An enduring mystery of the Kennedy Assassination
February 13th, 2010
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I have stated before that I don’t buy into the claims of a conspiracy surrounding the Kennedy assassination. It’s simply not that difficult or complex a task to shoot a man who is in an open car, moving at a slow speed and on a known route, especially when you have a good place to lay in wait. In the years since the assassination, there have been many who claimed to have information about a conspiracy, but no solid proof of any kind.
There is, however, one mystery which remains – the identity of two key witnesses, whose testimony could be the biggest blow to conspiracy theorists since the assassination. Having been more than forty years, the likelihood that either of these two witnesses are alive is diminished by the day, but given that they were described as “young” at the time, it is still likely that at least one and possibly both are alive.
Most conspiracy theories claim that at least one shot came from the so-called “Grassy Knoll” area. The two areas that are cited are the area behind a small concrete retaining wall and the area further back, behind a stockade fence.
There was, however, a person, or perhaps two persons at this location at the time of the assassination, and of this there is no doubt. There are two photographs taken only seconds before the assassination which show a figure in this area, dubbed the “Black Dog Man,” because of the resemblance to a black dog. Since the time of the assassination, many have come forward claiming to have found a figure hidden in the shadows of one of the many photos and films taken that day in Dealey Plaza. What makes the Black Dog Man photos unique is that there is fairly universal agreement that they do indeed show a human figure. This is not an issue of blurry shadows playing tricks with the eye. There is somebody or something there.
There have been numerous attempts to enhance these photographs, with varying degrees of success. However, due to the limitations of the film used and the lighting conditions, no enhancements have ever yielded any significant results that would help identify the figure. There is one more photo that may have captured the “Black dog Man” within less than a second of the fatal shot. The Moorman photo was taken by Mary Moorman at almost the exact time of the fatal shot, but unfortunately, the photo was taken with a Polaroid camera, resulting in an image of limited photographic quality.
In this image, the Moorman photo has been enhanced to improve local contrast and reduce grain noise. Caution should always be taken when looking at an image like this, as the human brain can easily find patterns that are meaningless and make them seem significant. However, there does appear to be a figure that, while not conclusive, could be the same as the one seen in the two above photos.
So who could this be?
An assassin? Unlikely. The location would have put the assassin in plain sight of many in the area and there’s no way that a potential assassin could have gotten away from the area without the significant risk of being caught. Many years ago, a man by the name of Gordon Arnold came forward, claiming he had been in that area at the time of the assassination and that he had witnessed a person, dressed in a police uniform shoot the president, even claiming that the “bullet whized by his ear.” He claimed to have been filming the assassination but that the officer confiscated his camera and film. Gordon Arnold has since died.
Arnold’s story has many holes in it, however. For one thing, he never said a word of it until 1978. His story also changed many times, including having numerous factual inconsistencies with the documented events of that day. There’s no solid evidence that Arnold was even in Dallas in 1963, and although Arnold claimed to have been in the area some time after the shooting, including being confronted by the police officer and others, many photographs were taken of the aftermath of the shooting, and nobody matching Gordon Arnold’s description can be seen in any, nor have any of those known to have been in the plaza ever mentioned him.
There was, however, one witness who was very close to the location and who went on record shortly after the events to describe what she saw. Marilyn Sitzman was Aberham Zapruder’s secertary. Mr. Zapruder suffered from vertigo and as he made his famous film of the assassination, Ms. Sitzman stood behind him to keep him steady on the pedestal where he stood. Anyone in the area of the black dog man would have been only a few yards from Sitzman and would have had to either run toward the street or past her to leave the area.
The following statements were made by Sitzman in an interview in 1966:
If this account is true, then there is no reason to assume that the couple were in any way involved in any assassination plot. It seems that after the shots were fired, they ran back away from the street, possibly ducking under the wall when they did so. This was not an unusual action to take. When the first shot was fired, many spectators did not realize what had happened, but within seconds it became clear that bullets were indeed flying. Many immediately hit the ground or ducked behind objects, fearing for their own safety. Several can be seen in photographs running from the area. The atmosphere after the shooting can be described as a combination of confusion and panic, and the accoustics of the area made it difficult to ascertain where the shooter was located, causing many to run in different directions seeking safety or attempting to find the assassin.
Additional Evidence:
Although Sitzman seems very confident in her observations, eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable. However, in this case, there is some photographic evidence to support her story. There was indeed a bench in the location she described and shortly after the assassination, investigators did find the remains of a sacked lunch.
There were several films and pictures taken of the area at the time of the assassination and slightly before. Unfortunately, the lighting conditions and speed of the film stock used makes it impossible to see any verifiable details in the shaded area behind the wall. However, several photos do show what appears to be an object on the wall itself, one which is consistent with a coke bottle.
The figure seen in the photographs could indeed be two people, sitting or standing close to each other, but there is another explanation as well. Several films and photos show that three men were standing on the steps in front of the wall area as the president’s car approached. One of these men was Emmet Hudson, a groundskeeper for Dealey Plaza who was thoroughly interviewed on record about what he saw. Another man is an unidentified black male – having been described as black by Hudson and appearing to be so in the photographs. This man’s actions were fairly well documented in film. Within seconds of the shots, the men on the steps appear to be aware of what is happening. They appear panicked, one of them waves his hands and the black man looks around frantically and then runs up the steps.
Given the actions of this man and his location, it is very possible that he was the man Sitzman had seen and that he stepped forward to get a better look at the president as he passed. Sitzman clearly indicated that she was not watching that area as the motorcade approached and thus would not have known if he had walked forward onto the steps. Based on this man’s actions, looking up toward the wall and then running in that direction, and based on the fact that the figure in the photographs behind the wall appears to be only one person (although it could be two) it seems very likely that this was one of the two described by Stizman.
The Aftermath:
There were hundreds of witnesses in and around Dealey Plaza. Not all of them were interviewed. Those who came forward to make statements were recorded and others who were considered especially significant, such as those who had taken photographs or who said that they had seen a man in the School Book Depository window were immediately interviewed by investigators.
Notice that in this photo, a group of black people can be seen standing together shortly after the assassination, while the rest of the crowd is almost entirely white. Even today, social groups may be separated by race, but in 1963 Dallas, this would have much more the case. Even when segregation was not the policy, this kind of social grouping was to be expected. Given the social climate, a young black couple might be more inclined not to get involved with the police and thus could have avoided ever being interviewed or documented.
There were many photographs taken in the minutes after the shooting. In order to determine whether the couple may show up in any of them, their movements need to be established. The following map shows the possible routes taken after the shooting occurred.
Establishing the movements of the couple:
Possible paths taken
This is what someone running up from the steps to the area behind the retaining wall would have seen. There was a large gap behind the pergola and a walkway that ran through the pergola. The area behind the gap was a freight stockyard and parking lot. Based on the final frames of the Nix film, it appears that the running man may have been running toward the back area, toward the fence and stockyard.
Here is one of the last images that shows the running man overlayed with a computer generated image of the area, as the area becomes too dark in the frame to make much out.
Some of the last frames of the Zapruder film also show the area where the “Black Dog Man” had been standing. By the time Zapruder panned toward this area, the person or persons in that location had left. They may still have been in the area infront of the pergola entrance, but they were not at the end of the retaining wall. After he finished filming, Zapruder and Stizman immediately stepped down from the pedestal where he had been standing. Within seconds of dismounting the pedestal, Associated Press Photographer Ike Algens snapped a photograph. He took out his camera as the presidential limo passed, but by the time he advanced the film and snapped the image, the car was out of frame. Instead, his image shows Zapruder and Sitzman along with Charles and Beatris Hester, who were lying on the ground near the pergola. The Hesters had been closer to the shooting, but when the shots were fired, they ran toward the pergola and Mr. Hester “shoved” his wife to the ground and attempted to lay shield her with his body from any bullets. (In general, it’s not considered polite to shove one’s wife, but in this circumstance, it seems excusable.)
Several other images and films were taken within seconds of the shots, none appear to show anyone matching the description of the couple in the area under or in front of the pergola.
These photos also add weight to the hypothesis that the running man on the steps was the man seen with the woman at the retaining wall. The man seen running up the steps and the person(s) at the retaining wall must both have taken the same route, since neither is seen in the pergola. Since the running man can’t be independently sited or placed, it seems all but assured that he was the man seen at the wall.
Although it is remotely possible that the couple ran through the pergola and were not photographed, this seems unlikely. There would have been a very short window of time during which they would have had to be hidden behind the wall of the entrance and then be completely out of frame by the time the next photo was taken. There are two other reasons why it seems probable that they would have gone behind the pergola. First, most of those who were standing in the area were aware that the shots had NOT come from behind them. Thus the area behind the fence would have been the most sheltered. Secondly, there is some evidence that the couple may have had a car, and if this were the case, they would likely have been parked behind the fence in the parking area.
Emmet Hudson made the following statement in a sworn interview:
Mr. HUDSON – Well there was a young fellow, oh, I would judge his age about in his late twenties. He said he had been looking for a place to park and he walked up there and he said he finally just taken a place over there in one of them parking lots, and he come on down there and said he worked over there on Industrial and me and him both just sat there first on those steps. When the motorcade turned off of Houston onto Elm, we got up and stood up, me and him both. He was on the left side and I was on the right and so the first shot rung out and, of course, I didn’t realize it was a shot, what was taking place right at that present time, and when the second one rung out, the motorcade had done got further on down Elm, and you see, I was trying to get a good look at President Kennedy. I happened to be looking right at him when that bullet hit him – the second shot.
There were three men on the steps, so it’s not entirely clear if Mr. Hudson was referring to the black man who ran up the steps after the shooting – the man who was very likely one of the couple. Emmet Hudson’s testimony is a bit sketchy. It seems to imply that the man had “come down” from the retaining wall, perhaps leaving his wife or girlfriend there to finish eating lunch, although Mr. Hudson never mentions her. Clearly Mr. Hudson’s recollection was a bit sketchy and the events were confusing.
However, based on photographs, it was the black young man who was standing on the same step as Hudson and who was standing to his left. Hudson is the man in the hat, wearing a brown or red jacket with light colored pants.
There were a handful of photos and films taken in the car park area after the shooting, but unfortunately, none were taken immediately afterward. Most where taken at least two minutes or more afterward.
Of those which were taken, few give a good overview of the entire crowd and none show any individuals who clearly fit the description of a young, African American couple in their 20’s.
Possibility of finding them in other photos:
Whether or not the couple had a car, it’s highly likely that they did not leave the plaza area immediately after the shooting – they likely stayed around for some time afterward, as this is what most witnesses did. Shortly after the shooting, the mood of Daley Plaza can best be described as confused. A few people saw what happened up close and knew the president had been shot. Most were unsure of what happened and in general, the condition of the president was unknown, although rumors and speculation quickly grew.
Few cars were able to leave, due to the crowd of spectators who immediately ran toward the area of the shooting. Many wanted to find out what had happened and others seemed to want to help find a shooter. Police poured into the area and immediately began cordoning off the general area. Less than a minute after the shooting, police had entered the Texas School Book Depository. One actually encountered Oswald in the lunchroom, as he headed up the floors looking for the gunman.
There were some distinct waves of spectators and investigators. Most of the crowd first ran toward the knoll area, near where the shooting had occurred. The acoustics of the Plaza may have contributed to some thinking the shots came from that area, although all who were on the knoll thought otherwise. A police officer ran toward the stockade fence and another ran up the knoll toward the parking area. Within minutes, attention shifted entirely to the book depository. Most of the spectators left the parking area and moved toward the street. As police entered, they began to push the crowd back from the depository building.
A few people had transistor radios. Others started up their cars and turned on their car radios. Many surrounded them to listen to reports. Others tried to get information from police officers. A few witnesses who were close to the event were surrounded by spectators and press as they described what they saw.
Based on the photos taken before and shortly after the shooting, we can begin to eliminate potential individuals to try to see if anyone fitting the description is in later photos:
In several photos, a black man and woman can be seen running west across the knoll. The woman is holding a young child. She runs and the man runs toward her, meeting her and grabbing the child. They both then continue running. At first glance, this might seem like a potential match for the description, but it’s not. This is the Chism family – their actions and location are well established and they provided testimony to the Warren Commission.
Based on this and other photos many individuals can be ruled out. The tall black man in a sweater was clearly in the wrong place as was the stocky woman near him in a headscarf. The man in the hat and the stocky man in the suit are both too old and was also in the wrong place – thus they can be ruled out if seen in any other photos.
Having looked at nearly all the photos taken in the period of time after the shooting, there is only one couple that stands out as meeting the following criteria:
- Black/African American
- Both young, in their twenties
- Identity unestablished or undocumented
- Neither the man nor the woman can be excluded by being placed elsewhere at the time of the shooting
Amazingly, this couple first shows up standing exactly where the couple Sitzman reported were. Could this be the couple, having returned to their location after running from the sound of gunshots?
Even the lunch bag can be seen, still sitting on the bench where it was left. But there is something else visible – the woman clearly has a baby in her hands. Sitzman never mentioned this – of course she also never said that they didn’t have a baby, and since she died in 1993, it’s not possible to ask her to clarify. It’s possible she had forgotten this or had not noticed. However, the couple having a baby does actually make a lot of sense, as it would explain a number of things: The fact that the man apparently went down the steps to view the president but left the woman behind would make sense if she wanted to stay with the baby while he got a closer look. It would also explain why they were so fast to leave the area and seek protection – few things light a candle under a parent like their child being in danger. It could also explain why the man (assuming it was him) complained about finding a place to park – he would not have wanted his wife to walk far with a baby in her arms.
The man looks very much like the man seen on the steps. He has a sweater or jacket which shows a white collar sticking up from under it. His pants are dark and he is of slender build, approximately the right height and has the right style of hair. The woman is about the right height. She has a scarf or cloth on her head. In the Betzner photo of the “black dog man” show what many believe is a fedora or similar hat, but this could easily be shadows behind the figure or some other simple illusion.
While it is impossible to be 100% certain, this would appear to be the best candidate for the couple seen at the retaining wall.
Other photographs of the couple:
A review of other photographs taken shortly after the assassination finds this couple does show up a few more times.
Here we see the woman and baby with onlookers at the Texas School Book Depository. The man is not seen in this photo, but the crowd of people makes it impossible to tell if he is there or not. He may very well be only a couple of feet away from her and is blocked by another person.
Holding a baby, dressed in white and with a white cap and wearing light colored slacks, white socks and a headscarf, the woman is considerably easier to spot than the man. She shows up again in frames from a film taken by a passing reporter.
Finding them:
Time may be running short as years become decades. If alive today, this couple would likely be in their early 70’s. Chances are at least one of them is alive. There is very little that is known for sure about them. We can be sure that there was a couple present that day who fit the description and who had a young child. They appear to be the best candidate for being the couple on the knoll.
Here’s what can be determined:
- A man and a woman, both African American and both lived in Dallas or the greater Dallas area. (It seems unlikely that someone would have traveled a long distance)
- They were described as being “young” and “20’s” – This puts their dates of birth sometime between the mid 1930’s and early 1940’s
- They had a child who was probably born in early 1963 or 1962. It’s possible the child was born in 1960-1961 (although the child does appear a bit small for a two or three year old)
- As there are no other children seen and given their age – this was probably their first child. Thus we’re seeking a couple who had their first child in the early 1960’s.
- They were most probably married (given the social concequences of having a child out of wedlock in the early 1960’s – most couples who stayed together would be married if they had a child and likely were married before)
- They probably owned a car and were likely fairly middle class.
- Possibly the best clue: The man on the steps with Emmet Hudson worked “On Industrial” – a reference to Industrial Blvd in Dallas. This man was likely the one seen with the woman on the bench behind the retaining wall. However, even if he was not, he would still be an important witness
There is a high probability that this couple would have mentioned seeing the assassination to friends or family. If the topic came up they may have said something like “You know, I was there when it happened, it was a real shocking thing to see” or something of that nature. It’s also possible that their child would have mentioned it, stating that he or she was in Dealey Plaza when the assassination happened, but was only a baby and either could not remember it or had only a very vague memory of it. Today he or she would be around the age of 48, give or take a year or so.
Do you know anyone who matches this description? An elderly black man or woman (or both) who lived in Dallas in the early 1960s, had their first child in the early 1960’s, was born in the 1930’s or 1940’s, owned a car, worked on Industrial Blvd? Perhaps it’s an uncle or aunt. A friend of the family. A co-worker or former co-worker, a neighbor. If you went to school in the area in the early 1970’s, perhaps there was an African American classmate who mentioned being a baby at the time and being at the location?
There are still several key witnesses alive, but many are not. Marlyn Sitzman and Emmet Hudson are both dead. Mary Moorman is still alive at age 77. Her friend, who was seen next to her in the Zapruder film, Jean Hill is now dead. Aberham Zapruder died in 1970. At last report, Bill and Gale Newman and their children – the family seen laying down on the knoll area immediately after the shooting are still alive. Orville Nix, who filmed the assassination from the side opposite Zapruder died in 1972, but family members who were with him are still alive. Charles Brehm, who was one of the closest and best witnesses to the shot died in 1996, but his young son seen with him is still alive. Nellie Connally was the last living person who had been in the car when she died in 2006.
Yet this couple could be the most important of any who were there in debunking conspiracy theories. They were in exactly the spot, or slightly in front of it, where many claimed an assassin was hidden.
This entry was posted on Saturday, February 13th, 2010 at 3:06 pm and is filed under Conspiracy Theories, Culture, History. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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February 13th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
Well, that would be really great if the couple could be tracked down alive and they could give a conclusive statement “Yep, we were right there. Right where they say the shots came from. Nothing came from that area. Just us and our baby and our lunch.”
There are some who would probably claim that they were part of the conspiracy, despite being about as unlikely as you can think of – a young couple, African American, with a baby probably neither very well off nor in any way connected to the government.
It shouldn’t actually be impossible to find them. I mean, assuming all the information is right, or at least try it all to start off with. How many African American babies, first born, to parents between the ages maybe 24 and 32 were born in Houston in 1962 and Summer 1963? (since that doesn’t seem to be a newborn) There can’t be more than a few thousand.
You could take those names and eliminate any who did not own a car (motor vehicle records) and then whoever is left, you could start to look up social security and tax forms and look for someone who worked on a buisiness with an address on Industrial Blvd.
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February 13th, 2010 at 5:37 pm
I should add: This would be easily doable to anyone who had full access to database record searches. Most of the stuff would be public record. It’s just that it can be expensive to sign up for all that pro-grade stuff if you don’t have it.
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February 14th, 2010 at 2:45 am
Even if this couple could be identified, it wouldn’t make any difference. The conspiracy theorists would either ignore the data or incorporate it into their theories (the couple is *clearly* the assassin!)
I’ve given up arguing with any conspiracy theorists until they can suggest some data that would disprove their theory.
Read Vincent Bugliosi’s _Reclaiming History_ for a comprehensive debunking of practically every conceivable conspiracy surrounding the Kennedy assassination.
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February 14th, 2010 at 2:36 pm
I would also suggest “Reclaiming History” by Vincent Bugliosi. It somepletely debunks the conspiracy hogwash.
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February 14th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
The problem with the heavily enhanced picture is that all I see in it is a black bear to the left of the black dog man outline. At that level of enhancement on that resolution of photo you simply can’t make reliable statements beyond the likely hood that the outlined figure really is a person. ::shrug::
For that matter I am always amazed at how complicated some people want to make things. Most of the conspiracies get way overly complicated.
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February 14th, 2010 at 3:34 pm
I think we solved it – a BEAR killed Kennedy. None of us are safe.
TomT said:
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February 14th, 2010 at 4:30 pm
TomT said:
Interesting, to me that picture looks like somebody (presumably Mrs. X) with Baby X. I’ll agree that that could just be wishful thinking on my part, though. I’d be more specific about exactly what I see, but I’m curious to see if anybody else can pick up on it with minimal prompting.
Chris said:
Aha! The Teddy Bear Mafia, obviously responsible for every presidential assassination since McKinley.
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February 14th, 2010 at 5:50 pm
TomT said:
Well I want to be clear on one thing: I’m not about to say conclusively that there is a person in the Moorman Polaroid or that the drawn figure is a person. It *might* be the person, but it does not stand on its own as evidence.
I’d suggest that it likely is a person because of the other evidence. The Willis and Betzner photos clearly show a figure there. They don’t show any real detail, but unless the person moved completely out of frame in about three seconds, they’d have to be in that photo. Also, the testimony of Sitzman and Hudson supports this.
You can’t rely on “enhancement” of photos too much. There are a few things that can be done when the focus is off by a little to clear it up, but if the information is not there, it’s not there. The Moorman photo is a Polaroid and the original is very small – a very unideal photo to begin with.
The fact that I outlined it completely kills any objectivity. I don’t think the Moorman polaroid on its own stands for much. Nothing conclusive about it. It’s at best, consistent with someone being there.
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February 15th, 2010 at 1:34 am
drbuzz0 said:
Oh no problem, it was just in the enhanced image without the outline my eye picked out the ‘bear’ first. that is without knowing where in the image to look. As you point out there are limitations on enhancement of photos.
Actually I think you did a pretty good job of detective work to figure all of that out.
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February 15th, 2010 at 2:23 am
TomT said:
Yeah, but there’s another problem – the quality of the images we have. The Moorman Polaroid is now in pretty bad shape. It was taken using Polaroid film that was different than the modern kind and came out of the camera “wet” It has a big finger print on it. When it was taken the finger print was not visible, but since then the oils in it have worked their way into the emulsion. Also, there’s the surface chemicals degrading. It was scanned in 2002 at high resolution, but it turned out to come out pretty badly.
The best we have of it, as it turns out, are photographic copies made in the 1960’s to more durable film. A photo of it was taken right afterward, but was of limited resolution – it’s the only one that shows it undegraded. The FBI had a copy made on film in 1963 and in 1968 a specialist used 4×5 slide film plates to make a copy of it. Today the 1968 copy is the best we have – better than the faded original. Still, by 1968 it had faded a bit.
There is one film that shows the entire knoll area and the area behind the wall at the time of the shooting – the Orville Nix film. That film could potentially show what went on there. It’s too dark because the film stock was not intended for those lighting conditions. On the bright side, it was very high quality Kodachrome film, so even at limited depth there should be some information there.
It should be possible to enhance that film at least a little. there is a way to increase film brightness by using multiple frames overlayed to bring out details and if it were scanned at high enough depth, it’s possible that some more details could be brought out.
Unfortunately, that’s not possible because nobody seems to know what happened to the original camera negatives. They were given to the FBI to be copied. The FBI insists they gave them back to the Nix family. The Nix family insists they did not. The FBI has been unable to produce a receipt for the return or anything like that. What we have is a couple of copies. One of the copies is high quality and high resolution but it has some frame damage. the other is in excellent shape but is lower quality.
**Sigh** If there was anything in that film, it’s lost in the copy.
There’s also a photo of the Texas School Book Depository that shows the window just after the shooting. The area inside the window is too dark to see anything, but it was thought that if it could be lightened and the negative processed a bit more, it might be possible to see if there was someone there etc. This may very well have been the case, but we’ll never know because in 1978 the House Select Committee on Assassinations got hold of the original negative and sent it to a lab to have this done. Only it got left in the chemical bath too long and was destroyed. Again… now we only have copies and prints.
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February 15th, 2010 at 2:24 pm
What Eric said – it’s not like anyone who still believes in “the grassy knoll assassin” now is going to change his or her mind because one or both of these people are found and give a statement.
They’ll either be dismissed as being an active part of the conspiracy (clearly, because otherwise why come forward now after all those years? To keep the truth down now that it’s On The Verge Of Becoming Accepted!), or having been intimidated into silence, or having “blocked the memory” or “the assassin must have been using a suppressor” or God knows what.
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February 16th, 2010 at 7:14 am
drbuzz0 said:
and yet you guys persist in labeling the conspiracy “hogwash”…
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February 16th, 2010 at 9:47 am
Nearly 50 years ago my mom took pictures of my older brother when he was a baby – for some reason the negatives were destroyed and all we have left is copies of prints – please let’s call Oliver Stone to figure it out.
People loose things – even important things (like the plans for the Saturn V – or the originals of the moon landing tapes). When we loose things sometimes it is bad luck, sometimes it is accidents, sometimes it is by mistake and very very rarely it is by design. In the middle ages a guy named Occom said – “pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate” which is now translated to the simplest explanation is most likely to be the truth.
What would set off my alarm bells (as a professional law enforcement officer) is if evidance did suddenly start showing up – after so long it would be impossiable to authenicate it. Let’s say a rusty high powered rifle with three shell casings was found hidden near the grassy knoll – could you link it in any way to the murder? No their is no chain of custody from 1963 to today – it could have been placed there at any time between 1963 and today. It would obviosuly be a plant by somebody wanting to “prove” something.
Is it simple that the thousands of people involved in the “cover-up” have keep their mouth shut for decades – hell no – the government cannot keep secrets very well because people have big mouths. There is NO way thousands of people could keep this secret for nearly 50 years. Get over it and move on.
How come everybody thinks Squeaky Fromm acted alone – but LHO didn’t?
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February 19th, 2010 at 3:29 am
I think most of the information regarding shooters other than LHO (if he even was involved at all) is that they were in the area behind the wooden fence behind that couple. That could be why they ran away so fast, because they realized someone was shooting from right behind them. That would be the place where there are a lot of suspicious reports of gun smoke and people seeing someone running. For my money I think that’s it. It would be the best place and it’s where most investigators believe the fatal shot was from.
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February 19th, 2010 at 9:34 pm
JRT said:
Alright, first of all, let me say that I don’t consider those who buy into a Kennedy assassination conspiracy theory to be “nuts” in the way I do those who believe that 9/11 was an inside job or something, because the belief is fairly mainstream. Still, I’d argue it’s not founded on evidence but more on misunderstanding and media hype.
The area behind the fence and the area behind the knoll in general would have been a very poor place for a sniper. It’s fairly exposed. Is it possible that you could pull it off and not get photographed or seen by many witnesses? maybe, but not guaranteed. Far from a sure thing. Way too much risk.
It seems the reason that there was some speculation initially that a shot came from that area is simply that that is where the motorcade was passing and the fact that it’s hard to tell where sound comes from in a place like Dealey plaza, where you’ve got buildings ringing it on one side and fairly open on the other. It echos.
All those who were actually on the knoll area and were interviewed were unanimous in saying the shots did not come from that area. Marlyn Sitzman said she couldn’t tell where they came from but didn’t think they could be anywhere near that close. Aberham Zapruder said he didn’t know, but they didn’t seem like they were close to him. Emmet Hudson said they were not from behind him.
It’s hard to tell where gunshots are coming from, but it’s easy to tell if the gun is right next to you – that’s hard to miss. Contrary to reports, nobody smelled gun powder or saw a muzzle flash. The only witnesses who said that came forward many years later, generally being paid in some way for a documentary or something.
Bill Newman looked around when he heard the shots, he then pushed his children to the ground and layed to try to protect them. He stated that he looked directly at the fence and saw nothing there. Granted eyewittnesses are not always reliable, but he was not alone and it’s a fairly simple observation. Also, photos confirm that he was facing that direction.
Now as for the stockyard/parking lot: There’s was only one way in and out of it by car – by Elm street which goes past the Texas School Book Depository to Houston Street – totally exposed, and we know no cars left, because of both films and wittnesses, including the police who were swarming in the area.
To walk out, you could go that way, and again, pretty much be seen by everyone or at least risk it, or you would walk completely across the area and try to go out along the train tracks around the back and across Houston Street. OR, you could have gone over the tripple overpass. Only the tripple overpass was not only visible to everyone, it had about a dozen railroad workers standing on it to watch the motorcade along with a two police officers, one on each side.
There were people back there too. In addition to the rail workers, who were pretty close to the fence area there was a guy named Lee Bowers working in the tower. Bowers has been misquoted many times and people have said he saw a flash or smoke or something. He never said any such thing.
Bowers could see the whole area and was watching it when the motorcade passed. He stated under oath that he saw two men, one an older man in his 50’s or so and another a young man in his mid 20’s. Both were standing at the fence watching the motorcade. Not far from them was a railroad employed welder. After he heard the shots, he said something drew his attention to the men. This has been what has been misquoted. Some have said he saw a flash or something. He saw no such thing. He only said he saw some “commotion” – in my opinion what he probably saw out of the corner of his eye was one or both of the men being startled by what they saw happen.
These men along with the railroad workers didn’t run away. They stayed there afterward and within seconds a police officer was at the top of the knoll, where the bridge meets the fence. They didn’t avoid the officer. At the same time another cop was running up toward the area via the retaining wall while other police were approaching the area via Elm street.
We don’t need to take Bower’s word on this. We have photos, radio transcripts, police reports and so on. The motorcycle cops were already at the location and were at the fence, literally within seconds.
There was also at least one and probably two parking attendants in the area as well as possibly others in the Criminal Courts building and School Book Depository who had a clear unobstructed view of the entire area.
Now you may ask, why were these people never documented and where are their statements. Well, they generally were not given formal interviews. If there was one error made by the Warren Commission it’s they never realized how these conspiracy theories would mushroom and therefore never went out of their way to debunk them. They found ample evidence that LHO was the shooter and none that a shot came from elsewhere, so they didn’t seek out everyone in areas where the shots didn’t come from to get a statement about how they didn’t see anything.
The police and secret service, of course, asked for spectators who saw anything to come forward and during the manhunt afterward, the attentions were asked if they saw anything suspicious. They didn’t. So what were they supposed to do? Find every person in a region of Dallas that the shots did not come from and bring them in for a notarized statement? They didn’t take any statements from the men in the yard because none of them saw anything. They also didn’t take formal statements from those on the South Knoll or the far up Houston Street or any place else away from the shooting area. The only difference is nobody ever said they came from there after the fact, so it doesn’t matter
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July 7th, 2010 at 2:43 am
I did research on the JFK assassination and found the last two gun shots in the Nix film. I even found in the Zapruder film the last shot that hit Gov.Connley. I also found in the photo by Moorman the two gunmen on the grassy knoll they where behind the pillar just to the right of Mr.Zapruder and the photo shows both gunmen with one looking throw the window of the pillar with his rifle sticking out of the other window below. The other gunmen was standing on the side holding his rifle. Now these two gunmen was also found in the Darnell photo but in this photo you can see one of the gunmen aiming his rifle. I colorized the Moorman photo and the Darnell photo to get a better look at both gunmen.
here is the site with my video I made to show both gunmen and parts of the films that shows the last two shots fired and when Gov.Connley got hit.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phkNwZXpZUU
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July 7th, 2010 at 2:47 am
My research shows that there was two other gunmen with Oswald that day
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July 7th, 2010 at 10:31 pm
Leroy Blevins Sr. said:
Your research has some major flaws.
The copy of the Nix film you are using is very poor. There better quality scans available. The anomaly you see as a shot or muzzle flash is clearly a film defect seen on better versions. In fact, it is not even present on all the Nix film copies. The original Nix film camera negatives are lost, but there are two early copies usually used for reproducing it. One is a first generation 8mm print. the other is a second generation print onto 16mm. These offer the best quality. The film defect is only on sources from one of these prints. Sorry, I’m not sure which, but it’s not on the initial negatives
Here’s a better version, although far from perfect due to the fact that it’s FLV-encoded: http://www.jfk.org/go/collections/item-detail?fedoraid=sfm:2000.001
Your contention that there are assassins seen in the doorway after the shooting is refuted by well established facts and documented in other photos and film. The persons in the doorway are Aberham Zapruder, Merilyn Sitzman and her friends, Charles and Beatrice Hester.
The timing is entirely wrong.
So is the location of the wound to Governor Conley. The real bullet hit him in the back, to the left of his spine, somewhat bellow the shoulder blade. It came out bellow his left nipple, blowing out a chunk of flesh and severely injuring his lung in the process as well. (He was lucky to have survived.)
Both the testimony of those in the vehicle and the films show governor Colony was shot before this time. As the vehicle comes out from behind the street sign in the Zapruder film, Governor Conoly can be seen wrenching in pain. He grabs his chest. He turned to Kennedy who was not yet hit in the head and the two exchanged some brief words. By most accounts it was something to the effect of “My god, I’ve been hit” followed by Connolly saying “They’re going to kill us”
His wife looked down and saw he was bleeding profusely. She grabbed him and he doubled over in pain, bending down and collapsing onto her lap. This ended up saving his life by helping close up the hole in his chest which was sucking in air as he gasped to breathe. His lung collapsed.
This all happened before the “head shot” in a period of about two seconds.
There has never been any credible report of gunmen in the area where you believe there were. They would have been fairly exposed and would have had a hard time exiting the area without being captured on any of the dozens of photographs and films taken within a minute or so after the shooting.
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July 7th, 2010 at 10:52 pm
Buzzo – Thanks for responding in such a measured manner. I was really tempted to write something much less constructive.
I am not sure that laying out the facts really does anything to the “true believers” but I think it is important to stay constructive.
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August 24th, 2010 at 10:21 pm
Your excellent research inspired me to do some of my own.
The older white man with Emmit Hudson is F. Lee Mudd. He was also interviewed by the Warren Commission, but he didn’t say anything of much use in determining who the other man is.
I think you are right that the black man was one of the couple who was seen on the knoll behind the retaining wall. Life Magazine analyzed the photos to track movements and came to the conclusion that the man on the steps was probably the same man as at the wall and he walked down shortly before the motorcade arrived.
The couple most probably exited to the parking lot. They did not run through the walkway. This can be demonstrated by the Weigman film and some of the photos taken after. They are not seen in this area and if they had run through there they would have had to just about jump over Charles and Beatrice Hester, who never mentioned anyone running past them.
They must have run into the parking lot, which confirms that they probably had a car there. Also, they probably did end up sticking around the area for a while afterward. There is only one way in and out of the parking lot and it was quickly blocked by police activity. The police blocked off the whole TSBD area and anyone who had a car there was probably not going to be allowed to leave for at least an hour.
Now the next question is did anyone take down license plates in the parking lot?
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October 30th, 2010 at 1:59 am
As the researcher who first proposed that the other white man on the steps was F. Lee Mudd, it’s nice to see that some are taking my lead. But I think Thomas S is incorrect to claim Mudd was an “older” white man. In Hudson’s statements he never mentioned that the young man he spoke to was black. Which leads me to believe he didn’t speak to the man directly to his right at the time of the shots–the black man–but to the man in a red shirt a few steps below him at the time of the shots…the man he can be seen standing near in several other photos.
If so, then the man Hudson said was working over on Industrial was Mudd. Mudd claimed in his statement that he’d been in Dallas buying clothing for his Western Wear shop. Perhaps the clothing manufacturer he’d visited had been over on Industrial.
One problem with this is that some have found records for an elderly F. Lee Mudd, who died many years ago, and assume this is the Mudd in the Plaza. But, apparently, this man had a son, who may still be alive.
And so…if you’re gonna try and track down the young black couple, might I suggest you also try and track down the Mudd family, and find out which Mudd was in the Plaza on 11-22-63?
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October 30th, 2010 at 11:40 am
Hi, Pat.
If I understand you correctly, then you’re saying that Emmet Hudson never spoke to the black man at all but rather that the conversation was between Hudson and the other white man on the steps, who you believe is F. Lee Mudd?
The one thing is that Emmet Hudson said that the man “Worked over there on Industrial”
To me, that indicates that the man was employed on industrial, but it’s possible that Hudson is mistaken. He probably was not paying very strict attention to what the man said, so if he said something like “I was doing some business on Industrial ave the other day” he might have taken that to mean he worked there.
It would be nice to have some better documentation of exactly who F. Lee Mudd was in terms of age.
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January 19th, 2011 at 3:13 pm
The problem that I see with the theory that the wife stayed at the corner of the retaining wall with the baby while the husband went down the steps to get a better view is how dark the image is. The photo’s of her holding the baby look’s like she’s wearing a light coloured sweater. Now compare the BDM image to Marilyn Sitzman in the Betzner and Willis photo’s. If BDM is in fact the young mother, the colour of the image should be much lighter, something like Sitzman.
BTW, I always thought that BDM looked very similar to Boris Badnov from the old Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons.
Kudos to the author of this page. Very well done.
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January 19th, 2011 at 4:21 pm
That young black man appears to be in the very 1st photo in the section entitled THE AFTERMATH:
He is at the far left, 1/2 cut off. Look to the right, is that Babushka Lady? She looks to be talking with a man wearing a hat and a lady in black boots, while still wearing her head scarf. Also look at the man at the bottom of the photo on the left. About 1/4 cut off wearing a hat, is that Dallas Police Detective Buddy Walthers? He looks to have a gun stuck in his pants at the waistline. If so, what a shame. He was so close by to two important witnesses who have never been positively identified (sorry Beverly Oliver but I never believed that you are the Babushka Lady), one of which had a camera.
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January 19th, 2011 at 6:55 pm
John Bonesso said:
It could be, but I don’t know. When I look closely at the picture it looks more like that man has Caucasian-looking hair, but i could be wrong. see better pic here: http://www.jfkassassinationforum.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=41&pos=36
No that’s not the Babushka Lady. It’s some other woman with a headscarf. She has some distinct differences, but has been commonly mistaken as the Babushka Lady. Comparisons of known photographs by several investigators disproved this.
Actually that picture does have a figure that may well be the Babushka Lady. Note to the right of the pergola there are a number of men, mostly black standing around. One of them has his hand on his hip and is looking to the left. Now look directly next to him, to his right, in the foreground.
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January 19th, 2011 at 8:11 pm
Tnks for the link to that photo, yea I do see the man has caucasian hair, also appears his sweater has a stripe along the arm. Yes I see what possibliy is Babushka Lady. Is that Buddy Walthers?
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March 8th, 2011 at 6:24 am
so i looked at, the picture, with the guy and you see him in the bushes outlined. well. i see an alien
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April 2nd, 2011 at 5:01 pm
I agree with the evaluation of the photos of the African American couple. Full disclosure I am a conspiracy believer.
You guys who want these witnesses found better be careful what you wish for.
So you are telling me that these witnesses, who are critical in any investigation are the only two individuals in the plaza that day who never came forward, never were sought out by the FBI, nor EVER interviewed by thousands of researchers and documentary producers? They were overlooked as TWO of only a handful of witnesses who had a clear view of the head shot, the nearest witnesses to the VERY VERY famous Abraham Zapruder-mentioned in testimony by same? So these two adult, seemingly competent(apparently the husband was employed) witnesses were missed by BOTH the Warren Commission AND the HSCA?!?
I will make a bet on behalf of all conspiracy theory researchers and YOU shake hands on your side of the bet for all non-believers.
If they trace these people my contention is that this anomaly is explained by these three possibilities 1. They died mysteriously shortly thereafter. 2. Received threats when stating the truth 3. Made a statement to authorities and that statement was destroyed or otherwise suppressed.
If they are found and say on the record- ” No problem, Oswald did it” then we will all go away. If my prediction is true you guys need to go back to the drawing board. I think they would have very interesting testimony.
M Thompson
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April 2nd, 2011 at 10:45 pm
Mark Thompson said:
They were not the only witnesses to this area and most of those who were on the grassy knoll were interviewed. None saw a gunman, btw. F. Lee Mudd, Emmet Hudson, the Chisms, Aberham Zapruder, Marlyn Sitzman, Charles and Beatrice Hester, all went on record and none saw anybody in the area or believed they heard gunfire from that region.
The most likely explanation is that this couple saw nothing out of the ordinary that they felt would be helpful to the investigation and thus never saw any reason to come forward. They may not want attention or to get wrapped up in it either.
The fact that they were black may also come into play. Considering the time and the fact that Texas was still at the end of the segregation era, they may well have simply preferred to avoid confrontation with the police. Why come forward? To say you didn’t see anything?
Not only that, but seeing the presidents head blown off and running to protect your child from gunfire may not be the kind of thing they want to talk about.
A number of people in the area of the plaza were never interviewed officially. Some didn’t want to be.
One example being Louie Steven Witt. He was seen in the plaza near the site of the assassination with an umbrella, thus being known as the “umbrella man.” He did not come forward but in 1978 the House Select Committee On Assassinations appealed to the public to help find the person seen with the umbrella. Some of Witt’s friends who knew of his presence with the umbrella heard this and he got him to reluctantly come forward to admit that he was there at the time.
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April 8th, 2011 at 8:43 am
Black Dog Man is most likely not standing in the corner of the retaining wall, as there is not much room there and he (or she) would appear taller in the Betzner and Willis photos. Rather, the best guess is that he/she is standing on the top step of the concrete stairs, which are in shadow like Black Dog Man, while the retaining wall is in sunlight. This location also makes better sense if he/she and the man further down the stairs are a couple.
The Muchmore film shows that within about a second before the head shot there is no one on the stairs. Where did Black Dog Man go and why? He/she probably SAW the rifle in the Depository as it fired the first two shots, and, terrified, moved back along the sidewalk towards the pergola some time between the Willis photo and the first Muchmore frame showing the empty stairs. How far back?
Well, the remains of the coke bottle which Sitzman heard smashing seem to appear in the same film a frame of which the author has printed showing our two subjects + baby, standing behind the retaining wall after the shooting. In that frame of the Jimmy Darnell film what the man in the suit in the foreground (I think it’s Buddy Walthers) is looking at itself appears a split second earlier: a dark patch on the sidewalk. How does this “puddle” fit in with other of the films and photos?
Well, in the Nix film frames 55-57 (Z345-47) show movement behind the retaining wall. That is, a continuous, downwardly-angled motion such as might be made by someone throwing down a coke bottle. It lines up with the location of the puddle. So then, what do we see if we check this same spot in the Moorman photo?
Looking at the FBI copy of the Moorman polaroid as it appears in jfkassassinationforum.com, there is a large tree behind the retaining wall the trunk of which lines up with the Nix movement and the puddle. To the left of this tree, or perhaps slightly obscuring it, are two white spots seemingly of the right size and shape to be the sweater and cap of the baby carried by the young black woman in the above article.
God help me, I’m seeing human forms in the bushes on the grassy knoll. Not assassins, just babies.
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April 8th, 2011 at 12:40 pm
The location of the gunmen on the grassy knoll was behind and beside the pillar on the grassy knoll. The Nix film and Darnell film and the Moorman photo and the Betzner photo shows the location of these two gunmen. I found them and post these photos of the gunmen in that location. The films and photos shows real images of the gunmen and not shadows or outlines. If you like to see this proof and know what really happened that day got to jfkassassination2.webs.com/
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May 17th, 2011 at 7:08 am
Since I have not received one reply (well, one……..) to the comment I left over a month ago, I have a feeling that people took the last line of it as being unduly sarcastic. It was not meant that way, I just want to guard against the phenomenon well known as “seeing things which aren’t really there.” I think this detail of the assassination scene is an important one, and the author of “An Enduring Mystery” has made a great start in solving it, to which I’d like to make a contribution. There was a puddle on the sidewalk at the exact point where someone appears to drop something in the Nix film — other interpretations aside — at the exact moment when logic would call for that to happen. The timing of the motion is one-and-a-half seconds after Moorman, so it seems to me that someone must be standing very near the same spot in that picture. When I checked the Moorman photograph, I saw what could be the “Black Dog Man” (who the above article tends to prove was a woman carrying a baby) in just the right location.
It could also be leaves and shadows and sunlight that I’m looking at — I don’t know, which is why I’m interested in what other people think.
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June 5th, 2011 at 1:00 pm
(I spelled my own name correctly this time.)
Our family in question does appear in the first photo in the “Aftermath” section, but in a different location than presumed by John Bonesso (#24). The man and woman are in the same spot, behind the end of the retaining wall, and in almost the same positions. We see the woman’s scarf from the back, the point of the corner hanging down; we see half of her husband’s face. The baby is obscured, but to the right of the couple we see the back of the head of the man in white (Hugh Betzner?) seen in the Darnell film.
Buddy Walthers also appears in this Jim Murray photo, at the lower left. Hypothetically, he has just descended from the top of the stairs, where he was filmed by Jimmy Darnell near the young couple with baby. The man with the light-colored hat who leads off this sequence may also be in the Murray photo: he is behind and to the right of Walthers, wearing glasses, with his hand to his face. He may have come down the stairs with Walthers, but this is not a positive match.
I say therefore that we have two pictures, taken very close together in time, of the witnesses who sat on the bench on the knoll, standing very near where they had eaten their lunch a few moments earlier. Note that the coke bottle seems to have been removed from the top of the wall.
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July 15th, 2011 at 2:19 pm
Looking at the pictures of the child the black woman is carrying made me think… perhaps the “Helmet Man” visible throught the foliage in Zapruder frame 413 is actually head of the kid, who is wearing a hat / bonnet…
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July 20th, 2011 at 8:48 pm
Quite possibly….
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January 2nd, 2012 at 6:14 pm
I searched this page & cannot find one single reference to the original research on JFKLancer or the man who first put the idea in our heads & supplied most of the backup images, Robin Unger.
Robin was suggesting this solution “of yours” back when all we had was a poor copy of the Darnell footage,
2005ish.
It was only after Jeff Rollins picked up on it again after a far better frame from the same footage became available that we finally took notice.
How people can ignore or forget to give credit to other’s work & act like it’s all thier own idea is beyond me.
I see Mark Bridger doing the exact same thing, exept he gave one reference to this page(like you both had the same idea) & while mentioning Lancer itself, he again give no credit to the thread that’s been stuck to the top for months.
http://www.jfklancerforum.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=3&topic_id=76337&mesg_id=76337&page=
What gives?
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January 2nd, 2012 at 6:38 pm
Blackdogman said:
I am well aware that I’m not the first person to ever suggest that the couple that Marlyn Sitzman saw were the “black dog man” or that the man may have walked down the stairs. It’s actually not an uncommon hypothesis at all. People can independently come to the same conclusion.
I came to think this is the case after looking at some pages of interviews from several in that area and looking at the movies. Of course, I did a search on it and found others had come to the same conclusion.
Again: I’m not claiming to be the only one to come up with this.
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January 2nd, 2012 at 7:50 pm
Fair comment in one respect DrBuzz,
Sitzman’s couple is indeed one of the oldest & simplest solutions to the BDM mystery but no one, not one person, ever forwarded the idea that one of the men on the stairs was black before the superior Darnell images came to light & if they did it was only mentioned in passing, a pure guess based on nothing, which conflicted the known evidence & never taken seriously.
You do not get the idea that it’s a blackman from either the movies or interviews however, no way. At best he looks darker than Hudson but never “black” & that’s why Sitzman’s couple were always said to be still behind the wall not on the stairs.
There’s only one new connection & it’s the Darnell frame/s that shows the dark skinned blackman in the corner & it’s only because he’s dressed very similar to the man on the steps “we’ve” now put him together.
Nowhere does Hudson refer to him as “black” & nowhere does he “look like a blackman in the images”.
People have been looking at this for 40+ years trying to put it together & once again, no one even considered him to be black until 2006 & let’s be clear, if you were to describe him “a black kid” would be the last thing you’d suggest.
I cannot except that you came up with this independently but I guess that’s my problem, you are even using Robin Unger’s images, or the very least, observations & images that he shared with us when this came up &
you’re claiming you found that black woman with baby in other images on your own without any outside assistance?
Anyway I’ve made my point.
I wish I could be as generous as Pat Speer but this is at least the fourth time I’ve seen this same solution with no credit to the original observations.
Mark Bridger again, all independant & no credit given.
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January 2nd, 2012 at 9:26 pm
I’ve read a lot about this. I’m not always going to be able to pinpoint who the first person to make a popular hypothesis was. But I have read about this on several pages.
The idea goes all the way back to 1967.
Read page 93: http://books.google.com/books?id=eEkEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PA93#v=onepage&q&f=false
Notice that in 1967, Life Magazine concluded that one of the men on the steps had been behind the retaining wall and gone down to the steps.
If the man on the steps had walked down from the retaining wall, then he must have been one of the individuals who Marlyn Sitzman saw there and stated in an interview in 1966.
Blackdogman said:
Yes, I did. Primarily by process of illumination. I haven’t really seen any other young black women with a child in any of the other photographs which I cannot place as being someone else. Some have claimed it might be the woman seen in several photographs with a young child running from the Knoll area, but that’s Faye Chism, who was in a different location.
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January 3rd, 2012 at 12:20 am
drbuzz0 said:
The black woman and child theory was first proposed by Jeff Rollins and myself on this Lancer thread
in 2008
http://www.jfklancerforum.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=3&topic_id=76337&mesg_id=76337&page=
What i object to is that you have used nearly all of my original images without any recognition to the person who created them.
I was the one who first cropped the Murray image from my gallery located the woman and child on her hip and put that red square around her.
I was the one who posted that higher resolution Darnell frame.
I was the one who found the woman and child in the tinted couch frames.
You appear to have used almost ALL of the images which it took me hours to accumulate.
I don’t mind that, providing Credit is given to the original researcher, for his hours of hard work
in scouring through hundreds of images looking for a needle in a hay stack.
Robin Unger
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January 3rd, 2012 at 2:05 am
Robin Unger said:
Fine. Well there you go. It’s out there now. I have a huge collection of images that I have acquired from a number of sources. Many I scanned myself from books. I may well have acquired the same images off a Google image search. Believe me when I say that there is not a single image taken that day in Dealey plaza that is publicly available which I have not seen.
If you found it before anyone, then fine, there you go, it’s out there. There you go. You made the comment.
These are NOT your images, by the way. You didn’t take them. They were taken by a number of people (Jim Murray, Marie Muchmore, Mal Couch, Jim Bitzner, Orville Nix to name a few). They are currently, depending on the image owned by someone other than you: Life Magazine, The Sixth Floor Museum, the National Archives etc.
The Murray print you refer to looks to be scanned from “Pictures of the Pain” (1994, Yeoman Press)
But fine. You say you discovered it? There you to. You want a trophy or something?
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January 3rd, 2012 at 8:05 am
No trophys required.
And just for the record, i scanned the Murray photo from Trask’s ” That Day In Dallas “
and you are right, they are not my images.
I have spent thousands of hours buiding up my assassination image galleries in the last 5 – years
so that all researchers may benefit and have easy access to the JFK Assassination photo’s from one website.
http://www.jfkassassinationgallery.com
That includes you also.
Enough said
I will leave it at that.
Thanks.
Robin.
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January 11th, 2012 at 11:29 pm
Sorry DrB.
I respond again only in the interests of accuracy.
What Life wrote about back then had nothing to do with either Ms Sitzman or a black person.
The writers of that article were simply trying to understand why they saw only one man on that particular step in Willis5 & two in Moorman, that’s all. What they came up with wasn’t that great, it was just “something”, one possible scenario, which was better than nothing & also gave an explaination for the “mysterious” dark figure to boot.
Someone is still behind the wall at the BDM position at the time of the headshot, we all know this now but Life did not & the man who you claim you see clearly as a “black” man was already on the step in Willis.
Life weren’t claiming it was “our man” who came hurriedly down the steps but rather the white man who was hidden & who we know today as Emmet Hudson. So what they came up with back then is far removed from “our” modern day theory.
They also clearly had no clue about Thompson’s interview.
IF they were aware of it, then they like others after them, still would have ruled out that man on the steps as being a “young black kid” who was most likely “still on the bench”.
Another reason why Life wouldn’t think of black people in this solution which has become popular now is perhaps because ITEK who looked at the images closely for Life were to conclude that the man behind the wall in Willis was actually white.
Regardless, Life thought a white man came down the steps & according to them was the ONLY reason for the shape behind the wall in Willis & Betzner which was no longer there in subsequent images.
Nothing of what they theorised on this issue back in ‘67 is actually used by anyone of us now so it’s completely different ideas.
“One man came down the steps”, okay that alone but add anything more to that theory of theirs like “at the time of the shooting” & it’s different.
This new theory has more in common with Sitzman’s & Thompson’s own conversation, you could have just as well linked to that interview.
JT: “Did one of them walk to the end of the wall at some point?”
MS: “They may have…”.
That idea actually still stands up where as Life’s is all “debunked” shall we say?
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/sitzman.htm
~~~~
Altgens did not take a picture of the limo around Z313 because(he said)… the headshot shocked him out of it.
His photo you refer to above which(came after another of Hill on the back of the limo) captured Zapruder, had nothing to do with the limo DrB.
Just a FYI, there is a lot of stuff I liked in this article.
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January 12th, 2012 at 6:31 pm
Blackdogman said:
Taken in combination with Sitzman’s interview, it’s pretty clear that the man on the steps with Emmet Hudson and F. Lee Mudd was up on the bench before and therefore can be presumed to be a member of the couple who was referenced by Sitzman. The man had a few words with Emmet Hudson as he would testify.
Blackdogman said:
The man is known to be black from both Sitzman’s interview and from the photographic evidence. It’s clear in the Muchmore movie. It’s also seen in many photos.
I still don’t quite get what you’re getting at.
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February 1st, 2012 at 10:29 pm
Mr Leroy Blevins, your observation is incredible, “you rigth”, this means zapruder is part of the conspiracy, I belive he is of the same etnic comunity as ruby and his secretary. I am very impress, I would like to see the photos of people that object your observation. but at this point I belive you are really brillant.
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February 1st, 2012 at 10:38 pm
ivan said:
If you like to see my research on the JFK Assassination ans see more images I can show on this please feel free to contact me at leroyblevins1@aol.com
This way I can send you images from my research.
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