BWF and LMR may not have been the only ones who saw LHO with a bag on 11/22/1963

[Colin Crow]

From Mr D von Pein's blogspot exploration of the curtain rods issue:

"[...]

5.) No curtain rods were found in the TSBD in the days and weeks after
the assassination. (Warren Commission Exhibit #2640 verifies this fact
via Roy Truly's statement in a September 2, 1964, FBI report.)

6.) Oswald did not take any curtain rods out of the TSBD when he left
that building on 11/22/63. (If he did, he disposed of them somewhere
between the Depository Building on Elm Street and his roominghouse at
1026 N. Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff, because he definitely did not
enter the roominghouse with any sort of package. If he had, the package
would have been discovered by police.)

[...]"

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/06/curtain-rods.html

Question for Mr von Pein!

How can your conclusion that no curtain rods were found be considered safe if, as the dates on the document below prove, the 2 curtain rods submitted for testing for Mr Oswald's fingerprints were not the 2 curtain rods taken from the Paine garage by Agent Howlett during Ms Paine's third on-the-record testimony taking?



Thanking you, Mr von Pein, for all your tireless efforts to promote Truth and Justice! 

Looks to me like you could make a case for the official form you show as being written on in 2 stages. The first in red pen, on March 15, by Day only. Interestingly the results may have been written at the time the form was being filled. No one was originally listed as entering the rods (ie blank) or it has been whited out. The second entry occurred on 24 March and has been signed by Howlett (twice) and Day in blue pen. The real questions are, where were the rods found on or before March 15? Who found them? Why were they considered important to test for Oswald's prints on March 15? What possible use testing of rods from Ruth Paine's garage for Oswald's prints have been to the investigation? If positive.....so what?

[Alan Ford]

Looks to me like you could make a case for the official form you show as being written on in 2 stages. The first in red pen, on March 15, by Day only. Interestingly the results may have been written at the time the form was being filled. No one was originally listed as entering the rods (ie blank) or it has been whited out. The second entry occurred on 24 March and has been signed by Howlett (twice) and Day in blue pen.

One problem with this is that the other version of the form----which became a Commission Exhibit----contains the first Howlett signature (submission of evidence) but not the second!

The real questions are, where were the rods found on or before March 15? Who found them? Why were they considered important to test for Oswald's prints on March 15? What possible use testing of rods from Ruth Paine's garage for Oswald's prints have been to the investigation? If positive.....so what?

Exactly! 

[Walt Cakebread]

There is no mention in any DPD, FBI or SS report of its having been verified that no curtain rods had been taken from the Paine household. An absurd omission!

In Reclaiming History, Mr Bugliosi imagines the key questions running through Captain Fritz's mind:

"Were any curtain rods found at the Depository, or in Oswald?s room? Did his apartment need curtain rods?"

Notice the question Mr Bugliosi leaves out:

"Were any curtain rods missing from Mrs Paine's garage?"

Maybe it was there in the draft text, but didn't survive proofreading stage! 

While I have no problem accepting that a couple of curtain rods were found somewhere in or near the TSBD that caused someone to suspect that they might be the curtain rods that Frazier said that Lee told him he had in the flimsy brown paper sack that morning.

And I suspect that it was a TSBD employee like Harold Norman, or Bonnie Ray Williams ( just as an example) who discovered them and told SS agent Howlett that he knew where some curtain rod were hidden. 

How could anybody know if they were curtain rods missing from the Paines garage....??   Ruth Paine may have been able to state the number of curtain rods that she had stored in the garage but ... Who could verify that number was accurate??   

"Were any curtain rods missing from Mrs Paine's garage?"

How could the answer be established with 100% certainty?   

[Anthony Clayden]

There is a way to make the evidence fit in regards the curtain rods, that doesn't involve to much contortion to do so (but is alas now unprovable)

Oswald gets up to go to work.
He has a lunch made by Marina but Marina is still n bed.
The lunch is in the fridge and not bagged.
Oswald does not have a bag.
Being a poor person, Oswald retrieves a bag from  the garage for his lunch, not to fussed about the size or type, just wants something to carry lunch.
This bag had curtain rods in it which he removed and placed his lunch in.
Puts oversized lunch bag in car.
Frazier asks Oswald about the bag, Oswald miss hears or misconstrues the comment to be about why the bag is so big, or what it used to contain.
(It is an unusual size for a lunch bag, and placing his lunch in a bag that used to have curtain rods is unusual. He maybe was originally going to take the curtain rods but decided against it an used the bag for his lunch.)
He mentions in an oblique way about the curtain rods to Frazier. Frazier took this to mean there were curtain rods in the bag.
Keeping in mind Oswald was likely emotionally churned following his conversation with Marina and his decision to leave the wedding band and money, and his reported lack of communicative ability in general conversation or small talk. (eg Geneva Hines comments)

[Walt Cakebread]

There is a way to make the evidence fit in regards the curtain rods, that doesn't involve to much contortion to do so (but is alas now unprovable)

Oswald gets up to go to work.
He has a lunch made by Marina but Marina is still n bed.
The lunch is in the fridge and not bagged.
Oswald does not have a bag.
Being a poor person, Oswald retrieves a bag from  the garage for his lunch, not to fussed about the size or type, just wants something to carry lunch.
This bag had curtain rods in it which he removed and placed his lunch in.
Puts oversized lunch bag in car.
Frazier asks Oswald about the bag, Oswald miss hears or misconstrues the comment to be about why the bag is so big, or what it used to contain.
(It is an unusual size for a lunch bag, and placing his lunch in a bag that used to have curtain rods is unusual. He maybe was originally going to take the curtain rods but decided against it an used the bag for his lunch.)
He mentions in an oblique way about the curtain rods to Frazier. Frazier took this to mean there were curtain rods in the bag.
Keeping in mind Oswald was likely emotionally churned following his conversation with Marina and his decision to leave the wedding band and money, and his reported lack of communicative ability in general conversation or small talk. (eg Geneva Hines comments)

Except, Frazier said that Lee said he wanted to pick up some curtain rods .....That was one of the reasons for the Thursday trip to Irving.

[Alan Ford]

While I have no problem accepting that a couple of curtain rods were found somewhere in or near the TSBD that caused someone to suspect that they might be the curtain rods that Frazier said that Lee told him he had in the flimsy brown paper sack that morning.

And I suspect that it was a TSBD employee like Harold Norman, or Bonnie Ray Williams ( just as an example) who discovered them and told SS agent Howlett that he knew where some curtain rod were hidden. 

How could anybody know if they were curtain rods missing from the Paines garage....??   Ruth Paine may have been able to state the number of curtain rods that she had stored in the garage but ... Who could verify that number was accurate??   

"Were any curtain rods missing from Mrs Paine's garage?"

How could the answer be established with 100% certainty?   

But! We can state with 100% certainty that, had Ms Paine asserted with any degree of confidence that no curtain rods were missing after the assassination, much hay would have been made of this fact by the authorities. 'Proof that Oswald lied...', etc.

Instead we get------up until Ms Paine's WC appearances------not a single reference in the official record to this elementary question's even having been asked by DPD, FBI or SS.

Speaks volumes---especially when put together with the documentary proof we have that 2 curtain rods other than the 2 taken from the Paine garage on 23 March were tested for Mr Oswald's prints!

 

[Alan Ford]

There is a way to make the evidence fit in regards the curtain rods, that doesn't involve to much contortion to do so (but is alas now unprovable)

Oswald gets up to go to work.
He has a lunch made by Marina but Marina is still n bed.
The lunch is in the fridge and not bagged.
Oswald does not have a bag.
Being a poor person, Oswald retrieves a bag from  the garage for his lunch, not to fussed about the size or type, just wants something to carry lunch.
This bag had curtain rods in it which he removed and placed his lunch in.

How does this make the evidence fit in? We have 2 curtain rods, origin unstated, being tested for Mr Oswald's prints at the same time as 2 curtain rods still on a shelf in the Paine garage!

The logical and straightforward explanation is that Mr Oswald took 2 curtain rods from Ms Paine's garage that morning, and they turned up in the Depository at some point after the assassination. (Why else would they have been fingerprinted?)

 

[Walt Cakebread]

How does this make the evidence fit in? We have 2 curtain rods, origin unstated, being tested for Mr Oswald's prints at the same time as 2 curtain rods still on a shelf in the Paine garage!

The logical and straightforward explanation is that Mr Oswald took 2 curtain rods from Ms Paine's garage that morning, and they turned up in the Depository at some point after the assassination. (Why else would they have been fingerprinted?)

 

How do we know that thee weren't six or eight or a dozen curtain rods in the Paines garage??.....   Isn't it possible that Marina had curtain rods ....she did decorate several apartments during the year before the assassination....

I'm simply asking HOW can we determine the number of curtain rods in the Paine garage?