Tuesday, May 1, 2012

A Basic Test on the Kennedy Assassination: Can Tom Hanks Pass It? (What about Vince Bugliosi?)

TIME: 10 mins. Choose A, B, C or D.


1. The primary purpose of JFK’s trip to Dallas was:

A. To see the city for the first time with LBJ

B. To see a Thanksgiving Day game between the Boston Patriots and Dallas Cowboys

C. To mend differences between the liberal and conservative wings of the Texas Democrats

D. To criticize Dallas’ reactionary tendencies at a speech to be given at its Trade Mart, following the motorcade


2. Lee Oswald was arrested by Dallas Police :

A. While eating inside the 2nd floor cafeteria of the Texas School Book Depository

B. Outside his apartment at 1026 North Beckley, after the J.D. Tippitt slaying

C. While inside the Texas Theater, during a movie entitled 'War is Hell'

D. On the steps of the Texas School Book Depository, as he was trying to leave.


3. The rifle originally reported found at the scene was identified as:

A. A 7.65 mm Swedish Mauser

B. A 6.35 mm Mannlicher-Carcano

C. A 7.35 mm Mannlicher-Carcano

D. An Australian Mauser.



4. The CIA’s JM/WAVE station in Miami ca. late 1961 was used to run which operation?


A. Operation Zapata

B. Operation ZR/RIFLE

C. Operation Mongoose

D. Operation Mockingbird


5. Irrespective of the correct answer to (4), and given that all the choices referred to bona fide CIA directed operations, place them in the correct time order, from earliest to latest
---(  )----(  )-----(  )------(  )---(Latest)


6. Right –wing extremist Gen. Edwin A. Walker (whom Oswald supposedly shot at) was relieved of his command by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in April, 1961. Why was this done?

A. Walker was a committed segregationist and passed out “whites-only” pamphlets for military service

B. He tried to indoctrinate his troops with John Birch Society propaganda

C. He secretly extolled and spoke sedition against the “communist-controlled government”

D. He openly protested the enrollment of James Meredith in Oxford, MS at the state university there.


7. According to the files released by the CIA to Military Science Professor John Newman (‘Oswald and the CIA’), which of the following was not a bona fide Agency file on Oswald?

A. 201-289248 CI/SIG

B. OS-351-164

C. 201-289248 CI

D. 74- 500



8. The Warren Commission was "suspiciously quiet” on the subject of Oswald's CIA files. The most likely reason for this was:


A. They had no information at all on the existence of the files, so couldn’t request them

B. Former CIA Director Allan Dulles (fired by JFK after the Bay of Pigs) sat on the Commission and would have obstructed their release because they’d have shown Oswald to be a CIA contract agent

C. Dulles hid the files with Hoover’s FBI

D. A and B.


9. How many alleged backyard photos of Oswald were claimed to be found:

A) One B) Two C) Three (D) Four


10. The Oswald “Ghost” photo found in Dallas police files was:
A) A photo of Oswald’s ghost as it left his body after Ruby shot him

B) A faint outline found in one of the backyard photos which is actually a double exposure

C) A wispy cloudlike feature that is found in two of the photographs.

D) A photo bearing the blank outline of a man over which an actual image can be superposed.


11. Eugene Hale Brading was a known Mafia courier identified coming out of the Dal-Tex building adjacent to the Texas School Book Depository immediately after the shooting. Since at least one shot trajectory could be traced there, suspicion fell on him but the Dallas PD let him go. His excuse was:


A) He had lost his way, and ended up in the building by mistake.

B) He had just gone to get a drink of water when the shooting erupted.

C) He had reported to the building to seek a job as mail courier.

D) The Dallas PD said they already checked him out and he was “good to go”


12. Of roughly 1,175 Dallas police on duty that day, nearly 200 were based at Love Field. How many were stationed along the motorcade route?


A) 450  B) 150   C) 575   D) 975

13. The most unusual aspect of the orders given to the Dallas officers stationed along the parade route was:

A) They were all to sing ‘My Country ‘Tis of Thee’ as JFK’s limo went by

B) They were to at all times maintain an exact distance of 100m (330’) from each other

C) They were to wear aviator sunglasses and not to smile

D) They were ordered to face the motorcade, and keep their backs to the crowd


14. In a number of Zapruder film frames, starting from Z-313, Jackie is clearly seen climbing over the limo trunk. What was she doing, according to her (sequestered) Warren Commission Testimony?

A) Trying to escape the bullets

B) Trying to retrieve one of JFK’s gold embossed cuff links that had dislodged

C) Trying to retrieve an occipital skull fragment dislodged by the head shot

D) Trying to get the attention of a Secret Service officer to the rear bumper


15. The bullet that struck the curb near the triple underpass also dislodged a pavement chip that hit witness James Tague. This would have been the 4th shot and four shots could not be made with the alleged Oswald rifle in 5.6 secs because it required a bolt action recycling time of 2.3 sec. Whatever became of the curb bearing the telltale bullet mark?


A) It was painted over.

B) It was moved to the other side of Dallas so no one would be able to locate it.

C) The FBI, after having the curb section removed, took it to their HQ in Washington, then when it was requested (by researcher Harold Weissberg) they said it was “destroyed”.

D) The curb was never struck, it was just another loony conspiracy tale


16. Nearly all the witnesses who saw the fatal head shot insist they also saw the presidential limo either slow or stop. However, careful examination of both the Zapruder and Nix films shows no evidence of deceleration. Assuming that 65 –odd witnesses were not all wrong, the most likely explanation for this anomaly is:


A) they were all blinded by the Dallas sunlight and couldn’t see what was going on

B) The limo was on an incline so appeared to halt or slow but this was an illusion

C) It was actually the lead car in the motorcade ((driven by Chief Jesse Curry) that slowed, and witnesses mistook it for the JFK limo

D) The two films were somehow altered to eliminate or reduce dramatically reduce the speed change.


17. This witness was standing on the grassy knoll filming, when a shot went by his left ear and he felt the percussion of surrounding air. The name of this witness, who was never called by the Warren Commission, was


A) Lee Bowers B) S. M. Holland C) Tom Arnold D) Frank Sturgis


18. Oswald’s Marine drill Sergeant, Nelson Delgado, testified that Oswald was called “Maggie’s Drawers” by his fellow soldiers. What did this mean?
A) He tended to wear drawers that looked effeminate.

B) He looked and acted effeminate when on the firing range.

C) He was a terrible shot in rifle practice, and often missed targets by wide margins

D) He mainly missed his shots wide left when ‘Maggie’ was written on drawers used for target practice.


19. After four trials, the expert team of 3 Army Master Marksmen assembled by the Warren Commission to try to duplicate Oswald’s alleged shooting feat (two hits, one miss in 5.6 seconds) still were unsuccessful. How did the trials finally achieve success?

A) The Italian-made Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5mm rifle Oswald supposedly used had its entire telescopic site rebuilt including shims added for altitude and azimuth correction.

B) The target was rendered stationary

C) The elevation of the marksmen was set to 30’, rather than Oswald’s assumed 60’

D) All of the above


20. For the same trials, how exactly was “success” defined?

A) At least four shots hitting the head after 18 rounds fired in all from three experts

B) At least two shots striking the head and shoulders within 5.8 seconds.

C) At least one shot (from one expert rifleman) hitting anywhere on the target, but in the 5.6 seconds – after 18 rounds fired.

D) At least one shot (from one rifleman) hitting anywhere on the target but after 3 rounds – not eighteen. (Since Oswald was alleged to require only three rounds).

--------------------------------------
NO GOOGLING!
 
Ratings: 18-20 correct (Expert - qualified to discuss the assassination)
 
15-17 (Good) - You know a bit about it but don't go making any "historical" 13 part series!
 
12-14 (FAIR) - Better bone up before doing ANY film making!
 
< 12  : Time to study your recent history!

3 comments:

vonmazur said...

I think they actually identified the first rifle take from the SBD as an Argentine Mod. 1891, cal. 7.65 mm. I believe that bullets from the Carcano that Oswald did not know he owned, were fired at the DPD in the tank, and saboted to 7.65 mm. This way all the shooters from the rear would have "Oswald" projectiles...I was at the LBJ Ranch in 1968, and got the story from the SS..

Copernicus said...

Interesting take! I am still wondering how this meshes with the WR testimony of Seymour Weitzmann that the rifle was a 7.65mm "Mauser". (Roger Craig also claimed it was a Mauser and their take seemed to be that th rifle was actually labeled so - or had a label to that effect.

Any ideas on how your take from the SS guy (rifle ID'd as Argentine Mod. 1891, cal. 7.65 mm) can be reconciled with the earlier testimony?

My guess is perhaps neither Weitzmann or Craig knew as much about rifles as they claimed. (Some years later, evidently, Weitzmann altered his earlier WC testimony and said he believed it was a 6.5 mm Mannlicher-Carcano)

vonmazur said...

It was the guys who actually shot from the rear that had the saboted rounds, the Carcano was planted after they took the Argentine Mauser away. All of the confusion stems from the gun that they found first,which was identified as an Argentine Modelo 1891. I saw it on the live feed when I got home from school that day. A DPD or Sheriff's Deputy was coming down the fire escape holding it. I do not know if anyone else noticed this, and it is rarely mentioned.