William and Gayle Newman, who were both 22 years old on November 22, 1963, were probably the closest witnesses to President John F. Kennedy when he was assassinated by rifle fire in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas.
The Newmans and their two young boys were standing at the curb on the north side of Elm Street when they became witnesses to one of the most horrific and most-talked-about events in world history--the murder of President Kennedy.
Immediately after the assassination, the Newman family was driven to Dallas television station WFAA-TV to be interviewed. At approximately 12:50 PM CST on 11/22/63, which was only about twenty minutes after the President had been slain, Bill and Gayle Newman were telling their story on live television to WFAA program director Jay Watson.
The WFAA-TV interviews with the Newmans can be seen in the video below:
In the second of his two WFAA interviews on November 22, Bill Newman said he heard only two shots fired during the assassination. And in his 11/22/63 affidavit, Newman said that the "shot" (singular) had come from "directly behind me"....which, of course, is NOT the picket fence area of the famous grassy knoll.
As the Charles Bronson photograph shown below illustrates, "directly behind" Bill Newman would have put a shooter a little to the EAST of Abraham Zapruder in the pergola area. And nobody I've ever encountered thinks any shots came from there:
Obviously, Bill Newman was confused and was wrong about two major things: The number of shots that were fired and the location of the gunman who was firing those shots that he heard.
In addition, both Bill and Gayle Newman are very good witnesses when it comes to supporting the truth about the location of where the large exit wound was located on President Kennedy's head. And as far as I am aware, Bill and Gayle Newman are the only witnesses who ever provided this much first-hand detail about the key issue of WHERE on JFK's head the large wound was located.
[NOTE / EDIT --- Abraham Zapruder was another witness who, on the day of the assassination, clearly indicated that the President had a big hole in the right SIDE portion of his head, and not the right REAR part of his head.]
Both Bill and Gayle stated on live WFAA-TV on 11/22/63 (within literally minutes of the assassination) that they both saw blood coming from the RIGHT SIDE of JFK's head, with Gayle Newman providing even more graphic details during the second of her two interviews with WFAA's Jay Watson:
"President Kennedy reached up and grabbed--looked like grabbed his ear--and blood just started gushing out." -- Gayle Newman; 11/22/63
Now, via the above graphic description [and accompanying photo from Gayle Newman's November 22 WFAA-TV appearance] of blood "gushing out" of JFK's head, I think it's fairly obvious that Mrs. Newman was NOT seeing blood gushing from the BACK of President Kennedy's head. She saw blood gushing from the RIGHT SIDE of his head, near his "ear", as Mrs. Newman said. And that is just exactly what we see in Abraham Zapruder's film of the assassination:
Bill Newman stated that a bullet had hit the President "in the side of the temple" (with Bill pointing to his own left temple when he said those words). But that erroneous statement is perfectly natural and acceptable under the circumstances.
At the time he made his "in the side of the temple" remark on WFAA-TV, Bill Newman was making the incorrect assumption that the place where he saw the large amount of blood on JFK's head was the same location where the bullet must have ENTERED the President's head.
But, as any doctor or pathologist will tell you, just the opposite is the truth in most cases of gunshot wounds, with the EXIT hole being the large, bloody wound, while the entry hole is most often very small and fairly clean and blood-free.
In the final analysis, Mr. and Mrs. William E. Newman are actually very solid witnesses in support of the official lone-assassin version of the assassination of President Kennedy.
David Von Pein
November 2010
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ADDENDUM #1:
JAMES FETZER SAID [LINK]:
None of this is rocket science, but it requires applied intelligence and serious study to work though the "smoke and mirrors" that those like Arlen Specter and Dave Von Pein have been trading in for all of these years. What disturbs me is not that they are willing to place politics before truth but that so many students of JFK continue to be willing to contemplate the possibility of a "magic bullet" or that the backyard photographs are genuine or that the Zapruder film is authentic--even to this very day!
DAVID VON PEIN SAID [LINK]:
What part of JFK's head did Gayle Newman say blood was "gushing" from, Mr. Fetzer?
Here's a visual hint:
Here's another hint:
http://DVP-Potpourri.blogspot.com/Newman Interviews
And here's a third hint (via the film that Prof. Fetzer thinks has been "altered", with a red "blob" being added to the film, which just happens to perfectly coincide with the exact place on JFK's head where Gayle Newman, within ONE HOUR of the assassination, said she saw blood "gushing" from; yes, I know that Gayle also said that it looked to her as if JFK had "grabbed his ear", which he never did; but her observation about WHERE on JFK's head she saw the gushing blood is the key point here, which is in perfect harmony with what we see in the Zapruder Film, a film that a super-kook named Fetzer thinks has been "wholly fabricated").
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ADDENDUM #2:
DAVID LIFTON SAID (VIA AN E-MAIL
SENT TO SOMEBODY ELSE):
It seems to me that, when it comes to the Newmans, DVP is just a flat out liar. (Would you not agree?)
FYI: In November, 1971, I was in Dallas and spent an evening with the Newmans--both of them. I had a SONY tape recorder. There was no question in their minds that the shots came from "above and behind" them--and by that they were talking about the area directly behind where they were standing, just as they indicated in their original interviews.
Guys like DVP are committed to a false reality, and will bend the English language to support their misconception.
I really do believe he's just a garden variety liar.
DSL
DAVID VON PEIN THEN SAID [LINK]:
David "ALL SHOTS CAME FROM THE FRONT" Lifton,
I take offense at being labelled a "garden variety liar" by you. When it comes to people who are "committed to a false reality" in the JFK case, it's certainly not me who falls into that category. It's you.
As for the Newmans, just take a look at the Bronson slide. At the time of the head shot, what location is "directly behind" the Newman family?
Answer: the pergola/peristyle area -- NOT the famous Grassy Knoll/picket fence shooting location that you conspiracy kooks love so well.
William Newman is on record (within 25 minutes of the assassination) saying that he thought there were TWO shots, with both of those shots coming from "behind" him from the direction of the "garden" behind him, which is not the picket fence area (like it or not).
And Newman is even more specific in his 11/22/63 affidavit, when he said that the "shot" had come from "directly behind me". And there's no doubt that his "directly behind me" remark was referring to the HEAD SHOT, and Mr. Newman even confirms that fact in his 2003 interview at the Sixth Floor Museum.
And during that 2003 interview, Newman goes into even more detail about his observations (Part 2, linked below, at the 6:20 mark), when Bill Newman says that his opinion about the direction from which the head shot came was derived more from the "visual impact that it had on me more so than the noise".
Newman saw the right side of JFK's head explode, and he immediately interpreted that VISUAL experience (incorrectly) as a bullet that struck the President in the right-front (temple) area of his head. And Newman explicitly says that very thing in this 2003 interview:
So, Mr. Lifton, is Bill Newman lying in the above video when he states that it was more what he SAW than what he HEARD which caused him to believe that the head shot had come from "behind" him?
DVP
7/17/11
[2003 INTERVIEW EXCERPT WITH BILL NEWMAN]
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ADDENDUM #3:
PAT SPEER SAID [LINK]:
You shock me, DVP. In your laundry list of Newman statements, you left out his testimony in the 86 mock trial, in which he marked a map of Dealey showing the area from which he assumed the shots had been fired.
DAVID VON PEIN THEN SAID [LINK]:
Pat,
You mean you actually want to BELIEVE something that somebody said at that mock trial in '86, a trial that virtually all CTers think was nothing but a "sham" and a "farce"? You shock me, Pat. :)
I'm also a little confused about your post in another sense, Pat -- Was your post about Newman's 1986 map supposed to be a "dig" at me? I.E., did you think you were actually supporting a "Grassy Knoll" gunman in your Newman post?
Because if that is what you were attempting to do, you'd better go back and look at Newman's map again -- because Newman marked that map in a place where NO conspiracy theorist believes any shots came from. He marked it in an area that is to the EAST of the pergola that was behind him when the shooting occurred.
He certainly didn't mark the traditional "picket fence" or "Grassy Knoll" areas of the Plaza. Not even close. Here is where Newman marked the map, which is a point in the Plaza that would have been located to the LEFT-rear (or northeast) of William Newman:
When all of Bill Newman's testimony and interviews over the years is assessed, it's pretty obvious that Newman is NOT a really good "conspiracy" or "Grassy Knoll" witness at all. He heard TWO shots, both from "directly behind me" (per his 11/22/63 affidavit), and he admitted in his Oral History interview in Dallas in 2003 that he was basing his determination about a gunman being "behind" him more on a VISUAL sense rather than the SOUND of the gunshot(s).
And then we have him marking a map in 1986 that would have a shooter located near the Elm Street service road at the FAR-EAST side of the pergola, which isn't even close to the popular Grassy Knoll area.
Conspiracy theorists, of course, love to distort things. And it appears to me that they've done just that when it comes to the comments made by William E. Newman. (And Lee Bowers too.)
David Von Pein
July 18, 2011
PHOTOS DEPICTING THE NEWMANS
JUST AFTER THE ASSASSINATION
ON NOVEMBER 22, 1963
(Click To Enlarge):
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