Free Book Now Available -- Hasty Judgment: Why the JFK Case Is Not Closed

[John Mytton]

Yes, absolutely: here is a postmark made in Dallas showing postal zone 32:



As you might notice, this is a WC exhibit of a letter sent from Oswald's post office box in Dallas to an address in New York.

Sorry Michael but that's definitely a "2B". But keep trying and let's see what you can find. K?



JohnM

[Michael T. Griffith]

Sorry Michael but that's definitely a "2B". But keep trying and let's see what you can find. K?



JohnM

Oh my goodness!  You're right!  I stand corrected. I did not notice that the 2 was not oriented correctly to be the 2 in 32.

[John Mytton]

Oh my goodness!  You're right!  I stand corrected. I did not notice that the 2 was not oriented correctly to be the 2 in 32.

No worries, it's in my above example, I also considered it could be a 28 but for the "Dallas Tex" stamps the numbers face inwards and the number/letter combinations face outwards.

JohnM

[Michael T. Griffith]

You haven't answered my question. You are working under the notion that the money order should have had a bank endorsement stamp on it. How have you determined that it should have had a bank endorsement stamp on it?  On the back of the money order you can see "Bank stamps are not regarded as endorsements".

I have seen a cashed USPS money order. You can see it below.

USPS money orders and bank checks were not handled in the same way. A check should get a bank endorsement stamp on it when cashed. USPS money orders did not.

When the Post Office changed the style of money orders in 1951, the postal regulation specified that "the new orders will be handled like checks," as Armstrong has documented (he provides an image of the source page in the postal regulations). Furthermore, has also documented, ALL money orders went to the Federal Reserve System. I'll quote from his article, since you apparently have not read it yet:

Postal money orders have traditionally been manufactured at a printing facility in Washington, DC. On July 1, 1951 the post office announced the introduction of a new style money order (blue tinted color), to be issued on tabulating (punch) cards that can be processed by electronic machinery. During production the new money orders were imprinted with sequential serial numbers and rows of punched rectangular holes (Hollerith computer code) that identified the serial number. With the computer-coded punch holes the new money orders could be sorted with electronic machinery and, according to the post office, handled "like checks." After being deposited or redeemed for cash at a bank or post office, these "pre-punched" money orders were sent to a Federal Reserve Bank (or Branches) and then sent (returned) to one of 12 postal accounting offices throughout the US.

According to the Postal Department, "The new type of orders, whether cashed at post offices or cashed at or deposited with banks, will ultimately be deposited with a Federal Reserve Bank or branch which, after processing the orders, will charge them to the account of the Treasurer of the United States and turn them over to the regional accounting office of the Post Office Department in the Federal Reserve city of the district." (July 1, 1951)( http://harveyandlee.net/Guns/PMO/Money_Orders.html)

The FBI confirmed this fact when it interviewed senior figures at the First Bank of Chicago and the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, as I will discuss later on.

As for your argument in another reply that since some postmarks have a number and a letter after the city and state, e.g., 3B, therefore this notation cannot be a postal zone. But you said the number 12 on the envelope to Klein's was the number of the cancelling machine that processed the envelope. So now you're saying that those machines had a mix of two-digit numbers in some cases and one digit and one letter in other cases? Why would those machines be labeled like that?  Is it not more logical to suppose that a postal zone could have been administratively (on paper) divided so that zone 3 would be 3A and 3B than to suppose that machines were given two types of identification numbers? Why would a cancelling machine have had the number 3B? 

In another reply you also said you see nothing in Robert Stovall's testimony that would suggest it was unlikely that Oswald could have been gone for 30 minutes or more without being noticed. You didn't see where Stovall described the technical nature of the work and said that Oswald was a trainee and that several guys worked "right with him"? Trainees at technical firms usually don't go unsupervised for very long. How about John Graef's WC testimony? Graef was Oswald's trainer at Jaggars-Stovall. Among other things, Graef said Oswald was "very punctual" and did whatever he was asked to do (10 H 180-186).

And I don't see anything in your reply that addresses the problems with the deposit statement that Klein's submitted to the WC.

Take a step back and think about what you are saying: You are saying that "Oswald's" money order was deposited in the First National Bank of Chicago and then processed through the Federal Reserve System but somehow, someway magically avoided receiving a single mark/stamp/notation that it was actually deposited by the bank or that it actually went through the Federal Reserve System. Somehow, someway, according to you, nobody at any of those institutions put a single mark/stamp/notation to document the order's deposit and processing.   

You haven't been paying attention to what I have said. I know for a fact that the money order was cashed. And the proof is right on the money order itself. Have you ever seen uncashed USPS money orders from that period? Here is a blue tinted money order of the format that was being fazed out in late 1962 and replaced with Yellow tinted cards in January of 1963:

The bank endorsement would have been on the back of the money order, not the front. This is the front of the money order. Why are you not showing the back of the money order?

Smuckler was a collector. The blue tinted cards were replaced with yellow tinted ones like the one Oswald purchased to pay Klein's with. Tom Scully did some research on this issue and made some discoveries. He can fill you in on those if he reads this post. Here is an uncashed money order from 1963:

Take note of what I've boxed in with green border. Then compare that with the Klein's money order.

What is your point here? I have said nothing about the color of the money order. What does this have to do with anything? The color of the money order does not change the fact that it should have a bank endorsement and a Federal Reserve endorsement on the back to document its receipt by the Federal Reserve.

In the Fall of 2015, Lance Payette found the following PDF and posted it on the ED forum:

Found on page 483 (fifth page of the PDF):

The money order had that file locator number (138 J159796) placed on it by the US Treasury Department in Washington. From there, it went to the federal records retention center in Alexandria, Virginia, where it was found on Nov 23, 1963.

The money passed through the Federal reserve system and reached it's final destination in Alexandria. It never would have done so if it hadn't been cashed.

This is old ground that was covered decades ago, but you do not know this because you have only consulted pro-WC sources. As for the money order's arrival in Alexandria, there is much more to this issue than you seem to be aware. You could start by reading Armstrong's research on the matter:

http://harveyandlee.net/Mail_Order_Rifle/Mail_Order_Rifle.html

The FBI interviewed First National Bank of Chicago VP Robert Wilmouth and Lester Gohr of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago on this issue, and they explained that the money order would have gone to the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago after it had been deposited. Walmouth said it should have gotten to the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank by March 18. See:

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=10408#relPageId=199&tab=page
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=10408#relPageId=200&tab=page

To fully understand Wilmouth's statements to the FBI, see:

http://harveyandlee.net/Mail_Order_Rifle/Mail_Order_Rifle.html

David Josephs has provided an entire appendix on the processing of money orders (Appendix B):

https://kennedysandking.com/images/pdf/JosephsRiflePart1.pdf

Josephs also addresses some of the problems with the story of the money order's "discovery," which I have not even mentioned yet.

This, of course, ties back to the altered handwriting in the existing copies of the order form. The original color copy that I presented earlier was included in PBS's 1988 documentary Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald? If Cadigan 3A is a copy of the color original, someone needs to explain why the "A" in "A. Hidell" is clearly, indisputably written differently in the two documents. In the color copy, the "A" is written in cursive, but in Cadigan 3A, it is written in print style. This indicates that somebody faked Oswald's handwriting in a second order form and decided to write the "A" in print style instead of cursive, and a copy of this form became Cadigan 3A.

[John Iacoletti]

Not to my knowledge. It is possible that it opened sometime before 8AM.

https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=56967#relPageId=33&tab=page

[John Iacoletti]

Oswald was rather thorough in his fakery.

It would appear that your only evidence Oswald faked his time sheet is that you believe he was buying a money order during that time.

[Martin Weidmann]

The HSCA handwriting experts were unable to render a decision on the note because they only had poor quality photoreproductions of it at their disposal. However, they pretty much dismissed it as fake anyway.

https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol8/html/HSCA_Vol8_0120a.htm

41)  VIII. The signature, "Lee Harvey Oswald," on the Hunt note (item 4-7) does not correspond to the Oswald signatures described under section I [signatures judged to be Oswald's].
.......
(43)  From the examinations of item 4-7, it was determined that the signature does not correspond with any of the Oswald signatures of section I. Similarly, the writing does not correspond to that in the section II Oswald documents.

(44)  I would like to note, however, that the quality of the original photoreproductions of the Hunt note was poor. Under the best of circumstances, reproductions lack clarity and detail. Here, as can be seen from the copies, the original photoreproduction was out of focus, giving the document a fuzzy appearance. Accurate analysis was difficult. The note is highly suspicious. The original would have to be checked in order to make a more definite analysis and reach a definitive conclusion.

Your attempt to discredit handwriting identification done by real experts has flopped. Handwriting identification is consistently accepted in courts of law. The handwriting on the money order is Oswald's.

The HSCA handwriting experts were unable to render a decision on the note because they only had poor quality photoreproductions of it at their disposal. However, they pretty much dismissed it as fake anyway.

And how does this differ from a photocopy taken from a microfilm of the Klein's order form? I would argue it doesn't, yet there they had no problem claiming the handwriting belonged to Oswald.

The original would have to be checked in order to make a more definite analysis and reach a definitive conclusion.

But they didn't require the original of the Klein's order form to "make a more definite analysis and reach a definitive conclusion"?

Handwriting identification is consistently accepted in courts of law.

I'm not sure what you mean by the word "accepted", but you are correct when you mean that it is allowed to be entered into evidence, so that it can be examined and challenged by the defense and their experts.

If you mean, however, that the word "accepted" means that the court accepts the findings of the handwriting expert as if it were a proven fact, then you are completely wrong.

The mere fact that courts of law accept handwriting identification into evidence is meaningless and does not say anything about the quality of the expert's findings!

The handwriting on the money order is Oswald's.

Really? It seems to me that, at best, you can say that according to the opinion of some experts the handwriting is Oswald's and even that is putting it to strongly, as from my own experience working with real unbiased handwriting experts I know they will never ever say with 100% certainty that the handwriting belongs to a particular person to the exclusion of all others.

[Michael T. Griffith]

We have already seen that Oswald’s Jaggars-Stovall timesheet shows he was at work when he supposedly bought the money order. We have also seen that his timesheet required specific job numbers for each print job that he did and how long he took on each print job.

Since lone-gunman theorists cannot tolerate the idea that someone else bought the money order, they speculate that Oswald doctored his timesheet to hide his 30-minute tardiness/absence, even though he had to list job numbers for each print job and had to put how much time he spent on each print job. This speculation seems unlikely on its face, given that Oswald’s job was not some low-skill warehouse job in a seven-story warehouse where you could take off for 30 minutes or more without your absence being noticed.

When we consider the WC testimony of Robert Stovall, one of the owners, and John Graef, Oswald’s trainer at the firm, the argument that he was gone at least 30 minutes and doctored his timesheet to hide it seems to collapse completely.

Mr. STOVALL. We are in the typographic services. We serve advertising agencies, advertising departments, and the graphic arts industry as a middle supplier for type services. We also produce newspaper mats for duplication throughout the United States. (10 H 168)

So this was not some low-skilled job in a seven-story warehouse where you could wander off for a time without anyone noticing.

Mr. STOVALL. You see, we employed him only as a trainee and I think we probably started him at $1.25 or $1.35, or something like that, (10 H 172)

So Oswald was a trainee. Technical companies normally do not leave trainees unattended/unsupervised to the degree that they could leave work for 30 minutes or more, or arrive 30 minutes late, and not be noticed. Trainees are usually watched fairly closely.

Mr. STOVALL. I don’t believe so. There was such a short period of time this fellow worked for us and he was a constant source of irritation because of his lack of productive ability, that. . . .

Mr. JENNER. Would you elaborate on that, please?

Mr. STOVALL. We would ask him to reduce a line to 4 inches in width, that happened to be 6, and he might make it 4 1/4 or 3 7/8, and this was a loss in labor and materials both, and it had to be redone. (10 H 172)

So Oswald irritated others because of his inferior skill at the job. This makes it all more unlikely that he could have skated off for 30 minutes or more without being noticed and reported. When your coworkers don’t like you very much, they won’t be inclined to look the other way if you are gone for at least 30 minutes.

Stovall’s comment here also speaks to Oswald’s known lack of coordination. He was a very smart guy, but he was not very coordinated. Several people who knew him noted this. They also thought it was why he did not drive. Yet, we are supposed to believe that he pulled off a feat of marksmanship that the WC’s NRA Master-rated riflemen did not even come close to duplicating.

Mr. STOVALL. I think he must have been reserved, because the fellows who worked right with him, no one seems to have had any particular conversation with him. One guy invited him to go to church and he had such an unpleasant reception to it that that was the end of that.

Mr. JENNER. What incident was that? Tell us about that.

Mr. STOVALL. Well, the fellow asked him what his religion was, and he asked him if he would like to go to church and I don’t know what he said, but that was the end of that. (10 H 173)

So there were employees who “worked right with him.” Not just one, but several—“the fellows.” They worked in his immediate area/proximity. This makes it extremely unlikely that he could have been gone for 30 minutes or more, or arrived 30 minutes late, without being noticed, especially given that the fellows who “worked right with him” did not particularly like him.

Now let us turn to the WC testimony of John Graef, who worked with and trained Oswald at Jaggars-Stovall:

Mr. JENNER. All right. Now, he worked directly with you or under you or under your supervision and direction?

Mr. GRAEF. That’s correct--that’s correct. He was with me a great part of the time. Of course, there are various times when I couldn’t be with him, but for the better part of the first 3 or 4 months of his employment-he worked for us approximately 6 months. (10 H 184)

So Graef was with Oswald “a great part of the time.” And then we learn that Oswald was “punctual” and that his work habits were “satisfactory”:

Mr. JENNER. Was he regular in his arrival at work?

Mr. GRAEF. Yes.

Mr. JENNER. Were his work habits in that connection satisfactory?

Mr. GRAEF. Yes. I would say he was very punctual in his arrival to work. He began working under me and I began the process of teaching him how to use our equipment. (10 H 184)

So Oswald was “very punctual” in arriving to work. Graef would not have said this if Oswald had been gone 30 minutes or arrived 30 minutes late one day. Given what we know about Oswald's work environment, it seems impossible that he could done this without anyone noticing.

We find out more about the fact that Oswald’s job was a technical job that required considerable training:

Mr. JENNER. Tell us what you taught him and how you attempted to train him and in what, and give me also, when you are doing that, his skills and aptitudes, as you recall them at the beginning?

Mr. GRAEF. Well, as I have explained, the most we hope for in a person is that perhaps any past skills they have will help them in learning our work, but basically our work is so different that there is no experienced help, and everyone who comes into the department is automatically a trainee.

Mr. JENNER. And he fell into that category?

Mr. GRUF. That’s correct. All our cameras are different from the ordinary cameras you find in commercial printing shops or printing establishments.

Mr. JENNER. Are these portable cameras or fixed cameras?

Mr. GRAEF. No, fixed cameras--dark room cameras. (10 H 184)

That’s not the kind of job that you can skip out for half an hour or more, or show up half an hour late, without your absence being noticed, especially when your trainer is with you “a great part of the time.”

Graef elaborated on the kind of training that Oswald received and how he performed. Graef explained that Oswald tried hard but just could not master the harder, more technical tasks:

Mr. GRAEF. Distortion work; yes. Now, the time that it took to bring him up to this point may have been 2 or 3 months, at any rate. It was at this time that we began, or he began to make a few mistakes on sizing. He would take a job back and it might be that his orders were to make it 4 inches wide and when the final print came up it might be 4ya inches wide or 41/s inches wide and this would have to be done over.

Mr. JENNER. Now, as much a difference as one-eighth of an inch on sizing as against an order for, let’s say, exactly 4 inches or for one-eighth of an inch, as the case might be, would make that particular work unusable?

Mr. GRAEF. Correct.

Mr. JENNER. This has to be exactitude?

Mr. GRAEF. Right. This didn’t mean that every job was wrong, but little by little as the days passed and we got into--we’ll say--into the fourth and fifth month of his employment, more and more he was being relied upon to produce this exact work and there were too many times-it was his mistakes were above normal-he was making too many mistakes. Of course, we helped him as much as we could to do a better job.

Mr. JENNER. Was it your impression along about this area that the errors were ones of lack of skill, or do you have a recollection now of any attributing on your part of those errors to lack of interest, lack of industry, dissatisfaction with the position-would you give me your impression in this connection, please?

Mr. GRAEF. Well, my impression of his mistakes were somehow that he just couldn’t manage to avoid them. It wasn’t that he lacked industry or didn’t try. Whenever he was asked to do a job over, he would do it willingly for me, with no--he would be more perturbed at himself that he had made an error, so I think he just couldn’t--he somehow couldn’t manage to handle work that was that exact. It wasn’t that he wasn’t trying or didn’t work hard to do the job, but somehow he just couldn’t make it, and now, like I said, it wasn’t every job that this happened, but it was too frequent to allow. There were too many times that these things had to be made over and they added to the final reason for dismissing him. (10 H 186-187)