247 Penthouse News Release, “Lee Harvey Oswald apparently was telling the truth.”
248 O’Toole, The Assassination Tapes.
249 O’Toole, The Assassination Tapes.
250 Ibid.
24
“Umbrella Man” and “Radio Man” in Dealey Plaza Appeared To Be Acting Operationally
“Umbrella Man” and “Radio Man” were two individuals in Dealey Plaza who appeared to be operational in some sort of signaling capacity that enabled the assassination. The crossfire on JFK initiated right after the opening of the umbrella and the device the other man was carrying is identifiable as a radio transmitter. The reactions of the two men also differed from those of everyone else in the plaza. While people were frantically running around, they behaved quite differently. They were calmly sitting down right next to each other on the curb, and then parting in opposite directions without saying a word. Efforts to explain their odd actions have been notably inadequate.
Still photography and film footage taken at the time of the assassination confirmed that the actions of the two men were in stark contrast with what would be expected from having just witnessed the murder of the President at close range and with the actions of others who were also eyewitnesses to that event.
The existence of the “umbrella man” and the dark-complexion[ed] man is fact. Their activities after the assassination especially bear study. While virtually everyone in Dealey Plaza was moved to action by the assassination—either falling to the ground for cover or moving toward The Grassy Knoll—these two men sat down beside each other on the north sidewalk of Elm Street.251
The two men were both standing very close to President Kennedy’s car when the shots rang out. One of the men held an umbrella—even though it was a sunny day and was not raining—which he thrust up in the air just as the President went by him and pumped the umbrella open and closed. The other man stood right at the curb as the President passed by and held his arms up, swinging them in the air, and then made a fist with one of his upheld arms high in the air.
You can see a good photograph of that, too. If it was a signal to shooters or to a com team (communications coordinators), it was a pretty clear one. Right at the curb, just as the President’s car passes through the most open area of that kill zone, you’ve got a white man in dark clothes holding an open umbrella; and even closer—in fact, on the street itself—you’ve got a dark-complexioned man in a white shirt holding his tight fist as high as he could in the air. It sure looks like a signal, because it would have been hard to miss. Check it out for yourself; the photo at the top of Russ Baker’s article252 is pretty clear: whowhatwhy.com/2011/11/28/ny-times%E2%80%99-umbrella-man-exposed/.
Then, when the flurry of gunshots had finally stopped, the photographic evidence also established that the two men reacted very differently than everyone around them. Almost every eyewitness reacted in one of two ways: either they hit the ground, shielding their loved ones from gunfire, or they joined the few dozen other people who raced up the grassy knoll area because it had seemed to many like that area was the source of the gunfire.
But instead, as the footage reveals, the two men casually sat down upon the curb. One man pulled out what clearly appeared to be a two-way radio and spoke into it. Then the two men—without seeming to talk to each other even though they had been sitting right next to each other—stood up from the curb and walked calmly away in the exactly opposite directions. And as the man who spoke on the radio walked away, he could be seen hiding the radio.
There are a number of photographs in existence of the two men and it’s an accurate description to say that their actions are disturbingly unusual. They can be seen online, too; for a good compilation of them, just Google: JFK Umbrella Man & Dark-Complexioned Man or go to: youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=NB-TLTWAh6s.
Since those actions took place just as the gunfire opened up on the motorcade, researchers noted that they may have been a signal of some sort to the shooters, possibly of noting that the target—the President—was not yet down. Whether or not it was a signal, the head shot that killed President Kennedy took place immediately after. Since the man with the umbrella had not been identified, he was referred to as the “Umbrella Man.” No one knew who the man with the radio was either so, since he had a dark complexion, researchers called him the “Dark-Complexioned Man.”
Here’s the way author Jim Marrs described the eerie event:
About the time that Kennedy was first hit by a bullet, two men standing near each other on the north sidewalk of Elm Street acted most strangely—one began pumping a black umbrella while the other waved his right arm high in the air.
As Kennedy’s limousine began the gentle descent into Dealey Plaza, a man can be seen standing near the street-side edge of the Stemmons Freeway sign holding an open umbrella. He holds the umbrella in a normal fashion and the top of the umbrella almost reaches the bottom of the sign.
In photos taken minutes before Kennedy’s arrival, the umbrella is closed and, immediately after the shooting, pictures show the umbrella was closed again. The man’s umbrella was only open during the shooting sequence. Furthermore, as seen in the Zapruder film, once Kennedy is exactly opposite the man with the umbrella, it was pumped almost two feet into the air and then lowered.
At the same time, the second man—in photos he appears to be of a dark complexion, perhaps a black man or Hispanic—raised his right hand into the air possibly making a fist. This man was located on the outer edge of the Elm Street sidewalk opposite the umbrella man, who was on the inner edge.
The man with the open umbrella was the only person in Dealey Plaza with an open umbrella. Under the warm Texas sun, there was no reason to carry an open umbrella at that time.253
By the time of the Congressional hearings by the House Select Committee on Assassinations, researchers drew public attention to “Umbrella Man” and “Radio Man” and asked Congress to investigate them.
Well, coincidentally—or quite suspiciously, depending on your point of view—someone then came forward. A man who had been a Dallas insurance salesman in 1963 announced, during the hearings of the Committee, that he had been the man with the umbrella. His name was Louie Steven Witt.
Mr. Witt sounded pretty strange from the start. He contacted two authors and they agreed to meet with him. Here’s the way one of those authors described their meeting and his impression of Mr. Witt:
I felt the man had been coached. He would answer no questions and pointedly invited us to leave. His only positive statement, which seemed to come very quickly, was that he was willing to appear before the House Select Committee on Assassinations in Washington.254
He got his wish, though. Witt was called to testify at the Congressional hearing. It was some very interesting testimony, too.
Witt told the Committee that on the spur of the moment, he grabbed a large black umbrella and went to Dealey Plaza to heckle Kennedy. He claimed that someone had told him that an open umbrella would rile Kennedy. While Witt offered no further explanation of how his umbrella could heckle the president, Committee members—not Witt—theorized that the umbrella in some way referred to the pro-German sympathies of Kennedy’s father while serving as U.S. ambassador to Britain just prior to World War II. They said the umbrella may have symbolized the appeasement policies of Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who always carried an umbrella.255
Well, as much as I hate to correct my former colleagues in the government (and yes, I’m smiling when I write that), it is historically inaccurate that an umbrella symbolizes Chamberlain’s appeasement policies to the Nazis; and neither Chamberlain nor Joe Kennedy were ever pro-Germany; they were just anti-war, as many people were at the time.256 But that was supposedly why Mr. Witt did what Mr. Witt did; which doesn’t make any sense, and we’ll get to that in a minute.
As far as what he actually did, Mr. Witt went into precise detail about his actions of that afternoon; where he was, when he opened up the um
brella, what he saw and what he did not see, and when he saw it. Well, there’s one big problem here, folks:
Based on the available photographs made that day, none of Witt’s statements were an accurate account of the actions of the “umbrella man” who stood waiting for the motorcade with his umbrella in the normal over-the-head position and then pumped it in the air as Kennedy passed.
Witt’s bizarre story—unsubstantiated and totally at variance with the actions of the man in the photographs—resulted in few, if any, researchers accepting Louie Steven Witt as the “umbrella man.”257
His account of his entire day doesn’t add up either. Here are some of the incongruities in his testimony that research veteran Jim DiEugenio noticed:
1. He never planned on doing what he did until that morning.
2. He did not know the exact parade route.
3. He just happened to wander around for a walk and guessed where it would be.
4. He did what he did with no relation to JFK’s policies, only Joseph Kennedy Sr.
5. What did the Cuban-looking guy say? Words to the effect of “They shot those people.” (Oh really, Louie?)
6. Admits he sat there for up to three minutes and that he never even looked behind him at the picket fence! (Truly surprising.)
7. He never did anything like this before or since, and he was not a member of any conservative group or organization.
8. He placed the umbrella on the sidewalk and then picked it up. He wavers on whether this is definitely the umbrella he had that day.
9. He often uses the conditional, like I think that is me, or that may be the guy I sat next to.258
So his testimony just didn’t add up at all, but also—and way too conveniently in many observers’ opinions—it explained away an uncomfortable aspect of the evidence that researchers had forced Congress to take a look at even though they hadn’t really wanted to look there. In other words, next case, please.
It seemed far more likely that, by pumping his umbrella, Witt was signaling to the assassins that JFK was still alive, which makes sense, rather than an obscure historical allusion that no one, including Jack Kennedy, would have grasped.259
On top of all that, Witt testified under oath that he had no recollection of a dark-complexioned man who, in photographs, appeared to possibly be Cuban. Witt said that a “Negro man” sat down near him and kept repeating, “They done shot them folks.”260
I’d like to point out here that—whether it made any sense or not—Mr. Witt’s dubious and even evidence-contradicting testimony was, as you might have guessed, welcomed and highlighted by all the illustrious Warren Commission supporters in the press with headlines like “‘Umbrella man’ not sinister after all”; and in a way that strongly implied that at least another wacko conspiracy theory had fortunately now been debunked.261 They embraced that false conclusion immediately, and very publicly, too. But I guess that’s just another coincidence, right? That must be just another delusion from another paranoid kook who sees conspiracies everywhere.
But, if any of those delightful “debunkers” of conspiracy theories were to actually examine the testimony of that witness, they may be surprised to see that—depending on your generosity—it’s not in accordance with the evidence, preposterous or ludicrous. And that’s not me, mind you; that’s the way that serious researchers have referred to it.262
His account of his activities that day don’t track with what Umbrella Man actually did, raising questions as to whether this man who volunteered to testify to the assassination inquiry is even the real umbrella-bearer, or someone whose purpose was to end inquiries into the matter.263
And on top of all those reasons, how ’bout this one? It didn’t make any sense! The witness would have been a little kid when Chamberlain had his umbrella, so how would he have understood all the subtleties and political significance of that? That’s even if the umbrella reference was historically correct, which it wasn’t!264 Plus, President Kennedy riding by thousands of people in his motorcade that day would probably never have noticed one guy with an umbrella. Even if he had noticed, what exactly is this guy’s story here? If Kennedy saw one guy (out of thousands) holding an umbrella, he then is automatically supposed to think “Oh, an umbrella—That must be in reference to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, and thereby, Joseph Kennedy’s appeasement policies during World War II when my Dad was Ambassador to Great Britain!” Are you kidding me?
Isn’t that the most insane explanation of something you’ve ever heard in your life? And they call conspiracy theorists nuts? I don’t know about you, but I’d say that “delightful weirdness” is an extremely generous description of the above explanation!
Of course, that didn’t stop The New York Times from pushing a piece that they liked on how an explanation of such “delightful weirdness” with such a “non-sinister” reality just simply had to be true.
That was in an Op-Doc for The New York Times a couple years ago in a splashy piece they did for the anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination. Watch it online and see the sly, sneaky ways that they twist the truth with their media spin. Just Google: Op Doc Umbrella Man or go right to: dailymotion.com/video/xmmhck_the-umbrella-man-errol-morris-for-the-new-york-times_shortfilms.
This is from that little film clip that The New York Times spoke so lovingly of. Without even questioning the total absence of logic in the witnesses’ story of what happened, they somehow manage to reach the following conclusion which is every bit as illogical as that man’s testimony:
What it means is, if you have any fact which you think is really sinister—Forget it, man. Because you can never, on your own, think up all the non-sinister, perfectly valid explanations for that fact. A cautionary tale!265
Well that’d be nice, and even comforting (like it’s apparently meant to be), except for the fact that it simply isn’t true. So I guess it’d be cute, even “delightful,” if it wasn’t for the point that it was completely wrong regarding an occurrence that quite probably had something to do with how the brains of the 35th President of the United States got splattered all over a Texas street in broad daylight one Friday afternoon. And in broad sunlight it should be noted too, in regard to “Umbrella Man,” whoever that individual actually was.
251 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 29–32; Jim Fetzer, “JFK, the CIA and the New York Times,” 29 November 2011: veteranstoday.com/2011/11/29/jfk-the-cia-and-the-new-york-times-2/
252 Russ Baker, “New York Times’ Umbrella Man Exposed,” 28 November 2011: whowhatwhy.com/2011/11/28/ny-times%E2%80%99-umbrella-man-exposed/
253 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 29–32; Jim Fetzer, “JFK, the CIA and the New York Times,” 29 November 2011: veteranstoday.com/2011/11/29/jfk-the-cia-and-the-new-york-times-2/
254 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 32.
255 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 29–32; Jim Fetzer, “JFK, the CIA and the New York Times,” 29 November 2011: veteranstoday.com/2011/11/29/jfk-the-cia-and-the-new-york-times-2/
256 Russ Baker, “JFK Umbrella Man — More Doubts,” 6 December 2011: lewrockwell.com/orig11/baker-r8.1.1.html
257 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 29–32; Jim Fetzer, “JFK, the CIA and the New York Times,” 29 November 2011: veteranstoday.com/2011/11/29/jfk-the-cia-and-the-new-york-times-2/
258 Jim DiEugenio, “Tink’s Performance in The New York Times,” 25 November 2011, The Education Forum: educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=18412&page=6
259 Jim Fetzer, “JFK, the CIA and the New York Times,” 29 November 2011: veteranstoday.com/2011/11/29/jfk-the-cia-and-the-new-york-times-2/
260 Marrs, Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, 29–32.
261 Margaret Gentry, “‘Umbrella man’ not sinister after all,” September 26, 1978, Associated Press: news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1298&dat=19780926&id=6wFOAAAAIBAJ&sjid=HowDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4995,3669986
262 Russ Baker, “New York Times’ Umbrella
Man Exposed,” 28 November 2011: whowhatwhy.com/2011/11/28/ny-times%E2%80%99-umbrella-man-exposed/
263 Ibid.
264 Russ Baker, “JFK Umbrella Man - More Doubts,” 6 December 2011: lewrockwell.com/orig11/baker-r8.1.1.html
265 “The Umbrella Man - Errol Morris for The New York Times,” Op-Doc for The New York Times, November 22, 2011: dailymotion.com/video/xmmhck_the-umbrella-man-errol-morris-for-the-new-york-times_shortfilms
25
The “Three Tramps” Photographed in Dealey Plaza After the Assassination Were Not Actually Tramps
A nother issue that stirred controversy was that several photographs were taken of three men who were arrested shortly after the assassination. In point of fact, they never were arrested, but they appear to be in custody and look to be led down the street by officers.
But there are a lot of weird things that researchers noticed about those photographs. The men were reportedly “three tramps” who police had found inside the boxcar of a freight train near the spot where Kennedy was killed. But they didn’t actually look like tramps. For example, they had very good shoes. If you look closely at the photos, the cops who are with them seem very relaxed; too relaxed, in some observers’ opinions. If you look online by searching “JFK three tramps,” you’ll see what I mean.
The FBI said that the three men in the photos were just tramps; that they were arrested, checked out, and then released. They even released their names: Gus Abrams, Harold Doyle, and John F. Gedney. Researchers checked it out, and sure enough, the specific three individuals whom the FBI had conveniently identified, actually were arrested and were apparently homeless. But notably absent was any proof that they were actually the same three men who had appeared in those photos. So everybody sort of wrote that one off; even Oliver Stone, director of the film JFK, apparently said that “he’d be happy to concede that one mystery had been resolved” on the condition that he’d still like to see photos of the men matched with the photos of the tramps.266
They Killed Our President Page 13
