Re: Missing the first shot

Andrew,

> Tina Towner finished shooting a second before Zapruder started filming
> (about 18 frames before z133 if his camera had been running). Towner
> said that the turned around and started walking back to the corner and
> was putting her camera away when the first shot occurred. She wrote a
> letter to the 6th floor museum, aparently (according to Gary Mack) and
> said that the shot was about 4-6 seconds after she stopped filming.
>  z200 is just under 5 seconds after she stopped filming.
Where did you get this information? That=92s not how Gary Mack repeats
her description: =93Tina has always been specific that the first shot
came just a second or two AFTER she stopped filming; she actually
stopped only a second or two before Z133.=94 As you can see from this
equation the sound must have happened at z133.

> Keep in mind that she [Virgie Baker] is standing on Elm in front of
> the TSBD and looking down the road. So past the Stemmons sign
> for Baker is much further down Elm than for Zapruder.
There is a tendency to look at witness testimony as all correct or all
wrong. More often witness testimony is a mix of accurate perception
and misperception. The key point with Baker is she saw someting hit
the pavement at the sound of the first shot. Her depth perception may
not be so good.

> Yes, if the first "firecracker" was the first shot. Many. Or are you
> suggesting that there was a real firecracker as well as shots?
> Do you think that anyone thought the first loud noise that they
> thought (at the time) was a firecracker was actually a firecracker
> and not a shot?
I think many of these witnesses focus on the second sound because it
is the one where they realize it=92s a gunshot, not a backfire and not a
firecracker. The first sound is dismissed by the mind as harmless.
With the second sound the awful realization is a gunshot, and someone
is trying to kill the President of the United States right before
their eyes in their own hometown. That realization is a shock to their
sensibility. Next is the horror of seeing the wounds to the President.
This terrible sight affected the Newmans to where they saw things that
didn=92t happen. Bill Newman=92s testimony in the Clay Shaw trial
disintegrated on the stand. Investigators have to sift through all
witness testimony to piece the puzzle together.

If the President does not react to the first sound, or reacts with a
normal movement, such as raising his right hand to his head, there is
no clue that someting is wrong. On the second sound JFK clinches his
fists and lifts his elbows looking straight ahead. Obviously
something=92s wrong inside the Limousine., and the crowd suddenly
realizes there is a problem. With the awful head shot the crowd is now
in shock. The collective memory perceives a problem beginning with the
second sound, not the first sound.

>>> Again, you have to use real evidence. No one found particles on the
>>> President that were actually shown to be cement. This grey powder may
>>> have been his own aspirated brain cells.
>> The mortuary employees said it was cement. Do aspirated brain cells
>> turn to powder or become gritty like cement?
> I don't know. Do you? Did they analyse the material?
No, its your theory. I don=92t know what aspirated brain matter looks
like or feels like. I do know what cement powder-grit looks and feels
like, and I would think most people do too.