20-07-2017, 11:52 PM
Larry,
Geneva Hine's comment about the lights going out & phones going dead conjured up ideas about someone flipping a master TSBD power switch as the President's limousine was approaching. I remember this issue was clarified at Lancer about 2009, that the lights she was referring to were the plastic Lucite display lights on telephones that offices used in the early 60's to accomodate several near-simultaneous incoming calls.
And you're correct about the lack of a switchboard at 411 Elm: (VI, p. 395)
BALL: Was there a switchboard?
HINE: No, sir; we have a telephone with three incoming lines, then we have the warehouse line and we have an intercom system.
BALL: You don't have a switchboard?
HINE: Not now; we did in the other building.
I believe she is referring to the 1st floor of the Dal-Tex, where the TSBD Company had its clerical offices from about 1952-1962. The old Houston St. warehouse may or may not have had a switchboard. It seems likely that by November 1963 it did not have one. And it is likely that the Dal-Tex switchboard was still in existence.
The Dal-Tex switchboard probably still tied into the 411 Elm phone lines, but in an inactive mode, when the TSBD Company relocated its clerical offices to the 2nd-floor central offices at 411 Elm.
So there exists a probability that somebody monkeyed with the switchboard circuitry to get the phone connection deadened as the limousine approached.
The only alternative I've considered is that a small group of bogus callers all stopped calling about 12:29.
It is rather odd that the 411 Elm phones would go dead as the killers readied their trigger fingers. Just a typical military overkill precautionary move, leaving nothing to chance.
Geneva Hine's comment about the lights going out & phones going dead conjured up ideas about someone flipping a master TSBD power switch as the President's limousine was approaching. I remember this issue was clarified at Lancer about 2009, that the lights she was referring to were the plastic Lucite display lights on telephones that offices used in the early 60's to accomodate several near-simultaneous incoming calls.
And you're correct about the lack of a switchboard at 411 Elm: (VI, p. 395)
BALL: Was there a switchboard?
HINE: No, sir; we have a telephone with three incoming lines, then we have the warehouse line and we have an intercom system.
BALL: You don't have a switchboard?
HINE: Not now; we did in the other building.
I believe she is referring to the 1st floor of the Dal-Tex, where the TSBD Company had its clerical offices from about 1952-1962. The old Houston St. warehouse may or may not have had a switchboard. It seems likely that by November 1963 it did not have one. And it is likely that the Dal-Tex switchboard was still in existence.
The Dal-Tex switchboard probably still tied into the 411 Elm phone lines, but in an inactive mode, when the TSBD Company relocated its clerical offices to the 2nd-floor central offices at 411 Elm.
So there exists a probability that somebody monkeyed with the switchboard circuitry to get the phone connection deadened as the limousine approached.
The only alternative I've considered is that a small group of bogus callers all stopped calling about 12:29.
It is rather odd that the 411 Elm phones would go dead as the killers readied their trigger fingers. Just a typical military overkill precautionary move, leaving nothing to chance.