Chasing Oswald - Documentary

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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri

On Friday November 22, 1963 I was five years old and my father picked me up in his new 1963 Ford pickup at noon from Kindergarten in Humansville.

It was brilliant, sunshiny day and shirtsleeve weather.

My father could barely operate a stove except to make coffee and fry bologna. About a quarter of one he was frying bologna for our dinner and we were both singing along with Talk Back Trembling Lips on the kitchen table radio when the Dee Jay stopped the song and we heard—

President Kennedy has been wounded in the head in his motorcade in Dallas Texas today a few minutes ago. Stand by for further developments as KWTO receives them.

I ran to the living room to turn on the television and Daddy served us there, and the phone started ringing. Mama came home early from teaching school and we all watched the entire thing live.



Ever since that day the JFK assassination has fascinated me. I can’t count all the books I’ve read and documentaries I’ve watched.

If you have any interest in the JFK assassination go someplace where you can spend an hour and a half to watch Chasing Oswald, a Timeline on YouTube.

It’s not about any of the usual conspiracy angles.

What if?

Marina Oswald had agreed to take their kids and come back to Dallas and start over, on Thursday night?

Or on Friday morning Oswald’s driver had checked his package of curtain rods and said, I’m not going to haul a rifle to Dallas put that thing back in Mrs Paine’s garage?

Or Officer Tippet had not been so observant and Oswald walked right on by?


Or if one of Jack Ruby’s strippers had waited a bit longer to beg $25 from him?


Or if a Postal Inspector had not questioned Oswald and delayed him on the Sunday morning transfer?

The actual timeline between 12:30 Friday until Ruby shot Oswald on Sunday is something I’ve never seen this well explored.
 

makhorkasmoker

Part of the Furniture Now
Aug 17, 2021
902
2,304
Central Florida
I recently read Norman Mailer’s “Oswald’s Tale.” It’s the best thing I’ve read by that author, and despite mailer’s reputation, he took a pretty down to earth approach to subject too, I thought.
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
Good documentary.
I think he definitely fired two of the shots. I also think others were involved and the only person who really knew what occurred was Allen Dulles.
I don’t know if you have but watch JFK Revisited it’s well worth the time
to watch.

What complicates the subject, is there’s so little money and fame to be had from the boring, mundane, truth. There are only riches and glory in the sensational.:)

Marina testified before the Warren Commision that Lee would dry fire his rifle to practice. One of the three spent cartridges on the sixth floor has a dented case mouth. It was an improvised “snap cap”. Oswald assembled his rifle with the snap cap in the chamber, ejected it, loaded three, and fired twice.

Agent Clint Hill only heard two shots.

A million deer hunters, have the skill to hit a target at 30 yards and again at 80 five seconds later, from a rest in an elevated stand.


If Oswald had not left most of his money by the bedside at Irving and called a cab, he’d have made the Greyhound, or an airport.

——

Shortly after the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle was found on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building,1 agents of the FBI learned from retail outlets in Dallas that Crescent Firearms, Inc., of New York City, was a distributor of surplus Italian 6.5-millimeter military rifles.2 During the evening of November 22, 1963, a review of the records of Crescent Firearms revealed that the firm had shipped an Italian carbine, serial number C2766, to Klein's Sporting Goods Co., of Chicago, Ill.3 After searching their records from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. the officers of Klein's discovered that a rifle bearing serial number C2766 had been shipped to one A. Hidell,

——

There would have been an international manhunt starting Saturday for Lee Harvey Oswald.

But nobody outside the seamier side of Dallas would have ever heard of Jack Ruby, owner of a strip joint and a dance club that catered especially to cops.

If Oswald had made the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City, he’d have bent radioactive by then. They’d have turned him away, if not over to the USA.
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
I recently read Norman Mailer’s “Oswald’s Tale.” It’s the best thing I’ve read by that author, and despite mailer’s reputation, he took a pretty down to earth approach to subject too, I thought.
I’ve read that, and maybe a couple of dozen other JFK assassination books.

The most amazing thing is all the people in Ruth Paine’s house on Thursday evening are still alive today and so is Westley Fraizer, the kid who gave Oswald a ride. Robert Oswald, Lee’s brother, only died a few years ago.

Lee Oswald would be 85 if he’d not been such a dumb son of a bitch.

Or, if he could have talked Marina out of living with Mrs Paine.:)
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
The best work of fiction on the topic is the Warren Report as issued 😉

On Saturday, J Edgar Hoover talked with LBJ and said it’s hard to believe a loser with a $21 rifle could kill the leader of the free world.

Yet last year in Butlet PA a loser with a rifle came within inches of killing President Trump.

The danger zone around a public figure is at least a quarter mile and you’d better figure one mile.

Oswald could have shot Kennedy with a .22.

What makes us doubt it, is it never happened before to a President and hasn’t since.
 
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PaulRVA

The Gentleman From Richmond
President Ford who was adamant Oswald was the Lone Gunman also allegedly commented on two occasions privately that there was conceivably a conspiracy however they never determined who orchestrated it or found any evidence pointing to who might’ve been behind it.
The Warren report wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on and I believe the statements from Governor Connally over the Report or Statements from Hale Boggs or any of the others and that is that a shot came from the front and the Magic Bullet Theory is crap.
 

Sobrbiker

Lifer
Jan 7, 2023
6,570
89,678
Casa Grande, AZ
I don’t doubt the capability of a 6.5 wielding Marine one bit, and as a guy that has spent a lot of time running bolt guns in dynamic competition (admittedly and thankfully never on a two-way range), the distance involved doesn’t make hitting a moving target the unbelievable feat it’s been portrayed as.
The many other leaps of imagination are harder to swallow…
 

JimInks

Sultan of Smoke
Aug 31, 2012
70,185
803,219
President Ford who was adamant Oswald was the Lone Gunman also allegedly commented on two occasions privately that there was conceivably a conspiracy however they never determined who orchestrated it or found any evidence pointing to who might’ve been behind it.
The Warren report wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on and I believe the statements from Governor Connally over the Report or Statements from Hale Boggs or any of the others and that is that a shot came from the front and the Magic Bullet Theory is crap.
Lyndon Johnson never believed Oswald acted alone, according to several of his friends. Nixon didn't either.

Watch Johnson's body language and how he answered Cronkite's question. After the taping, he asked Cronkite not to air this segment until after he passed away.
 
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PaulRVA

The Gentleman From Richmond
Lyndon Johnson never believed Oswald acted alone, according to several of his friends. Nixon didn't either.

Watch Johnson's body language and how he answers Cronkite's question. After the taping, he asked Cronkite not to air this segment until after he passed away.
That’s absolutely right and I completely forgot about the Cronkite Interview which was completely surreal !
I remember hearing a phone call between Johnson and I believe Hoover where they both said they didn’t believe it was Oswald alone.
I never knew about Nixons thoughts on it though.
And I miss watching Cronkite every night. You knew the truth when he told you what was what!
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
I don’t doubt the capability of a 6.5 wielding Marine one bit, and as a guy that has spent a lot of time running bolt guns in dynamic competition (admittedly and thankfully never on a two-way range), the distance involved doesn’t make hitting a moving target the unbelievable feat it’s been portrayed as.
The many other leaps of imagination are harder to swallow…

Seen from a distance of sixty some years the fact Oswald did it then Ruby shot Oswald is just overwhelming.

That’s the charm of this documentary.

I’ve basically been conservative and a skeptic all my life and this kind of progressive film making just ain’t fair. How dare they select all the facts I can’t explain to prove Oswald did it and Ruby shot Oswald.:)

Oswald sure had a lot of money to travel to Russia, get a bride, come back home and have two babies and form the Fair Play for Cuba committee and live in New Orleans and Dallas and travel to Mexico City, you know?

But then there’s Wesley Frazier.

Ruth Paine knows Marina’s bum husband needs a job and Wesley Frazier is a kid in the neighborhood who also works at the Texas School Book Depository. He sure as hell ain’t a co conspirator.


And then there’s the wing nut Major General Edwin Walker who was the luckiest conspiracy peddler in Dallas.


When you run down every rabbit hole, there’s nothing but the truth at the bottom.:)

Oswald did it and Ruby shot Oswald.
 
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JimInks

Sultan of Smoke
Aug 31, 2012
70,185
803,219
That’s absolutely right and I completely forgot about the Cronkite Interview which was completely surreal !
I remember hearing a phone call between Johnson and I believe Hoover where they both said they didn’t believe it was Oswald alone.
I never knew about Nixons thoughts on it though.
And I miss watching Cronkite every night. You knew the truth when he told you what was what!
Many years ago, Larry King asked Nixon about it. Nixon paused, looked up, slightly stammered and gave a nebulous answer. I knew right then that he knew something. Bob Haldeman said that Nixon had knowledge of the murder, and that everytime he mentioned "The Bay of Pigs", Haldeman said that was code for the JFK assassination.

On one of the Watergate tapes, you can hear Nixon refer to The Bay of Pigs while talking about E. Howard Hunt. He said Watergate will blow up the whole Bay of Pigs thing again. Very odd to me.

 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
Lyndon Johnson never believed Oswald acted alone, according to several of his friends. Nixon didn't either.

Watch Johnson's body language and how he answered Cronkite's question. After the taping, he asked Cronkite not to air this segment until after he passed away.

If you could be a little bird and fly through time, you’d perch on Lyndon’s shoulders when they reported the Gulf of Tonkin incident to him and say Oh Jeezus Lyndon do not escalate that war. You’ll lose. It will be a great and overwhelming disaster that will kill 58,000 boys and divide the nation and be the end of you politically:

Except for Vietnam in late 1969 Lyndon would still be the President, not a has been taking to Walter Cronkite .

By the way, Richard Nixon happened to be in Dallas on November 22, 1963. Dickie was staying at the same hotel as Joan Crawford.



What motivated Oswald?

He was a Marxist. He had genuine sentiments for the communists and for Castro and against our way of life.

And Marina Oswald was a beautiful woman with a tiny baby in 1963.’

He begged her, to move to Dallas, the night before Friday.

Then he should have fired when Kennedy was an approaching target, or when he made the turn.

Would this cup be lifted?

He’d just turned 24.
 

JimInks

Sultan of Smoke
Aug 31, 2012
70,185
803,219
If you could be a little bird and fly through time, you’d perch on Lyndon’s shoulders when they reported the Gulf of Tonkin incident to him and say Oh Jeezus Lyndon do not escalate that war. You’ll lose. It will be a great and overwhelming disaster that will kill 58,000 boys and divide the nation and be the end of you politically:

Except for Vietnam in late 1969 Lyndon wood still be the President, not a has been taking to Walter Cronkite .

By the way, Richard Nixon happened to be in Dallas on November 22, 1963. Dickie was staying at the same hotel as Joan Crawford.



What motivated Oswald?

He was a Marxist. He had genuine sentiments for the communists and for Castro and against our way of life.

And Marina Oswald was a beautiful woman with a tiny baby in 1963.’

He begged her, to move to Dallas, the night before Friday.

Then he should have fired when Kennedy was an approaching target, or when he made the turn.

Would this cup be lifted?

He’d just turned 24.
Nixon was in Dallas acting as a lawyer for Pepsi. He had nothing to do with the death of JFK, and had left Dallas that morning.
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
Many years ago, Larry King asked Nixon about it. Nixon paused, looked up, slightly stammered and gave a nebulous answer. I knew right then that he knew something. Bob Haldeman said that Nixon had knowledge of the murder, and that everytime he mentioned "The Bay of Pigs", Haldeman said that was code for the JFK assassination.

On one of the Watergate tapes, you can hear Nixon refer to The Bay of Pigs while talking about E. Howard Hunt. He said Watergate will blow up the whole Bay of Pigs thing again. Very odd to me.


The summer of 1946, the boys started coming back from the war and my mother was the headline pretty girl singer at the Camdenton J-H Rodeo.

Earl Edwin Pitt’s father asked my Mama to marry him, but she instead wound up a half mile South of Bug Tussle with my Daddy.

Earl’s father married some other shirttail relative of my mother’s.


I’ve know Earl Pitts, all my life. He’s somehow distantly a remote relative of mine.

He was part of a study group we had in law school.

Earl was a shy fellow. Very well dressed, didn’t talk much, and we congratulated him in 1983 for becoming an FBI agent.

Then in 1996 my mother called me crying and said Earl’s wife was a no account spend thrift %#+% that Earl took money from the Russians to support.

Mama offered to sell the farm, or a part of the farm, if I ever needed any money, but begged me never to become a spy.:)

G Gordon Liddy, was a narcissist, a blow hard, and in general a bad egg.

Haldiman, Eirlichman and Dean were once young lawyers hitched their stars to the wrong wagon, you know?

Nixon was paranoid.

My mother taught me what every word of this song meant, when it was current on the radio.

Watergate Blues


She also taught me Thirty Pieces of Silver, in more than one key.

Thirty Pieces of Silver

(Hank version)




Wilma Lee Cooper version

(Shirtail relative of my mother)


Traitors are no different than you and me.

They ought to have had mothers who were the pretty girl singers at the rodeo, you know ?
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
Nixon was in Dallas acting as a lawyer for Pepsi. He had nothing to do with the death of JFK, and had left Dallas that morning.
Neither did Joan Crawford, who was the eye candy at the Pepsi bottlers convention Tricky Dick spoke at.:)

Neither did Wesley Fraizer.

I had a roommate that mooched rides from me and even borrowed my car. He said his father was a doctor in St Louis who didn’t want to risk his older Mercedes to a college kid in Kansas City.

Then his parents drove up and took him out and bought him a $3,000 solid silver flute.

I hope I didn’t tell him to drive his damned flute the next time he wanted to borrow my $2,700 car my widowed mother had to pay outrageous insurance for my reckless ass to drive in Kansas City. But I did think that, and quit being his chauffeur.

What if Wesley Fraizer had lied and said I’m not going to Irving tonight, Lee.

But you can hitch a ride on Friday after work.

Oswald, is a poorly equipped, under financed commie assassin.:)

But the rifle found on the Sixth Floor—

Beyond the slightest possible doubt, to an absolute certainty —-

Was sold (along with the 38 revolver in another order) to A J Hidell by Klein’s to Lee Harvey Oswald, in Dallas.

That rifle was used in early 1963 to shoot at General Edwin Walker

And when Oswald read of Kennedy’s parade route by his workplace, that rifle was stored in Mrs Paine’s garage in Irving.

What if Wesley, had just said no?

Oswald is a lone wolf.

A paid assassin would have had a better rifle, you know?

If my wife’s health improves Dallas is on my bucket list.

If not, and they allow an old lawyer past the bar of heaven, then the first thing I want to see is Dallas late November 1963.:)

There are so many, many mysteries.

How did a man, who earned $50 a week and kept an apartment and a family in seperate places, have a month’s wages in savings?

Xxxx

Based on historical accounts related to Lee Harvey Oswald, on the morning of November 22, 1963,
Lee Harvey Oswald left his wedding ring and $187 in cash for Marina.

It is important to note the different amounts mentioned in the search results. While the first source specifically mentions $187, another refers to $170.

Xxxx

If Lee fired two shots, anybody could do that.

If three, that’s only barely possible.

A lot of people ran towards the grassy hill with the memorial (grassy knoll).

Why?

Connelly died claiming he was hit by another shot after the first one.

But, if there was a successful assisination in Butler Pennsylvania last year, Thomas Mathew Crooks would be as famous as Lee Harvey Oswald and all these details would be the subject of a conspiracy industry for the next sixty years.



We love to learn what there’s really no good answers for.
 
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AreBee

Lifer
Mar 12, 2024
1,199
5,792
Farmington, Connecticut USA
Nixon was in Dallas acting as a lawyer for Pepsi. He had nothing to do with the death of JFK, and had left Dallas that morning.
Not saying this isn't true, but I've read that he was driven to the airport by a Pepsi Executive on 11/22 after the assassination.

There are also three different accounts of how Nixon recounted heard about the assassination, all documented in his own words. Everyone I know who was alive on 11/22/63 knows every detail about the moment they found out.

To further assist the conspiracy theorists, the son of another Pepsi Executive had dinner with Jack Ruby on 11/21/63.
 
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Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
6,958
23,517
Humansville Missouri
Not saying this isn't true, but I've read that he was driven to the airport by a Pepsi Executive on 11/22 after the assassination.

There are also three different accounts of how Nixon recounted heard about the assassination, all documented in his own words. Everyone I know who was alive on 11/22/63 knows every detail about the moment they found out.

To further assist the conspiracy theorists, the son of another Pepsi Executive had dinner with Jack Ruby on 11/21/63.

There are so many fascinating coincidences.

The Three Tramps.

Umbrella man.

Babuska lady.

The Moorman photo.

And yet Oswald beyond any shadow of any doubt took his Carcano from Mrs Paine’s garage to work and he dunnit.

Dammit.:)

The real question is did he fire twice or thrice?

The “magic bullet” had to go through Kennedy and Conally was in the jump seat in its path. That’s one shot.

The head shot is obviously another.

Only if a fragment of the head shot struck Teague were there two shots.


If only two shots any deer hunter (who was minus a conscience) in America could have duplicated it.

Three shots, and Oswald had better be a Marine sharpshooter.:)
 
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