The First Shot

[Sean Kneringer]

In The Lost Bullet, Tina Towner and Amos Euins put the first shot much closer to the traffic light, so ...

[Mitch Todd]

Well done. I tend to believe the measurements are probably correct. I used to draw mechanical drawings as part of my work. And I began doing this (by hand) well before computer aided design became common. Drawings are an important form of communication for all parties involved in a project. I can only guess that this drawing was used to communicate the dimensions which the investigators of the assassination requested. It doesn’t seem to me to be the type of drawing that the actual workers who built the limo would need or use. And I can only guess that whoever created this drawing for the assassination investigators might have taken an early version of their design drawings and placed some requested measurements on it for those investigators while not being concerned that the actual drawing scales off accurately to those dimensions. I believe that H&E was in the process of reworking that limo during the WC investigation. Therefore someone at H&E might have taken those measurements from the actual limo. I think that the reworked limo is at the Ford Museum in Michigan now. And I wonder what some actual measurements of the limo might tell us now.

As someone else who's dealt with technical and construction drawings, I can confirm that you cannot always rely on them to actually be to scale, especially if they were made by a draftsman using pen and pencil on paper. The primary reason for this is simple: if a change has to be made that requires extensive redrawing, it was often easier just to change the value of a couple of dimensions rather than spend half a day erasing and redrawing. It also saves on a lot of mess, since erasing on a large scale never looks good. I'd warned Andrew about this years ago on a.a.jfk.

I agree that the dimensions are probably right, but the rest of the drawing shouldn't be blindly trusted. Most of the detail in the drawing was added ad hoc just to make the finished product "read" as an automobile at first sight.

[Dan O'meara]

In The Lost Bullet, Tina Towner and Amos Euins put the first shot much closer to the traffic light, so ...

How does this negate the statements of Templin, Brandt, Newman, Burney and Dishong who were stood feet away from the limo at the time of the first shot. All state the limo had passed their position at the time of the first shot.

Euins and Towner could hardly have been further away, up at the corner of Elm and Houston.

Which statements do you give more credence to?

[Sean Kneringer]

How does this negate the statements of Templin, Brandt, Newman, Burney and Dishong who were stood feet away from the limo at the time of the first shot. All state the limo had passed their position at the time of the first shot.

It contradicts what they say. No one used the word "negate."

Euins and Towner could hardly have been further away, up at the corner of Elm and Houston.

Further away from what? The limo at the time of the first shot? They'd disagree with you.

Which statements do you give more credence to?

Certainly not Buell Frazier, who thought all the shots came from the Knoll. Just out of curiosity, do you think the first shot was the SBT shot?

[Jack Trojan]

If you take any stock in involuntary "jiggling" in response to loud sounds (which is definitely a thing), this chart might interest you.

When I stabilized the Z film years ago I used the data to analyze the camera shake. If Zapruder responded to any loud noises during shooting the Z film, then telltale jiggles would show up as involuntary camera shake. 

http://www.kohlbstudio.com/Images/Zshake_yd-d.png

There appear to be a few possible candidate spikes that might have been the 1st shot. However, there were a lot of frames spliced out of the beginning of the Z-film and Zapruder can't recall ever taking his finger off the trigger. The 1st shot might be in that footage, which got spliced out. BTW, where is the original film? Zapruder only got a copy back.

[Dan O'meara]

It contradicts what they say. No one used the word "negate."
 
Further away from what? The limo at the time of the first shot? They'd disagree with you.

Certainly not Buell Frazier, who thought all the shots came from the Knoll. Just out of curiosity, do you think the first shot was the SBT shot?

If you were familiar with this thread you'd know I think the first shot was the shot that passed through both JFK and JBC.
I don't recognise the SBT as it relies on CE 399 as the bullet that passed through both men. I get the impression some researchers dismiss the possibility both men could be shot through by a single bullet because they disagree with the SBT, but they are two different things.

It is a well known fact in this case that there is lots of contradictory eye-witness testimony. Obviously, eye-witness testimony is a key part of understanding what happened that day but it shouldn't be used in isolation due to the contradictory nature of it [IMO]. Hundreds of witnesses were asked about events that day and there is bound to be contradictory recollections of specific details.
In the last few posts I have used the testimonies of a group of witnesses stood a few feet away from the assassination at the time of the first shot and stripped their testimonies down to one single fact - had JFK passed their position at the time of the first shot - and used this to locate the position of the limo in terms of Z-frames.
But this is just the latest evidence in a large body of evidence I have amassed in this thread supporting a first shot at z222/z223.

Templin, Brandt, Newman, Burney and Dishong state that JFK had just passed their position at the time of the first shot and that JFK reacted to that shot in the way we see in the Z-film.
Euins was a really short kid stood on Houston Street so I have to question how much he actually saw as the limo moved down Elm Street.
As I say, Towner was stood on the corner of Elm and Houston, nowhere near the limo at the time of the first shot.

Both sets of witnesses can't be right.
I prefer one set over the other due to their proximity to the event and the unanimous nature of their agreement.

BTW, what's your take on when the first shot occurred?

[Dan O'meara]

If you take any stock in involuntary "jiggling" in response to loud sounds (which is definitely a thing), this chart might interest you.

When I stabilized the Z film years ago I used the data to analyze the camera shake. If Zapruder responded to any loud noises during shooting the Z film, then telltale jiggles would show up as involuntary camera shake. 

http://www.kohlbstudio.com/Images/Zshake_yd-d.png

There appear to be a few possible candidate spikes that might have been the 1st shot. However, there were a lot of frames spliced out of the beginning of the Z-film and Zapruder can't recall ever taking his finger off the trigger. The 1st shot might be in that footage, which got spliced out. BTW, where is the original film? Zapruder only got a copy back.

Personally, I think jiggle analysis is a load of bollocks and the idea that the first shot occurred before z133 is utter horsesh$t.
The mountain of evidence amassed in this thread crushing the idea of such an early shot is overwhelming.
I would urge any researcher naive enough to believe such nonsense to have a trawl through this thread.

[Jerry Organ]

Interesting, that Knowles did draw both limos for the WC. I wonder if he was rushed by superiors and might have taken a shortcut or two resulting in the issues we have documented in this thread. If so, it reminds me of Carl Day and his situation. Not that I think Day took any shortcuts, but he appears to have become frustrated and just did as he was told and stopped working on the rifle while in the middle of his examination.  Apparently without objecting, like I wished he had done.

I wonder if this might be Ronald Knowles? ( "Installation of White House Army Signal Agency Equipment in New Limousine ... 15 June 1961" Link )

I find some of the human-interest stories around the JFK assassination quite interesting. Put aside the endless cycle of conspiracy wars and just read a book like "The Day Kennedy Was Shot" or "The Vantage Point". The Kennedy family history and RFK Campaign are very rich in history.

You did a great job on your limo drawing. I wondered if you purchased it. I have seen one for sale also. If it is Ford authorized, Ford (and/or the Ford Museum) might have provided dimensions. It seems like the asking price for it was around $80.00, if I remember correctly. Maybe I should be saving some money?

Looking into it just now, it's a Ford Licensed product, meaning "Ford Motor Company has specified allowed uses for this content, including editorial and non-commercial use." I guess a modeller can submit their product and request an endorsement, probably involving a fee to Ford. Seems to be no special access to the vehicle or information from Ford, and one site says the "modeling based on photos available on Google." The model is "real-world scale" and 616 cm long. However that is 242.5"  which is a bit short. Superficially, though, the model at first seems authentic.

It may be that a stock Lincoln Continental is more accurate because it's directly scanned in high-poly. But then one has to take that model and coach it into the 100-X. I think I'm getting pretty close to a reasonably accurate model.

The Hess & Eisenhardt company closed down last year. Maybe somebody from the company has the 100-X plans at home or is selling it online. That would be quite a thing to have.