Who Was the Umbrella Man? | JFK Assassination Documentary | The New York Times

[Music] in December 1967 John Updike was writing talk of the town for The New Yorker and he spent most of that talk of the town column talking about the Umbrella me he said that his learning of the existence of the umbrella man made him speculate that in historical research there may be a dimension similar to the quantum dimension in physical reality if you put any event under a microscope you will find a whole dimension of completely weird incredible things going on it's as if there's the macro level of historical research we're things sort of obey natural laws and usual things happen and unusual things don't happen and then there's this other level where everything is really weird on November 22nd it rained the night before but everything cleared by about 9:00 or 9:30 in the morning so if you were looking at various photographs of the motorcade route and the crowds gathered there you will have noticed nobody's wearing a raincoat nobody has an open umbrella why because it's a beautiful day it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood it's a beautiful day in the name and then I know this then all of Dallas there appears to be exactly one person standing under an open black umbrella and that person is standing where the shots begin to rain into the limousine [Music] let us call him the umbrella man did you name the umbrella man yes you can see him in the certain frames from the superior film standing right there by the Stemmons freeway sign there are other still photographs taken from other locations in Dealey Plaza which show the whole man standing under an open black umbrella the only person under any umbrella in all of Dallas standing right at the location where all the shots come into the limousine can anyone come up with a non sinister explanation for this mm-hmm so I published this in six seconds but didn't speculate about what it meant or got into any of the conspiracy theories because everybody else got into the conspiracy theories there was one wingnut who published a book with a heat diagram of the umbrella the umbrella was rigged so that there was a aiming device and there was a rocket tube that you could fire a flash it directly into Kennedy's throat the umbrella man is the real assassin that was the idea that was the source of all in the throat folks right mm-hmm well I asked that the umbrella man come forward and explain this spray so he did he came forward and he went to Washington with his umbrella and he testified in 1978 before the House Select Committee on assassinations he explained then why he had opened the umbrella and was standing there that day the open umbrella was a kind of protest a visual protest it wasn't a protest of any of John Kennedy's policies as president it was a protest at the appeasement policies of Joseph P Kennedy John Kennedy's father when he was ambassador to the court of st. James in 1938 and thirty-nine it was a reference to Neville Chamberlain's umbrella I read that and I thought this is just wacky enough it has to be true and I take it to be true what it means is that if if you have any fact would you think is really sinister right it's really obviously a fact which can only point to some sinister underpinnings hey forget it man because you can never on your own think up all the nonsense they're perfectly valid explanations for that fact a cautionary tale [Music] [Music] [Music] you [Music] you

Channel: The New York Times

Views: 8,458,521

Keywords: JFK umbrella man, JFK conspiracy theory, errol morris documentary, jfk assasination, jfk assasination video, jfk assasination footage, Zapruder Film (Film), jfk assasination consipiracy theory, Assassination Of John F. Kennedy (Crime), errol morris JFK documentary, JFK, Magic Bullet, Grassy Knoll, Lee Harvey Oswald, The New York Times, NY Times, NYT, Times Video, nytimes.com, news, John F. Kennedy, Errol Morris, Dealey Plaza, Dallas, The Umbrella Man, Umbrella Man Documentary

Id: yznRGS9f-jI

Length: 6min 36sec (396 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 20 2013

Reddit Comments

[u/alphari-me]

Umbrella Academy introducing another generation to the JFK conspiracy, I love it!

[u/Piehatmatt]

Yeah apparently the real umbrella guy was making a political statement to Kennedy.

[u/Dredgen_Ullr]

I watched this hoping he would get tackled. I was very disappointed.

[u/MyLadyBits]

I wonder if Umbrella theme in Umbrella Academy literally came from this guy. The most random thing can inspire writers.

[u/Krovul]

i had recently listened to Supernatural with Ashley Flowers’ episode on Majestic Twelve before watching the season. i just love when shows give their own explanation to crazy conspiracy theories

[u/bvnged]

Husband told me about “Babushka lady” as well!

[u/LittleBeanJeanine]

stop i cant do this binge watching the show at 4 in the morning already had me paranoid of any noise thinking someone was coming to get me but now there was a real umbrella guy im about to go down a rabbit holw

[u/freelanceisart]

If you want a deep dive into the Kennedy Assassination, check out the series that Last Podcast on the Left did. Really well researched and it goes into the side characters and tells the story of Lee Harvey Oswald more.

[u/alexanderhqmilton]

Yep! I was freaking out when I saw Reginald was The Umbrella Man because it’s just so perfect haha