prayer Man.

The above was explained to me by Jake Sykes, on this page.

 

[Alan Ford]

1 hour ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

I don't think so Alan.

The frame above was shot when Darnell was panning from one scene to another, an action that blurred the image. Where Darnell was aiming his camera directly at the TSBD (not panning), the frames are sharper. And without the panning blur, you can see the true shape of Prayer Man's shirt collar.

Hello, Mr. Larsen, and thanks for the link to Mr. Sykes' analysis.

I'm afraid he's given you very poor information indeed.

See for yourself. Here's the Darnell pan which Mr. Sykes refers to:

And here's the same sequence, only I've added two exclamation marks:

RED EXCLAMATION MARK: the frame which Mr. Kamp posted and which shows PM's round, feminine neckline: Mr. Sykes says it's blurry because it occurs during the panning sweep across the scene

BLUE EXCLAMATION MARK: the frame which Mr. Sykes says is not blurry because it is post-panning

Notice anything?

They're literally only two frames apart, and they BOTH come AFTER Mr. Darnell has stopped panning across the scene:

Blur from panning in the red-exclamation-mark frame? A figment of Mr. Sykes' imagination.

If Mr. Sykes wishes to explain away what the higher-quality version of the red-exclamation-mark frame shows-----------

-----------then he's going to need to come up with something a lot better

 

Edited October 26, 2023 by Alan Ford

[Eddy Bainbridge]

I am not wedded to Prayer man being Oswald, or to the figure being male. The analysis above from Alan Ford is pretty weak sauce so far. I was impressed with Shaun Murphy's elimination of potential alternatives to Oswald and I was impressed with the discovery of evidence Oswald may have been 'out front'. I am not impressed with collar debates based on a grainy photograph. The collar is at best indicative and certainly nothing to hang ones hat on (Almost a clothing gag!). 

The brown paper bag 'out front' is a massive stretch. Goodness knows what can be seen next to the post box, perhaps a parcel someone picked up later?

[Sandy Larsen]

3 hours ago, Alan Ford said:

I'm afraid he's given you very poor information indeed.

 

You may be right Alan. Either Jake Sykes threw me a bum steer, or I misunderstood his explanation.

I happen to have a rudimentary animated-gif player that allows single stepping. I also happen to have a short length of Darnell, zoomed in on the Prayer Man area. (I used that many years ago to study Gloria Calvery and Billy Lovelady on the steps.) I just used those to view several frames of Darnell, and what I found is that the image changes quite a bit from frame to frame. It is so bad that Prayer Man's head nearly disappears in one frame.

My conclusion is that one needs to cherry pick frames in order to get one with a feminine collar. Just like one needs to cherry pick to get one with a recognizable face.

Therefore, it is not correct to say that Prayer Man is a woman.

 

[Sandy Larsen]

15 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:

... the image changes quite a bit from frame to frame.

 

I believe that the reason for this is an unsteadiness in holding the camera, which results in complex motion blur.

 

[Chris Davidson]

4 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

I don't think so Alan.

The frame above was shot when Darnell was panning from one scene to another, an action that blurred the image. Where Darnell was aiming his camera directly at the TSBD (not panning), the frames are sharper. And without the panning blur, you can see the true shape of Prayer Man's shirt collar.

Here's a frame when Darnell wasn't panning:

 

Click on the image a few times till it quits zooming in. And then press <Ctrl>+ several times to zoom in more. Note the non-feminine collar-line on Prayer Man.

The above was explained to me by Jake Sykes, on this page.

 

Yet when scaled:

[Alan Ford]

2 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

You may be right Alan. Either Jake Sykes threw me a bum steer, or I misunderstood his explanation.

I happen to have a rudimentary animated-gif player that allows single stepping. I also happen to have a short length of Darnell, zoomed in on the Prayer Man area. (I used that many years ago to study Gloria Calvery and Billy Lovelady on the steps.) I just used those to view several frames of Darnell, and what I found is that the image changes quite a bit from frame to frame. It is so bad that Prayer Man's head nearly disappears in one frame.

My conclusion is that one needs to cherry pick frames in order to get one with a feminine collar. Just like one needs to cherry pick to get one with a recognizable face.

Therefore, it is not correct to say that Prayer Man is a woman.

 

Yes, Mr. Larsen, there are indeed changes & distortions around the area of PM's head from one frame to another. However, it seems that's an issue particular to the version of Darnell everyone has been relying on for 10 years: the BluRay Darnell frames from Mr. Oliver Stone's JFK, which Mr. Robin Unger ripped and shared.

And now we have a Darnell frame from elsewhere that is noticeably superior in quality. Juxtaposing it with its JFK BluRay counterpart, we see just how poor & distorted & inadequate an image of PM the latter has been giving us------------not because of any motion blur, etc., but because it's just of not comparable quality with a decent copy. (This is NOT, I hasten to add, through any fault of Mr. Unger's--------it's simply a problem with the BluRay version itself!)

OLD (JFK BLURAY): 

NEW:

There's just no comparison.

Now it would of course be wonderful if we had ALL the frames from the superior version of Darnell from which Mr. Kamp's new frame comes. But to bet the house---------as some are still doing----------on the one new frame we do have being an utterly distorted anomaly, when there's no good reason to think it is, is not IMO a smart or prudent or reality-based approach to settling the all-important question of Mr. Oswald's whereabouts @12:30pm. All the more so, when the original claim that PM-in-Darnell=LHO relied heavily on visual conclusions drawn from just ONE frame in the demonstrably INFERIOR version. 

To privilege that one frame from the inferior version, and to ignore (as has been happening) the frame from the superior version, is to engage in irresponsible cherrypicking IMO. 

Getting good people's hopes up that PM-in-Darnell is Mr. Oswald is----------at this point in time-----------distracting from much more promising & productive lines of inquiry related to Mr. Oswald's claim that he "went outside to watch P. Parade".

I would also add that this approach becomes even more dubious when we consider that Mr. James Hackerott has already told us that the round neckline is evident ACROSS the frames in the Sixth Floor Museum's first-gen copy of Darnell. One ignores this testimony at one's peril.

All told, I believe that the chances of PM in Darnell being Mr. Oswald are about as high as the chances of PM in Darnell being Mrs. Sarah Stanton-------------------i.e. nil.

Whereas the chances of this red-shirted, white-t-shirted white man------standing way over on the west side of the front steps in Hughes-------being Mr. Oswald rather than Mr. Lovelady stand very high indeed:

Edited October 26, 2023 by Alan Ford

[Sandy Larsen]

39 minutes ago, Alan Ford said:

Yes, Mr. Larsen, there are indeed changes & distortions around the area of PM's head from one frame to another. However, it seems that's an issue particular to the version of Darnell everyone has been relying on for 10 years: the BluRay Darnell frames from Mr. Oliver Stone's JFK, which Mr. Robin Unger ripped and shared.

And now we have a Darnell frame from elsewhere that is noticeably superior in quality. Juxtaposing it with its JFK BluRay counterpart, we see just how poor & distorted & inadequate an image of PM the latter has been giving us------------not because of any motion blur, etc., but because it's just of not comparable quality with a decent copy. (This is NOT, I hasten to add, due to any fault of Mr. Unger--------it's simply a problem with the source material itself as compressed into the BluRay format!)

OLD (JFK BLURAY): 

NEW:

There's just no comparison.

Now it would be wonderful if we had ALL the frames from the superior version. But to bet the house---------as some are still doing----------on the one frame we do have being an utterly distorted anomaly, when there's no good reason to think so, is not a smart approach to the question of Mr. Oswald's whereabouts @12:30pm.

I would also add that this approach becomes even more dubious when we consider that Mr. James Hackerott has already told us that the round neckline is evident ACROSS the frames in the Sixth Floor Museum's first-gen copy of Darnell.

 

 

Alan,

Given that the frame I showed the folks at ROKC -- to which Jake Sykes replied -- didn't even come from the Darnell copy that we all have access to, then that wasn't a fair question for me to ask them.

So, from whence did Bart Kamp get this special frame that 1) is of exceptional quality, and 2) has the feminine looking collar? And if it is true that a whole first-generation copy shows this collar on all frames, then why is Bart still trying to get access to the original Darnell at NBC?

 

[Alan Ford]

9 minutes ago, Sandy Larsen said:

 

Alan,

Given that the frame I showed the folks at ROKC -- to which Jake Sykes replied -- didn't even come from the Darnell copy that we all have access to, then that wasn't a fair question for me to ask them.

So, from whence did Bart Kamp get this special frame that 1) is of exceptional quality, and 2) has the feminine looking collar? And if it is true that a whole first-generation copy shows this collar on all frames, then why is Bart still trying to get access to the original Darnell at NBC?

 

These are fair questions, Mr. Larsen.

To my knowledge, Mr. Kamp has not to date disclosed where the superior frame came from. He should.

As for why he's still trying to get access to the original Darnell film------a noble enterprise--------I suspect (though I don't of course know) that he was only shown/given the one superior frame he shared with us. But again, it's up to him to be forthcoming with this information.

Now unless he (& others in the PM-in-Darnell=LHO camp) are privy to some esoteric information that indicates that a superior version of Darnell shows Mr. Oswald------------a vanishingly unlikely scenario IMO------------then the honest response to the superior frame's emergence would be for the PM folks to put their hands up and say:

'OK, the emergence of this new, superior frame is a setback. We admit PM here doesn't look like LHO, or even a male. However, we have not given up. There is still a chance, albeit a small one, that this frame is utterly unrepresentative of what the full superior version of Darnell shows. In the meantime, we wish to stress that the claim that LHO went out front does not, and should not, come down to the single question of whether he is PM in Darnell.'

If they made this their line going forward, it would ventilate the issue of Mr. Oswald's whereabouts @12:30, and avoid making the mistake the old AltgensDoorwayman crew made: that of unreasonable, evidence-denying dogmatism.