HardlyLee.nut

The HardlyLee.nut Version

Myra DaRouse was (HARVEY) Oswald's 8th grade homeroom teacher at Beauregard JHS (New Orleans) in the winter/spring semester of 1954. Myra knew and remembered (HARVEY) Oswald very well. She broke up a fight when Oswald was being attacked by several boys. She said, "He didn't start the fight, HARVEY had no fight in him whatsoever." After school, during basketball season, Ed Voebel ran out of the building and said to Myra and fellow teacher Dorothy Duvic, "A piano fell on HARVEY." Myra and Dorothy ran to the basement cafeteria and saw HARVEY, in the middle of the floor, with a piano on top of his legs. The teachers lifted the piano from HARVEY'S legs and Myra asked the school principal if she should take HARVEY to the clinic. Myra drove him to the Monte Lepri Clinic for an examination. She then drove him to his apartment at 126 Exchange Place. Myra saw HARVEY every day reading books, both before and after school. And she saw HARVEY and Ed Voebel ride their bicycles around the school ground during the spring of 1954. After the spring semester ended, neither she nor Ed Voebel saw HARVEY again.

 

Six months later, in the fall of 1954, Ed Voebel became acquainted with LEE Oswald after he witnessed him in a fight with Johnny and Mike Neumeyer (9th grade). The fight lasted a long time and was witnessed and remembered by several students at Beauregard. After the fight Voebel and two friends got some ice for (LEE) Oswald and attempted to patch him up. Forty years later Johnny Neumeyer and John Lane still remembered the fight, but neither man remembered whether or not Oswald lost a tooth. Voebel remembered, and testified before the Warren Commission (Volume 8, page 3):

 

Mr. JENNER. But you do remember that you attempted to help him when he was struck in the mouth on that occasion; is that right?

 

Mr. VOEBEL. Yes; I think he even lost a tooth from that. I think he was cut on the lip, and a tooth was knocked out.

--Warren Commission: Vol. 8, Page 3

 

A few days later a friend of the Neumeyers, Robin Reily, was quietly waiting for Oswald on the school steps. As (LEE) Oswald walked down the steps Reily punched Oswald in the face and then quickly ran away. Another bloody lip for Oswald.

 

Shortly after the fight, which occurred in November, 1954, Voebel took this photograph that appears to show (LEE) Oswald missing a front tooth. After the assassination, Voebel sold his photo to LIFE magazine for $75.

 

The Facts: Who was "Harvey"?

Myra was interviewed by the FBI on April 2, 1964. She told the agents that Oswald was a physically small boy who did not associate much with other students and that generally after eating lunch, instead of playing, he would sit and read various books. The only other thing she could recall was that he was not a trouble-maker but she did need to patch him up once after he had been held down by several boys while being punched by others.

FBI interview with Myra DaRouse

 

As a result of this interview, The FBI interviewed the Librarian, Shelby Smith. Miss Smith told the FBI that she did recall Oswald, but that he never came to the library except with his class during library period.

FBI interview with Shelby Smith

 

To find out who this small boy really was, we need to turn to a witness ignored by the author of the HardlyLee theory. Her name was Bennierita Smith. Bennierita was interviewed by the FBI on November 25, 1963. She told the agents that Oswald did not appear to have many friends except Ed Voebel and possibly a boy named Bobby Neumann.

 

To find out more about Nuemann, we need to go to Bennierita's Warren Commsion testimony.

 

Mrs. Smith. And they had this little boy--I think it was Bobby Newman [sic]--he used to take around with, but I don't remember too much about him either. I can remember he was little, he was short. 

Mr. LIEBELER. Who was? 

Mrs. SMITH. Bobby Newman. [sic]
 

 So there it is. The little bookish kid was not Oswald (the putative Harvey or the historical Lee Oswald). It was Bobby Nuemann - the occasional third guy in the smallest of cliques.

 

There was one other episode that needs to be addressed. Myra told John Armstrong that at one time, Voebel had come running to tell her that "Harvey" needed help because a piano had fallen on him pinning his legs. 

 

Not only did Myra not mention this to the FBI, she also never mentioned that Lee preferred to be called "Harvey". Likewise Voebel, who was interviewed at length by the media as well as by investigators, never mentioned the name preference, nor the piano incident. There was a very good reason for this. There was no "Harvey", no one requested to be called "Harvey" and the piano had fallen on Nuemann, not Oswald.

 

It was no wonder Armstrong, who had gone on a witness hunt during the research phase of his book, zeroed in on DaRouse. Even during her FBI interview, it is obvious she had the short, studious Nuemann confused with the taller Oswald.  After he had tracked her down, it seems he found her memory to be malleable and open to suggestion - thus Nuemann was transformed into "Harvey". 

 

The Facts: Was a Tooth Knocked Out?

The whole case for the tooth being knocked out is the uncertain statement of Ed Voebel that he thought the tooth had been knocked out, and a photo taken by Voebel, a section of which was massively blown up and purports to show a gap where Oswald's tooth should be. 

 

To learn what really happened, he must turn once again to Bennierita Smith:

 

Mrs. SMITH. One fight really impressed me, I guess because there was this boy--he wasn't going to Beauregard, this boy he had the fight with, and he was a little guy. I think his name was Robin Riley. He hit Lee, and his tooth came through his lip. 

Mr. LIEBELER. Through the upper part of his lip? 

Mrs. SMITH. Oh, gee, I don't know whether it was a bottom---- 

Mr. LIEBELER. But it actually tore the lip? 

Mrs. SMITH. Yes; it actually tore the lip, and I remember--what is that boy's name?--the blond fellow that was on television that knew him so well? 

Mr. LIEBELER. Are you thinking of Edward Voebel? 

Mrs. SMITH. That is him. 

Mr. LIEBELER. V-o-e-b-e-l? 

Mrs. SMITH. He took him back in school, and I guess they kind of patched his lip up.

 

This version was supported by the autopsy done on Oswald which stated, "Midline upper lip terminating at the vermilion margin is a 1/4 inch pale scar."

 

There was another confirming witness. Those details will be provided in Vol Two of Lee Harvey Oswald's Cold War which should be available before the end of 2015.  To cut to the chase, the tooth was loosened (as opposed to "knocked out") and reset.