New material uncovered! Were the Randles and Paines direct next door neighbours?

[Tony Krome]

6 minutes ago, Tom Gram said:

Ed Ledoux found a Tom Norman listed as the occupant of 2511 in the ‘64 (Polk?) criss cross.

If the canvassing happened in December ‘63, does that suggest that Norman just casually decided to move in next door to the Paines right after the assassination? 

With a different occupant every year it does seem like it could’ve been a rental property, but who was renting it out? Sharber?

It seems a bit odd that the Coles directory would screw up and list Sharber if he had no connection to the house since ‘61 but the Polk directory would list Norman. 

Was the canvassing done via mail? Door to door? If someone only moved in in December ‘63, why the hell weren’t they interviewed?

How the heck would the FBI etc. know the house was completely vacant from Sept. through Nov. unless they looked it up somehow?

If the house was really vacant on 11/22, it should’ve been searched for evidence f*****g immediately by the DPD. Did someone tell them to leave it alone? 

Oswald was supposedly capable of double murder, but it was unthinkable that he could’ve broke into a house twenty feet away from the Paines’ back door? 

So many questions… 

The canvassing was super thorough. They would front up to the door and talk to the occupant. Failing that they would quiz neighbours and leave cards in the mailbox. I believe they were required to try at least 3 times to secure the occupant's name.

Yes, it appears that Tom Norman was canvassed around December 1963. Maybe he thought it looked like a safe neighbourhood with all the FBI, Police and Secret Service around.

 

[Pete Mellor]

According to Nancy Weiford's recent Dealey Plaza U.K. article, West 5th Street shows two properties empty on 22/11/63.

2519 occupied by Ed & Dorothy Roberts.  2515 occupied by Michael & Ruth Paine.  2511 Empty since 1962.  2507 occupied by Clement & Rena Schneider.  2503 empty 11/63.

[Tony Krome]

5 hours ago, Pete Mellor said:

2511 Empty since 1962.

That's interesting. The criss cross for 1963 is showing Robert Cassel at 2511, which means he was there around December 1962. If the above is correct, and the Randles were there until November 1962, it sounds like a very short stay for Mr. Cassel.

2511 does appear to be a rental property with many names associated with it in such a short span of years. But then why was it empty for most of 1963?

Strange how the emptiness of 2511 coincides with the stretch of time that Ruth Paine knew the Oswalds.

 

[Pete Mellor]

On 11/11/2023 at 11:29 PM, Tony Krome said:

I'd be interested to see what fellow researchers here can contribute to this, cheers!

Not sure that this is relevant, but just to complete the picture.  Nov. '63 occupants on the opposite side of West 5th.

Opposite to the Roberts' 2519, in 2518 were Roy & Margaret Benton.

Opposite to the Paine's 2515, in 2514 were Allen & Priscilla Lewis.

Opposite the empty 2511, in 2510 were Herbert & Mary Williams.

Opposite the Schneider's 2507, in 2506 were James & Mary Goodwin.

Opposite the empty 2503, in 2502 were Clarence & Mary Ponder.

Just in case anyone recognises the name of a CIA agent spying from across the street. 👀

 

[Tom Gram]

Surprised I hadn’t stumbled on this very helpful document before: 

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=1317#relPageId=568

This lists the canvassing months for several different city directories. Like Tony said the canvassing months for the ‘64 Dallas directory were Dec. - May. I’m posting in this thread though because the canvassing months for the 1964 Irving directory are listed as May-June 1964, so the guy Tom Norman could have moved into 2511 well after the assassination. 

There’s some info relevant to other threads too. It looks like the Greater Dallas City Directory was just the Dallas city directory i.e. not a separate document. However, there was an additional Greater Dallas Alphabetical Telephone Directory that was different, which had a May 1964 edition that agents were able to check while the actual Dallas city directory was still being printed. I didn’t see any canvassing information for this telephone directory, but that would be good information to know.