I met Oswald in the elevator: Mr. Spaulding Jones

[Alan Ford]

14 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

You may need to edit that line. At the 35min mark, he explains that he saw the men around the building, and went on to say, "not inside" before the interviewer interrupted him. So there were outside the building.

I think his wording is a little ambiguous, Mr. Krome, but tending IMO to inside the building. He says they saw these men "around the building". His "not inside" is in specific answer to the question whether they had come to his office a day or two before. I think this means he saw them on his floor that morning, but didn't see them (or hear about them) coming into his office at any point.

Edited November 20, 2023 by Alan Ford

[Tony Krome]

9 minutes ago, Alan Ford said:

I think his wording is a little ambiguous, Mr. Krome, but tending IMO to inside the building. He says they saw these men "around the building". His "not inside" is in specific answer to the question whether they had come to his office a day or two before. I think this means he saw them on his floor that morning, but didn't see them (or hear about them) coming into his office at any point.

Up to you, but I don't recall anyone else mention unknown multiple suited men walking around inside the building before the assassination. Plus I believe he told the FBI no strangers that morning.

For some reason, the interviewer didn't ask him about the amount and spread of shots he heard. Frustrating.

[Alan Ford]

1 minute ago, Tony Krome said:

Up to you, but I don't recall anyone else mention unknown multiple suited men walking around inside the building before the assassination. Plus I believe he told the FBI no strangers that morning.

Not up to me, Mr. Krome-----------he says "not inside" in response to a question about his office.

As for what he told FBI, I'd be very slow to equate it with what FBI tell us about what he told FBI!

[Tony Krome]

2 minutes ago, Alan Ford said:

Not up to me, Mr. Krome-----------he says "not inside" in response to a question about his office.

As for what he told FBI, I'd be very slow to equate it with what FBI tell us about what he told FBI!

All good. The implications are that the FBI would have had to change the statements of TSBD staff that would have seen these strangers walking around the building. Spaulding suggested the said men were likely checking around the building before the arrival of the motorcade. If these men were inside the building, I'd imagine, to equate his description of them, he would have seen them casually checking windows etc on the 4th floor where Spaulding worked. I believe there were quite a few staff on that floor.

[Pat Speer]

The whole thing sounds a bit wacky. Oswald with his girls at the TSBD? Never happened.

As far as seeing a man in the elevator with a box heading up to the third floor? Well. Warren Caster brought two rifles into the building on the 20th, and admitted taking them up to his office on the second floor. 

[Tony Krome]

2 minutes ago, Pat Speer said:

The whole thing sounds a bit wacky. Oswald with his girls at the TSBD? Never happened.

Actually, that's a good point, effectively those 2 girls would then be "strangers" to many of the TSBD staff.

[Alan Ford]

55 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

All good. The implications are that the FBI would have had to change the statements of TSBD staff that would have seen these strangers walking around the building. Spaulding suggested the said men were likely checking around the building before the arrival of the motorcade. If these men were inside the building, I'd imagine, to equate his description of them, he would have seen them casually checking windows etc on the 4th floor where Spaulding worked. I believe there were quite a few staff on that floor.

I think the problem is resolved if we take 'strangers' to mean people who weren't supposed to be there (another phrase oft used in those FBI interview reports). A policeman or an S.S. man wouldn't be considered a 'stranger' in this sense.

And it's not hard to imagine an FBI agent being told by an employee, 'Well, there were a couple of men in suits around the place that morning.' 'Oh, we know about them. But did you see any strangers who looked out of place?'

[Alan Ford]

59 minutes ago, Pat Speer said:

The whole thing sounds a bit wacky. Oswald with his girls at the TSBD? Never happened.

Not Mr. Oswald's girls-------------Mr. Jones'.

[Tony Krome]

Just now, Alan Ford said:

Not Mr. Oswald's girls-------------Mr. Jones'.

haha

[Alan Ford]

2 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

haha

Not meant as a joke!

[Tony Krome]

1 minute ago, Alan Ford said:

Not meant as a joke!

Yes, I realise Pat unintentionally described them as Oswald's girls.

Back to the strangers. If, as you proffered, the FBI told TSBD staff that they knew about the strange men inside the building, that not to worry about them, does that indicate that they were genuinely checking the security of the building, as Spaulding suspected? 

[Alan Ford]

Just now, Tony Krome said:

Yes, I realise Pat unintentionally described them as Oswald's girls.

Back to the strangers. If, as you proffered, the FBI told TSBD staff that they knew about the strange men inside the building, that not to worry about them, does that indicate that they were genuinely checking the security of the building, as Spaulding suspected? 

Well, I believe there was a White House-approved off-books false-flag missed-shots event planned, so my take would be that if these guys were SS then they were only going through the motions of checking the security of the building. They were really there to check that all was well with the planned operation.

[Michael Griffith]

On 11/15/2023 at 9:44 AM, Alan Ford said:

https://emuseum.jfk.org/objects/15772/spaulding-jones-oral-history?ctx=baa5742ebe327533c7877c25dd91d058a76ead47&idx=251

It's quite an eyebrow-raiser.

Two things leap out in particular:

1. On the morning of 11/22, Mr. Jones says he saw unfamiliar men in the building whom he took to be (non-uniformed) Secret Service men. His assumption was that they were checking the building out ahead of the P. Parade.

2. That same morning (hours before the motorcade), Mr. Jones encountered Mr. Lee Harvey Oswald on the front ('passenger') elevator. Mr. Oswald got off on (according to Mr. Jones' best recollection) the third floor. Mr. Oswald was carrying a box about this wide-------------

and this deep-------------

The box was (to use Mr. Jones' own word:) "tall". (Mr. Jones afterwards wondered if it might not have contained the rifle.)

------------------

With regard to #2 above, cf (perhaps) this information given to the HSCA in 1977 by Mrs. Mary Hall, who had worked on the fifth floor of the Dal-Tex building:

Did Mr. Oswald that morning receive delivery of something necessary to that day's planned activities, and take it upstairs somewhere?

The presence of unfamiliar men in the TSBD that morning is revealing and important. This is an angle that should have been discovered and thoroughly explored by local authorities and then by the WC.