Dan Rather's first three televised descriptions of the first version of the Zapruder film, 25/11/63

[Paul Rigby]

C) Third description of the Zapruder film

Broadcast at 2026hrs, EST, duration approximately 3 mins 26 secs.*

[video=youtube_share;kiSoxFHyjGY]http://youtu.be/kiSoxFHyjGY[/video]

Transcript of the third description on line: http://www.etcfilmunit.com/Cronkite.html

I-Accuse.com

1. The films we saw were taken by an amateur photographer, who had a particularly good vantage point, just past the building from which the fatal shot was fired.
2. The films show President Kennedy's open, black limousine, making a left turn, off Houston Street on to Elm Street on the fringe of downtown Dallas, a left turn made just below the window in which the assassin was waiting.
3. About 35 yards past the very base of the building, just below the window, President Kennedy could be seen to, to put his right hand up to the side of his head to, either brush back his hair or perhaps rub his eyebrow.
4. President Kennedy was sitting on the same side of the car as the building from which the shot came.
5. Mrs. Kennedy was by his side.
6. In the jump seat in front of him, Mrs. Connally, and Governor Connally, Governor Connally on the same side of the car as the president.
7. And in the front seat, two Secret Service men.
8. Just as the president put that right hand up to the side of his head, he, you could see him, lurch forward.
9. The first shot had hit him.
10. Mrs. Kennedy was looking in another direction, and apparently didn't see, or sense that first shot, or didn't hear it.
11. But Governor Connally, in the seat in front, appeared to have heard it, or at least sensed that something was wrong.
12. The Governor's coat was open.
13. He, he reached back in this fashion, exposing his white shirt front to the assassin's window, reached back as if to, to offer aid or ask the president something.
14. At that moment, a shot clearly hit the governor, in the front, and he fell back in his seat.
15. Mrs. Connally immediately threw herself over him in a protective position.
16. In the next instant, with this time Mrs. Kennedy apparently looking on, a second shot, the third total shot, hit the president's head.
17. He, his head can be seen to move violently forward.
18. And, Mrs. Kennedy stood up immediately; the president leaned over her way.
19. It appeared that he might have brushed her legs.
20. Mrs. Kennedy then, literall,y went on the top of the trunk, of the Lincoln car, put practically her whole body on the trunk.
21. It, it appeared she might have been on all fours, there, reaching out for the Secret Service man, the lone Secret Service man who was riding on the bumper of the car, the back bumper on Mrs. Kennedy's side.
22. The Secret Service man leaned forward and put his hands on Mrs. Kennedy's shoulder to push her back into the car.
23. She was in some danger, it appeared, of rolling off or falling off.
24. And when we described this before, there was some question about what we meant by Mrs. Kennedy being on the trunk of the car.
25. Only she knows, but it appeared that she was trying desperately to, to get the Secret Service man's attention or perhaps to help pull him into the car.
26. The car never stopped, it never paused.
27. In the front seat, a Secret Service man was, was on the telephone.
28. The car picked up speed, and disappeared beneath an underpass.
29. This is Dan Rather in Dallas.

*Ken Rheberg: "Dan Rather described the Zapruder film THREE separate times on CBS-TV Monday 11/25/63. The final report was televised at approximately 8:26PM EST."

Source: http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index....6&p=262821
Post #249, 17 November 2012, within the thread: Was Muchmore's film shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on November 26, 1963?

It should be noted that Gary Mack offered an earlier time for the broadcast of this third description, and I have, at present, no means of knowing which is correct.

Gary Mack, "The $8,000,000 Man," The Continuing Enquiry, 22 August 1980, (Vol 5, No 1), 3: 6:30 PM, EST
http://digitalcollec...o-jones/id/1181

It is perfectly possible that there was at least one more Rather description of the first version of the Zapruder film, and a very interesting one at that.

According to an intriguing passage from a 2009 Black Op Radio appearance of John Barbour*, producer of the Garrison Tapes documentary, there was this broadcast to be added to the list:

Oh, I have a lot of footage. I have some stunning footage. I got, I got a piece of footage that I would have loved to have put in there, and I could never get it in there. And it's footage of Dan Rather.

You know Dan Rather was just a local reporter in Dallas at the time. Now how is it that Dan Rather, a local reporter, gets to go on CBS News to describe the Zapruder film - the Zapruder film which is in the hands of the Federal Government - and then goes on the air to lie about it? And the lie I'm telling you about is this.

I have him in a kinescope on television. He's on CBS evening news and you see the motor vehicle moving and he's describing everything that Jackie Kennedy's wearing, the little pea-pod hat, the little pink outfit, the little roses on her lapel, describing what Kennedy's wearing, describing everything that Connally has, got a little hat in his hand, describing everything, and he's absolutely right in what he's describing.

Then it comes to the time of the fatal shot. And he stops the Zapruder film and he looks into the camera. And he says: "This is too gruesome for you to see so I just have to describe what is happening. There is a gunshot. John Kennedy is struck in the back of the head and thrown violently forward." Now I'll tell you how I came across this film.

I was a lecturer at a university and some students got a hold of this film. Then they got a hold of the Zapruder film, and they ran Dan Rather's audio over the Zapruder film, so you can see the man is obviously lying, because the gunshot hits him in the right temple, he's thrown violently backwards, half of the skull is thrown out the left rear and on to a motorcycle cop, part of the skull is in the back and Jackie jumps out to grab it to bring it to the hospital in hopes she can repair her husband's shattered head. And the College students, eighteen or nineteen years of age, start hooting and hollering that Dan Rather is a liar. You never saw that on the news. You never saw anybody report about how this guy lied; and nobody ever confronted him.

I never got that into the documentary. It would have made it too long. Because I was trying to tell Jim's story and that's a different story. If I ever get round to part II, part II will be about the extensive media cover-up…

If Barbour was - is - right, and Rather did appear on CBS Evening News on Monday, November 25, 1963, accompanied by some or all of the Zapruder film, the orthodox history of the film and its chain of possession is, irrespective of the version shown, a corpse, and its advocates discredited.

I emailed John Barbour in an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a DVD copy of the kinescope in question. If any one has a better line of communication with him, please try again.

*Black Op radio, show #435, August 6, 2009, 44:40 until 47:36.
It used to be available, but is no longer, at this link:
http://www.blackopra...chives2009.html
The show in question is still obtainable, though on disc only, at the following:
http://www.blackopra...m/products.html