A half-century ago, two young black people in Dallas found themselves eyewitnesses to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy — yet their voices have never been heard. Indeed, a half century later, even their names are unknown.
This young man and woman were sitting on the spot famously dubbed “the grassy knoll” on November 22, 1963. They had a front row seat for a key moment in 20th century U.S. history: the murder of a popular liberal president.
They were two young African-Americans, friends or perhaps siblings. While JFK was reviled by many whites in Dallas for his liberal policies, he was popular among young black people for his support of their aspirations for equal rights. They came to see JFK and First Lady Jackie in person, and they witnessed a nightmare.
How we know the story
“There was a colored couple. I figure they were between 18 and 21, a boy and a girl, sitting on a bench, just almost, oh, parallel with me, on my right side, close to the fence, ” recalled Marilyn Sitzman, a bystander who also witnessed JFK’s assassination.
Sitzman, a secretary, had accompanied her boss, dressmaker Abraham Zapruder, to Dealey Plaza in downtown Dallas to watch President Kennedy’s mid-day motorcade. They found a spot on a marble wall atop a grassy embankment overlooking the president’s route. Sitzman was standing behind Zapruder who held his Super 8 millimeter movie camera. Zapruder’s famous movie would capture the killing of the president.
In a 1966 interview, Sitzman told author Josiah Thompson that she had first noticed the black couple 10 or 15 minutes before JFK’s arrival.
“Everybody was milling around down there, trying to find a place to stand and everything,” she said, “and I know when we went over to get up on the marble thing, they were already sitting there.”
“They were eating their lunch, ’cause they had little lunch sacks, and they were drinking Coke,” Sitzman recounted.
As the motorcade passed by, President Kennedy, seated next to First Lady Jackie, was waving to the friendly crowd when gunshots rang out.
Kennedy was struck by a bullet in the back and then then flung violently backward by a bullet that struck his head above his right ear blasting his skull open in an explosion of blood, brains, and bone, killing him almost instantly.
In the ensuing chaos Sitzman saw the black couple again.
“The main reason I remember ’em is, after the last shot I recall hearing and the [president’s] car went down under the triple underpass there, I heard a crash of glass, and I looked over there, and the kids had thrown down their Coke bottles, just threw them down and just started running towards the back, and … everybody else was running that way.”
Sitzman didn’t see “the kids” again. They were never identified or interviewed by any law enforcement officer or investigator. No journalist, researcher or author ever found them. In the vast literature of JFK’s assassination, they barely exist. They were present at the scene of an epic crime — and they vanished.
What did they see and hear?
The two young African-Americans were sitting right in the middle of the spot hat would become famous as “the grassy knoll.” If there was a gunman there, they were as close to him as anybody else.
No such gunman has ever been identified.that doesn’t mean there wasn’t one. “Grassy knoll” is sometime used as a synonym for crazy conspiracy theorizing. (“Oh don’t go all grassy knoll on me.”) But it was not a conspiracy theorist who came up with the idea that Kennedy had been killed by a gunshot fired from in front of his motorcade. It was a veteran newspaper reporter.
The term was coined by Merriman Smith of United Press International who was riding in a car behind JFK’s limousine when the shots rang out. Twenty five minutes later, Smith filed a story on JFK’s assassination in which he reported:
“Some of the Secret Service agents thought the gunfire was from an automatic weapon fired to the right rear of the president’s car, probably from a grassy knoll [emphasis added] to which police rushed.”
Smith had coined an immortal phrase. At least 34 witnesses would come forward to say they thought a gunshot had been fired from the grassy knoll area. A more comprehensive survey found 52 witnesses said they heard a shot from the knoll area.
But there was no young black man or woman among these witnesses.
What they left behind
There is a photograph that corroborates the details of Marilyn Sitzman’s story.
The photo, taken within a few minutes of JFK’s assassination, shows the park bench referred to by Sitzman. It shows two Dallas police detectives looking at the remains of a bag lunch. Another photograph taken at the time shows a pool of liquid on the ground, the spilled soda.
The black man and woman whom Sitzman saw were never identified or interviewed by any law enforcement officer or investigator. No journalist, researcher or author ever found them. In the vast literature of JFK’s assassination, they barely exist. They were present at the scene of an epic crime — and they vanished.
They might still be alive. If Sitzman was right about their ages, they would be between 68 and 71 years old now (The average life expectancy of African-Americans is 70.2 years.)
There have been some reports claiming to identity of this couple. I went to Dallas to corroborate these claims. I interviewed a person who claims to have known one of them. I could not corroborate those claims.
Why didn’t they come forward?
Don Roberdeau, a former U.S. Navy officer and JFK researcher who has mapped the exact location of many witnesses to the assassination, told me in an email:
“For me, one of the black couple simply threw down his/her pop bottle after the shock of seeing President Kennedy bloodily executed only 75 feet away. Someone, maybe the other black person, set his/her pop bottle atop the retaining wall, they left their hamburgers bag behind, and they both just went off into the [Texas School Book Depository] parking lot, choosing never to come forward, nor have they been identified publicly — for whatever reasons. My guess is that they both sensed the nearby fired shot and one or both of the black couple saw the … picket fence assassin who was only forty feet southwest of the sitting bench.”
If the black couple is still alive, their testimony would be important contribution to commemoration of the 50th anniversary JFK’s assassination. If the fatal shot came from a gunman behind the fence, they were closer to him than almost any other witnesses. Conversely, if there was no gunman in that area, they would have been among the first to see that.
Jim Crow in Dallas
One can well appreciate why they did not come forward at the time. In 1963, Dallas was a Jim Crow city, where racial segregation was legal and respectable, and African-Americans were routinely treated as second-class citizens, especially by law enforcement officers.
The official story of JFK’s assassination, promoted almost immediately by the Dallas Police Department, J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI, and Lyndon Johnson’s White House, was that the president had been shot from an office building behind Kennedy’s limousine, by a pro-Castro communist named Lee Harvey Oswald, who had no co-conspirators and no discernible motive.
The FBI studiously avoided interviewing white people in the vicinity (like Bill Newman, the man seen lying down in the top photo above). Newman said he thought the fatal shot came from the front and he was mostly ignored.
Under such circumstances, it would have been foolish for any young black person to come forward to tell a story that few white people in positions of power wanted to hear. After Oswald, who denied shooting JFK, was murdered in police custody, it would have been almost suicidal.
The black people on the grassy knoll met a familiar fate of African-Americans in that time. They were silenced: by fear, by the hostility of law enforcement officers, and the indifference of the media. They were written out of black history and American history.
————-
If you know something about these people, please send me an email. Confidentiality is assured.
Dealey Plaza should be re-named to, Smoke & Mirrors Plaza.
It was interesting to read that someone on this thread said over a year ago that the two African Americans on the Grassy Knoll were Elizabeth and Alfred King.
They obviously didnt want to say what they observed from a key position on the Grassy Knoll on 22/11/63.
The most interesting development in this whole case is the increasing amount of information on Oswald’s Intelligence connections.
Perhaps though if the two African Americans would be courageous enough to come if still alive it would be a game changer.
Go listen to Walter Cronkite’s account on the interruption of As the World Turns. He said a man and woman were seen on a grassy hill, insinuating they may have committed the crime.
Can anyone confirm the identity of these witnesses in the Weigman film? A man and woman standing in front of the curved facade, just to Abraham Zapruder’s right. They duck to the ground and note the man runs immediately to look through a window in the facade, into the railroad yard behind the picket fence. JFK The Weigman Film.wmv: http://youtu.be/PuID6-uLy2w via @YouTube
I’ve heard from the beginning that Woody Harrelson’s dad was the main shooter. There were also 2 men dressed like hobos that were part of the conspiracy. They disappeared in the train yard. I’m sure Johnson was behind the whole thing. He had told his students over and over when he was a teacher, that he would be president. He felt the only way that could happen was if JFK was out of the picture. Also Kennedy’s advisor told him not to go to Dallas, as they felt something was very wrong about he trip. Johnson insisted he go. Another indication of his involvement.
You’re right about LBJ, Ron Another thing about him is that he very much wanted his friend Connally to ride in the Veep car, not with JFK, as it eventually turned out. . Makes you wonder if LBJ knew something bad was going to happen. LBJ’s involvement in this can’t be counted out.
Motive, means and opportunity all point to LBJ.
if the shooters were in the pergola behind zapruder and looking at the darnell film it seems possible, this couple may well have seen the shooters exiting the pergola, rifles in hand.
A shot from the grassy knoll does not line up with the head shot. There is no evidence of a shot entering the right front of his head nor any damage to the left side of his head or skull.
The Zapruder film clearly shows the head wound is consistent with the autopsy photos and x-rays where a bullet entered the back of his head blowing out a large portion of his skull above his right ear, leaving a large flap that is clearly visible in the Z film, with two large fragments striking the limo’s windshield and the windshield frame; fragments that match Oswald’s ammo.
All that is fact, and all of it points directly at the one and only assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald.
Rob, what the Zapruder film shows is that there was a shot to the head that clearly did not come from Oswald.
Rob, the testimony of Clint Hill and others contradicts depictions of the head wound you describe above and in the autopsy photos. Clint Hill refers twice to a large gaping wound in the right rear portion of the skull, not above the right ear or top right of skull:
Warren Commission – Testimony Of Clinton J. Hill, Special Agent, Secret Service (description of the President’s head wound):
Mr. SPECTER. Now, what is your best estimate of the speed of the President’s automobile as it turned left off of Houston onto Elm Street?
Mr. HILL. We were running still 12 to 15 miles per hour, but in the curve I believe we slowed down maybe to 10, maybe to 9…Well, as we came out of the curve, and began to straighten up, I was viewing the area which looked to be a park. There were people scattered throughout the entire park. And I heard a noise from my right rear, which to me seemed to be a firecracker. I immediately looked to my right and, in so doing, my eyes had to cross the Presidential limousine and I saw President Kennedy grab at himself and lurch forward and to the left… I jumped from the car, realizing that something was wrong, ran to the Presidential limousine. Just about as I reached it, there was another sound, which was different than the first sound. I think I described it in my statement as though someone was shooting a revolver into a hard object–it seemed to have some type of an echo.
Mr. SPECTER. What did you observe as to President Kennedy’s condition on arrival at the hospital?
Mr. HILL. The right rear portion of his head was missing. It was lying in the rear seat of the car. His brain was exposed. There was blood and bits of brain all over the entire rear portion of the car. Mrs. Kennedy was completely covered with blood. There was so much blood you could not tell if there had been any other wound or not, except for the one large gaping wound in the right rear portion of the head.
Mr. HILL. As I lay over the top of the back seat I noticed a portion of the President’s head on the right rear side was missing and he was bleeding profusely. Part of his brain was gone. I saw a part of his skull with hair on it lying in the seat. The time of the shooting was approximately 12:30 p.m., Dallas time. I looked forward to the jump seats and noticed Governor Connally’s chest was covered with blood and he was slumped to his left and partially covered up by his wife. I had not realized until this point that the Governor had been shot.
*Note his description of the President’s back wound, as seen at the Bethesda autopsy, which is not consistent with the SBT:
Mr. HILL. I remained with Mrs. Kennedy except for one time when I was requested to come to the morgue [at Bethesda] to view the President’s body…I saw an opening in the back, about 6 inches below the neckline to the right-hand side of the spinal column.
“…please forgive me Mr. Regan, but I fare to differ with you. Not to confuse or to include testimony or comments by Mr. hill at later periods; please,”re-read” Mr. hills testimony/examination by Mr. Specter a tad closer. Note that Clint hill does note a “seperation” if you will, of the two head wounds; the one..of the back of his head missing, and that of a large wound on from which he was,”profusely bleeding:” two independent wounds!”-DM
Again….so much discussion about this and that. Here is an interesting clip of Zapruder’s secretary, who happened to be in a perfect spot with her boss. I think she pretty much sums up the foolishness of the entire grassy knoll nonsense…and, at the same time, accounts for the African American couple sitting only a few feet from her.
Enjoy:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-1c323jlvE
Jeff, the photo you open with tells the whole story.
A Dallas Cop running towards the Grassy Knoll.
I think the real story on this thread just demonstrates this: Someone was eating something on those steps as JFK’s car was coming down elm street and this person appears in at least on photo, called the ‘black-dog’ photo. A coke bottle was seen sitting on the wall after the shooting (see Grodin’s Book, The Death of a President …but don’t buy it please…pure conjecture/conspiracy nonsense). People have mentioned that it they saw a young couple sitting there and they ran off. Evidence that they were there exists in the wrapping, bench discussion of witnesses, and the coke bottle. What is debunked is the black-dog man hunkering down.
Just another case of another theory on a shooter at that wall going up in flames.
Bottom line on the title of this thread. Blood or a Nehi Strawberry soda was seen there. A Tom Thumb Grocery Store bag was photographed there. Somebody ate on the steps, disappeared after the shots, possibly over to their left, right or over their heads (see Newman family diving to the ground in front of this area). I don’t blame them for getting the hell out of there whether they’re Black, White or Pink. Witnessing the shooting of a President could make anyone wonder what’s really happened and shut up permanently.
I believe in the conspiracy theory for 43 years and I’m 54. That being said, one thing puzzles me. This paragraph from the above article: Kennedy was struck by a bullet in the back and then then flung violently backward by a bullet that struck his head above his right ear blasting his skull open in an explosion of blood, brains, and bone, killing him almost instantly.
If the bullet struck above JFK’s right ear, how did it exit from the right rear of his head. Wouldn’t it have exited the left side?
It would not exit from his left side if it was a tangential strike as illustrated in this diagram, posted by me via TinyPic for your convenience (credit: Albert Miatello’s science article, Physics and JFK Assassination et al).
http://tinypic.com/r/23w67wl/8
But given that Kennedy’s head was rotated somewhat to the left, that trajectory would be inconsistent with both the Badgeman position, and the HSCA “acoustic” position for a shooter.
Want to go with a shooter on the underpass?
Professor John, I am interested in your post: “But given that Kennedy’s head was rotated somewhat to the left, that trajectory would be inconsistent with both the Badgeman position, and the HSCA “acoustic” position for a shooter.” Would you be kind enough to post (description of the location is fine) the HSCA acoustic location on the Knoll for me? Thanks in advance.
Actually….the photo that was shown (with the two investigators) does heck of a lot to dispel the ‘Black-dog Man’ nonsense. These two were shown in the willis photo and another photo as well. The ‘coke’ bottle of one of them was also shown in photos as well. The issue is this: The bench was at the corner of the wall…and, with multiple people seeing this couple, it should put to rest the Black-dog Man story. Now if people will just drop the nonsense about the Badgeman Photo. All speculation and all of it doesn’t account for the nonsense spewed by Gordon (that must have taken days to occur with the way he tells it). I have to laugh….here is a man who claims to have this protracted discussion with this ‘assassin’…sheds his crocodile tears…and is forced to get on his knees…discuss what he has in his camera…etc…ALL THE WHILE WITH PEOPLE RUNNING UP THOSE STEPS…and not a single other witness see’s or hear’s anything of it. More astounding is that people take one part of the story (the bargeman) and make him real…while forgetting his meeting with dear Gordon.
Rumor mongering..and conspiracy building at its best.
Some interesting info in the link. “But even if two Ruby friends did see the Willis photograph and say the man was Ruby, it does not necessarily make it so.”…”This information I’ve uncovered is obviously does not prove that Ruby was not there…”
Ruby was testified to as being at the Dallas Morning News at the time of the Assassination who stated that he was ‘as white as a ghost’. So, her testifying that he was there…and I think that I read others testified to that as well…would make it unlikely that he was at the scene at the moment of the shooting. Heck…even if he were to go there after the shooting (only a few blocks)…that doesn’t prove anything either (except that he said he didn’t do that…and lying is indicative of hiding something..isn’t it?
He(Ruby) probably was at the newspaper site, but I’ve read accounts and testimony that say he stepped out of the bldg for some time. To do what??? Maybe to go to the crime scene at the time it happened. I can’t recall the sources of this, but I don’t make stuff up. Someone driving in the area saw someone runing and said “If that isn’t Jack Ruby, it’s his twin brother”. When the FBI questioned Jean Hill about seeing Ruby running, they told her they had sources placing him at the Dallas Morning News. Maybe those sources saw him there, but could they account for him never leaving the bldg?
I have asked the question on several other pages so I will ask it here also, what would be the odds of 5-6 known assasins (hitmen) to be in Dealy Plaza,at the scene of the assasination of JFK? got to at least think conspiracy, don’t you think? Can supply names if you need them, or I believe you can google it.
Jerry, the way I see it from all I’ve been able to determine and read is that we have Mac Wallace and Loy Factor in the TSBD 6th floor, two behind the Grassy Knoll fence(maybe Sarti as one of the two), a shooter in the Dal-Tex Bldg., and a shooter from ground level.
I’ve mentioned on another one of those pages that photos or arrests only come up with the following suspicious persons:
– James Brading (questioned why in Dal-Tex building)
– Mark Lane shows uncropped photo of DP in aftermath showing Jacky Ruby.
– Anti-castroite (complected) seen in background of Altgens famous photo taken towards TSBD and JFK’s limo but that person is a spectator.
– Convicted murder Charles Harrelson as one of the three tramps?
You will have to give a credible source as to presence of those five to six assassins or hitmen (other than the suspects above, who can’t all be assassins).
That’s been debunked long ago, most particularly by Trask.
Here’s what I say in my book:
Here is the source cited:
http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=48698&relPageId=15
Is it debunked?
Moyer and Gallagher’s response in The Fourth Decade article you cite indicates that the Ruby look-a-like is a different person than the one that Trask says is not Ruby.
And also a different person from the one that Mark Lane and Phil Willis say is Ruby.
So how is this game played? Debunk one balding supposed “Ruby” in a photo, we just find another fellow and claim he is Ruby?
@ John McAdams, Sep. 17/2014 at 11:31 am
You’re jumping to conclusions about game playing Professor (much like some conspiracy theorists do, he he).
Authors Moyer and Gallagher point to another person that resembles Ruby AFTER COMPARISON with other photos that they know IS Ruby, and have the agreement of ‘numerous people’.
Therefore, they aren’t just picking ‘another fellow’.
Sooooo, it would be great to see that January 1997 Fourth Decade article with those photos, to actually vet this issue ourselves.
Oops, I only meant to blockquote what is enclosed by quotation marks.
[The addition of an edit button would be cool. Some VBulletin software forums include an edit button with a spot for its reason].
THe best evidence that Kennedy’s head shot was fired from somewhere on the grassy knoll or from behind the picket fence, was the Newman’s testimony that the “visual impact ” of seeing the right side of the president ‘s head explode gave them the impression that the shots were fired from behind them and over their heads. All of the people who witnessed the President ‘s head shot, believed that the shot came from the grassy knoll or the picket fence area. The next best evidence that the head shot entered the president’s right temple and exited the back of his head came from Dr. Robert McClellan,who examined the performer’s head wound at Parkland Hospital . Dr. McClellan testified that there was a”large gaping hole” in the back of Kennedy’s head and that he could see directly into this hole and that the only portion of Kennedy’s brain that remained was a portion of the cerebellum (the lower rear portion of the brain). Dr. McClellan’s statements ‘re: the head wound has remained consistent . Check it out on C-SPAN3 (Parkland Hospital Reunion). Even The publicly available autopsy photos support Dr. McClellan ‘s observations. According to my readings, a large gaping hole in the rear of the head is consistent with an exit wound. One shot from the rear. One shot from above and through the right side of the head. Two shooters. Either Conspiracy or two people acting independently of each other who wanted the President dead accomplished their objective.
I don’t believe in coincidences (and neither did John Judge).
Here’s a Tiny Pic link to Z335 showing an avulsion to the back of JFK’s head (first time I saw this was in Groden’s 1st major book with Harry Livingstone I believe). I may have a better copy at my office though but it’s a holiday today (Victoria Day in Canada).
http://tinypic.com/r/xct37d/8
I will try to post the image here too but don’t know if it will work.
[IMG]http://i62.tinypic.com/xct37d.gif[/IMG]
* then again, he could have been wearing a black hooded sweat shirt.
I’m too young to remember. Did they have hooded sweatshirts in 1963?
Mistake: she was wearing a SMU shirt or sweater.
Check through all the photos or films you can find of the crowds watching the motorcade that day. See if you spot anyone wearing a hooded sweatshirt or a “hoodie.” I don’t recall them being popular as casual attire at the time. Sportswear was considered just that at the time. It was an incredibly different time, in so many ways.
In relation to this thread’s topic and that no one else has mentioned Evelyn King and her brother Arthur I wonder id there might be others out there as ignorant as I was.
“supported by research done in Dallas by Casey Quinlan and Joe Backles between 2009 and 2012. They identified the young people seen by Stitzman on the bench as an African American sister and brother named Evelyn and Arthur King. The King did not have a chld with them. According to a 2012 posting by Backles on the Education Forum….Evelyn King said that she and her brother arrived on the Grassy Knoll about 12:12 and sat on the bench near the retaining wall. She said she was a Southern Methodist University student, wearing a SMU shirt or sweat shirt, that she and her brother had just come from classes, taking the bus to Dealy Plaza. They were eating hamburgers from the Tom Thumb chain, and she was drinking a bottle of Nehi strawberry soda pop.
According to Backles, Evelyn King recalled that,
there was a conversation with a police officer by a young man who was in an Army uniform And she said this guy came in with a camera and stood at the fence line…that was Gordon Arnold.
And then she says very fast, quickly, somebody ran right in front of her and then past her and got next to the corner of the concrete wall…she didn’t know who the guy was, but he had a black hoodie* on and that he had his hands in his front pocket and he appeared to have something in his hands. She said she saw what appeared to be a gun, a little bit larger than a handgun. And did this gentleman use it? She said,, I don’t know, because she was distracted. She was distracted because as she was sitting there eating her lunch, a Dallas police officer fired a shot.
Well how do we know it was a Dallas police officer? When the shot was fired she turned around and looked right at the fence line 15 to 20 feet away, looking at him right in the eye. She said it was a Dallas cop. Before she could hit the ground, another person and she believed [he] was another police officer fired from the fence line. She couldn’t tell if it was a police uniform but it was blue or black. …she had a Nehi bottle, strawberry, and it broke. It shattered on the sidewalk…”
*they discuss this, I think she just used a modern term to approximate what she remembers.
“Backles writes that Evelyn king verified her account in 2009, when she was 69 years old… When asked why she wouldn’t speak publicly or have her picture taken…This is 1963, I’m Black, I live in Dallas Texas.”
If she was coached it was well done for a story she won’t go public with. If she made it up she knows the case very well.
Thank you Mr. Backles, Mr. Quinlan, and Mr. McBride.
I met Casey Quinlan and got his and Brian Edwards book on Ed Hoffman’s story last November.
Is there an article on this by Casey Quinlan? (I could try to email Brian).
If not a ‘hoodie’, I thought Black Dog Man was a guy wearing a dark rain coat (or trench coat) with a corresponding hat.
The whole Evelyn King story has been around for some years, yet the only source for this story seems to be the infamous Dealey Plaza regular Mike Brownlow. Evelyn and Arthur King have not been identified to this day to my knowledge, so the story remains pure speculation based on a very shaky source.
touche!
“…no doubt, it pays to “read further” on: none the less, this testimony by the “Kings,’ makes perfect sense, and ‘fills in” an awful lot of gaps! This also helps to substantiate “many others” testimony that there were, not one but, ‘two” uniforms behind that stockade fence (see z 478). I can’t blame anybody for keeping a lid on “things” that could get them killed…however, as we get older, we come to the conclusion that nobody is getting out of this world alive (save ones religious convictions)!”-DM
I’m close to finishing Joseph McBride’s “Into The Nightmare” and thought of this thread on pg. 551. I’d never read the Evelyn King account. It is quite convincing. I remember “Colored” labels on water fountains in the early 60’s in Fort Worth.
When I was 4-7 years of age, I lived in far southern Illinois. Although segregation was outlawed in Illinois at the time, Jim Crow was alive and well where I lived. Separate water fountains, bathrooms. The adults understood it; I didn’t.
Recall that Marilyn Sitzman denied , several times, that there was a shot from her right side.
And of course, the HSCA has a finding of fact that a shot was fired from the Knoll.
So why didn’t the HSCA call her?
Sitzman’s right side is not parallel with the stockade fence.
She’s standing well behind the suspected GK shooter’s position.
So she may not have heard a nearby shot to her right.
There are or have been perhaps a dozen or more “suspicious figures” found at various points in images and all “to the right” of Sitzman’s position.
Behind the wall, the fence, in the shelter and actually behind her in the RRY.
All of these she would have heard unless they were using suppressors.
Unlikely she could have pinpointed it’s position though, extremely unlikely in the plaza by all accounts and neither would she automatically assume it was a gun.
As to the reason why she did not testify, could be any reason at all, one would be if she appeared overly nervous.
Doesn’t look good and convinces no one.
If you still believe Zappy, Sitzy, the Hesters and the Newmans stood there watching the parade whist hearing unmistakable sounds of gunfire going on around them as the VIP of all VIPs rides past them you are very much mistaken.
Zapruder could not have continued filming and Charles Hester would not remain seated until ten seconds after the fatal shot/s before deciding to push his wife to the floor.
The ONLY reason Bill Newman acts BEFORE the last shot is because he is studying the faces and body language of the occupants up close.
The noises he and others heard heard did not scare anyone.
A shooting was the last thing on their minds.
Can you explain the part of Zappy’s film that shows a direct shot to the right front of JFK’s head that resulted in huge blood splatter? I highly doubt that shot came from the TSBD. Oswald didn’t kill JFK, someone else did. And Zappy’s film is the proof.
Hi Paul,
there is a difference in what you perceived I wrote and my actual point.
I have come to the realisation that(apart from Bill Newman) no one, not one single bystander/member of the public reacted to a shooting before the last explosion inside the limo. It was how those who witnessed that terrible sight reacted to what they SAW that people reacted to and this is truer with the folks standing outside the TSBD more than anywhere else since it was caught on film.
They as a group, did not react to anyone firing three shots from a window almost directly above their heads.
Some just went back to work in there and no one stopped them from doing so.
So all this talk about people hearing gunshots and being able to point to the exact source does not stand up.
The photographic evidence shows no one reacted to those sounds that “sounded like fireworks/gunshots.
Sadly what we don’t have is footage of the three men NOT leaning out of the window on the fifth and NOT pointing up to window above them and NOT once and for all proving that Bob Jackson was a damn liar.
“..sitzman, in a video interview just prior to her death, did in fact say that there was someone behind the fence! Further, she said the reason she didn’t hear their shot was “that they were probably using a silencer!” Check it out on you tube. Oh, she also was on the set of Stone’s film, “JFK” as an advisor. Note: in the nix film, as well as the Moreman photo, sitzman can be seen “reacting” very odd; looking to her right! What was she reacting to?-DM
You should not rely on any statements by Marilyn Sitzman. She has never given any testimony under oath in this case. Even at the time of the HSCA in 1978 when a finding of fact that a shot was fired from the Grassy Knoll AND Zapruder was no longer alive, she still was not called to testify under oath.
To my knowledge she did not even give a witness statement to the DPD like so many other witnesses did that day.
Just because a DP witness isn’t called to testify or isn’t interrogated by the DPD, doesn’t mean they can’t be a good witness.
If anything, it’s a failing of an investigative authority to not call witnesses or ascertain who they may be in order to call them.
Lots of witnesses were asked to gather outside the TSBD to await transportation and questioning. Sitzman was among them as Robin Unger has shown us.
What happened after that is anyone’s guess.
Perhaps her report of someone running away from the GK did not sit to well with the developing three shots from behind scenario?
Standard procedure would tell you to ignore her along with the evidence left behind on the bench and pathway.
“We already have or man damn it and he was in the building at the other end of the street”.
Whether the young couple she saw were merely innocents or not the record seems to suggest that they were still interesting enough to Sitzman for her to track them at least to see where they were heading to.
I can see no other reason for her to head directly into the shelter and insist that Zappy come with her.
Wiseman mentioned her.
http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/wiseman.htm
But of course in his report everyone he talks to points to the TSBD that is, by his own admission, after arriving on the scene in less than a minute and the first man(supposedly Bill Newman) points him to the source of the shots, instead of going to check it out, he starts taking statements from others and taking the time to write down their details instead of checking out this white hot lead.
“I ran at once to the Sexton Building”
sure you did as long as by “at once” you mean shortly after gathering sufficient grounds to enter it.
It is extremely unlikely that those closest to the limo looked to that building for a source, like the four outriders. their immediate impression from what they saw happen in the limo rightly or wrongly was that it came from nearby.
One woman ran the whole length of Elm to find a cop and tell him to check the bushes on the knoll.
I’m not claiming she was accurate I have no way of knowing just that, this was her immediate impression and do you see Smith or Baker taking the time to take down her particulars?
Sitzman’s full DPD statement would not include any reference to anyone running away from the knoll.
Thompson’s interview with her, official or not has to be taken as this woman’s best recollection of this terrible event.
There were quite a number of black Americans that were present during the ambush of President Kennedy that slipped through the cracks & were not identified or interviewed besides the black couple near Zapruder & Sitzman. They include the porter cleaning one of 2 parked train passenger cars car parked on the railroad tracks near the back of the North pergola that Eugene Boone encountered while searching the railyard, the Dal-Tex fire escape onlooker & a small group of male & female onlookers on the Elm Street sidewalk near the cupola walkway entrance to the North pergola (visible in the Robert Croft Elm Street photo). Jeff Morley has generously opened the door for such witnesses skipped over by law enforcement & the media to tell their stories to the world via his website while maintaining their privacy. We all would benefit to know what these witnesses experienced.
Jackie should have grabbed her hubby and pushed him down after the first shot. What was she thinking?
I’m fairly certain she said she had no idea what was going on and was initially confused which is clear from her reaction. It’s easy to sit in judgement when you don’t have bullets whizzing by you and blowing your spouse’s head to smithereens in a matter of seconds along with the noise from cars, motorcycles, a cheering crowd and people in the car losing their minds.
And I just can’t with the word “hubby”.
That certainly would have changed history, as I bet the orders from the assassination planners were “do NOT hit Jackie”.
Not that I subsribe to this, but articles have been written that claim if it wasn’t for JFK’s back brace keeping him upright, she may have been able to do that.
As for my comment last night: I’ve since gone online and looked at other copies of the Moormon photo and the area in question in those photos are all different and just look like tree branches and leaves. The copy I’ve been looking at is not as well defined as some of those and the 2 people I see in my copy although very convincing are probably just a result of digital noise.
Are there any photos of the couple? I may be visualizing something that is not there and perhaps is just an image of tree leaves but it seems in the Mary Moorman photo there is a man and a woman poking there heads above the wall at the moment of the headshot. The woman is to the right of the man and seems to have blonde bushy hair, perhaps died blonde. They can be seen from their necks up. However they don’t seem to show up in the 8mm films taken from the same side of Elm St.
I wouldn’t put much faith in Groden’s sidekick. Last visit to Dealey Plaza he was telling the crowd gathered at the flea market table by the Zapruder pedestal that he knew all the blacks on the sidewalk (depicted in Robert Croft’s photo); he had names for each of them.
When visiting Dealey Plaza listen to him spin his tales & then walk over to the spot in one of the Ike Altgens photos he claims to be him in the photo. Stoop down to an adolescent’s height & look at Elm Street. It can’t be seen; the drop off is too steep.
I’d stick with Jeff’s original call for the couple, their offspring or friends to go public with what they know before relying on spinmasters that make money off JFK’s murder.
Wouldn’t the simplest explanation for their absence from history be that Miss Sitzman simply made a mistake?
Nobody else at the scene has mentioned them.
There aren’t any pictures of them.
They didn’t exist.
A mistake?
Wow – I would have never thought of that!
What you’re saying is that she was hallucinating.
Truly amazing!
There are 3 pictures of the person(s) standing at the retaining wall. While each picture is blurry, they can be seen in the same spot in all three photos.
The person known as “BlackDog” man is actually a picture of the black woman holding her baby.
It is explained at this link
http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=19310#entry256997
The introductory post above shows a picture of their lunch bag investigated by FBI agents or police detectives.
[In the meantime, I’ll add ‘mistake’ to the other list of pro-WC descriptions as attempts to debunk key witnesses or their statements (i.e., lone-nut communist, mental illness, spontaneous act of passion, etc. etc.]
“…then please explain the residual, or empty coke bottle left on the wall by the bench where they allegedly were seated. It is very clearly visable in many of the post event photos taken within the minutes that followed – even ones where “smoke’ is seen in the air “hanging” under the trees in front of the stockade fence! check it out!-DM
Joseph McBride attributed only
the questionable source for his details of the young black couple to a post on the Education Forum. The details in that thread are sourced from a presentation by Casey Quinlan, who Bill Kelly said was informed by an intermediary who claimed to have met the black couple and was speaking for them. The intermediary is Groden sidekick, Michael Brownlow, the sole source of the name Evelyn King. Bill Kelly, myself, and a number of others have been unable to verify Brownlow’s information as presented by Quinlan and quoted in McBride’s book. Bill has talked with Brownlow by telephone and was told by him that Evelyn King was with her brother Albert, now deceased.
No death record can so far be located. No one other than Brownlow, it now seems, has claimed any direct contact with the black couple in Dealey Plaza.
Many visitors to Dealey Plaza meet (or are accosted by) Mr Brownlow. After my first time there in Feb 2012, I did a little research and found that he’s quite the fixture. Mr Brownlow claims to have been in the crowd the day of the assassination, a 13 year old boy standing with his grandmother outside the Dal-Tex building on Elm & Houston. He also claims to have seen a puff of smoke from behind the picket fence. I have no cause for dispute re: his presence that day or what he saw. However, there is a question surrounding Mr Brownlow’s age. As mentioned above, Mr Brownlow said he was 13 at the time of the assassination. However, a mugshot of Mr B I found online gives his age in 2011 as 55. If correct, it means Mr Brownlow was no older than eight in Nov 1963. I acknowledge that the mugshot info may be incorrect, but if not, a question needs asking about the veracity of Mr Brownlow’s claim. I’ve no axe to grind; I found Michael to be a very affable man. (Mugshot can be found here: http://www.justmugshots.com/texas/dallas/712673 )
I like it,
also if Brownlow were telling the truth couldn’t he just rustle up a picture of himself as a lad proving to all that he was indeed that skinny boy in the Altgens Houston St image with the big ears that looks nothing like his modern day self?
Personally, I don’t believe a word he says and the way he explains the explicit details of the head shot for kids to hear like it was nothing makes me sick.
No consideration, no class, no researcher.
Sadly he’s way to scary for gentle folk to deal with.
Luckily for Robert though this evolving tale of the young couple now involves an assassin, so everyone hanging around the knoll at the weekends is at peace again.
Remember to buy the T-shirt kids.
Don’t know why I never thought of this but I’m sure others have.
The reason to have SS credentials was to keep people out of the area BEFORE the shooting as well as afterwards to explain your presence.
Never thought about that aspect myself, or read anything about it (the BEFORE part). Excellent reasoning and post though I’m no judge. Thank you.
Gordon Arnold’s and Ed Hoffman’s stories seem to recount a SSA that kept them away from the GK area at some point or another PRIOR to the shooting.
You’re right about Gordon Arnold, but from what I read about Hoffman’s account, Hoffman simply found his own place with no trouble from the SS.
You’re right about Gordon Arnold, but from what I read about Hoffman’s account, Hoffman simply found his own place with no trouble from the SS.
According to one researcher, this couple was Evelyn and Arthur King. He interviewed them:
http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=19310&page=4
They are also mentioned in Joseph McBride’s new book INTO THE NIGHTMARE.
McBride seems to have done a thorough job on this issue of the back couple in his book “Into the Nightmare.” For his response to the confusion & theorizing go to the thread at:
https://deeppoliticsforum.com/forums/showthread.php?11861-My-new-book-quot-Into-the-Nightmare-quot/page24#.Uu1sMfvgxc5
Just one point regarding McBride’s black couple allegedly seeing what appeared to be a shooter or shooters resembling “Dallas police” officers:
The documentary “The Men Who Killed Kennedy” noted that when professional assassinations are hired for jobs like this, they will often appear in disguises, such as dressed as police men or workmen during the shooting. As incredible as it sounds, the real Dallas police officers who rushed towards the knoll right after the shooting might encounter an assassin in the vicinity whom they assume to be a fellow officer, simply because he is convincingly dressed as such.
I’m of the opinion that during the head shot the limousine was briefly stopped (or near stopped), and that there were two near simultaneous shots to Kennedy’s head: one being a full metal jacket bullet fired from behind (perhaps from the Dal Tex building), followed closely by a frontal head shot using an exploding bullet fired from the drainage ditch/culvert area. The shot from the knoll could have been merely a near simultaneous shot that was basically a “blank” or diversionary shot designed to get the police & spectators to run towards that area.
If McBride is correct on this issue, Evelyn King would represent another witness (e.g., see also “The Girl in Blue”) who had previously been reluctant to come forward, & now in their senior years is more comfortable with speaking out, albeit only to a select few researchers/journalists.
Great JFK Facts article and discussion. Regards, George, Canada
“…i’m sticking my neck out as well as my reputation…and my life; but george; you are right! in fact; in many cases, perhaps most large metropolitan cities, many of the ‘killers for hire” are in law enforcement – crazy as that may seem, but just give that a little bit of thought for a minute! I can only say that my knowledge of this is not guess work, and i’ll leave it at that!
in the dallas event, these people 9if they saw those behind the stockade fence, did-in fact-see two(2) men in dallas pd uniform! Please, take ‘a really good look” at z frame # 478 and you Will see at least one man dressed in uniform and a rifle!” the ****’modified’ the last 20 or so frames of the current z film, to cover up the identies of the shooters/participants behind the fence! but use your sense; you can see them – if anything..him! that’s all i’m prepared to state for now!
See “Into The Nightmare”, Joseph McBride – Page 551 & 552…
One of the dangers of searching for genuine JFK ambush victims is the public doesn’t know if they are getting the ‘real deal’ or a hustler. Beverly Oliver was (and still is) accused of conning the public with her claim of being the ‘babushka lady’ (Gerald Posner pounced all over the woman in TV interviews). The fellow who hangs around Robert Groden claiming to be in one of the Ike Altgens photos has aroused a lot of suspicion too; after listening to what he claims to have witnessed go over & stand at the spot he claims to be at & one can’t help but notice that a view of Elm Street literally disappears from that spot (cars & trucks are barely visible, if at all with, even with no traffic obstructions).
The tale of the 2 black people is indeed intriguing. It was reported that a pool of blood was found on the western end of the TSBD front sidewalk shortly after the assassination. The late Jack White spoke about it often. Someone sustained an injury during or after the ambush; it may have been one of the black couple that bled there after being attacked by someone connected to the shooting. We don’t know.
Whoever they are, if they haven’t been murdered & are still alive they would have to be aware of the global interest in this case & the fact they would become instant historical celebrities, joining the ranks of Abe Zapruder, Mary Moorman and a handful of others that were unquestionably present during the ambush. Perhaps their offspring will come forward & tell us who their parents were, what they told them they witnessed & what happened to them.
They might even see it here & act. The Internet reaches around the globe in an instant.
Almost one year later… I Google Black Dog Man.
I liked the way your post started Hans, the first paragraph is very sensible but I disagree with what you followed it with sorry.
Even if they were as believable as Pam Grier and Morgan Freeman it would not make a speck of difference. We’d believe them and others wouldn’t.
Witness testimony does not impress everyone. Thankfully.
Since it’s practically worthless and studying this case proves that to us time and time again.
The Mal Couch observance of blood is weak sauce.
The idea that it was merely spilt pop is bolstered by the fact that this so called newsman decided it wasn’t worth wasting one single inch of film on.
This is completely relevant too.
You believe him.
I don’t believe him at all, it wasn’t blood and neither did he see that alleged rifle in the window.
Bob Jackson concurs with me on the latter alone.
He says it was impossible for anyone else to see it since it had already been drawn back in when he shouted out.
Sure.
See?
I don’t believe A single witness got it right.
Give me an example where one did.
Respectfully.
“…well, i’d be happy to don: but most of their testimony was not taken by the WC! besides, we both already know that there has been some very accurate testimony…but you’re just not going to believe what you don’t want to hear…”-DM
If these two black people were the closest to the fence near where “badge man” supposedly was I can think of two possibilities.
One, seeing the head shot they were horrified, and, having the shot come from almost literally right over their heads they were scared to death and ran away scared to tell anyone (or as alluded to above they did tell some one and were intimidated into silence, or worse).
Second, if they were the first ones behind the fence they may have seen something they were not supposed to (e.g. gun disposal, people running away)and might have been escorted away by some of the ‘secret service’ agents on the knoll.
It would be interesting to know if any black individuals from the Dallas area had ever been claimed as missing after the Nov. 22nd event.
Ed Hoffman, who saw the killers firing from the picket fence(including the puff of smoke that Sam Holland also saw), described the “gun desposal” and the “people running away” that you mention, Ronnie. Poor Ed Hoffman-probably one of the best of the witnesses, but as he was a deaf mute he couldn’t do a good job of communicating what he saw.
“…Ronnie; if you were an american who happened to be black, and were living in Dallas (much less anyplace else)in 1963, and you watched a parade where you saw “two,” uniformed DPD officers stand up only a few feet away from you, and assassinate the president of the united states…in daylight no less; what would you have done? Later one, while you’re “thinking” about maybe coming forward, you see the “accused,” whom, by the way, you are convienced is completely innocent, get murdered on live tv, i’m afraid you’d do what they did…remain anonomyous! simple as that! that’s why they’re still alive today!”-DM
The missing bullet or large parts of it are still in Dealey Plaza. It is worth an easy million dollars if found, yet not one person, has grabbed some high end metal detectors to locate this treasure. Lead does not degrade in soil. A bullet hitting grassy soil is surely pristine, even after 50 years. I wish I lived in Dallas. I would be sweeping the Plaza with my metal detector in my spare time. A million dollars would buy me lots of fun.
“..then why don’t you move to Dallas and make a “million”?”-DM
You know up to 8 days ago with the advent of the new “smoking gun” tv show I had never noticed any of the JFK specifics.
The final conclusions from my 7 day study of jfk details are .. Oswald was definitely conscripted into the assassination plot – the collated totality of oswald history says that. It may not hold up in court but supplies that detail. Therefore the conspiracy had completed its plans for where it was to take place before it arranged Oswalds job in the book building. SO it was that wide a specific conspiracy.
A lot of what i read debunks a lot of supported evidence facts of that seemingly on the grounds they think there could not have been a wide as that plot much less that wide involved specifics. So I conclude 80-97% of the supported evidence of such is true.
Oh and btw WHY was the 80-97% of supported evidence true and planned?? … to confuse the issue and draw attention away from the 2 cameraradar synced silenced guns that zeroed in from front and back similtaneously on JFK’s head or the only other scope of such I explain below.
EG that is why there is 5ft of blood and bone splatter in both and all directions. One such gun in front of the windscreen of the car behind JFK and the other in the rear of the car in front of JFK or the other that direction scope.
There is no other trajectory possible for both or either of those shots to my eyes. I studied all the supported evidence claims of the head shot and while they are many and varied they all fall within a certain area that allows only that trajectory.
The from behind claims all need a slight upward trajectory which is only possible from below the windscreen of the car behind JFK.
Whilst the from the front claims all need a near level very slight up or down trajectory which is only possible along the road in front of jfk passing gov connallys right, or facing jfk from an angle between the car occupants to jfk. Which second possibility of from the front trajectory may have a wider possibility than just the car ahead of jfk, ie from the overpass end of the grassy knoll and south including the overpass and through the overpass.
Where was LBJ during shooting?
LBJ was supposedly ducking down before the gun shots went off, three cars behind Kennedy’s limo. And, taking a peek every so often as the shots were being taken at JFK.
LBJ said he wasn’t ducking. He said he had dropped his lucky pen and had to crawl around on the floor before he found it. It took a few minutes.
Actually Congressman Ralph Yarborough, riding in the back seat with LBJ and Ladybird said: LBJ was bent over between the two front seats. He and his #1 Secret Service Agent Rufus Youngblood, who was also bent low, to his left and back in the right front seat were listening to a radio communication channel turned so low Yarborough could not hear it. Interestingly I’ve read the first communication over one of the police channels after the head shot was the word Victory in Morse code.
Were the front seats bucket seats?
In any event, an excellent discussion of LBJ’s low profile in his seat and absence in a blow-up of the uncropped Altgens photo (cropped as CE 203) at the same time we see JFK reacting to a shot through the presidential limo’s windshield, can be found in Phillip F. Nelson’s book, LBJ: The Mastermind of the JFK Assassination.
I remember listening to the DPD radio tapes (supplied by Mary Ferrell) back around 1974-75. As a longtime ham radio operator (K2HKC) who used to regularly communicate in Morse code–I was rather astonished to hear the unmistakable “di di di daah, di di di daah”, repeated twice (and just as I have written it out here), transmitted some time in the first minute or two following the assassination. That’s an unmistakable “V” for victory, as Ronnie Wayne’s post indicates, and as was made popular in the TV series “Victory at Sea.” Who the heck made such a transmission in the immediate aftermath of the President’s murder? And why wasn’t this investigated? I am writing this post to (a) confirm that I heard this with my own ears; and (b) to argue that it suggests rather wide spread involvement of certain officers in the Dallas Police Department, most probably in the motorcycle escort.
I don’t believe that he was peeking around like that, but then again some have said that if LBJ wasn’t President of the United States, he’d be in a mental institution.
LBJ later asked someone at the FBI(maybe Hoover himself) if any shots were fired at him. I think that could prove he was ducking in anticipation of shots, because if he was NOT ducking, he’d know the answer to his question.
“…perhaps(since johnson “was aware” the calls in the oval office were recorded – he even had a “kill switch” installed later-no pun intended!) he was “highly concious” of his ‘being recorded” (as i’m sure mr. hoover was as well!), and that he was “playing the game:” taking any suspicion away from himself…something a person would do regardless! It could’ve looked suspecious if he didn’t ask!…but that seems the more likely answer-as Hoover had to have been privy to any coup or it would’ve been discovered in only a few hours..or less!-DM
That’s a factoid.
If you disagree, post your source.
Phillip Nelson in his book LBJ: The Mastermind of The JFK Assassination, shows an enhanced version of the Altgens photo with a note ‘LBJ MIA?’ pointing to the spot where his head should show, which seems absent from the photo.
Personally, I wish it was a more resolute photo. I noticed in an earlier photo or film shot when LBJ’s car turns north onto Houston from Main, that he’s sort of hanging over the right side panel.
So maybe his head/torso isn’t positioned in the center of his seat like Lady Bird or Senator Yarborough are, and also blended or camouflaged with the background scenery of spectators flashing by.
John, you can’t make this stuff up, and I didn’t.
LBJ was in the second car behind JFK. I’ve seen and heard commentary that essentially tells us that he knew when the shots were to come.
how do we know they never came forward? Is it possible they went to the DPD and were scared into leaving and never coming back? They may even have been murdered if they were, indeed, good eyewitnesses; we know of a few who testifed in the Tippit shooting, for example, and were assaulted afterwards.
Those are all possible scenarios too, but hopefully they are still around, although the assasssination of RFK and MLK would not have encouraged them to talk about their experience.
It would be a Godsend if they came forward. Publicity and the passage of time might also protect them now.
(Related note: If Gordon Arnold saw them, that might have shed further light & corroborated his own story which has problems).
Hi Jefferson Morley, thanks a lot for posting this. I feel the same way about wanting to identify this young black couple. There was a very good article about them some time ago, see:
http://depletedcranium.com/an-enduring-mystery-of-the-kennedy-assassination/
Robin Unger and others have to be thanked to bring this story to the forefront over the last years. I recently suggested at the JFK assassination newsgroups to start a crowd funder to finance a full one page ad in the biggest most widely circulated Dallas region newspaper with best possible quality images of the colored man and ask the public if anyone recognizes him. The 6th Floor Museum could help with this effort too. What do you think?
Interesting article but this last part needs work:
“If you know any black people in Dallas, or have ever heard anything about an African-American couple in Dealey Plaza on November 22, 1963, please send them this article.”
Should I just arbitrarily send it to any black person I may know in Dallas?
Send it to anybody you think would be interested in helping find these people. Please.
I think we may just find these 2 witnesses or their descendents, Mr. Morley!
“To some JFK commentators, “grassy knoll” is sometime used as a synonym for crazy conspiracy theorizing. (“Oh don’t go all grassy knoll on me.”)”
There has been a whole book written with the witness testimony of those who saw or heard something funny behind the picket fence on the grassy knoll.
“The Grassy Knoll Witnesses: Who Shot JFK?” by Harry Yardum. It is an excellent book.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Grassy-Knoll-Witnesses-Shot/dp/1438945612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1363287671&sr=8-1&keywords=grassy+knoll+witnesses
Then there are those who smelled gunpowder in Dealey Plaza – call them “nose witnesses” if you will. With the wind blowing west to east, they could only smell gunpowder coming from the front of JFK’s limo.
Perhaps that explains why Youngblood said he couldn’t see how he could smell gunpowder from the TSBD area.
Absolutely. In the documentary The Smoking Gun, they recanted Senator Yarborough’s account of how he smelled gunpowder but upwind only (i.e., not from the TSBD).
Finding the black couple and anything else about the grassy knoll is totally moot. The Autopsy x-rays clearly show that the bullets that hit the President and Gov. came from behind. There is no doubt about this – the path of the bullets leave microscopic traces of air which prove which direction the bullets traveled. Andy they all came from the 6th floor of the Texas school book depository building. Also, Abe Zapruder and his secretary were some 20-40 FEET away from the grassy knoll and neither heard nor saw any gunman. They couldn’t have missed someone firing a gun from so close. But again – it is moot since the bullets were definitely fired from behind.
No way Mr Burns. Not sure what photos you have examined but no way they just show that. No question a bullet hit Kennedy in the head from behind, no question shots were fired from the 6th floor, but not from the so called “sniper’s nest”. Shots were fired from the front as well, no question about this, which can be substantiated from eye witness testimony and autopsy evidence. Also using Abe Z as the only witness it a bit of a joke really, he was there for a reason, it was no accident. Don’t make yourself look so foolish, it is not a MOOT point, the lone gunman argument is ridiculous as pig flying.
If it was so airtight as you suggest, WC G Ford would NOT have had to modify the wound!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! what case have you ever heard of, where they actually change the location of the wound to FIT a fictitious story. Don’t be such an obvious fool Burns no one believes that fairytale unless of course you are PAID to?
As we’ve know from the first day based on the autopsy report and witnesses there, the neck wound came from the front and had NO EXIT.
It was surmised that the bullet probably fell into JFK’s chest cavity.
The back wound — at the level of JFK’s right shoulder blade — also had NO EXIT.
And it was made at a 45 to 60 degree DOWNARD angle.
As even a child could figure out, even with Gerald Ford (who later was our only unelected VP and unelected President) moving the back wound up, two wounds with NO EXIT cannot connect.
And, a double impossibility of the back wound connecting to anything above it as it was made at a DOWNWARD angle.
Also —
From the 1992 JFK Classified Records Panel —
“Oswald worked for the CIA on high level assignments and probably also for the FBI.”
Journalists immediately asked for Oswald’s employment records, Tax returns, W-2 forms.
They were denied.
The Tunheim Panel would have seen those records.
It’s a waste of time to even review the autopsy findings because their objective nature can not be trusted. The government was in sole control of this information; therefore, maybe the autopsy findings are valid; maybe they’re not. It’s best to move on and look at other ways of resolving what happened.
You’re ignorant of the facts. Do a lot more reading. Evidence of Over ten shots hit: pavement, south lawn, limo occupants, limo windshield, limo windscreen. That’s more than WC proclaimed 3 shots, and obviously takes more than one shooter….simple logic….
Former Mayor Ron Kirk would be well connected within the African American community in Dallas, and I think that he would be sensitive to the best approach for on-the ground-circulation of your request. I emphasize ‘sensitive’ because, as you have pointed out, you are seeking two people of a certain generation living in what was then a racist Dallas.
He’s now the outgoing Obama trade representative.
I know, and I think that his long-standing ties to the Dallas community might well serve the search for this couple.