by Jerry Organ
Zapruder's camera recorded the limosuine just after its turn from Houston
onto Elm. The big Lincoln Contintental breifly went behind a highway sign
between Zapruder and the vehicle. As the car's occupants re-emerged, the
film captured a peculiar sight--in broad daylight, a man on the sidewalk
was holding aloft an open umbrella.
Early on, researchers speculated the umbrella was a firing signal--it would
be featured as such at the suggestion of Groden in the JFK movie. Massachusetts
researcher Robert Cutler developed the fantastic theory that the umbrella
was a weapon designed to fire a poison dart at JFK in order to paralyze
him for a fatal gunshot. The CIA has developed similar disguised dartguns,
and an assassination in Europe employed an umbrella with a poison tip.
Men in Texas were not known to use umbrellas against the sun.
It had rained that morning, so some may have had umbrellas in hand, but
why open it? Why pump it up and down as the limousine goes by?
A Dallas man named Steven Witt appeared at the 1978 HSCA hearings,
claiming to be the "Umbrella Man." Witt said he took the umbrella
to Dealey Plaza as a rightwing protest against Kennedy's "softness"
on communism. The symbolism came from Neville Chamberlain's appeasement
of Hitler, in which cartoonists portrayed Britain being shielded by Chamberlain's
trademark umbrella. Prior to WWII, Joseph Kennedy was Ambassador to England;
he encouraged Chamberlain's efforts.
Is Witt the Umbrella Man?
Ron Ecker has an interesting
site on the Umbrella Man, concluding the mystery has "no definitive
answer."
Dave Reitzes notes the JFK
movie totally ignored Steven Witt's claims.
One of the all-time great conspiracy scenarios--did the umbrella fire
a dart at the President?
CopWeb (Marcel Dehaeseleer) argues the
man next to the Umbrella Man is Orlando Bosch Avila.
Digital design and contents:
(c) Copyright 2004 Jerry Organ.
All rights reserved.
Photographs have individual copyright.
