How did the Dallas Police learn on Nov 22 that Oswald had driven a car on Nov 11?

[Denise Hazelwood]

If I remember correctly, in the days after the assassination, a car salesman contacted the police about a man matching Oswalds description coming to his lot to take a car on a test drive. There was something about throwing the specific information in the trash once the car was returned. I don't think it was proven that the man who took the car on a test drive actually WAS Oswald, and unfortunately, I can't source that info at the moment, but that's what I recall having come across somewhere. 

[Karl Kinaski]

@Denise Hazelwood:

Garrison: ON THE TRAIL OF THE ASSASSINS. quote:
 

Quote

 

 But the most preposterous incident (...) took place one
afternoon in early November of 1963.
A young man arrived at the Downtown Lincoln Mercury dealership—
which happened to be just across the way from where the assassination
soon would occur. He announced his intention of test driving and buying a
car. The salesman, Albert Bogard, showed him a red Mercury Comet, and
in short order they were cruising along the Stemmons Freeway, the
customer at the wheel. After they got on the freeway, he revved up the
speed to 60 and 70 miles an hour and began driving like Mario Andretti at
the Indianapolis 500. He had the car taking even the tightest turns at high
speed. As the salesman afterwards told his boss, “He drove like a madman.”
When they got back, the customer seemed unhappy upon learning that
he would have to pay at least a $200 or $300 down payment to drive out
with the brand new car. Eugene Wilson, another salesman, heard him say,
“Maybe I’m going to have to go back to Russia to buy a car.” The man then
told Bogard that he would be back to get the car in a couple of weeks, that
he had some money coming in. He gave his name as “Lee Oswald,” and
Bogard wrote it on the back of one of his business cards. Several weeks
later Bogard heard on the showroom radio that Lee Oswald had been
arrested. He pulled out “Oswald’s” card, ripped it up, and threw it away.
“He won’t want to buy a car,” he said.
Bogard remembered the speed of the ride on the freeway better than he
remembered the appearance of the customer. His response was: “I can tell
you the truth, I have already forgotten what he actually looked like. I
identified him as in pictures, but just to tell you what he looked like that
day, I don’t remember.”
Frank Pizzo, for whom Bogard worked, was much more positive in his
recollection. The Warren Commission counsel, Albert Jenner, after

unsuccessfully showing him a number of pictures of Lee Oswald with other
men, finally showed him a photograph of Oswald taken on November 22
after his arrest.* Here is the dialogue which followed:
MR. PIZZO: He certainly don’t [sic] have the hairline I was describing ….
MR. JENNER: This was taken the afternoon of November 22 in the Dallas City Police
showup.
(Discussion off the record).
(Discussion between Counsel Jenner and Counsel Davis and the witness, Mr. Pizzo, off the
record).
MR. JENNER: Back on the record. You recall him as being more in the neighborhood of
what—5 feet 8 inches, 5 feet 7 inches, more or less, or more or less?
MR. PIZZO: Between 5 feet 7 inches and 5 foot 8½ inches with sort of a round forehead
and that V shape is the thing that I remember the most.
MR. JENNER: A widow’s peak?
MR. PIZZO: Yes, but very weak.
MR. JENNER: Very weak.
MR. PIZZO: Very weak—not the bushy type that I see in the picture. Well, if I’m not sure
—then—I have to say that he is not the one—if you want the absolute statement.
So much, it would seem, for any likelihood of Lee Oswald himself
having been the wild driver at Downtown Lincoln Mercury. Oswald was
five feet eleven inches tall.
Eugene Wilson, a senior car salesman at the dealership, disagreed even
with Frank Pizzo’s recollection of the young man’s short stature. Wilson
said that the young drag racer had been well under “5 feet 7 to 5 foot 8½
inches tall.” Wilson, who was five feet eight, said that the man who called
himself Oswald was “only about five feet tall.”
While the Commission simply bypassed Frank Pizzo’s precise
testimony, it initially did not present Eugene Wilson’s testimony at all.
Consequently Wilson is not listed in the index to the hearings. Later, just as
the Commission’s report was about to go to press, Wilson was discovered,
presumably by accident. The belated F.B.I. interview of Wilson, then a car
salesman with another Mercury dealership, clearly bothered the
interviewing agents. It not only eliminated the possibility of Oswald being
the young visitor but underscored the probability of a pretender using
Oswald’s name. The F.B.I. report emphasized that Wilson had a problem
with his vision because of glaucoma. However, he still was selling

automobiles, and it was fair to conclude that he could tell when another
man was a good deal shorter than he.
The Commission loftily stated that it had carefully evaluated the
Downtown Lincoln Mercury incident “because it suggests the possibility
that Oswald might have been a proficient automobile driver and, during
November 1963, might have been expecting funds with which to purchase a
car.” Had the Commission said that it had carefully evaluated the incident
because it indicated that Oswald had shrunk considerably in height, this
would, at least, have been more relevant.

 

 

 

[Greg Doudna]

5 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

Then if both ladies were there on the Monday, the memory would be clear. It would have been very usual for Hunter to be there, being a Monday, plus it was Veterans Day. 

Neither woman, in the days and weeks after Nov 22 when they tried to remember backward when that had happened, said they could remember for sure. The argument it was Mon Nov 11 has many supporting independent points as developed in my two papers but the big one is it is the only possible time it could have been if it was Lee and Marina, without Ruth Paine knowing about it if it was any other time, and Lee was not even in Irving but in Dallas at work at the Book Depository on any other weekday.

Now I ask you the same question I asked Steve Roe (which he answered and now I ask you for yours): do you accept that was Lee and Marina, and if so what other day do you think they were there, and how do you account for Ruth’s lack of knowledge of Lee and Marina driving to a furniture store in Irving on some other day when Lee was not in Irving but at work in Dallas at the TSBD?

[Tony Krome]

10 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

Neither woman, in the days and weeks after Nov 22 when they tried to remember backward when that had happened, said they could remember for sure. The argument it was Mon Nov 11 has many supporting independent points as developed in my two papers but the big one is it is the only possible time it could have been if it was Lee and Marina, without Ruth Paine knowing about it if it was any other time, and Lee was not even in Irving but in Dallas at work at the Book Depository on any other weekday.

Now I ask you the same question I asked Steve Roe (which he answered and now I ask you for yours): do you accept that was Lee and Marina, and if so what other day do you think they were there, and how do you account for Ruth’s lack of knowledge of Lee and Marina driving to a furniture store in Irving on some other day when Lee was not in Irving but at work in Dallas at the TSBD?

The witness statement is clear, it was either Wednesday or Thursday BEFORE the football game. If it was me in front of those ladies, I'm quite sure I wouldn't correct them and state, no, it was Monday AFTER the football game. The advantage they have, is they were there.

As far as Ruth goes, well, there was no apparent reason for her to get all upset when Jean confronted her about the Furniture Mart. Why the reaction? Why declare Oswald could not drive? Of course he could drive, you know that, the Murret's know that. Who cares if if he's a crap driver, the fact is he could get behind the wheel and drive.

 

[Greg Doudna]

41 minutes ago, Tony Krome said:

The witness statement is clear, it was either Wednesday or Thursday BEFORE the football game. If it was me in front of those ladies, I'm quite sure I wouldn't correct them and state, no, it was Monday AFTER the football game. The advantage they have, is they were there.

As far as Ruth goes, well, there was no apparent reason for her to get all upset when Jean confronted her about the Furniture Mart. Why the reaction? Why declare Oswald could not drive? Of course he could drive, you know that, the Murret's know that. Who cares if if he's a crap driver, the fact is he could get behind the wheel and drive.

Could you translate that into an answer to the question asked? Are you saying it was or wasn’t Lee and Marina?

[Greg Doudna]

How it is known that Mon Nov 11, 1963 (Veterans Day) was the date of the Furniture Mart/Irving Sport Shop visit?

Yes, Edith Whitworth alternatively said she had no way of remembering the specific day it happened, then said it was when she and Mrs. Hunter were discussing tickets for the Fri Nov 8 high school football game. And Mrs. Hunter at first said she reconstructed the date by linkage to what she said was a bus trip of her husband (no further information concerning that or its independent date), then that was dropped with no further explanation and Mrs. Hunter too said it was when discussing tickets for the Fri Nov 8 game. Mrs. Hunter said it had to have been mid-PM (when weather history data says it cannot have occurred; the cool "light wrap" temperature remembered is compatible ONLY with a ca. 9 or 10 a.m. time before the day heated up) based on she made her practice of going to visit Mrs. Whitworth at the Furniture Mart--where she liked to hang out for a couple of hours at a time--after talking to her daughter in a phone call during the daughter's 1-2 pm lunch hour at an office job. 

That reasoning of Mrs. Hunter is perfectly sensible except for the holiday, Veterans Day, when offices--her daughter's job--were closed for the holiday, and there would be no lunch hour phone call from her daughter on that particular day because her daughter was not at work that day, and hence no reason for Mrs. Hunter to delay any trip to hang out at the Furniture Mart that day (the Furniture Mart as a big-ticket retail store, unlike banks, the post office, and most office businesses, open on Veterans Day).

The FBI verified Fri Nov 8 as the firm date of the high school football game referred to, so that date is fixed.

We have a man who looks like and is identified as Oswald, who talks proudly of his 2-3 week old new baby girl. A young woman who is positively identified as Marina in the most basic form of positive identification there can be, a face-to-face meeting and conversation of the women set up by the FBI (Marina denying up and down, not too convincingly, that she had been in that store or seen those women there). Like Marina, the young woman with the man (Oswald) in the store never speaks English, has a 2-year old girl and a 2-3 week old baby. The women in the Furniture Mart see both the 2-year old girl and the the baby so that is not made up.

The FBI as thoroughly and conclusively as it was capable of doing, established via investigation that there was no such local or area family with children of those ages or recent births of a baby girl, other than Lee and Marina. But asking about furniture for an upcoming apartment move, sounds like a local? Who could it possibly be in Irving of that description? 

The couple with their two children matching exactly to Lee and Marina arrive in a car of the exact colors of the only possible way Lee and Marina could have gotten there without Ruth Paine driving them: via Michael Paine's blue and white old car, parked on the street in front of Ruth Paine's house unused since late Oct when Michael Paine had bought it and parked it at Ruth's. 

I have cleaned windows for countless retail store owners in my life on routes--some that grew quite large-- that I would develop whenever I felt like moving to someplace new and scenic. The frequency was established--e.g. every two weeks, monthly--but with only a few exceptions I would leave flexibility on the precise day I would show up, adjusted to weather and workload issues. The customer just knew I was reliable and would show up at the frequency agreed though the exact day of the week would vary. I would remember doing particular jobs but not exactly when in the past (typically I would have to consult paper records to know that). They all run together in the past in memory--one has only a rough approximation of how long ago even though remembering the specific details of the job or a personal interaction. (Everyone has experienced this with remembering a visit of relatives clearly but the exact date being not so clear.) This was the case with Edith Whitworth, busy store owner, and Mrs. Hunter with Lee and Marina in that store. The issue of the date only comes up post-Nov 22, and they try to remember what exact date it was. They were influenced by talking with one another. And neither the FBI nor Warren Commission asked either of these women to recount visits of Mrs. Hunter to the Furniture Mart after Nov 8. 

But the date cannot have been a weekday prior to Fri Nov 8 if it was Lee and Marina because (a) Lee was at work at the TSBD in Dallas those days; and (b) Marina's whereabouts were known to Ruth Paine at all times those days because she was living with Ruth, and Ruth Paine said Lee and Marina never drove any car to a furniture store to her knowledge. 

And the time cannot have been the 2 or 3 or 4 pm that Mrs. Hunter thought with certainty it was--Mrs. Whitworth said she had no idea of the time of day--no matter who it was, because of the weather data history. As Mrs. Hunter got the time of day wrong, so she got the calendar day of the week wrong too. Easy mistake to make! They just were mistaken, because the evidence says they were. Not by much though. Nov 11 is not that much different from Nov 6 or 7, from a post-Nov 22 memory trying to fix that past date for the first time. 

Two commenters above (the discussion is welcome even if there are differences), like the Warren Commission, take the date reconstruction memory as fixed and fix on that as argument against the only possibility that date can work for Lee and Marina, Nov 11. One of the commenters concludes therefore it cannot have been Lee and Marina, which was the reasoning of the FBI and Warren Commission. The other commenter seems not to be pleased to say whether it was Lee and Marina or not on a non-Nov 11 date, even though that question requires an answer.

Here is more: why the Irving Sport Shop visit had to have been Mon Nov 11

The Furniture Mart and Irving Sport Shop Oswald job ticket visits are linked and are the same day, because Oswald or the Lee and Marina and baby doppelgangers, whichever it was, went from one store to the other that day, whatever that day was. Therefore, whatever date is true or established for either one, fixes the correct date for the other.

At the Irving Sport Shop it can be known that occurred Mon Nov 11, because Dial Ryder was alone in the store that day. We can know that because we know owner Greener was on vacation (from ca. Nov 1 to Nov 14), and because the only other employee of the Shop, a young woman secretary who probably also would help out at the front counter, normally was there but was not there the day of the Oswald job ticket. We can know that because that woman said she remembered no Oswald job ticket customer. And also, because it is clear Dial Ryder did that as a cash job with the cash going into his pocket not into the cash register, which is more consistent with being alone in the store. 

And the only day that makes sense for the secretary not to be in the store was Veterans Day, Mon Nov 11, when she had the holiday off to be with her husband and family, but Dial Ryder was in the shop because it was peak hunting season with lots of scopes (and other) activity and money flowing into the shop. 

A parallel to Dial Ryder doing the Oswald job ticket job for cash, doing the scope reinstallation on the spot, with the cash going into his pocket instead of into the cash register, is this parallel from a Secret Service interview of another transaction being investigated (some Nov 22 anti-JFK printed materials in Dallas):

"Klause told his customer that he could make the film, and that he would have some ready during the early afternoon ... he made delivery to his unknown customer on that same day at about 4:00 or 4:30 P.M. He charged the customer $4.00 for the job, which was paid in cash. Klause did not write up this sale, as he said he saw a chance to make a few dollars on the side. Hence no record is available for this transaction. Klause said no other employees were at the shop, as they had gone home for the day." (Secret Service, 12/6/63, CE 2473, https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=1141#relPageId=687)

"No record is available for this transaction" is exactly what Dial Ryder told the FBI agent who surprised him by a knock on his door on Mon Nov 25, 1963, and Dial at that time disclosed the Oswald job ticket which up to that moment he said he had only told to his wife. 

The reason there was only the Oswald job ticket, but no cash register record of the transaction, for Dial Ryder was the same reason as the above: Dial Ryder was working alone in the shop on Veterans Day and the cash went into his pocket. That also accounts for Dial Ryder's reluctance to tell Greener about that transaction, an awkward conversation.

And so Mon Nov 11 is when that happened at the Irving Sport Shop, which agrees with (a) Dial Ryder telling the FBI agent on Mon Nov 25 that he remembered it as about "two weeks" earlier; and (b) the Oswald job ticket was notably handwritten in Dial's writing in pencil not pen, and Dial related that to a day or two back there when he seemed to remember atypically using a pencil, which corresponds to documented use of a pencil by Dial confirmed on Tue Nov 12.

Then in what might be called an "excited utterance" when Marina, caught off guard and denying like crazy any association of herself with that rifle the best she could, at first said on Nov 22 she thought she had last seen a glimpse of that rifle about two weeks earlier and without a scope. (It was without a scope when Lee and Marina took it out of the garage on Mon Nov 11 to take it to get the scope base repaired and the scope put back on.) Later in her Warren Commission testimony Marina swore she never saw a glimpse of that rifle after early October--the true Nov 11 date allusion completely disappeared in her testimony. 

Because the Irving Sport Shop Oswald job ticket is dated to Mon Nov 11 because of Dial Ryder working alone, that establishes, or rather confirms, Mon Nov 11 for the Furniture Mart date as well, which by coincidence is the one and only time that that could have happened when Ruth and her children were gone from her house, and Lee and Marina had opportunity to obtain the car key out of some desk drawer and borrow, without Ruth's knowledge, the old unused blue-and-white car of Michael Paine parked out front, and drive to the Furniture Mart and Irving Sport Shop.

Its been there all along. But the FBI, and the Warren Commission, missed this one. There is no reason why it needs to continue to be missed now and today though. 

Edited March 15 by Greg Doudna

[Steve Roe]

On 3/15/2024 at 9:02 AM, Greg Doudna said:

But the date cannot have been a weekday prior to Fri Nov 8 if it was Lee and Marina because (a) Lee was at work at the TSBD in Dallas those days; and (b) Marina's whereabouts were known to Ruth Paine at all times those days because she was living with Ruth, and Ruth Paine said Lee and Marina never drove any car to a furniture store to her knowledge. 

Greg, you cannot bend testimony to fit your theory. Mrs. Whitworth was extremely specific about the date, as well as Mrs. Hunter. She most certainly said it occurred before the Richland Hills vs. Irving football game. Whitworth, Edith - 7/22/64 (maryferrell.org)

Mrs. Hunter said in her testimony that she didn't leave her house before 2:00 PM because she talked to her daughter before she got back off her lunch break at Commercial Title. That doesn't jive either. Warren Commission Hearings, Volume XI (maryferrell.org)

If it was November 11th, don't you think both Whitworth and Hunter would have said Veterans Day???? Everyone knows it was a long holiday weekend, yet both these women made no mention of that at all. Yes, most retail outlets were open on Veterans Day. 

Sorry Greg, not buying it. 

 

[Greg Doudna]

4 hours ago, Steve Roe said:

Greg, you cannot bend testimony to fit your theory. Mrs. Whitworth was extremely specific about the date, as well as Mrs. Hunter. She most certainly said it occurred before the Richland Hills vs. Irving football game. Whitworth, Edith - 7/22/64 (maryferrell.org)

Mrs. Hunter said in her testimony that she didn't leave her house before 2:00 PM because she talked to her daughter before she got back off her lunch break at Commercial Title. That doesn't jive either. Warren Commission Hearings, Volume XI (maryferrell.org)

If it was November 11th, don't you think both Whitworth and Hunter would have said Veterans Day???? Everyone knows it was a long holiday weekend, yet both these women made no mention of that at all. Yes, most retail outlets were open on Veterans Day. 

Sorry Greg, not buying it. 

The visit of Mrs. Hunter to Mrs. Whitworth's furniture store after 2 pm on a weekday to discuss tickets to the Richland Hills game surely happened. That is not in dispute. What is to be disputed is that simply was not the occasion of the visit of Lee, Marina, June, and baby Rachel in that store even if one or the other of the women placed it at that time and the other agreed.

That family of four went from there to the Sport Shop less than two blocks away and the man gave his name as "Oswald". The woman was positively identified as Marina by the women and there was a 2-3 week old baby girl matching to Lee and Marina's baby girl born Oct 20. On the weekdays you suppose this happened at 2 pm, Lee was in Dallas at work and Marina was at Ruth Paine's house and not taking any trip to a furniture store with Lee.

A different visit of Mrs. Hunter to the Furniture Mart on the morning of Monday Nov 11 Veterans Day is the day the visit of the family had to have happened, because it simply cannot have occurred any other day, unless you are going to argue for doppelgangers who look exactly like all four members of the Lee and Marina family and used the name "Oswald" (at their next stop at the Irving Sport Shop), yet were not Lee and Marina. 

You can see the same time-memory distortion phenomenon in the Sports Drome Gun range witnesses of the "Oswald" (who was not Oswald) there, how witnesses remembering the same event differed on which day in the past it was.

The women would have said "Veterans Day" if they had associated the visit of Lee and Marina with that morning when they were there too.   

Did you adequately consider what I brought out about the cool weather, the "light wrap" temperature, remembered when Lee and Marina and June and Rachel were in the store? Unlike a misdating of the visit of the family by association with the wrong visit of Mrs. Hunter to Mrs. Whitworth's store, a memory of temperature at the time of the family's visit is probably not going to have been mistaken. That temperature memory proves whoever that family of four were, they were definitely not there at 2 pm in the afternoon. This point has nothing to do with whether or not it was Lee and Marina. It has to do with it cannot have been 2 pm whoever they were; Mrs. Hunter was just wrong. She was not wrong on visiting the Furniture Mart at 2 pm on a weekday to discuss Richland Hill tickets; but wrong on that as the day the family came in.

There are very good weather records of temperature of every hour at Love Field, Dallas, from a federal agency for any day you want to check in 1963. You can look it up on any number of weather history sites, such as this one: https://weatherspark.com/h/m/8813/1963/11/Historical-Weather-in-November-1963-in-Dallas-Texas-United-States#Figures-Rainfall.

Mrs. Hunter was just wrong about the man and woman with their little girl and baby, whoever they were, coming in at 2 pm because at 2 pm it was 80s-90s Fahrenheit temperature every single day at that time. Check and see for yourself! 

The weather detail establishes that the visit of this family of four occurred on a morning, and therefore not on the Wed or Thu Nov 6 or 7 game-tickets visit at 2 pm of Mrs. Hunter that did happen, just without the family showing up then.

The family were in that store on some day which cannot have occurred later than ca. 10:30 am or so at about the latest. 

How does that square with these women placing that visit at the 2:00 pm visit on Wed or Thu Nov 6 or 7 when Mrs. Hunter was there that both remembered, talking about tickets to the game? 

It doesn't square, because that cannot have been when the visit occurred. It rules out that day. 

Any regular weekday Mrs. Hunter said she would wait until ca. 2:00 before going to hang out at the Furniture Mart with Mrs. Whitworth. There is only one day when a morning visit was possible: the holiday, Veterans Day, when Mrs. Hunter's daughter was not working and there was no 1-2 pm phone call which is why Mrs. Hunter waited until 2 pm. 

it could be on Veterans Day Mrs. Hunter had some juicy gossip she couldn't wait to tell Mrs. Whitworth, maybe something from the Richland Hills game, and went to the Furniture Mart Monday morning at opening time on Nov 11 on the holiday--who knows why. But that's the only day that works for the time of day--morning--when the weather data says the family were in the store.

How do you propose to explain Mrs. Whitworth's memory of it being cool, and the little girl wearing a light coat or wrap in the store because it was slightly cool, when the family was there? 

This "fundamentalism" or "witness inerrancy" on witnesses' time dating of past associations of incident memories would be like quoting Marina remembering Lee practicing shooting his rifle in January 1963 as evidence that the March 1963 records of an Oswald rifle purchase at Klein's cannot have been Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle. When it was Marina's time memory in error (not necessarily in that case motivated for any reason, just simple error). 

But, you're free to stick to doppelgangers coming in to the Furniture Mart when it was blazing hot after 2 pm and witnesses mistakenly remembering 90 degree heat as if it was cool light-wrap weather cooler than 70 degrees. 🙂 

We will just have to disagree here, because I don't buy that all four of this family, the use of the name "Oswald", an identically colored car to the one they had means, motive, and opportunity to drive on the morning of Nov 11, the witnesses' positive identifications of Marina in a face to face meeting, are to be explained as doppelgangers, when there is no need for that.

And think Steve--what is there not to like about this identification? It does not go either way on adding or detracting from whether Oswald killed Kennedy in any direct way. I don't know fully what it means myself, only that the facts call for it. Why not consider the Nov 11 idea? Anyway thanks for your comments. 

Edited March 18 by Greg Doudna

[Steve Roe]

10 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

And think Steve--what is there not to like about this identification? It does not go either way on adding or detracting from whether Oswald killed Kennedy in any direct way. I don't know fully what it means myself, only that the facts call for it. Why not consider the Nov 11 idea? Anyway thanks for your comments.

Running short of time today, Greg. First of all, I acknowledge your weather data. I use a different one but it's pretty much the same. I don't dispute that. 

I'm more interested in what is verifiable, as the true facts of the case. As I see it, this Furniture Mart sighting doesn't square up with the facts, even though it could be construed as pointing to Oswald's guilt. 

When I get more time, I'll look further into this. In the meantime, if you take a look at Commission Exhibit #2976, the FBI interviewed Mrs. Dominey (Gertrude Hunter's friend in Houston). It's not very flattering and points to credibility issues with Mrs. Hunter. As I stated earlier in a post, Mrs. Hunter came up with another wild story of seeing Marina at a gas station in the Hunter/Whitworth/Marina testimony. Warren Commission Hearings, Volume XXVI (maryferrell.org)