As a 21-year-old college student, I returned to my hometown of Ft. Worth for the summer of 1962. Original black and white photographic negative taken by an unidentified Dallas Times Herald staff photographer. After they escorted me into a nondescript conference room in a downtown building, the agents homed in on the question of the day, which, of course, has lingered over the past 50 years: Did I think Oswald worked alone or was part of a larger conspiracy? I try to hold that in the back of my head. MORE THAN 30 YEARS AFTER the Kennedy assassination, Lee Harvey Oswald is a name that will not go away. The first car was The National Enquirer. Sometimes when the cheerleading squad went to football games in different towns, people in the stands would shout stuff at me - you know, Your daddy shot Kennedy or Good thing your daddys dead and buried. But mostly things were pretty normal. By September 1963, Marina was pregnant with her second child and she moved the family back to Dallas, where they roomed in a boarding house, according to Spartacus Educational. You try to be nice because you don't want to make somebody upset who's going to seek you out if they're kooky enough to do that stuff anyway. He said, I know who your father is, and then he just got up and shook his head and left. Marina answered most of the questions, speaking quietly and occasionally showing photographs. However, Marinas husband Lee Harvey was later arrested in 1963 after the 35th president of the United States of America, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was murdered. They had so little in Minsk anyway, she said, why waste money on a faraway nation that offered her fellow citizens little besides expensive sugar? We support the idea of independent revolution in the Western Hemisphere, free from American intervention. Yet I recall that his companion for the evening, a Russian woman named Anna Meller, couldnt resist asking the question we all secretly wanted answered why had Lee defected to the Soviet Union? I mean, think about it. Q: Over the years, you've kept a pretty low profile. US, he met Marina Prusakova at a dance, and they were married on April 30, 1961. Later on, Marina went to Minsk to stay with her uncle named Ilya Prusakov, a colonel in the Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs. That catches you off guard when you just wake up. But anonymity exacted a curious price of its own, as June faced myriad graceless references to her father, mother and family. Book Haven readers will remember his earlier account of the events of 1963 in The New York Times Sunday Magazine here. This story appears in the March issue of Texas Monthly. On the morning of November 24, while being transferred from a jail cell to an interrogation office, Oswald was shot by a distraught Dallas nightclub owner, Jack Ruby. I didn't shoot anybody, no sir . didnt want to recruit Oswald. What if I dont tell him at all? The evidence has remained highly debatable. "She never knew when we'd run into someone, and she didn't want us to look like poor white trash"' June says simply. A few days later, my father decided to check up on Oswald and his wife, and because I was around their age and home for the summer, he took me along. Ive tried not to be make a big deal about things. "Biography/Personal Quotes". I have to remind Rachel that this is the man who beat our mother, who didn't provide for his children. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). John B. Connally in an open-car motorcade in Dealey Plaza. Sacrifice, Revolution, Certain. Nothing did, of course, but there were so few migrs in the area that the Dallas Russians, as my family called a group of their friends, felt protective of their own. Through my father, I had become a close or, as Robert Oswald would later say, almost the only friend of Lee and Marina Oswalds from virtually the moment they arrived in Fort Worth, in June 1962, until the end of that November. "She and Ken are good people, the best neighbors you could ever have," said a neighbor, Fred McCurley. The kids didnt care much one way or the other. In every community across Washington, families are facing the challenge of accessing and affording long-term care. And it was there that my father told Marina, in Russian, that her husband just died. Early that summer, Lee brought home a catalog and class schedule from Texas Christian University, and we eventually decided to drive to the T.C.U. It's a little bit like opening a family album you didn't know existed before. And, the feds wanted to talk. The Russian-American widow stands at a net worth that is approximately $1 Million $5 Million. He got really scared and wanted to take me to a hospital. Lee Harvey Oswald's childhood did not take place in any one town or city. Dont get me wrong, Rachel said, blushing a little. In 1963, according to Marina, her husband tried to assassinate General Edwin Walker, a far-right politician, while the family was living in New Orleans; the Warren Commission would later confirm that Oswald attempted to assassinate the general. Lee and Robert invited us in to meet Marina, who was slender, almost fragile, with a natural beauty. "Please get her away from Michigan. Brigit Mahoney Bio, Age, FOX Weather, Married, Ryan, Salary. Very interesting. And you know, it's not Lee's fault he got killed by Jack Ruby. They think you always have to have a car, whereas I got away on my own two feet. The Highly Unusual Funeral of Lee Harvey Oswald. There's always been this little group that's followed us - Mom, Rachel and me-and calls us and is fascinated by anything surrounding us. Oh great!" My first serious boyfriend -that's what he was fascinated about. Q: Do you and Rachel argue much about this? A: Yes. Marina met Lee Harvey Oswald (a former U.S. Marine who had defected to the Soviet Union) at a dance on March 17, 1961. Great!" Lee, by contrast, was restrained. In January 1979 a special U.S. House of Representatives Assassinations Committee, after a two-year investigation, reported that a second assassin may also have fired a shot and that there may have been a conspiracy. Then I find out he's been doing some quote-unquote assassination research. The bars decor consists chiefly of scuffed wooden tables, and junkyard scraps nailed to the walls - rusted license plates, cow skulls, yellowed newspaper clippings, and a hand-scrawled sign above the cash register noting that Tipping is not a city in China. Old Life magazine photographs used to hang on the walls, including one of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. There was always the question of whether I should tell the guy about Lee. For the most part, folks were nice, but they were always whispering things. Or who my father was?. Pete Gregory, the authors father, seated center left, translating as Secret Service agents questioned Marina Oswald days after the Kennedy assassination. But you know, just because you're hanging out with a weird group - they could have set him up, and he could have had no idea what was going on that day. So she became a sort of tourist attraction. He argued that it would jeopardize his fluency in Russian, but more important, it was a way he leveraged control over her. So I said, O.K, this is it. While staying with her uncle she also studied pharmacy. If it is true that poetry is the silence between the words, then there is something genuinely poetic about the life Rachel Oswald is quietly leading between the headlines. agent or two, Mafia bosses and even C.I.A. Dinner ended abruptly. Richard Rodrigues Author has 3.4K answers and 465.8K answer views Oct 2 For seven years Rachel was a waitress at the Chili Parlor while she put herself through nursing school. In that instant, my father, Pete Gregory, linked the voice to a nurse who sat in the back of his class and had once identified herself as Oswald. Until this phone call, he hadnt realized that she was the mother of Lee Harvey Oswald, a Marine who had defected to the Soviet Union only to return two and a half years later with a Russian wife and a 4-month-old daughter. During one visit to a Rexall drugstore that August, Lee became visibly angry when a pharmacist offered to hire Marina, who had worked at a hospital pharmacy in Minsk, once her language skills improved. _________________________________________. Gifts processed in this system are not tax deductible, but are predominately used to help meet the local financial requirements needed to receive national matching-grant funds. George Bouhe, a dapper bachelor who took it upon himself to be a one-man social-service department for new Russian-speaking immigrants, was particularly eager to meet Marina. Q: Tell me about growing up in the aftermath of the assassination. Lee Oswald Harvey allegedly assassinated former U.S. President John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963. These were lean times for the Oswalds, but they werent without hope. But you have to understand that, aside from what role he had in the assassination, there's the issue of what role he had in our family. As virtually the only American living in Minsk, he became something of a celebrity in that provincial capital. However, he was arrested for the same by denying the allegations. Rachels mother, Marina, then barely in her 20s, had arrived from Minsk, Russia, only a year earlier and spoke very little English. I want to make sure they understand why I'm so matter-of-fact about it. This image shows Oswald family members during the graveside funeral service for Lee Harvey Oswald at the Rose Hill Memorial Park in Fort Worth, Texas on Monday, November 25, 1963. Rather than tell him that there wasnt much of a market for a Russian translator in 1960s Texas, my father, who fled Siberia during the civil war, welcomed the chance to meet this fellow Russian speaker in person. Hidell, Lee Harvey Oswald's pseudonym, are both listed on the form. Its set in 1978, when I was 15 and my sister was 17. Lee Harvey Oswald, his wife Marina Nikolayevna Prusakova, and . Marina Oswald had become the most wanted witness in America. I didn't really want to be the center of gossip in this whole building. Lee responded defensively that, yes, he did not think that the party faithful believed in Communism anymore but that this did not make America a great place. While Lee Harvey Oswald was sitting in a Dallas jail cell, his wife and mother and two young daughters were hiding out at the Executive Inn, a commuter hotel near the airport, where they. We always used my stepfather's name, Porter, growing up, even though we were never legally adopted. Audrey was born after her family moved from Russia to the United States. And she said, "June Oswald?" I would have liked for him to have his day in court. He avoided deportation by attempting suicide and was sent to Minsk, where he met Marina. Thanks for the video; I'd never seen it before. Well, they say it just takes a second to die. Now Lees voice rose again. (At the time, I didnt realize he hadnt graduated from high school.) A: Mom kept us together. Marina waved goodbye from the steps. Would I mind coming over? Rachel loved listening to that. Q: Where do you stand today as far as your perception of what really happened out there in Dealey Plaza? Oswald, after all, fled the Texas School Book Depository by Dallass notably unreliable public-transportation system. Obviously, if I'd wanted to share that I would have told everyone a long time ago. Lee Harvey Oswald was a former U.S. Marine who was accused of killing President John F. Kennedy. She continued watching the broadcast until the agents had to rush her out so she could attend her own husbands funeral at the Rose Hill Cemetery. We were studying the Presidents. Marina's daughter, June Oswald, spoke with NBC in 1993 about her family. As the University of Michigan Heritage Project notes, she was only 22 years old, with two young children, when she was widowed. Kate is a bit of a tomboy and a . The Mind of Oswald, p.171, Trafford on Demand Pub. I made Lee guilty," she said at the time. Probably the only other people in America who have to routinely see film images of their father being killed are the children of President Kennedy. She blew a long stream of smoke toward the ceiling, Kinda strange, huh?. Porter was born on the 17th day of July in the year 1941 in Severodvinsk, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union. Most Texans resent this with a passion, and many of them blame Rachels father. There was more I wanted to ask, but it was clear from her face that she was wondering if she hadnt shared too much already. By Melissa De Witte Those alive when John F. Kennedy was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963, remember where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news the president had been shot. You will be able to leave a comment after signing in, political justice, conspiracy/truth, music, law, Bible prophecy, quote name='John Geraghty' date='May 13 2006, 02:49 PM' post='62308']. The director of the Miller Funeral Home was a man named Paul Groody. Anyway, the only person I knew up there was Priscilla Johnson McMillan, who wrote my mother's book. Texas. "Now she's a widow, too," said newspaper headlines across the country. Anyone can read what you share. Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. I was certainly relieved to hear that the Oswalds were doing well, and I assumed, from the spelling and punctuation mistakes, that Marina had written the letter and was getting the hang of English. Spencer Hawk (Gupi) Bio, Age, Songs, Parents, Net worth. As the familys translator of choice, my father was now part of the plan to get the Oswald women out of the dingy hotel room and into a safe house that Robert had arranged at his in-laws farm, north of the city, so Marina could be questioned. Some of you may not have read June (Oswald) Porter's 1995 interview and might find it of interest. A week and a half after his return, he went to the 15th floor of the Continental Life Building in downtown Fort Worth. Connie Chung Bio, Age, Husband, Net worth, Daughter, Younger. I guess it was easier for him to believe that I was insane than that Lee was my father. So I called my staff in, a group of 10 or so, and I said: "Yes, that is me in the article. It was 7 a.m. on Sunday when the single phone at the bottom of the stairs echoed through my parents red-brick house, right off Monticello Park in Fort Worth. A few of the regulars.. I think he was checking me out because I look very much like my father, and think he was trying to feel for my dad by looking at me. We were just trying to be a normal family. I have a copy of an earlier interview with June from 1983. I asked what it was like being named Oswald and growing up so close to Dallas. A good person. Q: Did you ever take the so-called assassination tour? Q: I'm sure there must have been a lot of unusual incidents as you were growing up. Seated from left to right are: Lee Harvey Oswald's wife, Marina, holding their daughter June; his . . Lee Harvey Oswald was alleged to have murdered the 35th president of the United States of America, John Fitzgerald Kennedy. U.S. National Archives A young Marina Oswald during her years living in Minsk. Thinking, Two, Feet. So this little boy she was going with, his parents were going to come get her and they were going to go to the dance. My father asked Oswald to translate passages from a Russian book he chose at random, and he was surprised at how well the young man performed. While in police custody, Oswald was murdered by Jack Ruby. I nodded that I appreciated the distinction. It was distributed by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate. For the time being, he was treating her better, but she did not know for how long. However, not long after their marriage, Oswald became disillusioned with life in the USSR, and the family returned to the U.S., living in Dallas, and New Orleans. I asked Rachel how many people in the bar knew who she was. A: I think there definitely is circumstantial evidence that could imply he had something to do with it because of the characters he was hanging out with in New Orleans. Lee Harvey Oswald. With Oswald dead, Marinas testimony became even more important, and the Secret Service immediately diverted the group to the nearby Inn of the Six Flags, ushering everyone into adjoining rooms 423 and 424. A: I've never publicly said one way or the other for sure. But when he walked into the restaurant, he had come straight from rehearsal and seemed really tired - they were doing the scene where Lee was held in jail - and he was wearing the same white T-shirt and blue overshirt that Lee had been wearing, his hair was cut like Lees, and the way he walked - he looked exactly like him. We usually left with only one bag of groceries, which kept the Oswalds going for a week. My father helped Lee and his young family get settled in Fort Worth a year earlier. "We have to get the Government to move before it's too late.". A: I don't have a comment on it as far as its conclusions because I haven't read them, but I did start the book. Until I was 23, I didnt even know there were alternative theories. Q: How did you feel about being singled out? Upon entering public school, June took the surname of her stepfather, Kenneth Porter, who married Marina in 1965. The following day, an agent named Mike Howard picked my father up and . That didn't set well with me. He was too difficult and unreliable. She was pretty strong. And then at one point, while hes asking my mother questions about Lee, he starts to cry. Marina had always seemed eager to impress on me the finer points of grammar during our Russian conversations. I didn't break down and cry or anything. She his always felt really bogged down by it. I listened uncomfortably, sensing his hostility at me for suggesting that he, a self-styled intellectual keeping a Historic Diary, could not write or punctuate any better than someone just learning English. Additionally, she gave birth to her second daughter and named her Audrey Marina Rachel Oswald. It was so exciting, you know, me being a young woman and everything. The conversation segued to the Time cover; Marina ventured that the president appeared to be a nice man and that the first lady, at least from the pictures she had seen, appeared quite glamorous. Q: Your childhood doesn't sound like it was easy. Thanks for this. We beg you not to think ill of us.. And again, in 1996,she claimed that she was part of the system that had railroaded her deceased husband, whom she claimed was a patsy, according to The Independent. 17 Copy quote. It features interviews with Rachel Oswald Porter and June Oswald Porter, the daughters of Marina and Lee Harvey Oswald, who were raised by their mother and their adoptive father, Kenneth Jess Porter. All of our family pictures were confiscated.. Oswald was born two months after his fathers death; his mother subsequently remarried for three years, but the family moved frequently between 1939 and 1956. Marina did her best to disappear into obscurity once the dust had settled on her husband's crimes and subsequent murder. My father, who was then 59, translated furiously. Are you able to maintain the same detachment when you see that? Lee, who controlled the budget, would then haggle over prices, particularly with meat. One guy tracked me down to the Chili Parlor and for a while was coming in several nights a week. Tippit, who believed that Oswald resembled the suspect already being described over the police radio. Moreover, Marina is convinced that her mobile phones are tapped by the Secret Service and the Secret Service wants to assassinate her. Now he is the author of The Oswalds: An Untold Account of Marina and Lee, out on Nov. 15 with Diversion Books. Cuban intelligence officers, a K.G.B. Over a final round of drinks we started talking about the movie JFK. I asked her what she thought of Gary Oldmans portrayal of her father. She needed a translator fast. He was short and wiry, his hairline noticeably receding, and he spoke with a Southern accent, not Texan, perhaps a relic of time spent in New Orleans during his youth. She stays with her second husband who is called Kenneth Jess Porter. And we got to President Kennedy and I was told to go across the hall during that one. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. I always felt that the Cubans were being pushed into the Soviet Bloc by American policy. In the year 1965, the widow got married to a man named Kenneth Jess Porter. One guy I told actually thought I was crazy. What Happened To Lee Harvey Oswald's Wife? A: The first time l saw it l was very upset, but it gets to the point where it almost becomes unreal, this movie you're watching that has very little to do with you as a person. officers (including, supposedly, members of Nixons plumbers team) have somehow been tied to Oswalds actions that day, but its difficult to understand how these conspiracy theories would have worked. But it was still depressing, seeing my father shot every time I came to work.. I guess they decided we must be a certain way and then wrote it. See, this is the difference. My husband couldn't have cared less. Oswald's wife Marina, two daughters, brother Robert and mother Marguerite were the only mourners. This, we reasoned, would be better for my language skills and help Marina learn the city. Oswald told his wife about the assassination attempt, but she never told authorities before Kennedys death. I'm a strong woman, but I don't know if I could've kept myself together. Diane Holloway, Lee Harvey Oswald, Bob Cheney (2008). If he allowed Marina to learn English, he said, his Russian would suffer, and it was very important that he retain his fluency. I asked her what else she remembered about growing up. She told me that there was going to be a movie made about the assassination and asked if I wanted to have lunch that afternoon with Oliver Stone and Kevin Costner - my mother didnt even know who they were - and I was thinking to myself, Oh, my gosh, Im going to have lunch with Oliver Stone and Kevin Costner! So we meet them at a Chinese restaurant. By Steve Salerno. Diane Holloway, Lee Harvey Oswald (2000). It was hilarious. When I read the script, I was really angry. Later in the evening, Bouhe and Meller began to insist that Marina needed to learn English if she was to survive in America. There was a bill passed at the end of the Bush Administration that required all Government agencies to review their files for any information related to the assassination and to release it - unless they felt there were matters of national security or a couple of other issues. . By October, Oswald had found his own room and, with the help of Marina's landlady, had found work at the Texas School Book Depository. The assassination has also been a constant in the life of June Oswald Porter, the 33-year-old daughter of Lee Harvey Oswald. Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 - November 24, 1963) would become infamous for his involvement in the fatal shooting of John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. They had a son and now live in a central Texas town, not far from Dallas. I know that in my life, Lee wasn't a good man. Before we even set a fee, Marina agreed to see me twice a week. She took on the name Marina Oswald Porter, and the family moved to Richardson, Texas. 2 Her mother died a few years after Marguerite was born leaving her and five other young children in the care of their father, a streetcar conductor.3 Although . Nevertheless, Marina was not implicated in the assassination but testified against Lee Harvey during the Warren Commission hearings. A single armed detective patrolled the grounds as Marina chain-smoked and drank coffee and was asked questions about Lees rifle, a photo of him holding the assassination weapon and his various associates. An analysis by Mark McClishPosted January 3, 2013. A competent sharpshooter but an indifferent marine, he began expressing pro-Soviet and politically radical views and, on a hardship plea, secured release from the corps on September 11, 1959. "The Mind of Oswald", p.171, Trafford on Demand Pub. Kate O'Brien (Christa Miller) - Friends with Drew, Lewis, and Oswald since they were kids. Listen as Dan Rather reports on the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby on November 24, 1963, assassination of John F. Kennedy: The capture and death of Oswald, Encounter Walter Cronkite through his CBS News special commentary on the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald and on the Warren Commission. By found it I meant that I was looking back through the forum pages and this was posted first in 2004 so I decided to bring it back up to peoples attention. As they ordered their lunch, my father tried to engage Oswald about his wife and life in contemporary Russia, but the young man volunteered little about how a former Marine and Fort Worth resident could end up in Minsk other than to say enigmatically that he had gone to the Soviet Union on my own. Upon parting, Oswald offered the address and telephone number of his brother Robert, with whom he and his wife were staying, just in case anything came up. So I sat across the hall in a time-out room. Stevie Ray Vaughan was turned up loud on the radio. A: Yes and no. (The issue, which would curiously remain in the same place during all my visits, was dated Jan. 5, five months before the Oswalds arrival in the U.S.) We sat there uncomfortably for some 20 to 30 minutes until Lee burst in the door, dressed in his customary simple slacks, a plaid shirt with open collar and sleeves rolled up to the elbows, carrying a stack of weighty books from the Fort Worth public library. The couple wed within a few weeks, and eventually had a daughter. She studied gymnastics and ballet, made good grades, was a varsity cheerleader, and was even voted most popular student by her classmates. "Personal Quotes/ Biography". She hinted at physical abuse and explained that she had left him only to reconcile after he pleaded for her to attend Thanksgiving at his brothers house. She got all caught up, because she wants so badly to have this identification with her father. The wall build around Oswald's family women was intense after Dallas. I have a bachelors degree in natural sciences. But over the course of those months, it became harder for him to convince her of his exceptionalism. Both girls grew up with the shame of being the children of a despised assassin. by certain people in the critical communiity, so no wonder they are a bit gunshy. MORE THAN 30 YEARS AFTER the Kennedy assassination, Lee Harvey Oswald is a name that will not go away. In June 1962, he, his wife, and their daughter were allowed to leave Russia, and they moved to Fort Worth, Texas. A: I don't have any real memories of those ages. The first time I met Gary, she said, I was visiting my mother in Dallas. Lee Harvey Oswald (1939-1963) was the assassin of John F. Kennedy, unless even if you believe the claims of the conspiracy theorists. After a couple of months of lessons, my parents Russian migr circle became curious about my new friends. The writers never talked to me or my sister about our lives. She needed a translator fast. I mean, things werent completely normal. These women were left with a horrible legacy and have no doubt tried to separate their father from his legend- father as Lone Nut, a disgrace or Government worker and valiant spy, patsy? Over the years, though, Marina began to shy away from making public statements about her deceased husband. Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 - November 24, 1963) was, according to five government investigations, the sniper who assassinated U.S. President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963.. A former U.S. Marine who lived in the Soviet Union for almost 3 years, Oswald was first arrested for the murder of police officer J. D. Tippit (1924-1963), who had been shot on a Dallas . Lee was intelligent, but he was no genius. Eventually, she retired. During a trip to the Fort Worth Botanic Garden, Oswald exuded an air of optimism. (Lee was one of several suitors back in Minsk.) I've never seen her act like that, like she needed to become more of a crusader, and it's taking its toll. Marina asked her husband why he would attempt to murder someone: "I mean how dare you to go and claim somebody's life," she reportedly said. It was just kind of eerie. We are very close - except when these kinds of things come up. After I insisted, she said she had never had such a sum of money in her life and planned to go right to Montgomery Ward. But a week and a half later, after I returned to my parents home for Thanksgiving, I answered our single phone at the bottom of the staircase. A: No. But as a true patriot of his adopted country, he was wary of her husband for leaving the U.S. for the Soviet Union. Dear Paul! it read, We have moved to Dallas where we have found a nice apartment and I have found work in a very nice place, we would like you too [sic] come and see us as soon as you get a chance, before eventually signing off in Russian. He sold an article for an astronomical amount back then - I think it was $25,000. The widow is approximately 5 feet 5 inches (1.65 meters). He said things when we were together like he really wanted to have children because "that would be the blood of Lee Harvey Oswald that was flowing through the kids.". The Mind of Oswald, p.164, Trafford on Demand Pub. I do blame him for having beat my mother, and not being a good father or a good provider. When I reached him by phone at his home, he had the wary tone of a man who has spent half a century answering for someone else. I drive a beat-up car. Nevertheless, Marina was not implicated in the assassination but testified against Lee Harvey during the Warren Commission hearings. Marina then told me she was unhappy. Oswald took a bus and a taxi to his rooming house, departed, and about a mile away was stopped by Patrolman J.D. Earlier that morning, my father, a successful petroleum engineer, received a call from a young man who wanted certification of fluency in Russian. In one of the most shocking crimes in the 20th century, and in perhaps all of U.S. history, an assassin shot and killed the 35th President of the United States, John F. Kennedy.