Countdown to Dallas: Ready to Binge

November 22, 1963 is a day that remains frozen in time. Kennedy’s assassination and the ensuing investigation into it have been analyzed and revisited countless times over the past six decades. Until recently, it has been impossible to see the whole picture. Too much of the story was redacted…classified…obscured. But over the past few years, the National Archives has released tens of thousands of previously-classified documents – mostly from the CIA and FBI – a treasure trove for those seeking the truth.

In Countdown to Dallas, available now at Evergreen Podcasts, veteran White House correspondent Paul Brandus dives into this treasure trove, pulling out the missing pieces of a decades-old puzzle.

But instead of focusing on the afternoon of November 22nd, Brandus goes back further in time, to where the real story begins: A ramshackle apartment in New Orleans, where Lee Harvey Oswald came into the world. Brandus tracks the strange life of Kennedy’s killer, bringing his audience into Oswald’s world – a world of insecurities, resentments – and from an early age violence.

We meet Oswald’s abusive mother Marguerite, whose emotional neglect would, in part, shape the man Oswald became.

Marguerite struggled to provide for her family, so the Oswalds never lived in an apartment for very long. From New Orleans to Texas to New York City and back again, we follow them throughout the country as they wander about. At one point, Marguerite even dumps young Lee into an orphanage, deeming him too much of a burden. As soon as he is able, Oswald – seeking escape – joins the Marines. By now, his anger and penchant for violence is well-known; he even expresses a desire to assassinate President Dwight Eisewnhower.

Meanwhile, he begins fixating on the idea that he’s meant for some higher purpose, that he’ll be galvanized by history. He tells fellow Marines that he’ll likely be president one day. He also begins reading Soviet newspapers and studying Russian, trying out words and phrases on other leathernecks. This, during the height of the Cold War.

Court-martialed twice, his request for an early discharge is granted. By now, he’s a full-blown Marxist, convinced that the Soviet Union and a life under communism is the life for him. He arrives in Moscow, tries to renounce his American citizenship, and blasts America and its capitalist system to anyone who will listen.

While in the USSR, he meets his future wife, Marina. They marry quickly. But the marriage – and Oswald’s enchantment with the Soviet Union – cool off. So he asks the American officials he so openly loathed for help. He returns to the United States, this time with a wife and young daughter in tow.

But Oswald’s struggles continue. He bounces between menial jobs and lives in poverty. He also becomes a wife beater; hitting Marina in bouts of fury and resentment. “I can’t help myself,” he confesses to her at one point. He’s emasculated and bitter, angry at the world for overlooking his perceived talents, and obsessed with the idea of achieving notoriety and fame.

Seven months before President Kennedy came to Texas, Oswald devised a plan to secure his so-called legacy. He took his rifle to an upscale neighborhood in Dallas, Texas, where he crouched behind a fence that overlooked the home of former US Army General Edwin Walker. He shot a bullet through Walker’s window, then high-tailed it out of there—probably by catching the bus, since he didn’t drive. It was only once he got home that he learned from the news that his bullet had missed; Walker was unharmed. Oswald was never a suspect in the assassination attempt.

But he still saw himself as an agent of some higher purpose. His need for notoriety consumed him. Made him angrier, moodier, and even more uncooperative. His wife left him, his kids barely saw him. He was a man at the end of his rope.

And then one day in mid-November 1963, while Oswald was at his new job at the Texas School Book Depository, he overheard that President Kennedy was coming to town. And that his motorcade would be passing right by his place of work. He and his colleagues would even be able to watch the motorcade from the fifth floor of the building.

Later that day, Oswald took the elevator up a floor higher. To the empty sixth floor, full of nothing but stacked boxes—and a big row of windows that overlooked Dealy Plaza. In just a few days, Kennedy would pass beneath them. And Oswald began hatching a new plan to obtain the infamy he craved.

The Countdown to Dallas podcast which is based on Brandus’s book Countdown to Dallas: The Incredible Coincidences, Routines, and Blind "Luck" that Brought John F. Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald Together on November 22, 1963, is now available at Evergreen Podcasts. Throughout the season, Paul Brandus draws from extensive research and newly declassified government documents to shed light on gritty details of Oswald’s life that have long been overlooked or misunderstood. Brandus also dives into the intricacies of presidential security measures, the geopolitical climate of the early 1960s, and the persistent allure of conspiracy theories that have surrounded the assassination for more than sixty years.

Six decades have passed since President Kennedy's assassination, yet its impact continues to reverberate across generations. "Countdown to Dallas" acknowledges this enduring legacy and its profound influence on American culture, politics, and public discourse. By delving into the broader historical context surrounding the assassination—from Cold War tensions to domestic policy debates—the podcast offers listeners a comprehensive understanding of the era in which President Kennedy lived and died.