Lee Harvey Oswald sits at the top of the Depository building waiting for Kennedy’s car to pass by at the perfect time.1 Time passes, Oswald’s chance becomes closer, he starts to get a clearer view, and he can barely stand the wait. He is about to commit one of the greatest assassinations known in American history.
In order to understand this Oswald and what brought him to that floor of the Depository building that day, let’s take a look into his past and see what life was like for him. When Oswald was a teenager he developed strong left-wing political views and became an avowed Marxist. When he was sixteen he joined the Marines in hopes of emigrating to the Soviet Union. He successfully received dishonorable discharge from the U.S. Marines in 1959 and escaped into Russia.2 Oswald lived in Russia for three years before moving back to Dallas, Texas. Oswald visited New Orleans early in 1963 and founded a pro-Castro organization known as the “Fair Play for Cuba Committee,” in which he was the only member. Oswald then returned to Dallas that October and began a low-paying job at the Texas School Book Depository.3
Although Oswald was successful in getting what he wanted, there were complications in his assassination of Kennedy. He fired three bullets, one only wounding Kennedy, the second wounding Governor John Connally, and a third that struck Kennedy in the head, killing him instantly.4
In the few short moments it took for Oswald to assassinate Kennedy, he knew he needed to get out of that building. He quickly rushed out and during his escape managed to kill another man, Officer J.D. Tippett. After killing the officer, Oswald was arrested in a nearby movie theatre at 1:51 pm, and charged with the murder of officer Tippett.5 Oswald was then taken to jail, and was held there for two days before being moved to the county prison.
A series of unfortunate events occurred as Oswald was being transported to the county prison. As he was being transported, Oswald was shot and killed by the owner of a Dallas night club, Jack Ruby.6 Although some may say that what Ruby did was right in trying to get revenge for Oswald murdering a beloved president, he was found guilty of murder with malice and sentence to death. Ruby was a lucky man though; his lawyers were able to fight hard enough to get him out of facing the death penalty.
Lee Harvey Oswald will forever be known as a murderer and assassin. He can be seen as someone that demoralized Americans, and caused so many people to doubt the true nature of people. Oswald has always been seen as an abnormal person, he did so many things that would’ve been red flags if the government had been watching him before the assassination. Oswald was a man of evil nature and will be talked about in history classes across the country until the end of time.
- William Rubinstein, “Oswald Shoots JFK,” History Today 49, no. 10 (October 1999): 15. ↵
- William Rubinstein, “Oswald Shoots JFK,” History Today 49, no. 10 (October 1999): 15. ↵
- William Rubinstein, “Oswald Shoots JFK,” History Today 49, no. 10 (October 1999): 15. ↵
- Tom Wicker, “Kennedy is Killed By Sniper As He Rides In Car In Dallas; Johnson Sworn In On Plane,” The New York Times (New York City, New York), November 22, 1963. ↵
- William Rubinstein, “Oswald Shoots JFK,” History Today 49, no. 10 (October 1999): 15. ↵
- Kalyan B. Bhattacharyya, “Fredric Andrews Gibbs and the Assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy,” Annals of Indian Academy of Neurology 20, no. 2 (April 2017): 103. ↵
52 comments
Madeline Torres
Oswalds life has always been a mystery to me and now that I have read about it it leaves me wondering what have caused him to act out so erratically. He caused the lives of 2 innocent people who did not deserve to die the way they did. Oswald was in fact not in a stable state of mind and he caused so much hurt in the country, Kennedy was a great president and his life should have never ended that way. As for the officer who’s life was taken for protecting his citizens.
Christopher Hohman
Nice article. Oswald certainly was a fascinating character. It is a terrible thing what he did to president Kennedy and to that police officer. I can respect people’s political views, but having different political views does not mean that you can kill people. Oswald sounds like he got caught up a little too much in his own crusade. As for Jack Ruby, I cant blame him for doing what he did, but he did kill a guy so he to deserved his sentence
Maxx Arizmendi
I remember learning about the presidency of JFK, and it was sad that he was killed while he was in the car in Dallas. I find it interesting that Lee Harvey Oswald is the subject of many conspiracy theories, and his life story was pretty interesting as well. I found this article to be a fascinating read.
Jennifer Salas
I’ve always been really curious about Lee Harvey Oswalds intentions on killing president Kennedy. Did he actually kill him? and if he did why? It makes me wonder what information we would have known if Jack Ruby didn’t shoot Oswald before he was going in for questioning. This article really made me think about how things would have been different if Oswald was stopped when he started acting suspicious. I really wish this article was longer and went a more into Oswalds everyday life. I hope that one day we find out the missing details of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Steven Hale
What a bizarre life Oswald led. Conspiracy theories regarding the Kennedy assassination still abound and it is easy to see why. His military training could lead someone to argue that Oswald was still connected to parts of the US government and carried out the assassination on their behalf. On the other hand, his time spent in the Soviet Union and pro-Cuba activities at a time when Cuba was an adversary are also problematic. I suppose we will never really know if there was more to Oswald or if he was just unstable.
Devin Ramos
John Fitzgerald Kennedy was my favorite president by far. Him and his wife Jackie Kennedy won over the american peoples hearts. This made Kennedy one of the most liked presidents of all time, Lee Harvey Oswald was jealous of all this attention Kennedy would get he would later then assassinate him for him to gain more attention than the president. Oswald was later then killed for that man to gain attention which is just crazy.
Esperanza Mauricio
Learning about this man has always been a fascination of mine because he chose to assassination JFK. I was taught very little about him within school and wondered about him once I got older. This article was insightful about Oswald and I learned a deal more about him. I have done individual research about this man and what I previously knew of him is very much the same as your article.
Cristina Cabello
This is a really informational article. I watched a show about this with James Franco starring, but it is definitely not as informational as this article. It was a fictional and informational show. I liked how this article describes how Harvey Oswald was. Then by evaluating on why he committed his crime. Even though he committed a terrible crime, I find this story really interesting.
Caroline Bush
Interesting article! There are so many conspiracy theory’s behind John F. Kennedys death that its interesting to actually think about what really happened. I do wish that this article would have been a little bit longer but it did manage to get all the information across. Its tragic how Kennedy lost his life due to one man with a gun who had a deluded idea that he was doing something good. Overall I really enjoyed this article and found the topic to be very interesting.
Christopher King
This is an article I enjoy and wish it could have been longer. There is so much to this story and the conspiracies are covering every aspect of motivation from outside members or influences. Some believe that there was a second shooter. Some believe that the Russians were involved, some the mafia because of Kennedy’s family ties, or it could have been the FBI under the instruction of LBJ so that he could become president. There is evidence of all three perspectives involved and that Oswald was a scapegoat. Some believe that Oswald was purely alone in this act, but whether or not he acted alone is something I do not believe many will every know.