Mary Woodward said there were 3 shots and the 1st shot missed everything

[Jarrett Smith]

We know where she was standing  That is made completely clear in the 2015 interview. The issue is why she wrote on the day of the JFKA that she was sitting and eating lunch on the thinly populated grassy knoll. And not only made that absurd error but compounded it by describing the shots as coming from behind and to her right. Her hearing problem tap dance doesn't explain how she got her location and circumstances so completely wrong. And this was a reporter for a major newspaper, no less.

She was a very flighty lady from what I had seen of her in interviews. I don't understand the deal with her on TMWKK, it was nothing she hadn't said before.

[Tom Graves]

The 25 witnesses who said that JFK did not continue to wave after the [loud] first shot [sound] and reacted visibly [to it] were completely wrong and all imagined the same thing that did not happen.

Was JFK waving in Z-133, when Zapruder resumed filming after a 17-second pause?

Yes.

Was he waving to Mary Woodward and her three journalism colleagues at that point?

No. They were further down the street.

Was he still waving in Z-138?

Yes,

Was he still waving in Z-139?

No. His hand was still raised, but he was looking straight ahead.

Was he quickly turning his head to his left in Z-144?

Yes.

When does he start looking to his right again?

Z-158.

When does he start waving again?

By Z-173.

Can we see Woodward and her three colleagues in Z-173?

We can see most of Woodward's colleague, Maggie Brown. Woodward and her colleagues Aurelia Alonzo and Ann Donaldson are standing to Brown's left, just out of the frame.

Was JFK waving continuously from Z-173 to Z-204?

Yes.

Who was he waving to from Z-173 to Z-204?

He was waving to his acquaintance, Mary Woodward, and her three journalism colleagues.

When was JFK hit by the first bullet that hit him?

By Z-224, about five seconds after the backfire / firecracker-like missing-everything first-of-three shots (see above).

https://assassinationresearch.com/zfilm/

[Lance Payette]

I don't think this is at all confusing. She probably did eat her lunch somewhere on the GK and then moved up to the curb when she saw the motorcade was approaching. I don't know that for a fact but it seems a reasonable explanation.

I didn't want to be unkind, but my sense is what Jarrett is suggesting: Mary was a dingbat.

Your explanation just doesn't work. For one thing, she said in her article the Newmans were ten feet away from her when they dove to cover their child. Uh, no. She had multiple opportunities to clarify that they had eaten lunch on the grassy knoll earlier and then walked down to Elm, but she didn't. In her 2015 interview, she said that while they were standing on Elm she looked at the grassy knoll and commented to her companions about the lax security. She said nothing about having been there herself. Mary was a dingbat.

[Tom Graves]

I didn't want to be unkind, but my sense is what Jarrett is suggesting: Mary was a dingbat.

Your explanation just doesn't work. For one thing, she said in her article the Newmans were ten feet away from her when they dove to cover their child. Uh, no. She had multiple opportunities to clarify that they had eaten lunch on the grassy knoll earlier and then walked down to Elm, but she didn't. In her 2015 interview, she said that while they were standing on Elm she looked at the grassy knoll and commented to her companions about the lax security. She said nothing about having been there herself. Mary was a dingbat.

Dear FPR,

Mary "Dingbat" Woodward was probably traumatized when she watched, from a short distance away, the head of her acquaintance, JFK, get blown to smithereens.

I'm sure that something like that would not affect a macho genius like you.

Even though she was traumatized, she did get five easy-for-her-to-recall things right in her next-day article:

1) The first shot sounded like a backfire.

2) The first shot missed everyone.

3) JFK and Jackie turned their heads in response to it.

4) JFK and Jackie waved to her and her three colleagues.

5) There were three shots.

-- Tom

[Andrew Mason]

Was JFK waving in Z-133, when Zapruder resumed filming after a 17-second pause?

Yes.

Was he waving to Mary Woodward and her three journalism colleagues at that point?

No. They were further down the street.

Was he still waving in Z-138?

Yes,

Was he still waving in Z-139?

No. His hand was still raised, but he was looking straight ahead.

Was he quickly turning his head to his left in Z-144?

Yes.

When does he start looking to his right again?

Z-158.

When does he start waving again?

By Z-173.

Can we see Woodward and her three colleagues in Z-173?

We can see most of Woodward's colleague, Maggie Brown. Woodward and her colleagues Aurelia Alonzo and Ann Donaldson are standing to Brown's left, just out of the frame.

Was he waving continuously from Z-173 to Z-204?

Yes.

Who was he waving to from Z-173 to Z-204?

He was waving to his acquaintance, Mary Woodward, and her three journalism colleagues.

When was JFK hit by the first bullet that hit him?

By Z-224, about five seconds after the backfire / firecracker-like missing-everything first-of-three shots (see above).

https://assassinationresearch.com/zfilm/

As I said, the hard part is figuring out why only these witnesses got just this one observation completely wrong all in the same way.

[Lance Payette]

Mary is a certified dingbat. Here is the 1993 panel that Milicent Cranor mentioned. Mary appears at 1:20. As in the 2015 interview, she says they had planned to watch the motorcade from Houston but, because it was crowded, they walked across Houston and stationed themselves "just down from" the TSBD; absolutely nothing about the grassy knoll, except that she repeats making the comment to her coworker that the grassy knoll looked like a dangerous spot and there must be lots of security up there. She thought the "first shot" sounded like a firecracker and turned to her coworker and asked what it was. The third shot came "very, very quickly on top of" the second. Her big schtick is that the limo almost came to a stop after the first shot (?) and she has been forever haunted by the thought that JFK might have lived if the Secret Service had reacted more quickly after the "first shot" (which she herself thinks missed and didn't recognize as a shot?).

To make things worse, she typed up her story within minutes of getting back to the office. She reread it just before this appearance, and "the only thing [she] got wrong" was saying that the shots seemed to come from behind and to her right - which she then explains by her hearing issue. Well, no, Mary, you got wrong where the hell you WERE. You specifically said you and your coworkers and your lunches "decided to wait" on the grassy knoll and had been "waiting" about a half hour before the first motorcycles appeared. The Newmans were about ten feet from you and covered their child because "Apparently, the bullets had whizzed directly over their heads."

The only plausible conclusions are that Mary is a Grade A dingbat or someone got to her as Milicent Cranor suspected. I can't believe the assorted interviews allowed her to get away with the "hearing problem" explanation when it simply doesn't touch the blatant discrepancies in an article typed IMMEDIATELY after the JFKA. Something drastically doesn't add up. No one is THAT confused.

https://www.c-span.org/program/public-affairs-event/journalists-remember-jfk-assassination/121449

[Tom Graves]

As I said, the hard part is figuring out why only these witnesses got just this one observation completely wrong all in the same way.

As I said, how is it that the Zapruder film corroborates her reporting that:

1) The first "backfire-like" shot was early, as evidenced by the fact that JFK stopped waving at Z-143 and turned his head quickly to his left in Z-144, and Jackie turned her head farther to her left to be "captured" in Robert Croft's Z-161 with a concerned look on her face.

2) This early first shot missed everyone, as evidenced by the fact that no one -- except possibly James Tague -- was hit by it.

3) JFK and Jackie did turn their heads and wave to her and her colleagues between Z-175 and Z-204.

Hmm?