The anybody but LHO crowd likes to believe that LHO actually stood at the bus stop near his rooming house when he left it a little after 1:00 on 11/22/63. And they point this out as part of their argument claiming that LHO couldn’t have traveled on foot the distance to the Tippit murder scene in time to get there before Tippit was murdered.
Here is a quote from a photograph of the actual typewritten notes by Hugh Aynesworth written in May of 1964 for The Dallas Morning News and published in a book titled “The Reporters’ Notes by The Dallas Morning News published in 2013.
“Mrs. Roberts recalled the now star-boarder running in about 1 p.m. as she sat watching the TV coverage of the assassination. “Boy you’re in a hurry,” she said. He hasn’t replied yet. She told us Oswald (Mr. Lee as she knew him) had hesitated at the front of the house a moment, then started running down Beckley Street south.
So, the later claims by Mrs. Roberts that LHO went to the bus stop and waited there for a while are (quite obviously to me) not true. She may believe that he did, but it is apparent that her later memory is false. Her fresh recollection (given to Aynesworth and the others just hours after the event) of LHO running south on Beckley, and no mention of the bus stop, are bound to be more accurate than her later one. Our memories are reconstructions (unlike taped re-runs) based on associations. It is easy to understand how Mrs. Roberts could mistakenly associate another memory (of LHO standing at the bus stop at another time) as part of what she remembered of 11/22/63. We all have mistakenly remembered a few things wrong from time to time. And we only realize it when we encounter evidence contrary to our memories. So, it probably happens to all of us more often than we think it does.
Some of you will cling to Mrs. Roberts’ false memory account and say that it is true. But I am convinced otherwise. I always have felt this way. But now have firm evidence to support my conclusion.
Whether Roberts saw Oswald standing at the bus stop or not is of very little significance. Roberts tells us that when Oswald came in she was trying to get the television to work to watch the news at 1 o'clock and that he left again after about 3 minutes.
We also know from the Gary Mack time trial that the fastest route between Beckley and 10th street took 11 minutes to walk.
Combined this means that Oswald couldn't have gotten to 10th street until 1.12 pm at the earliest. Add on two minutes for a short conversation with Tippit and the events that followed and you've got a shooting at 1.14 pm.
The problem is there is convincing circumstantial evidence to justify the conclusion that the actual time of the shooting most likely was between 1.06 and 1.10. For instance, Markham said she took the same bus, on Jefferson, every day at approx 1.15 pm, which of course means that she would have been at the bus stop at the time of the shooting and thus couldn't have been at 10th street at 1.14 to witness it.
So, you see, the whole point of Oswald waiting at the bus stop or not is really a trivial matter.
