Real Crime Stories/Paranormal Hauntings/Conspiracy Theories Book II

The Babushka Lady

The Babushka Lady is an unknownwoman present during the 1963 assassination of President John F.Kennedy who might have photographed the events that occurred inDallas's Dealey Plaza at the time President John F. Kennedy was shot.Her nickname arose from the headscarf she wore, which was similar toscarves worn by elderly Russian women (бабушка – babushka –literally means "grandmother" or "old woman"in Russian).

The Babushka Lady was seen to beholding a camera by eyewitnesses and was also seen in film accountsof the assassination. She was observed standing on the grass betweenElm and Main streets and is visible in the Zapruder film as well asin the films of Orville Nix, Marie Muchmore, and Mark Bell (44minutes and 47 seconds into the Bell film: even though the shootinghad already taken place and most of her surrounding witnesses tookcover, she can be seen still standing with the camera at her face).After the shooting, she crossed Elm Street and joined the crowd thatwent up the grassy knoll. She is last seen in photographs walkingeast on Elm Street. Neither she, nor the film she may have taken,have ever been positively identified.

Beverly Oliver's claim

In 1970, a woman named Beverly Olivertold conspiracy researcher Gary Shaw at a church revival meeting inJoshua, Texas, that she was the Babushka Lady. Oliver stated thatshe filmed the assassination with a Super 8 film Yashica and that sheturned the undeveloped film over to two men who identified themselvesto her as FBI agents. According to Oliver, she obtained no receiptfrom the men who told her that they would return the film to herwithin ten days. She did not follow up with an inquiry. Shereiterated her claims in the 1988 documentary The Men Who KilledKennedy. According to Vincent Bugliosi, Oliver "has neverproved to most people's satisfaction that she was in Dealey Plazathat day." Confronted with the fact that the YashicaSuper-8 camera was not made until 1969, she stated that she receivedthe "experimental" camera from a friend and was noteven sure the manufacturer's name was on it.

Beverly Oliver's claims were the basisfor a scene in Oliver Stone's 1991 film JFK, in which a characternamed "Beverly" meets Jim Garrison in a Dallasnightclub. Played by Lolita Davidovich, she is depicted in thedirector's cut as wearing a headscarf at Dealey Plaza and speaking ofhaving given the film she shot to two men claiming to be FBI agents.

House Select Committee onAssassinations report

In March 1979, the PhotographicEvidence Panel of the United States House Select Committee onAssassinations indicated that they were unable to locate any filmattributed to the Babushka Lady. According to their report:"Initially, Robert Groden, a photographic consultant to thecommittee advised the panel as to pertinent photographic issues andrelated materials. Committee investigators located many of thesuggested films and photographs, however, some items were neverlocated, i.e. the Babushka Lady film, a color photograph by NormanSimilas, and the original negative of the Betzner photograph."

Public hearings of the AssassinationRecords Review Board

On November 18, 1994, assassinationresearcher Gary Mack testified before the Assassination RecordsReview Board that he had recently been told by an executive inKodak's Dallas office that a woman in her early 30s with brunettehair brought in film purported to be of the assassination scene whilethey were processing the Zapruder film. According to Mack, theexecutive said the woman explained to federal investigators alreadyat the film processing office that she ran from Main Street acrossthe grass to Elm Street where she stopped and snapped a photo withsome people in the foreground of the presidential limousine and theTexas School Book Depository. Mack said that he was told by theKodak executive that the photo was extremely blurry and "virtuallyuseless" and indicated that the woman likely went homewithout anyone recording her identity. After suggesting that thewoman in the story may have been the Babushka Lady, Mack then toldthe Board: "I do not believe that Beverly Oliver is theBabushka Lady, or, let me rephrase that, she certainly could be butthe rest of the story is a fabrication."

Also appearing that same day before theARRB as "Beverly Oliver Massegee", Oliver statedthat she was 17 years old at the time of the assassination. She toldthe Board that she was filming with an "experimental"8 mm movie camera approximately 20 to 30 feet (6 to 9 m) from Kennedywhen he was shot and that the film was confiscated by a man whoidentified himself as an FBI agent. According to Oliver, she handedover the camera because the man was an authority figure and becauseshe feared being caught in possession of marijuana.