November 22, 1963 - This Day In History

[WildBill]

I was in an 8th grade Texas History class and the reaction by the students wasn't what the media would have you believe. Don't get me wrong, I wish the man had not been murdered. I wish he had lived to loose the 1964 election so he could have gone on to be forgotten even more than Gerald Ford.

As those of us who were alive and old enough to know the truth die, the public is going to be stuck with the media's version of the Kennedy administration and Kennedy family. Unfortunately, progressively fewer Americans are going to know that there was no Camelot, there was no American version of a royal family and JFK certainly was not a beloved President. (I was politically active at 13; actually at 10 when I campaigned for Nixon in elementary school in 1960 and for Goldwater in 1964).

Kennedy won the 1960 election because of Lyndon Johnson who carried the south for the ticket. Word had leaked out that Kennedy was dumping Johnson in the 1964 elections and southern Democrats were in full revolt. The only reason Kennedy was in Texas a year before the 1964 election was to try and save his reelection bid. All the media wants to talk about now is the Cuban missile crisis (that he actually mishandled, but got lucky), but in 1963 the Bay of Pigs fiasco was a far bigger story. Funny how that's never mentioned anymore.

After his death, the whitewash began. Cape Canaveral Florida changed its name to Cape Kennedy, only to change it back to Cape Canaveral in 1973 when details about Kennedy were gradually becoming public. The media to this day promotes the idea of Camelot and it's a load of garbage. Only the media and a handful of Kennedy family groupies bought into that line.

This post has probably angered some Members, but that isn't my goal. I'm sick of a half century of the media and Democrats lying to the public about the Kennedy years and the man himself. He didn't deserve to die, but he didn't deserve a coronation either.

Chas.

I disagree with some of that. The whitewash didn't begin after his death, but years before. The Kennedy PR machine had years to perfect the image of a youthful, vigorous, wealthy, intelligent family man. All of it phony, except he was relatively wealthy. At the time, the media knew most of the sordid truth but kept it from us. Back then, if he had been known as a serial prolific philanderer, he wouldn't have been elected dog catcher of Hyannis Port.

There was a great deal of handwringing about his Catholicism, all of it needless. It turns out Kennedy didn't care a whit about what the Pope said, or thought. Truman turns out to have been right again, observing that it wasn't the Pope he was afraid of, it was The Pop, referring to Joseph P. Kennedy. The forum software prevents me from recounting an accurate quotation of what Truman said about Richard Nixon, which turned out to be spot on, too. Maybe the pessimist is always right!

The investigation and subsequent tests I have seen show that it was possible for a single gunman to have made the shots that killed Kennedy and wounded Gov. Connally. They have the records showing that the rifle that fired the shots was sold to LHO, and pictures of him with a gun of that type. His fingerprints were on the gun found in the Schoolbook Depository. What they have not shown is that he was the triggerman. A Dallas policeman entered the Depository ~45 seconds after the shots and discovered LHO in the lunch room, no signs of excitement, out of breath etc. He might have moved across the 6th floor, down the stairs 4 flights, and into the lunch room but not without respiratory and circulatory impact.

It is astonishing given the amount of man-hours and funds spent on the investigation, headed by the Chief Justice, the case against LHO would have been thrown out of just about any court in the country if that's all they introduced, especially after the testimony of eyewitnesses who were NOT called before the Warren Commission, were called in rebuttal.

Actually he was intelligent, youthful and his father was extremely wealthy. Of course his health, "vigor" and piousness were complete a fabrication. His father was a master manipulator of PR and could buy the support and votes of most anyone that he wanted. I never did understand the Catholicism bit, it may have been more anti-Irish than anything else.

[The Annoyed Man]

I consider myself a fairly decent rifle shooter. I shot expert in the Marines and I do ok at the range....BUT...I can't imagine using an old bolt action rifle to place 3 quick fatal shots into a 100 yd/+ moving target. Thats all I have to say about that.

Go to the 6th Floor Museum, and look out the window next to the one Oswald shot from. Look down to where the big white X (just recently removed) would be on the pavement. You would actually be shocked at how close the shot was—not at all like what I had imagined it to be. The distance from the shooter's window to Kennedy was only 181 feet, or just a little over 60 yards. The three shots are spaced over six seconds.

Oswald's Carcano had a 4X scope on it. The target was not moving that fast. The clock starts with the 1st shot. Three seconds to make the 2nd shot; three more seconds to make the 3rd shot. . . . . .totally doable, even for an average rifle shooter. That said, there were only TWO fatal shots, not three: (1) the bullet that hit Kennedy in the neck then went through Connolly; (2) a second shot that missed completely and and struck a curb just before the overpass, wounding a bystander near the eye with a chip of concrete; and (3) the third shot which hit Kennedy in the head. The bullet impact mark on the curb from the 2nd shot is thoroughly documented. The bullet that hit the president's head was very slightly deflected and hit the chrome rail over the top of the windshield. That too is well documented, and it left a significant dent in that rail.

The 6.5mm Mannlicher-Carcano cartridge the Carcano fired was a ballistically interesting cartridge. It had a 162 grain round nose bullet with an extremely long shank. The weight and shape of the bullet gave it a very high ballistic coefficient for caliber, but upon impact, the bullet was known to yaw dramatically......although in certain applications it was known for very deep penetration. In fact, African elephant hunters often used it because the bullet would reliably penetrate an elephant's skull, dropping the animal. The first bullet that hit Kennedy and then Connolly was no "magic" bullet. It had begun to yaw, just as it left his neck, and it keyholed through both Connolly's seat and his shirt and jacket, causing a keyholed entrance wound. The feat was even duplicated by another shooter, using the same kind of rifle and ammo, for a TV show, in which the "magic" bullet was totally explained.

Like you, I used to think that the shot was well over 100 yards, and not being familiar with Dealy Plaza, the TV footage always made the distances look further than they are, but they are surprisingly close. None of this rules out the possibility of more than one shooter, but the truth is, one shooter of average skills could have done it. If you go look out that window for yourself, it will all become clear. I'm a big believer in the principle of Occam's Razor: the simplest answer is usually the correct answer. Otherwise stated: any argument which depends on proving any number of subordinate statements before the final statement can be proven is most likely the incorrect argument. To disprove Oswald as the only shooter, you have to prove an alternative because Oswald IS plausible without any extra proof required. Until you can do that, Oswald is the correct answer. To prove an alternative, you have to prove a host of sub-arguments to make the conspiracy theory hold together, and many of those are unprovable. (For instance, just because Bobby Kennedy had it in for the mob, that doesn't prove that the mob killed Jack Kennedy.......particularly when it would make more sense for them to kill Bobby.)

I met a guy at the last Fort Worth gun show who had a Carcano for sale, and we got to talking about the rifle and the assassination. He told me that he has several friends who own an example of the rifle, and that sometimes when they get bored, they'll take a couple of pieces of old discolored spent brass, got to Dealy Plaza, and when nobody's looking they'll salt them around the grassy knoll and grind them down into the grass with a boot heel. Then they sit back and watch to see if someone finds one of them. He said that results are usually pretty entertaining.

A conspiracy theory is certainly possible, but it is not as possible (or as easy to explain) as a paranoid schizophrenic commie-wannabe with a giant chip on his shoulder. . . . .and Oswald was on record with his wife and their circle of friends as saying that Kennedy must be stopped because of "what he was doing to Cuba" (Bay of Pigs, Missile Crisis). He had the motive, the desire, and the means. He did not get the job at the book depository in order to carry out the assassination. He first learned of the job opening on October 14th from family friend Ruth Paine, and actually got hired on there on October 16, 1963, a month and 6 days before the fateful day. Kennedy's trip to Dallas was first announced in September of 1963, but the exact motorcade route wasn't finalized until November 18 and it wasn't announced to the public until after that. Oswald was a man with a temper who could not keep a job. He bounced from job to job to job. In other words, the fact that Oswald had a job at the book depository, and access to the 6th floor from which to shoot, is nothing more than a "happy accident" (for him). I am very convinced that he was a lone nut-case with a grudge, and he carried it out. When I hear so-called experts quoted and interviewed on TV shows about the shooting, the ballistics, etc., etc., it just makes me cringe because it is SO obvious that some of them don't know a single thing about shooting, about ballistics, about wound characteristics, etc., etc., etc.

[Oldgringo]

None of us knew back then what we think we know/suspect now about Kennedy....or anything else. Fifty years from now what will those future people know about us and our contemporaries; e.g., the current POTUS, et al?

Heckfire, a recent forum poll suggests that most forum members weren't even a gleam in their daddy's eye, let alone, born 50 years ago. That same poll suggests that some of us won't be around 50 years from now to tell the world what we didn't know in 2013.

So,

[WildBill]

None of us knew back then what we think we know/suspect now about Kennedy....or anything else. Fifty years from now what will those future people know about us and our contemporaries; e.g., the current POTUS, et al?

Heckfire, a recent forum poll suggests that most forum members weren't even a gleam in their daddy's eye, let alone, born 50 years ago. That same poll suggests that some of us won't be around 50 years from now to tell the world what we didn't know in 2013.

So,

Cheers.

[baldeagle]

I consider myself a fairly decent rifle shooter. I shot expert in the Marines and I do ok at the range....BUT...I can't imagine using an old bolt action rifle to place 3 quick fatal shots into a 100 yd/+ moving target. Thats all I have to say about that.

That isn't what happened.

The first shot went through Kennedy's neck and into Governor Connally's back, traveled through his arm and exited near his wrist. The second shot missed. The third shot hit Kennedy in the back of the head and killed him. The scene was recreated for a two hour PBS special a few years ago, and a marksman, using a Mannlicher Carcano rifle (the same type Oswald used) was able to accurately produce the shot sequence, including the timing. He stated afterwards that the third shot was the easiest. They used the same type limo traveling at the same speed (11.2 mph), angle (17 degrees) and direction, the same elevation from which Oswald fired and located dummies in the exact same locations in the car as they were in the assassination. The distance of the third shot was 81 meters (about 88.5 yards). The first shot struck Kennedy precisely where it would have if the shooter were aiming for the top of the head. By the third shot Oswald had adjusted his aimpoint sufficiently to account for the low hit and struck Kennedy high on the back of his head.

[Charles L. Cotton]

In 1978, the second official investigation into the Kennedy assassination was conducted by the House Select Committee on Assassinations. It issued a final report that there was most likely more than one shooter and that Kennedy was the victim of a conspiracy. The report also noted that the Warren Commission Report was "seriously flawed."

The closer a target is to the shooter, the more difficult the shot when shooting from a high elevation. In precision rifle school, we shot from only the 4th story at targets from 50 feet to 100 yards and they were a bear to hit. The targets weren't moving, we were using very accurate rifles and we weren't suffering from any adrenalin dump or other aggravating factors one would experience when aiming at the President of the United States. There's no evidence Oswald had that type of training and it wouldn't matter how many rounds Oswald fired from ground level, it wouldn't prepare him for a shot from the 6th floor at a moving target. I seem to recall a Marine Corps sniper trying to duplicate the shots and couldn't, but I may be mistaken; it's been a long time.

The only way the official story works is if one round hit both Kennedy and Connelly. Connelly gave two interviews while still in Parkland Hospital. In the first, he clearly stated he heard the shot and was turning toward the rear of the car and saw that Kennedy had been hit. He stated that while he was turning, he was struck, clearly proving he and Kennedy were not hit with the same round. In the second interview not long thereafter, after being questioned by "suits," he wasn't sure what happened or the time sequence. Most interesting . . .

Oswald's fingerprints on the rifle prove nothing; I saw Forrest Gump shake John Kennedy's hand. It's far more significant that Oswald was seen in the 4th floor cafeteria only seconds after the shots were fired and showed no signs of stress or physical exertion.

I don't buy any particular conspiracy theory, but I also don't buy the Warren Commission's Report when they declined to interview numerous eye witnesses, including people who heard shots and were seen on film to jerk their heads toward the so-called grassy knoll. I don't know what happened, but I believe the U.S. lost more than a President on that November day 50 years ago.

Chas.

I consider myself a fairly decent rifle shooter. I shot expert in the Marines and I do ok at the range....BUT...I can't imagine using an old bolt action rifle to place 3 quick fatal shots into a 100 yd/+ moving target. Thats all I have to say about that.

Go to the 6th Floor Museum, and look out the window next to the one Oswald shot from. Look down to where the big white X (just recently removed) would be on the pavement. You would actually be shocked at how close the shot was—not at all like what I had imagined it to be. The distance from the shooter's window to Kennedy was only 181 feet, or just a little over 60 yards. The three shots are spaced over six seconds.

Oswald's Carcano had a 4X scope on it. The target was not moving that fast. The clock starts with the 1st shot. Three seconds to make the 2nd shot; three more seconds to make the 3rd shot. . . . . .totally doable, even for an average rifle shooter. That said, there were only TWO fatal shots, not three: (1) the bullet that hit Kennedy in the neck then went through Connolly; (2) a second shot that missed completely and and struck a curb just before the overpass, wounding a bystander near the eye with a chip of concrete; and (3) the third shot which hit Kennedy in the head. The bullet impact mark on the curb from the 2nd shot is thoroughly documented. The bullet that hit the president's head was very slightly deflected and hit the chrome rail over the top of the windshield. That too is well documented, and it left a significant dent in that rail.

The 6.5mm Mannlicher-Carcano cartridge the Carcano fired was a ballistically interesting cartridge. It had a 162 grain round nose bullet with an extremely long shank. The weight and shape of the bullet gave it a very high ballistic coefficient for caliber, but upon impact, the bullet was known to yaw dramatically......although in certain applications it was known for very deep penetration. In fact, African elephant hunters often used it because the bullet would reliably penetrate an elephant's skull, dropping the animal. The first bullet that hit Kennedy and then Connolly was no "magic" bullet. It had begun to yaw, just as it left his neck, and it keyholed through both Connolly's seat and his shirt and jacket, causing a keyholed entrance wound. The feat was even duplicated by another shooter, using the same kind of rifle and ammo, for a TV show, in which the "magic" bullet was totally explained.

Like you, I used to think that the shot was well over 100 yards, and not being familiar with Dealy Plaza, the TV footage always made the distances look further than they are, but they are surprisingly close. None of this rules out the possibility of more than one shooter, but the truth is, one shooter of average skills could have done it. If you go look out that window for yourself, it will all become clear. I'm a big believer in the principle of Occam's Razor: the simplest answer is usually the correct answer. Otherwise stated: any argument which depends on proving any number of subordinate statements before the final statement can be proven is most likely the incorrect argument. To disprove Oswald as the only shooter, you have to prove an alternative because Oswald IS plausible without any extra proof required. Until you can do that, Oswald is the correct answer. To prove an alternative, you have to prove a host of sub-arguments to make the conspiracy theory hold together, and many of those are unprovable. (For instance, just because Bobby Kennedy had it in for the mob, that doesn't prove that the mob killed Jack Kennedy.......particularly when it would make more sense for them to kill Bobby.)

I met a guy at the last Fort Worth gun show who had a Carcano for sale, and we got to talking about the rifle and the assassination. He told me that he has several friends who own an example of the rifle, and that sometimes when they get bored, they'll take a couple of pieces of old discolored spent brass, got to Dealy Plaza, and when nobody's looking they'll salt them around the grassy knoll and grind them down into the grass with a boot heel. Then they sit back and watch to see if someone finds one of them. He said that results are usually pretty entertaining.

A conspiracy theory is certainly possible, but it is not as possible (or as easy to explain) as a paranoid schizophrenic commie-wannabe with a giant chip on his shoulder. . . . .and Oswald was on record with his wife and their circle of friends as saying that Kennedy must be stopped because of "what he was doing to Cuba" (Bay of Pigs, Missile Crisis). He had the motive, the desire, and the means. He did not get the job at the book depository in order to carry out the assassination. He first learned of the job opening on October 14th from family friend Ruth Paine, and actually got hired on there on October 16, 1963, a month and 6 days before the fateful day. Kennedy's trip to Dallas was first announced in September of 1963, but the exact motorcade route wasn't finalized until November 18 and it wasn't announced to the public until after that. Oswald was a man with a temper who could not keep a job. He bounced from job to job to job. In other words, the fact that Oswald had a job at the book depository, and access to the 6th floor from which to shoot, is nothing more than a "happy accident" (for him). I am very convinced that he was a lone nut-case with a grudge, and he carried it out. When I hear so-called experts quoted and interviewed on TV shows about the shooting, the ballistics, etc., etc., it just makes me cringe because it is SO obvious that some of them don't know a single thing about shooting, about ballistics, about wound characteristics, etc., etc., etc.

[krieghoff]

I just wanted to ask:
1) How and when Oswald knew about the route of the motorcade?
2) When Oswald got the job at the place the shot came from? And, who hired him.
3) How in the world, the work of place and and route of the motorcade coincide to provide a linear 6 o'clock to 12 o'clock line of fire?

Back during that time, routes were announced. If my memory serves me right, it was that shooting that changed the way the SS handled presidential travel.

I was a junior in high school. I remember exactly where I was standing when another student came running in shouting what had happened. He had heard it on his car radio and let all know before the principal announced it. Like most, we spent the next few days glued to one of the 3 TV channels (that's all there were back then) and among other things saw LHO shot by Jack Ruby. We were not fans of Kennedy but did not like what had happened.

[puma guy]

I was a sophomore in high school American History class when the principal made an announcement the President had been shot and killed. Having done some research into the family I'm no fan of any of them. But, he certainly did not deserve to die.

[talltex]

In 1978, the second official investigation into the Kennedy assassination was conducted by the House Select Committee on Assassinations. It issued a final report that there was most likely more than one shooter and that Kennedy was the victim of a conspiracy. The report also noted that the Warren Commission Report was "seriously flawed."
I don't buy any particular conspiracy theory, but I also don't buy the Warren Commission's Report when they declined to interview numerous eye witnesses, including people who heard shots and were seen on film to jerk their heads toward the so-called grassy knoll. I don't know what happened, but I believe the U.S. lost more than a President on that November day 50 years ago.

Chas.

This. Back in the early 70's, I had a noted history professor that had somehow obtained a copy of the Zapruder film long before it was shown to the public. Each semester he would show the film off campus at a local watering hole along with a slide presentation pointing out the contradictions and flaws in the Warren Commission report. It was quite an eye opener to anyone who listened to him.

[nightmare69]

This was before my father was born but I have some questions to those who lived that day or know more on the subject.

How did Kennedy have the highest approval rating, a rating that still holds up today?

I read there were 3 shots, 1st missed, 2nd went in through his back and exited his neck and the 3rd was the fatal.
A few trained snipers have recreated this and shown that it's not as difficult as it was made out to be. They took someone a amateur shooter and with 3hrs of training recreated the shooting successfully.

I'm not a tin foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist but the whole thing seems off. What was gained by killing Kennedy?

[baldeagle]

This was before my father was born but I have some questions to those who lived that day or know more on the subject.

How did Kennedy have the highest approval rating, a rating that still holds up today?

Positive press coverage. The press was enamored with Kennedy and gushed about him almost as much as they do about Obama.

I read there were 3 shots, 1st missed, 2nd went in through his back and exited his neck and the 3rd was the fatal.

Not exactly right. The first shot hit both Kennedy and Connally. The second shot missed. The third shot killed Kennedy.

A few trained snipers have recreated this and shown that it's not as difficult as it was made out to be. They took someone a amateur shooter and with 3hrs of training recreated the shooting successfully.

I'm not a tin foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist but the whole thing seems off. What was gained by killing Kennedy?

What was gained by killing Lincoln? Or McKinley? Or shooting Reagan?

Nutballs are looking for gain. They simply want to kill the object of their obsession.

[JALLEN]

I never did understand the Catholicism bit, it may have been more anti-Irish than anything else.

Do you remember that campaign? I do.

The nation had never before elected a Catholic President. There had been a good deal of prejudice towards various groups, Catholics among them, Irish too, for that matter. The fear was that a Catholic President would be under the influence of the Pope, thought to be an undesirable situation. The issue dogged Kennedy.. Ultimately he appeared in Houston at a Ministerial Association conference and told them "I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party candidate for President who also happens to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my Church on public matters – and the Church does not speak for me." Kennedy questioned rhetorically whether one-quarter of Americans were relegated to second-class citizenship just because they were Catholic, and once stated that, "No one asked me my religion [serving the Navy] in the South Pacific." His performance on that occasion seemed to settle some worries on that issue.

It seems strange today. Back then, Protestant kids were discouraged from dating or socializing with Catholic kids and vice versa. There were separate cemeteries in some cases.

As far as who might have done it goes, the Italian Mafia was certainly to be suspected. The Pop had been a partner in whiskey smuggling operations with the Mob, had helped finance mob some operations. As Senator, Kennedy participated in the committee hearings, with Bobby as Chief Counsel, that humiliated some mob bosses. On one occasion, Federal Agents kidnapped New Orleans mobster Carlos Marcello took him to a plane with engines running and flew him to Central America where he spend some months sleeping on a couch and scheming how to get back into the US. He finally did. The Kennedy's role in the prosecution of Jimmy Hoffa is well known. The Pop is supposed to have arranged with Chicago boss Giancana to provide union electoral support to carry Illinois, which elected Kennedy. Ingratitude, and disrespect, are mortal sins in the mob. They certainly had the motive, and the means to attempt a hit on Kennedy. Professional killers would be adept at deflecting blame from themselves, onto a patsy, perhaps. Marcello had ties to both Oswald and Ruby. Could it be?

[WildBill]

I never did understand the Catholicism bit, it may have been more anti-Irish than anything else.

Do you remember that campaign? I do.

I was ten years old so I don't remember much about the campaign. I did go door-to-door and hand out Kennedy pamphlets and remember several households refusing to take them. I HAVE read about all of the controversies that you mention in your post, but we did not have any anti-Catholic sentiment in our household so I never witnessed any of this firsthand.

[WildBill]

I don't know what happened, but I believe the U.S. lost more than a President on that November day 50 years ago.
Chas.

I think that this is the salient point of this discussion.

[J.R.@A&M]

I consider myself a fairly decent rifle shooter. I shot expert in the Marines and I do ok at the range....BUT...I can't imagine using an old bolt action rifle to place 3 quick fatal shots into a 100 yd/+ moving target. Thats all I have to say about that.

That isn't what happened.

The first shot went through Kennedy's neck and into Governor Connally's back, traveled through his arm and exited near his wrist. The second shot missed. The third shot hit Kennedy in the back of the head and killed him. The scene was recreated for a two hour PBS special a few years ago, and a marksman, using a Mannlicher Carcano rifle (the same type Oswald used) was able to accurately produce the shot sequence, including the timing. He stated afterwards that the third shot was the easiest. They used the same type limo traveling at the same speed (11.2 mph), angle (17 degrees) and direction, the same elevation from which Oswald fired and located dummies in the exact same locations in the car as they were in the assassination. The distance of the third shot was 81 meters (about 88.5 yards). The first shot struck Kennedy precisely where it would have if the shooter were aiming for the top of the head. By the third shot Oswald had adjusted his aimpoint sufficiently to account for the low hit and struck Kennedy high on the back of his head.

I have always found it easier to believe the theory (highlighted by Gerald Posner and others) that the **first** bullet missed, causing a visible "Huh, what?" reaction by the President and also causing the little running girl in the Zapruder film to stop dead in her tracks and look back at the sound. This is before the limo passed between Zapruder and the highway sign. When it emerges, the President and the Governor are both reacting to the second shot that hit both of them. This theory also helps explain why the Governor insisted that he heard a shot, and was twisting in his seat trying to look back this way and that to see what happened (prior to being struck by a subsequent shot).

Another corollary of this theory is that Oswald had more time to get off the 2nd and 3rd shots, making more plausible the theory of Oswald as the lone shooter.