Benjamin Cole Posted July 29 Share Posted July 29 I don't know much about Mel Ayton, but he wrote a book on Presidential assassinations and attempts, and a couple books on RFK1A and Sirhan. Lori Spencer thinks highly of him. Maybe an EF-JFKA'er has read his books and has a comment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Morrow Posted July 29 Share Posted July 29 Mel Ayton is long time Lone Nutter on the JFK assassination and he is also a "lone nutter" on the RFK assassination as well as he indicts Sirhan Sirhan alone for RFK's murder (as I do as well). MEL AYTON – LONE NUTTER Mel Ayton http://www.melayton.com/ Mel Ayton's latest book Hunting The President was published in April 2014 and received nation-wide acclaim from The Sean Hannity Show, The Michael Medved Show, Bill Martinez Live, In The Market with Janet Parshall, The Brian Thomas Show, Daybreak USA, Talk Back with Chuck Wilder, The Lars Larson Show, The Janet Mefferd Show, and The Dennis Miller Show as well as numerous local US radio shows. News stories about the book appeared in the US national press including The New York Post, and The Los Angeles Times and many American regional newspapers and media websites Mel Ayton, “Lee Harvey Oswald’s Motives,” Mel Ayton, History News Network, 2006 - https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/23430 Mel Ayton: Review of John McAdams's "JFK Assassination Logic: How to Think About Claims of Conspiracy" (Potomac Books, 2011) http://hnn.us/article/143124 QUOTE In the 1970s, Priscilla Johnson McMillan’s Marina and Lee, a book which could be characterized as ‘Marina Oswald’s Memoirs, gave the American public an insight into the mind and character of JFK’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, an enigmatic young man who had remained a puzzle to the American people since the November 1963 assassination. In the 1980s, Jean Davison’s Oswald’s Game gave readers a logical explanation for the assassination: Oswald, a hero-worshipper of Fidel Castro and a wannabe revolutionary, had political motives and he likely acted out of a distorted sense of political idealism. In the 1990s, Gerald Posner’s Case Closed, a well-written account of the assassination that debunked numerous conspiracy scenarios provided a refreshing antidote to Oliver Stone’s movie about the assassination, JFK. Stone’s largely fictional drama had been released in cinemas in the early 1990s. Its central character was Jim Garrison, the New Orleans District Attorney who accused the CIA of Kennedy’s murder. His false history of the assassination had a corrosive effect on a new generation’s ability to understand this important event in U.S. history. Fortunately, another corrective to the movie came in 1998 with the publication of Patricia Lambert’s excellent book False Witness, which firmly exposed Garrison as a charlatan and a fraud. Within recent years Vincent Bugliosi’s Reclaiming History, a mammoth 1,600 page book, examined every theory and every conspiracy claim. The former Los Angeles lawyer, who became famous for his prosecution of hippie killer Charles Manson, took the debate about conspiracy allegations a step further by providing a devastating no-nonsense approach to the ridiculous assassination scenarios constructed by conspiracy authors, all of whom, as his book ably demonstrates, deliberately skewed the evidence in the case. His book was a masterwork that decisively marginalized JFK conspiracists. UNQUOTE Mel Ayton gives a ringing endorsement of John McAdams lone nutter book Mel Ayton bio See www.melayton.com Mel Ayton lives in Durham, England. He has a B.A. Honours degree in politics and history and a master's degree, M.A. (Dunelm). For his Durham University degree Ayton specialised in the teaching of American history in US schools and colleges. He is a former teacher, deputy school principal and college lecturer. Throughout his teaching career he has taught in elementary schools, high schools and colleges. In 1988 he was selected as a Fulbright Teacher and taught in schools in Michigan, USA. He also worked in Bermuda and taught in Zambia. In 2003 Mel Ayton was the historical adviser for the BBC’s television documentary, The Kennedy Dynasty, which was broadcast in the UK and the US in November 2003. He also worked as a historical consultant for NBC News, National Geographic Channel and the Discovery Times Channel and appeared in the documentaries - CIA - Mind Control (2006), CIA Secret Experiments (2008) and Conspiracy Test: The Robert Kennedy Assassination (2008). Ayton was also a guest on Fox News’ Hannity show in 2009 and 2014. Ayton has appeared in television programmes produced by the BBC’s Newsnight and the UK’s Channel 4 News and has also appeared as a guest on numerous US radio talk shows including: The Peter Boyles Show, The Dennis Miller Show, The Michael Medved Show, The Lars Larson Show, The Janet Mefferd Show, The Brian Thomas Show, Bill Martinez Live, The Paul Ibbetson Show, The Schilling Show, In The Market with Janet Parshall, WDUN’s Morning News with Bill and Joel, The Steve Cochran Show, Ireland’s Newstalk with Sean Moncrieff, and Canada’s Ted Woloshyn Show. Ayton is the author of numerous articles for various print and online publications, including History Ireland, Crime Magazine, David Horowitz's FrontPage, Max Holland’s Washington Decoded, George Mason University's History News Network, The Los Angeles Times and TIME magazine. Ayton’s recent book is a second edition of The Forgotten Terrorist: Sirhan Sirhan and the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2019). The new edition includes an updated Afterword by the author and a Preface written by Harvard Professor Emeritus Alan Dershowitz. In 2011 Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, sought a new trial or freedom from his life sentence asserting his innocence. In December 2011 California’s Attorney General, Kamala Harris, through her Deputy Attorney General, Jamie Fuster, requested Ayton’s assistance in preparing a brief challenging Sirhan’s claim that he is innocent of the murder of Senator Robert F. Kennedy. The California courts eventually dismissed Sirhan’s request in 2015. (See: https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20150106770 ) Mel Ayton is also the author of: Questions of Controversy - The Kennedy Brothers (University of Sunderland Press 2001) The JFK Assassination - Dispelling The Myths and Challenging the Conspiracy Theorists (Woodsfield Publishing, 2002) A Racial Crime - James Earl Ray and the Murder of Martin Luther King Jr. (ArcheBooks, 2005) Dark Soul of the South - The Life and Crimes of Racist Killer Joseph Paul Franklin (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2011) Justice Denied - Bermuda's Black Militants, The 'Third Man' and the Assassinations of a Police Chief and Governor (Strategic Media Books, 2013) Beyond Reasonable Doubt – The Warren Report and Lee Harvey Oswald’s Guilt and Motive 50 Years On (Strategic Media Books, 2014) Hunting The President Threats, Plots and Assassination Attempts – From FDR to Obama (Regnery Publishing, 2014) Plotting To Kill The President – Assassination Attempts – From Washington to Hoover (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2017) Protecting The Presidential Candidates - From JFK to Biden (Frontline Books, 2021) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Benjamin Cole Posted July 30 Author Share Posted July 30 12 hours ago, Robert Morrow said: Mel Ayton is long time Lone Nutter on the JFK assassination and he is also a "lone nutter" on the RFK assassination as well as he indicts Sirhan Sirhan alone for RFK's murder (as I do as well). MEL AYTON – LONE NUTTER Mel Ayton http://www.melayton.com/ Mel Ayton's latest book Hunting The President was published in April 2014 and received nation-wide acclaim from The Sean Hannity Show, The Michael Medved Show, Bill Martinez Live, In The Market with Janet Parshall, The Brian Thomas Show, Daybreak USA, Talk Back with Chuck Wilder, The Lars Larson Show, The Janet Mefferd Show, and The Dennis Miller Show as well as numerous local US radio shows. News stories about the book appeared in the US national press including The New York Post, and The Los Angeles Times and many American regional newspapers and media websites Mel Ayton, “Lee Harvey Oswald’s Motives,” Mel Ayton, History News Network, 2006 - https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/23430 Mel Ayton: Review of John McAdams's "JFK Assassination Logic: How to Think About Claims of Conspiracy" (Potomac Books, 2011) http://hnn.us/article/143124 QUOTE In the 1970s, Priscilla Johnson McMillan’s Marina and Lee, a book which could be characterized as ‘Marina Oswald’s Memoirs, gave the American public an insight into the mind and character of JFK’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, an enigmatic young man who had remained a puzzle to the American people since the November 1963 assassination. In the 1980s, Jean Davison’s Oswald’s Game gave readers a logical explanation for the assassination: Oswald, a hero-worshipper of Fidel Castro and a wannabe revolutionary, had political motives and he likely acted out of a distorted sense of political idealism. In the 1990s, Gerald Posner’s Case Closed, a well-written account of the assassination that debunked numerous conspiracy scenarios provided a refreshing antidote to Oliver Stone’s movie about the assassination, JFK. Stone’s largely fictional drama had been released in cinemas in the early 1990s. Its central character was Jim Garrison, the New Orleans District Attorney who accused the CIA of Kennedy’s murder. His false history of the assassination had a corrosive effect on a new generation’s ability to understand this important event in U.S. history. Fortunately, another corrective to the movie came in 1998 with the publication of Patricia Lambert’s excellent book False Witness, which firmly exposed Garrison as a charlatan and a fraud. Within recent years Vincent Bugliosi’s Reclaiming History, a mammoth 1,600 page book, examined every theory and every conspiracy claim. The former Los Angeles lawyer, who became famous for his prosecution of hippie killer Charles Manson, took the debate about conspiracy allegations a step further by providing a devastating no-nonsense approach to the ridiculous assassination scenarios constructed by conspiracy authors, all of whom, as his book ably demonstrates, deliberately skewed the evidence in the case. His book was a masterwork that decisively marginalized JFK conspiracists. UNQUOTE Mel Ayton gives a ringing endorsement of John McAdams lone nutter book Mel Ayton bio See www.melayton.com Mel Ayton lives in Durham, England. He has a B.A. Honours degree in politics and history and a master's degree, M.A. (Dunelm). For his Durham University degree Ayton specialised in the teaching of American history in US schools and colleges. He is a former teacher, deputy school principal and college lecturer. Throughout his teaching career he has taught in elementary schools, high schools and colleges. In 1988 he was selected as a Fulbright Teacher and taught in schools in Michigan, USA. He also worked in Bermuda and taught in Zambia. In 2003 Mel Ayton was the historical adviser for the BBC’s television documentary, The Kennedy Dynasty, which was broadcast in the UK and the US in November 2003. He also worked as a historical consultant for NBC News, National Geographic Channel and the Discovery Times Channel and appeared in the documentaries - CIA - Mind Control (2006), CIA Secret Experiments (2008) and Conspiracy Test: The Robert Kennedy Assassination (2008). Ayton was also a guest on Fox News’ Hannity show in 2009 and 2014. Ayton has appeared in television programmes produced by the BBC’s Newsnight and the UK’s Channel 4 News and has also appeared as a guest on numerous US radio talk shows including: The Peter Boyles Show, The Dennis Miller Show, The Michael Medved Show, The Lars Larson Show, The Janet Mefferd Show, The Brian Thomas Show, Bill Martinez Live, The Paul Ibbetson Show, The Schilling Show, In The Market with Janet Parshall, WDUN’s Morning News with Bill and Joel, The Steve Cochran Show, Ireland’s Newstalk with Sean Moncrieff, and Canada’s Ted Woloshyn Show. Ayton is the author of numerous articles for various print and online publications, including History Ireland, Crime Magazine, David Horowitz's FrontPage, Max Holland’s Washington Decoded, George Mason University's History News Network, The Los Angeles Times and TIME magazine. Ayton’s recent book is a second edition of The Forgotten Terrorist: Sirhan Sirhan and the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2019). The new edition includes an updated Afterword by the author and a Preface written by Harvard Professor Emeritus Alan Dershowitz. In 2011 Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, sought a new trial or freedom from his life sentence asserting his innocence. In December 2011 California’s Attorney General, Kamala Harris, through her Deputy Attorney General, Jamie Fuster, requested Ayton’s assistance in preparing a brief challenging Sirhan’s claim that he is innocent of the murder of Senator Robert F. Kennedy. The California courts eventually dismissed Sirhan’s request in 2015. (See: https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20150106770 ) Mel Ayton is also the author of: Questions of Controversy - The Kennedy Brothers (University of Sunderland Press 2001) The JFK Assassination - Dispelling The Myths and Challenging the Conspiracy Theorists (Woodsfield Publishing, 2002) A Racial Crime - James Earl Ray and the Murder of Martin Luther King Jr. (ArcheBooks, 2005) Dark Soul of the South - The Life and Crimes of Racist Killer Joseph Paul Franklin (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2011) Justice Denied - Bermuda's Black Militants, The 'Third Man' and the Assassinations of a Police Chief and Governor (Strategic Media Books, 2013) Beyond Reasonable Doubt – The Warren Report and Lee Harvey Oswald’s Guilt and Motive 50 Years On (Strategic Media Books, 2014) Hunting The President Threats, Plots and Assassination Attempts – From FDR to Obama (Regnery Publishing, 2014) Plotting To Kill The President – Assassination Attempts – From Washington to Hoover (University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2017) Protecting The Presidential Candidates - From JFK to Biden (Frontline Books, 2021) RM-- Thanks for your collegial response. I disagree with Ayton on the JFKA/RFK1A, which in my view are siamese twin political assassinations. But, a forum is for having debates and not monologues, so let Ayton be Ayton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W. Niederhut Posted July 30 Share Posted July 30 This post isn't about Ayton, but it's related to the broader subject of the historiography of Presidential assassination attempts. Has anyone on the forum ever done a deep dive down the John Hinckley, Jr. rabbit hole? Most of what I know about the Hinckley/Bush family histories came from reading Russ Baker's book, Family of Secrets. William Kelly started an archival Education Forum thread about Hinckley, but there hasn't been a great deal of discussion here about that 1981 assassination attempt on Reagan, which could have put GHWB in the White House. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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