When everyone was awake at the Plano home of the Johnson’s, I was taken from my resting place on the dresser and carefully positioned into the camera bag. My photographer tried to be extra careful with me as the damaged spot on my left leg was getting worse. Sunday July 31, 2016 was a day that I had been looking forward to since we left Abilene, and we didn’t want a leg injury to prohibit me from standing at any of the JFK assassination sites in Dallas.
Bill Johnson had volunteered to drive my photographer and me around to the different sites in the Dallas area. Not only would we tour the Texas School Book Depository that Bill hasn’t visited since he was a kid, we also planned on seeing a handful of Lee Harvey Oswald sites in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas that Bill has never seen. In 2014, I stood on the Dealey Plaza site where Kennedy was shot and I saw the depository building, but my photographer didn’t take me up to the sixth floor where the shots were fired. That all changed on that Sunday.
Before we reached Dallas and the JFK-related sites, Bill had to make a stop in Addison, Texas at his business called Dallas Aerial Surveys. While we were there, my photographer and I got to see a handful of antique aerial cameras that were once used to survey the land from the air. Bill also showed us an aerial photograph of Dealey Plaza that his company had captured a week or two after the JFK assassination.
We arrived in the rough Dallas neighborhood of Oak Cliff around 11:15am. My photographer had scheduled a tour of Lee Harvey Oswald’s rooming house at 1:00pm, so that gave us plenty of time to visit the handful of other Oswald sites first.
The historic Texas Theater, located on West Jefferson Avenue, kicked-off our Oswald-site tour. Bill parked the white Tahoe a short distance from the theater and I was carried along the same sidewalk that Lee Harvey Oswald had walked on November 22, 1963. After Oswald had allegedly shot police officer J.D. Tippit at the corner of 10th Street and Patton Avenue, the assassin walked five blocks to the theater where he snuck past the ticket booth clerk without buying a ticket. Ironically, someone saw Oswald sneak into the theater and once the clerk was notified, Julia Postal called the police. Oswald was arrested as he watched “War Is Hell” on the big screen from his seat near the back of the theater.
My photographer carried me beneath the marquee and up to the doors of the historic Texas Theater. My excitement of standing on Lee Harvey Oswald’s theater seat was quickly dashed when we learned the doors were locked and the theater was closed that day. But as I posed for a handful of photos near the red front doors, I envisioned that fateful day in 1963 and I could see in my mind’s eye the police as they dragged Oswald out of the theater through those doors. Was the man who was arrested inside the theater the actual assassin of President Kennedy and Officer Tippit? We may never know for sure.
As we left the theater and walked back down the sidewalk towards the Tahoe, I heard my photographer mention to Bill that he hoped our Texas Theater experience wasn’t the start of a day filled with disappointment. At the same time, I thought to myself that the missed opportunity would give my cameraman another reason to bring me back to Dallas in the future.
In my mind, Dallas’ most notorious killer was Lee Harvey Oswald and I had planned on spending my entire day visiting sites related to that alleged assassin. Our next stop, which surprised me, was a place where a more notorious Dallas killer once lived as a teenager. In the early 1920s and without any money, Henry Barrow moved his family to poverty stricken West Dallas where they lived in a tent. In 1926, Henry purchased a small house that he turned into the Star Service Station and the Barrow’s lived/worked there for about ten years. One of Henry Barrow’s seven children was a son named Clyde, who began a life of crime at about the same time Henry purchased the small house. Clyde Barrow, along with Bonnie Parker, became famous bank robbing outlaws who met their demise on May 23, 1934. Henry Barrow and his wife Cumie left their West Dallas filling station to attend their son’s funeral. When we arrived at what is known as the Clyde Barrow boyhood home, the former Star Service Station was boarded up and in disrepair. Like Oak Cliff, that area of Dallas seemed extremely “sketchy” and my photographer simply captured the images of the Barrow place from the safe confines of the Tahoe.
It was a three-mile drive from the home of one killer in West Dallas to another in Oak Cliff. Lee Harvey Oswald, his wife Marina, and their baby daughter June had lived on the second floor of the Neely Street apartment from March 2nd to April 24, 1963, but during that short time one of the most infamous aspects to the JFK assassination had occurred and I wanted to pose there for a photo. Why was that apartment an important site for me to visit? On March 31, 1963, Marina Oswald had photographed her husband near the back stairway as he held a World War II Mannlicher-Carcano rifle that he had purchased from a Chicago mail order company for $19.95.
As we approached the Neely Street apartment, it was hard to tell whether or not anyone was living in the building. Bill had pulled the Tahoe into the alley that went alongside the apartment’s backyard; but unfortunately there was a wooden fence that was in place to keep people from trespassing onto the property. My photographer carried me to the white painted fence and all we could see from that vantagepoint was the top of the building; there was no view of the infamous staircase where Oswald had once stood. That’s when Bill came up with a brilliant solution: “Hey Tom, why don’t y’all move that loose piece of fence over there and sneak into the yard? I don’t think anyone’s home anyway.” I laughed when I heard Bill mention that scheme to my photographer because I knew Vicki would’ve been dead-set against us even thinking about trespassing onto the property; especially in that indigent neighborhood.
Before I knew it, I was carried through the opening in the fence; and “Wild Bill” followed right behind us. As I looked up from my case, there it was – the wooden staircase where Lee Harvey Oswald had posed with his mail order rifle on March 31, 1963. As I stood in the same location where Oswald once stood, my photographer did his best impression of Marina Oswald as he captured several images of me. I thought to myself: “It was the photos of Oswald that were taken right here that positively linked him to the JFK assassination. How stupid could he have been, unless that was all part of a huge conspiracy.”
After Tom was finished capturing images of me pretending to be Lee Harvey Oswald, it was his turn. My photographer had usually been too shy to stand in front of his own camera, but after I heard Bill say “Why don’t all y’all stand by the stairs and let me take a picture of you”, Tom quickly moved into position and submitted to Bill’s request.
The Oswald rooming house was a half mile from the assassin’s Neely Street apartment and when Bill parked the Tahoe in front of the ranch-style home on North Beckley Avenue we were about 20 minutes early for our 1:00pm appointment. In an effort to kill some time, I posed for a handful of photos with the exterior of the house that had become a part of Presidential history on November 22, 1963.
Patricia Hall, granddaughter of the 1963 home owner Gladys Johnson, invited the three of us to begin our tour fifteen minutes early. After my photographer and Bill each handed over their twenty bucks, the laid-back, comfortable tour with Ms. Hall began. For me, I thought the best part of our visit to the Oswald rooming house was Patricia Hall and how she took her time showing us the historically important parts of the home. Hall also answered any questions that pertained to Oswald, the home, or the Kennedy assassination. What was intriguing to me was the fact that Hall was 11 years old when Oswald lived at her grandmother’s home and she personally knew the alleged assassin.
The house featured some authentic furnishings that were there on November 22, 1963; including the bed that Lee Harvey Oswald slept on during the six weeks that he lived in the home. Since Oswald’s bedroom was important to my photographer and I, we asked Hall to start our visit there. Oswald’s room, which he paid $8 per week to rent, was very small. When I was carried into the room, I noticed the bed took up much of the narrow room. I also saw a small table with a lamp that was next to the bed, while another table and mirror was positioned across from the closet that had concealed Oswald’s dresser.
After my time in Oswald’s bedroom was finished, Tom was granted permission by Patricia Hall to lay down on the bed. I heard my photographer tell Bill that he felt awkward laying in the bed of an assassin, but he said it was historically cool at the same time – especially when Bill snapped a picture of the event. It seemed as though Tom was concerned whether or not the bedroom was haunted with the evil spirits of the dead assassin, but Pat assured him that she had not seen or heard anything out of the ordinary since she’s owned the house. But when Bill Johnson was asked to take his turn on the bed for a photo, he said: “I’m not going to lay on that bed. That’s just too creepy for me. Y’all just go ahead and have fun with that.”
The rest of the tour consisted of the living area, or day room, for the boarders. In that large section of the house, Oswald would use the community telephone to call his estranged wife Marina, who was living with their children in the home of Michael and Ruth Paine in Irving, Texas. As I stood next to the black telephone with the number 214-946-7277, it was as though I could hear Oswald as he held the receiver and spoke Russian to his wife.
As my photographer, Bill, and I were in the living room’s seating area that featured a large couch, numerous chairs, and other authentic furniture, Patricia told stories and answered questions about Oswald. Hall recalled that “Mr. Lee” would watch the news on the television or at times he would stay in his room to read. Pat said she and her brothers Hal and Mike knew him as “Mr. Lee” because he had registered under the name ‘O.H. Lee’ and not Lee Harvey Oswald.
When my photographer asked Patricia point-blank whether or not she believed that Oswald shot the President, Hall’s recollection of the assassin was different than I would have expected. She mentioned that the man that she knew when she was an 11-year-old would not have done what Oswald was accused of doing – which was the assassination of President Kennedy and the killing of J.D. Tippit. Patricia said the “Mr. Lee” she knew was a very sweet, gentle, quiet, soft-spoken, courteous young man who loved children. She told the three of us a story of when her brothers were rough-housing in the front yard about two weeks before the assassination. Oswald, who was sitting on the front porch, broke up the fight. Pat said that she stood behind the front screen door and watched “Mr. Lee” as he sat on the steps between the two youngsters (Hal was ten and Mike was six) and Oswald told them “I want you to listen to me. Y’all are brothers and you need to love each other. And never, ever do anything that would harm another human being.” Ms. Hall finished the story by saying: “That’s why I say that I don’t believe ‘Mr. Lee’ would hurt anyone, let alone kill the President.”
The three of us had spent about 90 minutes inside the home of Patricia Hall, owner of the Oak Cliff rooming house where Lee Harvey Oswald had rented a room during the final six weeks of his life in 1963. Going into the tour, I had no idea of what to expect; but the stories of “Mr. Lee” that Pat shared with us were priceless, as was the access that we had inside her home. Were her stories of Oswald embellished a bit? Perhaps, but nearly 53 years had gone by since that fateful day in Dallas and most anything would morph into a more spectacular version after that much time had elapsed. All I knew, and I think my photographer and Bill Johnson would agree, was that Patricia Hall was a true American treasure; and so was her historic home.
A minute or so after we said goodbye to Pat Hall, Bill drove the Tahoe as we followed Lee Harvey Oswald’s path into infamy. It had been reported that roughly 35 minutes after JFK’s assassination on November 22, 1963, Oswald left the rooming house on North Beckley. With a pistol in hand, Lee headed south on foot. When Oswald arrived at the corner of 10th Street and Patton Avenue in Oak Cliff, Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit pulled his patrol car alongside the 10th Street curb where the alleged assassin was walking. After a short verbal exchange, Oswald supposedly shot Tippit to death alongside the police car.
When we arrived at the Tippit murder scene, there was a historical marker near the corner and a black ‘X’ marked the exact spot on 10th Street. For some strange reason, my photographer didn’t capture an image of me at the Tippit murder site. Instead, Bill grabbed Tom’s camera and he took several snapshots of my photographer as he stood on the ‘X’. I was stunned that I had been forgotten and I thought perhaps that I had been replaced by a larger ‘bumblehead’. As I stayed in the Tahoe and watched Tom and Bill do their thing, all I could do was shake my head in disbelief.
Our final Presidential stop of the day was arguably the most famous JFK site in Dallas; Dealey Plaza. It was nearly 3:00pm when Bill parked the Tahoe behind the Texas School Book Depository, and I was immediately carried into the seven-story brick building. Unlike when I was there two years earlier, my photographer was allowed to take his camera onto the elevator; however, photos were prohibited on the infamous sixth floor and its museum. But my innovative cameraman simply took me to the seventh floor; he placed me on the window ledge directly above the sixth-floor sniper’s nest and I had a nearly identical view that the assassin had on November 22, 1963. As I stood on that ledge, it was almost as though I could hear the rifle shots as they rang out above the unsuspecting President. When I stood on the assassination site in 2014, it seemed as though I was a long way from the sniper’s nest high above Dealey Plaza. But from the window of the School Book Depository, I think Tom could’ve thrown a baseball and hit someone in the head riding in a convertible on Elm Street below.
Even though Tom was unable to sneak any photographs of me inside the Sixth Floor Museum, he carried me around the gallery where I saw a handful of really cool assassination artifacts. There was the infamous sniper’s nest that had been recreated near the window where the assassin allegedly fired three shots at President Kennedy. I also saw Lee Harvey Oswald’s wedding ring, the handcuffs that were on his wrists when he was shot at the Dallas Police Headquarters, the hat and suit worn by Jim Leavelle who had escorted Oswald when he was shot. Another historic artifact that I saw was the grey fedora worn by Jack Ruby when he shot Oswald. There were hundreds of items on display, but it was the authentic artifacts that intrigued me the most.
The rest of our time at Dealey Plaza was spent as the three of us walked in front of the Texas School Book Depository for an up-close look at the historic building; then it was onto the famed Grassy Knoll where I was once again placed onto the four-foot-tall block where Abraham Zapruder stood as he filmed the assassination. When it came to the actual assassination site on Elm Street, my photographer decided not to take a chance of me getting hit by a car. That decision was made because the 2014 images he had captured were perfect and the reward wasn’t worth the risk. Instead, Tom and Bill took turns standing on the ‘X’ with the schoolbook building in the background. I had to laugh to myself as there was one instance that my photographer escaped injury as he narrowly made it off the street before being hit by a speeding motorist.
It was nearly 4:30pm and Bill had a huge surprise in store for my photographer. The Texas native drove us to a place called Campisi’s Egyptian Restaurant where my photographer and Bill had an early dinner. That wasn’t just any old fancy place to eat, however. Campisi’s founder, Joseph Campisi, had a huge connection with organized crime since 1946. On the evening of November 21, 1963, which was the night before the Kennedy assassination, Jack Ruby was seen eating in the restaurant. Campisi and Ruby were so close that the nightclub owner and Oswald assassin asked Joe Campisi to visit him in jail, which he did for ten minutes on November 30, 1963.
As I watched Bill and Tom scarf down a pizza, I had an uneasy and eerie feeling about being there. The upscale eatery not only reeked of organized crime, but the ambience also made me feel that perhaps the assassination plot of JFK had been hatched inside that restaurant; with the help of Joe Campisi and his friend Jack Ruby. From the friendly confines of my camera case, I had wondered which table Ruby had dined at and whether or not he wore the same grey fedora that he sported when he shot Lee Harvey Oswald.
I was relieved when my photographer carried me out of Campisi’s nearly intact. Even though my left shin had a piece of resin missing, at least my kneecaps weren’t broken nor was I wearing cement shoes. When we got back to the Johnson’s home at about 6:00pm, I was placed back onto my usual spot on Ryan’s bedroom dresser.
For the rest of the night all I could think about was Lee Harvey Oswald as I wondered whether or not he killed President Kennedy. I envisioned those famous steps that I stood near and could see Oswald in my mind as he proudly held his newly acquired rifle. But I also could hear Patricia Hall’s words that I will never forget: “Mr. Lee told my brothers to never, ever do anything that would harm another human being.” Two weeks later Oswald was accused of not only harming another human being, he was blamed for killing a cop and a President. Although we may never know the truth of who killed JFK; the intrigue, speculation, and mystery makes not knowing the truth tolerable – and kind of fun, too!
