The area behind the picket fence (and a bit about Lee Bowers)

[Lance Payette]

This is not an LN or CT post, merely informational.

When I visited Dealey Plaza in 1987, I was struck (like everyone else) by how compact it is. Our visit was brief, and I paid no attention to anything behind the picket fence or TSBD.

The six-minute YouTube video below, from a couple of years ago, is quite interesting. Beginning at about the 3-minute mark, the photographer (obviously an LN proponent) spends considerable time panning the entire area behind the picket fence and TSBD. It’s fascinating (to me) how utterly wide open it is.

I was also struck by Lee Bowers’ tower, which is both lower and farther back than most written materials tend to suggest. It is Interlocking Tower 106 of the railroad and was put into service in 1916. It is now owned by the Sixth Floor Museum and was renovated in the 2000s. It is 14 feet high, and the Warren Commission said it sits “approximately 50 yards from the back of the TSBD.”

This short TikTok video pans forward to the picket fence and says “150 yards” to it: https://www.tiktok.com/@solvingjfk/video/7203459605299547435. Anyway, it’s quite a distance. Below the YouTube video is a photograph with red lines purporting to show Bowers’ line of sight to the motorcade. If nothing else, it helps orient us to where everything is located.

There seem to be virtually no contemporaneous photos of Bowers’ view. The black and white image below is the only one I could find, and it’s not clear that it’s actually from Tower 106.

If there’s any LN-orientation to this post, I guess I might question Bowers’ ability to observe the level of detail he purported to have observed as stated in his affidavit the day of the assassination, https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337486/m1/1/. After that, of course, his story got even "better." (Too bad he "had to be silenced" by "them." Why did he have to be silenced three years after the JFKA, enquiring minds wonder?)

Well, that's all from me for now. Say hi to Mom.

[Charles Collins]

This is not an LN or CT post, merely informational.

When I visited Dealey Plaza in 1987, I was struck (like everyone else) by how compact it is. Our visit was brief, and I paid no attention to anything behind the picket fence or TSBD.

The six-minute YouTube video below, from a couple of years ago, is quite interesting. Beginning at about the 3-minute mark, the photographer (obviously an LN proponent) spends considerable time panning the entire area behind the picket fence and TSBD. It’s fascinating (to me) how utterly wide open it is.

I was also struck by Lee Bowers’ tower, which is both lower and farther back than most written materials tend to suggest. It is Interlocking Tower 106 of the railroad and was put into service in 1916. It is now owned by the Sixth Floor Museum and was renovated in the 2000s. It is 14 feet high, and the Warren Commission said it sits “approximately 50 yards from the back of the TSBD.”

This short TikTok video pans forward to the picket fence and says “150 yards” to it: https://www.tiktok.com/@solvingjfk/video/7203459605299547435. Anyway, it’s quite a distance. Below the YouTube video is a photograph with red lines purporting to show Bowers’ line of sight to the motorcade. If nothing else, it helps orient us to where everything is located.

There seem to be virtually no contemporaneous photos of Bowers’ view. The black and white image below is the only one I could find, and it’s not clear that it’s actually from Tower 106.

If there’s any LN-orientation to this post, I guess I might question Bowers’ ability to observe the level of detail he purported to have observed as stated in his affidavit the day of the assassination, https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337486/m1/1/. After that, of course, his story got even "better." (Too bad he "had to be silenced" by "them." Why did he have to be silenced three years after the JFKA, enquiring minds wonder?)

Well, that's all from me for now. Say hi to Mom.

Here’s an image from google maps with a scale in the bottom right corner. I drew yellow lines from the tower to the TSBD and the corner of the picket fence area and added black lettering for approximate distances. This shows about 300’ to the picket fence corner area and about 200’ to the back of the TSBD.




I don’t think Bowers could see much of the motorcade (only a short section between the structures). I think that Bowers’ better and therefore more important view was of the areas between the tower and the picket fence, etc.

[Royell Storing]

This is not an LN or CT post, merely informational.

When I visited Dealey Plaza in 1987, I was struck (like everyone else) by how compact it is. Our visit was brief, and I paid no attention to anything behind the picket fence or TSBD.

The six-minute YouTube video below, from a couple of years ago, is quite interesting. Beginning at about the 3-minute mark, the photographer (obviously an LN proponent) spends considerable time panning the entire area behind the picket fence and TSBD. It’s fascinating (to me) how utterly wide open it is.

I was also struck by Lee Bowers’ tower, which is both lower and farther back than most written materials tend to suggest. It is Interlocking Tower 106 of the railroad and was put into service in 1916. It is now owned by the Sixth Floor Museum and was renovated in the 2000s. It is 14 feet high, and the Warren Commission said it sits “approximately 50 yards from the back of the TSBD.”

This short TikTok video pans forward to the picket fence and says “150 yards” to it: https://www.tiktok.com/@solvingjfk/video/7203459605299547435. Anyway, it’s quite a distance. Below the YouTube video is a photograph with red lines purporting to show Bowers’ line of sight to the motorcade. If nothing else, it helps orient us to where everything is located.

There seem to be virtually no contemporaneous photos of Bowers’ view. The black and white image below is the only one I could find, and it’s not clear that it’s actually from Tower 106.

If there’s any LN-orientation to this post, I guess I might question Bowers’ ability to observe the level of detail he purported to have observed as stated in his affidavit the day of the assassination, https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337486/m1/1/. After that, of course, his story got even "better." (Too bad he "had to be silenced" by "them." Why did he have to be silenced three years after the JFKA, enquiring minds wonder?)

Well, that's all from me for now. Say hi to Mom.

   I am currently researching the area connected to the very 1st Still Frame. Take notice of that short section of retaining wall running from the hand railing directly into the picket fence. That short section of retaining wall is directly across from the wall where the Black Dog Man was captured on Willis 5. The problem here is that Willis 5 shows the Picket Fence to be BEHIND (N) of the Black Dog Man/Short Wall. The picket fence glistens in the Sun behind (N) of the Black Dog Man on Willis 5. Yet, here on this still frame, we see that the Picket Fence is Now IN FRONT OF/(S) of the Black Dog Man/Short Wall. What has physically been done inside Dealey Plaza to make this happen? And why?

  With respect to Lee Bowers and the distance between the railroad tower he was inside and the picket fence area that he detailed seeing a WHITE Shirt Man and a Plaid Shirt Man, you need to remember that Bowers controlled the movement of train cars that were high on the other side of Commerce St and train cars that were moving across the Top of the Triple Underpass. In my opinion, Bowers would require a pair of binoculars to see these train cars and therefore do his job effectively. Bowers detailed WC description of the picket fence area and his detailed description of the 3 automobiles and what was going on inside those 3 autos was probably done with the aid of binoculars. Binoculars inside that Railroad Tower would be no different than binoculars inside an Airport Tower. During his WC Q/A, Bowers was not asked about his using binoculars.   

[Lance Payette]

I can find nothing suggesting that Bowers used binoculars in making his observations. For those who can't get enough about Tower 106 - and that should be all of us, eh? - here is a pretty interesting historical article with a couple of photos of Tower 106 in the 1940s (one of which shows the TSBD): http://txrrhistory.com/towers/057/057.htm.

Here, from a site with the unlikely name of "Conspiracy Dossiers," is an exhaustive article from 2024 about Bowers that is one of the most thorough, rational and balanced JFKA pieces I have read in a l-o-n-g time: https://conspiracydossiers.com/2024/04/22/lee-bowers/. Oh, if only all JFKA writing were this sane.

It relies in part, as all pieces on Bowers' must, on Dave Perry's actual research into the claims made about Bowers' death in Geraldo Rivera's 1992 TV program, "Now It Can Be Told: The Curse of JFK." Here is Perry's article: https://dperry1943.com/bowers.html.

I also bought accident investigator Anita Dickason's book on Bowers' death: https://www.amazon.com/JFK-Assassination-Eyewitness-Conspiracy-Paperback/dp/B011827KF6. I remember I wasn't as impressed as I'd hoped to be.

Surely the "mysterious deaths" crowd - which includes some very prominent voices in the CT community - is the absolute far edge of the lunatic fringe of the CT community. In Bowers' case, you run him off the road into a bridge abutment on a remote highway three years after the JFKA? Who came up with this genius plan? And you do this three years after the assassination because ... because ... well, WHY?

[Royell Storing]

       If you believe that Bowers was controlling train cars on the other side of Commerce St without binoculars because he was Not questioned about this, that's "OK". Do you also believe Bowers controlled train cars without a walkie- talkie because he was Not questioned about using a walkie-talkie? The WC Q/A was routinely confined. 

[Sean Kneringer]

Regarding the pergola on the opposite side of the street, what's the building indicated by the red arrow? It's not the Post Office building.

[Lance Payette]

Regarding the pergola on the opposite side of the street, what's the building indicated by the red arrow? It's not the Post Office building.

I believe that photo is all to the right of the Post Office Building (looking from Bowers' vantage point). I believe the edge of the pergola and stairs would be at the far left of this photo. If the PO Building is there at all, it would be behind the dense trees on the left. It is an odd perspective, which is why I was a bit equivocal in my original post. It was posted at the Ed Forum by Chris Davidson as being one of the few (or only) contemporaneous photos showing Bowers view.

[Lance Payette]

       If you believe that Bowers was controlling train cars on the other side of Commerce St without binoculars because he was Not questioned about this, that's "OK". Do you also believe Bowers controlled train cars without a walkie- talkie because he was Not questioned about using a walkie-talkie? The WC Q/A was routinely confined.

It isn't a matter of belief. He may have had a 100-power telescope for all I know. The fact is, in all his descriptions, from the WC to his Mark Lane interview, he never said anything to suggest he was using anything other than his naked eyes. He did indicate that the cars came quite close to the tower, which would explain his detailed observations of them. I have no reason to be skeptical of Bowers and scarcely regard him as a bombshell CT witness. He version of events did get somewhat better in the hands of Snake Oil Salesman No. 1 - that would be Mark Lane - and after his death he predictably became the subject of CT mythology about "what he REALLY saw but never told." I simply say he was paying remarkably close attention if he really saw all he said he did.