Warren Commission (14 of 26): Hearings Vol. XIV (of 15)

by United States. Warren Commission

TESTIMONY OF EARL RUBY RESUMED

The proceeding reconvened at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. Griffin. Let me state for the record that as we resume this deposition that I presume you understand that the oath you took this morning with Mr. Hubert and all the formalities which you went through still pertain to this hearing.

You are still under oath and we will continue in the same fashion that we did before.

If there are any questions about it why you are free to say anything.

We were talking, it seems to me, that we got you to the point where you had just met Mr. Belli.

Mr. Ruby. Belli, that is right.

Mr. Griffin. Now, I wanted to confine your attention from here on in to certain narrow aspects of your dealings in Los Angeles, and that is your efforts to find financing for Jack’s trial and what the actual financing of the trial is.

Can you tell us, first of all, whether prior to seeing Belli, that day that you were in Los Angeles, you talked to Mr. Shore and Mr. Woodfield at all about the financing of the trial?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I told them we had to raise money, and I told them Howard gave me a figure of anywhere from $25,000 to $50,000, and I asked them about how much they thought they could obtain from a story, and they said they couldn’t promise 50 but 30, 35, I think that was the figure that Woodfield used.

Mr. Griffin. Would that be the gross figure or would that be what your brother would have ultimately had available from the entire sum for his defense?

Mr. Ruby. That was the figure, the net figure my brother would have left over after they took their commissions and percentage, and the agent’s fee and all of that.

Mr. Griffin. How many people were to share in the proceeds from the sale, beside Jack?

Mr. Ruby. Woodfield, William Woodfield. Larry Shiller, the agent, and then they in turn said they would pay commissions to sales people.

I don’t know who those were, of course.

Mr. Griffin. Now, this first day in Los Angeles——

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Prior to meeting Belli and your talk with them, did you discuss how long the article or biography would be and where it would be published and other details such as that?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t think so; not the first day.

Mr. Griffin. Now, at the meeting at Mr. Belli’s house, did you discuss the biography of your brother?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. What discussion took place there?

Mr. Ruby. Just the general discussion that Woodfield would do the writing of it. That is about all. And a figure did come up of how much could be raised through the story, through the selling of the story.

Mr. Griffin. What was the speculation at that time?

Mr. Ruby. That is what I said, you know, the same figure.

Mr. Griffin. How long did your meeting at Mr. Belli’s home last?

Mr. Ruby. I would say at least an hour.

Mr. Griffin. How much of the time at Mr. Belli’s house was spent discussing the sale of the biography or the life story?

Mr. Ruby. Probably 10 minutes altogether.

Mr. Griffin. Now, when you finished——

Mr. Ruby. Excuse me, would you want to know who else was present there?

Mr. Griffin. Yes; I would.

Mr. Ruby. Sam Brody, one of his associates in L.A., another attorney, who was in the case for a while but if you will recall he stepped out, and Woodfield’s wife, yes, Woodfield’s wife, I don’t remember her name——

Mr. Griffin. Was Mike Shore there?

Mr. Ruby. No: I don’t think so. No; I am quite sure he wasn’t.

Mr. Griffin. When that meeting ended there, had there been an agreement——

Mr. Ruby. Excuse me a minute.

I am trying to think if Mike Shore was there. I don’t place him there. I am not sure he was there. I can’t say yes or no to that question.

Mr. Griffin. He might have been there but you are not sure, is that your answer, or is your original answer that he wasn’t there still your best impression.

Mr. Ruby. If my recollection is correct, I think he just met Belli and then left. He had an appointment or something but I am not sure.

Mr. Griffin. What was the conclusion of your talk at that point as to whether Belli would represent Jack.

Mr. Ruby. It wasn’t definite yet. We talked about lawyers and he mentioned what he thinks we ought to do, and psychiatrists we might need—and different things that—he mentioned he would bring in Tonahill. He worked with Tonahill before.

Mr. Griffin. Was that the first time Tonahill’s name was mentioned?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Now, did you remain in Los Angeles that night?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I think I was there that night.

Mr. Griffin. Were you there the next day?

Mr. Ruby. I think I left the next—about noon of the next day if I am not mistaken.

Mr. Griffin. When you left Los Angeles what arrangements had been made with respect to the autobiography or the life story of Jack?

Mr. Ruby. Nothing really definite.

Mr. Griffin. Did Woodfield ultimately write the story that you are talking about?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, yes.

Mr. Griffin. And——

Mr. Ruby. He came down to Dallas later.

Mr. Griffin. Where was that published, that story? Just tell us generally.

Mr. Ruby. Well, they offered it for sale to foreign countries, publications in foreign countries, and also here through the newspapers, through a sales organization that handles that, I think, out of New York.

Mr. Griffin. Was that life story serialized in a number of newspapers throughout the country?

Mr. Ruby. When you say serialized, I don’t understand what you mean.

Mr. Griffin. It was published over a period of days.

Mr. Ruby. Yes, yes.

Mr. Griffin. Did it appear in any national magazines?

Mr. Ruby. No; not in the United States. I don’t think so.

Mr. Griffin. Did you have some original discussion with Woodfield that it would appear, that he would try to sell it to a national magazine?

Mr. Ruby. Well, our agreement was that he would sell it—yes, that if he could sell it to a national magazine that he would.

Mr. Griffin. Did you have any discussions with him about selling it to the Saturday Evening Post?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. When did that discussion take place?

Mr. Ruby. Not until later; probably down in Dallas when we met in Dallas later on.

Mr. Griffin. How much did the Ruby defense ultimately realize from that newspaper article?

Mr. Ruby. The net?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. A little over $30,000.

Mr. Griffin. Did you people get—did the Ruby defense also get contributions from people?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; but very little, very little.

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us approximately what the total of the contributions were?

Mr. Ruby. Contributions—are you speaking right up to today now or until the trial?

Mr. Griffin. Not until the exact day. But do you have some figure as to what it was up to today? Roughly, what it is? I don’t ask you to be accurate to the penny.

Mr. Ruby. Well now, you see there are two funds, the story fund and a separate fund that a defense committee was trying to raise.

Mr. Griffin. Well, the story fund comprises the $30,000.

Mr. Ruby. Separate; yes.

Mr. Griffin. Is there anything else in that fund besides the $30,000, or did anything else go into it?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I put in whatever donations my brother received in the jail I deposited. It was only—I don’t think it was $500 from there.

Mr. Griffin. Now, other monies were given for the defense, though, were they not?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Did they go into the defense committee fund? Did these other monies go into the defense committee fund?

Mr. Ruby. Well, they were used for paying the bills, if that is what you mean.

Mr. Griffin. What I am trying to get at is, you say there are two funds, one fund is what you call the newspaper fund——

Mr. Ruby. Well, you see, that—the newspaper—was more or less Jack Ruby’s own fund. He authorized to write the story, and that was more or less his own fund.

Mr. Griffin. I see.

Mr. Ruby. But this is a separate committee that was set up in Chicago, and they got several hundred dollars but we spent—well, on one ad we spent $200 for the ad and we got $205 back—to give you an idea. We kept using the money hoping to get more money in but it didn’t work out too well.

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us who the members of that defense committee are?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes. There is Michael Levin, a lawyer in Chicago, my brother Hyman Ruby, Rubenstein, and Barney Ross, Marty Eritt.

Then there is another one or two in there that I am not too familiar with. But they have got stationery. I don’t have it with me.

Mr. Griffin. What efforts did they make to obtain funds?

Mr. Ruby. Well, they wrote some letters and they did advertising, as I told you. However, quite a few of the—quite a few—most of the newspapers wouldn’t take the ad. The Chicago papers wouldn’t take it. The Tribune, and the Sun-Times in Chicago wouldn’t take an ad for an appeal for funds for Jack Ruby.

Mr. Griffin. Were you ever given any reasons?

Mr. Ruby. No; the answers were it is not their policy, and there was another reason, I can’t remember the exact words. I don’t recall. But Mike Levin did most of that, you know—the lawyer—he did most of the calling and he told me, but I don’t remember the exact words and I would rather not say—you know, if I am not sure of the exact words.

Mr. Griffin. I don’t want you to say if you didn’t hear it.

Mr. Ruby. No.

Mr. Griffin. Did you keep the records for that defense committee fund?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; most—yes; I would say yes.

Mr. Griffin. Do you have those records here with you today?

Mr. Ruby. No; I gave them to an agent, though. I give them to an agent some time ago. I gave him a list of all the monies that came in, and I think I even gave him a list of who I paid it out to.

Mr. Griffin. What is your best estimate of how much money came in altogether in the defense committee fund?

Mr. Ruby. Now you are not talking about the story—right?

Mr. Griffin. That is right.

Mr. Ruby. From the defense committee fund between $1,500 and $2,000, altogether.

Mr. Griffin. What were the expenses of the fund or is this—excuse me—is this $1,500 or $2,000—is that a net figure or a gross figure?

Mr. Ruby. That is a gross.

Mr. Griffin. All right. After expenses, what was ultimately left for the application to the defense?

Mr. Ruby. I can’t give you an exact figure because I just can’t recall all of the expenses we had, because I just paid a bill last week, and I just don’t have it, but I would say we spent probably close to a thousand dollars, because one ad alone was close to $300, and the letter was another $300—is $600 already that I can think of. There were other, smaller expenses.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know what the total expenses were that have been for the defense of your brother so far?

Mr. Ruby. In the low thirties. Of course, you must understand we are continually spending money, so I don’t have it.

Mr. Griffin. Have you been given an estimate recently as to what the total expenses of the defense of your brother is going to be?

Mr. Ruby. An estimate?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. You mean if it goes to the Supreme Court and all that?

Mr. Griffin. Yes; have you been given any estimate as to what the total expenses might be.

Mr. Ruby. No; I would say no. Just said it would run into a lot of money but no figure was ever actually quoted, except by Belli.

You see, he really didn’t, either. He just—I am trying to think what his statement was, now. No; he didn’t either, because at that time we weren’t talking about Supreme Court, we were only talking about—you know—the first trial.

Mr. Griffin. What was his——

Mr. Ruby. He mentioned between $75,000 and $100,000.

Mr. Griffin. As a total cost.

Mr. Ruby. Of the first trial. And that is now his fee and everything, when you are talking expenses. I am talking everything they wanted.

Mr. Griffin. How much of a fee did he quote to you at that time?

Mr. Ruby. He was talking about $50,000, if I recall correctly.

Mr. Griffin. Did he quote it to you personally or is this a figure you have learned from somebody else?

Mr. Ruby. No; he quoted it to me.

Mr. Griffin. Now how much——

Mr. Ruby. In other words, it wasn’t a definite figure. He said it could be around, you know.

Mr. Griffin. Have the costs of the investigation for the defense been paid to date?

Mr. Ruby. What do you mean by investigations?

Mr. Griffin. Did the defense hire investigators?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. And have these investigators been paid for their work?

Mr. Ruby. Not completely.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know——

Mr. Ruby. Well, there is a difference of opinion so——

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us how much has been paid and how much is claimed as to the total bill?

Mr. Ruby. Well, the original investigator that we had, I think, we paid him about $5,000 already, plus some expenses of a thousand dollars or so; I don’t remember the exact figures, and he claims we owe him $1,500.

Mr. Griffin. More?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; and there is a little dispute about that.

Now, we have got a new investigator, I don’t know his name there. My sister hired him down there and she has given him several hundred dollars, I don’t know how much. I don’t know how much she gave him.

Mr. Griffin. Did Mr. Howard get any money?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes.

Mr. Griffin. How much was he paid?

Mr. Ruby. I think we paid him, I am not sure of this figure though, $3,500.

Mr. Griffin. And the remaining funds that have been paid, I take it, have been paid to Mr. Belli?

Mr. Ruby. Belli got, I think, $11,000, if I am not mistaken. Then we paid the doctors, I don’t know, $5,000 or $6,000, you know, the psychiatrists that came down, and some of my expenses came out, just my flight expenses and telephone calls, and who else now?

We gave Burleson some money, he has got, I think, about a thousand dollars that we gave him since the trial. He was supposed to get paid from Belli before. That is the reason we didn’t pay him. However, he claimed Belli never gave him anything. And we paid, like George Senator, the witness, our No. 1 witness, we had to give him money to live on because he was so, what shall I say the word for that, well, he lost his job and he was so upset he couldn’t, you know, he just couldn’t work.

And then we had to pay—he went home and I had to send him airplane fare to come back, you know, and there is——

Mr. Griffin. How about Larry Crafard, did you pay him any money?

Mr. Ruby. Larry Crafard, I think we just gave him a few dollars, $5 maybe because he was broke when he was living on the road, he didn’t have a dime, so I think I gave him some money.

Mr. Griffin. Did Larry incidentally contact you any time while you were in Detroit?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; I wish he would have, because he hitchhiked all the way down there, and I was driving at the same time, but he didn’t know I lived there, and we——

Mr. Griffin. How was he notified to come to the trial?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. If I remember correctly he came on his own. He just thought that when all this came out about, you know, Jack getting him to take that picture of Earl Warren, he had the camera or something, I forgot the full details myself, but he is the one who took the picture, right, if I am not mistaken, and he just thought he should come down to help Jack as much as he possibly could.

Could I go a little further?

Mr. Griffin. I don’t really want to pry into this unless this is something you care to reveal.

Mr. Ruby. The most important thing is coming up now, I mean one of the most important things.

Mr. Griffin. All right. I do want to reflect this—that I don’t want to push you into saying things, talking about subjects that you would rather not talk about, and I realize that this in one of them. Now, if you do want to say something about it why, of course, we would be happy to hear anything you want to say.

Mr. Ruby. Well, I returned home, I went from L.A. to Dallas, I talked to Jack, I talked to Howard. We hadn’t hired Belli yet. He was going to go down and see Jack, and talk to him before he decided to come in, you know, and take over the case.

I went back to Detroit and in a couple of days I get another call, I get a call, from Woodfield. He is very upset. He just heard some news that he thinks I must know. However, it is so confidential that he can’t even tell it to me over the phone. And I talk to Mike Shore and between us—they couldn’t tell me on the phone, I had better go back to California.

So, I go out there again. The story he tells me is that, in the meantime he is trying to make contacts, this is about a week later. He is trying to make contact to sell the story to the different publications, to the Saturday Evening Post, you know, and other publications, and somebody from the Saturday Evening Post called him, I think—now this is what he told me—and said that Tom Howard was up to the Saturday Evening Post office in Dallas offering for sale a picture of President Kennedy with a piece of his head shot off, and so I immediately, or as soon as I could, when I left them, I called my sister Eva in Dallas and I said, “Get a hold of the agent that has been talking—that has been taking—your story there and tell them about this so they can check into it.”

And then I went home, I flew back to Detroit.

By the time I got to Detroit they had tried to contact me to get some more information on the story. I mentioned this to Tom Howard and he denied it.

Mr. Griffin. Was his denial a flat denial?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, yes; you know, complete, and you know. However, I think it was the fellow at the Saturday Evening Post that said—now I have given all this to the special agents or, I think, the Treasury Department.

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. The Saturday Evening Post man said, “Well, let them come in front of me in my office and deny it.”

But, of course, we never brought it to a head. But, anyhow, I don’t know what happened. They never told me, of course, as you know.

Mr. Griffin. Do you recall the name of the Saturday Evening Post man in Dallas that Howard allegedly contacted.

Mr. Ruby. No; I did originally but I think I gave it to the agents.

Mr. Griffin. Did you talk personally to this man from the Saturday Evening Post who claims he talked to Howard?

Mr. Ruby. No; Woodfield.

Mr. Griffin. Somebody—you just reported that somebody said—“Let Howard come before me and deny it.”

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. I take it this was the Saturday Evening Post man who allegedly made that statement?

Mr. Ruby. Let me look in my book. Perhaps I have it.

Mr. Griffin. What I am getting at is where did you get—who told you—that the Saturday Evening Post man said that?

Mr. Ruby. Woodfield.

Mr. Griffin. Woodfield?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. So everything you know about this transaction between Howard and the Saturday Evening Post comes either from Woodfield or from Howard’s denial?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; right. I don’t have it. I may have it somewhere else in another book but I don’t have it here.

By the way, if you are asking about the finances, we still have bills of—altogether from what my sister tells me—of close to $10,000 that are unpaid now.

Mr. Griffin. Is there any money left in either of the funds at this point?

Mr. Ruby. No; I have been putting it off.

I mean, Burleson insists he wants some money so I have been sending him out of my personal account.

Mr. Griffin. How soon after your brother shot Oswald did you see him?

Mr. Ruby. I think it was about at least a week.

Mr. Griffin. Well—— Mr. Ruby. I am not sure. Because I made so many trips there. I was down there about seven or eight times.

Mr. Griffin. Was it before you went to Los Angeles to see Mike Shore?

Mr. Ruby. No; I think I made it on the way back. I went to Los Angeles first, the first trip, and then on the way back I went to Dallas.

Mr. Griffin. How much time did you spend with Jack on this first visit?

Mr. Ruby. Well, they only let you talk about 20 minutes or a half hour at the most.

Mr. Griffin. When is the last time you have seen him?

Mr. Ruby. The last time I saw him was—I was there at the verdict, you know.

Mr. Griffin. Have you seen him since the verdict?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, oh, yes; I stayed there for at least several days, anyhow, and I saw him every day at least once.

Mr. Griffin. Have you seen him since then?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; since I came back, since that trip, I haven’t been back.

Mr. Griffin. All right. Did you notice any change in your brother’s mental and physical condition between the first time that you saw him in Dallas and the last time that you saw him in Dallas?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; definitely. Physically he lost about 30 pounds, and you know, his face was drawn and his eyes sunken, and in addition to that he was despondent, of course, and you couldn’t—he would have to repeat questions or ask questions from him more than once to get a reply. It just didn’t seem to register all the time.

Even Belli mentioned that he couldn’t get across to Jack all the time, and Burleson mentioned to me several times that Jack is off his rocker. This was, you know——

Mr. Griffin. Was this after the verdict or before?

Mr. Ruby. No; before. He says, “Your brother is off his rocker. He has got himself involved with all the Jews all over the world and he doesn’t know what he is talking about,” but my brother did know what he was talking about. It was Burleson who didn’t understand. Because in order to understand—it is a Jewish problem—and most Jews would understand it.

Burleson, not being familiar with this, it just went over his head. I didn’t even think of it then but he kept telling me, “Your brother has got himself all mixed up with all the Jews all over the world and he is off his rocker.” That was the statement he made several times to me.

Mr. Griffin. I would like to explore this with you at some length if you don’t mind.

Mr. Ruby. That is why I brought this with me. I have all of this in here.

Mr. Griffin. Let me try to ask you some questions first and then we will get into the papers that you have brought. You say there was a disagreement, that you disagreed with Burleson’s appraisal of your brother’s involvement with the Jewish question.

Mr. Ruby. He couldn’t explain it. So, really, I didn’t understand it myself. I didn’t know what he was talking about at the time.

Mr. Griffin. You subsequently did come to learn what he was talking about, I take it?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; it wasn’t until somebody brought it to my attention, really.

Mr. Griffin. What was brought to your attention—what particular facts?

Mr. Ruby. Well, the fact it seemed that Jack in digging down into his past, he had an obsession about the Jewish people, and he always went out of his way to show people that Jews are not bad people, you know, because you know they have been persecuted over the years, and that is one of the reasons he brought the policemen at the station sandwiches and went out of his way to bring them cheesecakes and he was in debt to me for thousands of dollars, yet he never sent me any money but he always had money to give more or less or lend to these other people, almost all non-Jews to show them that a Jew would help them out.

A policeman became a father and was short on money, he would lend him a couple of hundred, never got it back, never got anything back.

Another friend he ran into needed a car to get a job—lent him a few hundred.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know—can you give us the names of some of these people?

Mr. Ruby. No; but my sister has them down there. I don’t have it. But I know of these instances, and he read all these books on the Jewish problem, the persecution of the Jews, going all the way back.

Mr. Griffin. How do you know that?

Mr. Ruby. I know from my sister. He lived with my sister and she told me, and he told me—both.

Mr. Griffin. Is this Eva?

Mr. Ruby. Eva; yes.

Mr. Griffin. Jack has told you that he read books on the Jewish problems?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; he even went to lectures on it, the synagogue, they had movies of the killings of the Jews in Germany. He went to all of these, things of that sort.

Mr. Griffin. I don’t know if Mr. Hubert has covered this or not, but do you recall an episode or a period back before World War II when Jack showed some concern about the Jewish problem, about the treatment of the Jews?

Mr. Ruby. Before World War II?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. You mean—well, he was in Chicago in the early thirties, they had the Nazi Bund meetings and Jack was always one to go and see if he could help break them up.

Mr. Griffin. Did you go on any of these groups?

Mr. Ruby. No, no.

Mr. Griffin. Well——

Mr. Ruby. He was about 4 years older than I am.

Mr. Griffin. Over what period of time was Jack involved in trying to break up these Bund meetings?

Mr. Ruby. In the early thirties there, I don’t remember.

Mr. Griffin. Do you remember any other people who participated with him in those?

Mr. Ruby. No; I don’t know their names.

Mr. Griffin. Was this a group of people or would Jack go alone?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; it was a group. But I don’t know the other names.

Mr. Griffin. Was it any sort of organized group? Was there an organization that he belonged to?

Mr. Ruby. No; I don’t think it was an organization. It just was several Jewish fellows and I don’t think they had an organization of any kind. Just when they learned that meetings were taking place, they would go there and try to break them up.

Mr. Griffin. Was Jack ever arrested in connection with any of those?

Mr. Ruby. Not as far as I know, because he has no arrest along those lines at all.

In fact, the only violation he has, from what I could gather, was being open after hours, and carrying concealed weapons which, from what I understand, they don’t need a permit in Dallas, you know, when he carried large sums of money.

Other than that—you must understand I was away from him, practically from the time he went to Dallas until the incident. I only saw him for short periods of time.

Mr. Griffin. Did you ever hear of the Dave Miller gang?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes.

Mr. Griffin. What was the Dave Miller gang?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I read about them in the paper. I was just a school kid then, but that was a gang that hung around Dave Miller’s fight gymnasium, that is all I can remember. But I know something like that existed.

Mr. Griffin. How did they get newspaper publicity?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know.

Mr. Griffin. Did Jack have anything to do with those people?

Mr. Ruby. He used to hang around Dave Miller’s gym but he was Barney Ross’ follower like, and I think Barney Ross trained there and so he was very close with him.

Mr. Griffin. Well now, this group that was referred to as the Dave Miller gang.

Mr. Ruby. Dave Miller was a referee.

Mr. Griffin. Dave Miller was a referee?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; Davy Miller was a referee in Chicago for many years.

Mr. Griffin. And he ran a gymnasium?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; to train the fighters.

Mr. Griffin. And did Dave Miller have a following of some sort?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I would say it was—there was a restaurant downstairs and it was a hangout. He owned the restaurant and the gym, and he was a referee so the fighters hung around there and other people came around to see the fighters, so it was a general hangout for people of that type.

Mr. Griffin. Did the Dave Miller gang have anything to do with these efforts to break up the Bund meetings?

Mr. Ruby. I think so, but I don’t have any concrete evidence. I think they did.

Mr. Griffin. Would you go ahead and tell us—let me ask you this, rather. You say that your awareness of your brother’s, what we’ll call involvement with his Jewish background or his position in society as a person of Jewish background, was brought to your attention by someone else. Who brought this to your attention?

Mr. Ruby. No; what was brought to my attention, I knew he was also interested in the Jewish problem, but I didn’t think it entered into this picture because I didn’t—this article here that was drawn up by Sol Dann, who through his daughter, a friend of the family, became interested in it because he could see what was in the background, and he studied all the things and he got some information from me and he talked to my brother, my sister and the psychiatrists on the case, and the more he talked to them the more he could see that this was an obsession with my brother, who probably didn’t realize it was as great an obsession as it actually was, and that is probably one of the reasons why Belli mentioned to me on a few occasions, “I can’t get across to your brother. I don’t have a client.”

He says, “I have a patient, not a client.”

He mentioned that to me several times. He says, “I can’t get through to your brother.”

Mr. Griffin. Did he give any specific indications?

Mr. Ruby. No; I didn’t go any further either, because I thought Belli was such a great lawyer. I say—I don’t even remember what I said, I just—then he had psychiatrists, when the psychiatrist would interview my brother he would talk to him afterward, and if ever I asked, I mean, what they say, he says, “Well, they claim he is sick, he has got this”—I don’t know the medical terms he used, you know, and so on and so forth, and, “We have a good case, he is definitely sick,” and all that, but the real problem. I mean the obsession itself, I don’t think that even registered with Belli or the other psychiatrists, because as far as I know—because it was never mentioned at the trial, and the psychiatrists never mentioned it to us, and we didn’t think to tell it to them, because we didn’t know if it had any importance or not, but we find now in talking to the psychiatrists that it is of great importance and it was probably one of the factors in his thinking the way he did.

Mr. Griffin. What about Mr. Burleson—did he tell you during this period, when you didn’t understand what he was talking about—what did he tell you about Jack?

Mr. Ruby. Well, he was aloof from us. That was the big problem with that trial.

Mr. Griffin. Let me say, Mr. Ruby, I don’t want to, I am not asking you to comment on the way Mr. Burleson conducted himself, but I am trying to find out what it was he said to you about Jack which you didn’t comprehend at the time.

Mr. Ruby. He said he is getting himself involved with all the Jews all over the world on an international scale—“He is off his rocker”—that was one of his——

Mr. Griffin. Did he specify any of the things Jack was talking about?

Mr. Ruby. No; he used to say, “Jews all over the world, on an international scale,” that was his expression several times and then, of course, he stated, “He is off his rocker.”

Mr. Griffin. Did Mr. Burleson tell you this sort of thing before the trial, or only after the trial?

Mr. Ruby. Before and during, I would say.

Mr. Griffin. Right.

Mr. Ruby. And not so much after, because after we were disgusted, I will tell you that.

Mr. Griffin. How long before the trial did Mr. Burleson begin to call these problems about involvement with Jews.

Mr. Ruby. Right after he got involved. Because he lived in Dallas, and he talked to my brother more so than anyone else because he lives there and right after he got into the case, not a few days later, he says, you know, made the statement again, “That your brother has got himself involved with all the Jews on an international scale and he is off his rocker, he doesn’t know what he is talking about.”

And to be truthful to you I didn’t understand his statement. It didn’t register with me because they kept saying, Belli said, “Your brother is sick. I have got a patient on my hands, you know. I am trying to take care of your brother, and I can’t get across to him.”

And my brother, I know, he had many fights because of the Jewish question, of being called, you know, names, referring to his Jewish parents and all that stuff, and, of course, I have been through it myself but he more so, and he fought more about it.

He was always quick tempered and just couldn’t take it.

Mr. Griffin. What other fights did he get involved in because of the Jewish question?

Mr. Ruby. Many fights. I know on several occasions he came home once with his suit full of blood from downtown.

He was downtown Chicago. I said, “What happened?”

He said, “Somebody called me a dirty Jew or something like that.”

Mr. Griffin. Do you know who he fought with on that occasion?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; there are many instances that my older brothers and sisters know of because I was younger, 4 years younger and in his teens, early teens, I didn’t go with him because 4 years makes a big difference, and I went my way and he went his way.

Mr. Griffin. How old was Jack at the time that you saw him with this suit full of blood?

Mr. Ruby. This goes back now, if I recall in 1946, I think, 1946.

Mr. Griffin. This was after he got out of the service?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, yes; he told me he had several fights in the service regarding this. He told me he had fights with a professional heavyweight in the service because he said something about the Jews.

My brother was so Jewish conscious that it didn’t make any difference whether he said, swore at him for being a Jew or he swore at somebody else a half a block away. He would get in there and fight right away, you know, unless they apologized and what have you. And he—so this, checking into it from what the psychiatrists tell me, he went out of his way to show the gentiles that in their thinking that all the Jews are no good or money grabbers or what have you, here was a nice guy that went out of his way—and didn’t have the money—to help anybody he could.

Mr. Griffin. Do you have any examples of this from the period that you worked with him at Earl Products?

Mr. Ruby. Well, this——

Mr. Griffin. Let’s just focus on that for a while.

Mr. Ruby. He was with me only a short period.

Mr. Griffin. What examples do you have from that period?

Mr. Ruby. I know from Earl Products is when he had that fight.

Mr. Griffin. What else?

Mr. Ruby. That I know of. Other instances, I can’t think of because as I said he went around with an older group of fellows than I did. We didn’t run around together. And not only that, I was married then, and you know he has been a bachelor all his life so he went to places——

Mr. Griffin. You traveled with him, didn’t you in the early forties you traveled with Jack, didn’t you?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; a little bit.

Mr. Griffin. Now, look back on that experience, if you can, do you remember any episodes from that?

Mr. Ruby. Actually, you must understand I didn’t travel with him. I only met him every weekend. He traveled by himself, and I traveled by myself, and we got together on weekends and then we would only see each other Friday night and then he would go on.

And we traveled through the East mostly.

Mr. Griffin. Mr. Ruby, you have brought certain papers with you, and Mr. Hubert is now in the room, and I want to bring him up to date a little bit on where we are, and we have been talking sometime about your brother’s obsession, as I think you call it, with his position in society as a person of Jewish background, and you indicated to me that you really only fully became aware of this problem since your brother shot Oswald, but that you have thought about it considerably since then, and that you have brought with you certain papers in connection with it.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. I wonder first if you can first identify a paper in your hand, if you will identify that paper, and I will give it an exhibit number.

Mr. Ruby. What would you call this——

Mr. Griffin. You are handing me——

Mr. Ruby. This document.

Mr. Griffin. A document that consists of 30 typewritten pages purporting to have been prepared by a man named Sol Dann, 1820 David Stott Building, Detroit 26, Mich. This is a Xerox copy and on the first page I am going to write your name “Earl Ruby Deposition, June 3, 1964, Exhibit No. 1” and I will ask you if you will state for the record what that is.

(Earl Ruby Exhibit No. 1 was marked for identification.)

Mr. Ruby. Well, this I would like to get into the record if I can.

Mr. Griffin. What is Exhibit No. 1 and then I will mark this other thing that you gave me.

Mr. Ruby. This is only what I want to state.

Mr. Griffin. Exhibit No. 1, tell us what that is. In a general fashion tell us what that consists of.

Mr. Ruby. Well, this is as was stated, prepared by Mr. Dann as to why or one of the reasons, that Ruby, that is Jack Ruby, shot Oswald.

Mr. Griffin. All right. Now, you have also handed me a handwritten penciled set of papers consisting of three pages.

Mr. Ruby. I was going to read that, is that all right?

Mr. Griffin. Certainly.

Mr. Ruby. That was my intention if it is all right with you.

Mr. Griffin. Do you have a statement you would like to make for the record?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. All right, go ahead then.

Mr. Ruby. I am filing this document with you because it explains why I need the help of the United States, and more especially, your help.

My brother, Jack, was deprived, and is presently being deprived, of his constitutional and civil rights. The hatred and bigotry in Dallas, Tex., resulted in the assassination of our President. It almost cost the lives of our present President, Mr. Johnson, and others.

With all the protection that this Government could give it could not guard against and prevent the assassination.

My family and myself are unable to cope with that situation and it may result in my brother’s death.

As pointed out in this document, my brother, Jack, is being made the scapegoat of this horrible situation. I, therefore, need, and respectfully request, your assistance in order that those guilty of this atrocity, either because of their acts or omission, gross negligence, or commission shall not go unpunished or undisciplined.

I don’t think that my brother, who had nothing to do with the assassination of the President, should be the only one punished. My family as well as myself have almost exhausted all of our resources in an effort to protect my brother’s civil rights, but now I am calling upon you for the help we need.

That is it.

Mr. Hubert. I suggest you put the document in the record as well.

Mr. Griffin. Do you mind, Mr. Ruby, if we would put that in the record?

Mr. Ruby. No; this I didn’t use.

Mr. Griffin. I will mark the three pages from what you have just read.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. I have marked them “Earl Ruby Deposition, June 3, 1964, Exhibit No. 2,” and that is on the first page. I think on the second page I will write Exhibit No. 2, and on the third page I will write Exhibit No. 2.

I will ask you if we may keep this and include this as part of our permanent record.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Let me hand you Exhibit No. 2 and ask you if you will sign it on the first page and initial each of the other pages.

(Earl Ruby Exhibit No. 2 was marked for identification.)

Mr. Hubert. Mr. Ruby, may I ask, this is addressed to whom, this Exhibit No. 2, which you actually read into the record. Who are you addressing it to?

Mr. Ruby. To the Commission.

Mr. Hubert. To the Commission. It is your desire that we see that the members of the Commission receive that document, is that correct?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Hubert. That is to say both your letter and the attachment?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; both.

Mr. Hubert. I notice that Exhibit No. 1 which is the long one of 30 pages, has the name Sol Dann.

Mr. Ruby. Sol Dann.

Mr. Hubert. I also notice he didn’t sign it. Did he actually prepare it?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; he did.

Mr. Hubert. Have you read it?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Hubert. Do you concur in what he says then?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Hubert. Is there any reason why he didn’t sign it?

Mr. Ruby. No; I didn’t even notice it, to be honest with you.

Mr. Griffin. Let me ask Mr. Ruby, I will hand him back Exhibit No. 1, and ask you if you will simply sign that on the first page, so we may have it properly marked for the record.

Mr. Hubert. Let me ask you about Exhibit No. 2. This is in pencil?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I didn’t think that you would want it so I, of course, didn’t——

Mr. Hubert. When did you write this Exhibit No. 2?

Mr. Ruby. Yesterday.

Mr. Hubert. It is your own handwriting?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, yes.

Mr. Hubert. All right.

I will have photostats made of this.

Mr. Ruby. If it doesn’t take, I can rewrite it in ink in 5 or 10 minutes.

Mr. Griffin. Let me ask you some questions to get the background of this document which we have marked here as Exhibit No. 1.

First of all, would you tell us how you happened to know Mr. Dann?

Mr. Ruby. His daughter teaches Hebrew in the school where my daughter attends, and his daughter impressed on him, after several conversations to contact me, and see what he could do to help us because he has been very active in helping I should say, the minority groups of any organization.

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us what Mr. Dann does for a living?

Mr. Ruby. He is an attorney.

Mr. Griffin. In Detroit?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. How old a man is Mr. Dann?

Mr. Ruby. I would say 55. That is a guess, of course.

Mr. Griffin. Did you know Mr. Dann before his daughter talked with you about——

Mr. Ruby. His daughter didn’t talk with me. She talked with him and finally convinced him to contact me and see what he could do to help us.

Mr. Griffin. When did Mr. Dann first contact you?

Mr. Ruby. Shortly after the verdict was passed.

Mr. Griffin. Now, do you know what efforts Mr. Dann made after talking with you, to talk with other people in order to prepare this document?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; he talked with many other people, the psychiatrists, he talked with Dr. West. He talked with Dr. Smith, the chief counsel, he talked, with Mr. Charles Bellows, the consultant on the case.

He talked to a psychiatrist by the name of Tanay in Detroit, and he mentioned several other people but I don’t recall their names.

Mr. Griffin. Can you——

Mr. Ruby. Excuse me; he also talked to my brother in Dallas, Sam.

Mr. Griffin. Did you say he talked with your brother Jack?

Mr. Ruby. No; he talked to Eva. But he talked to Dr. West and Dr. Smith and Bellows who spent a lot of time with Jack, of course, altogether.

Mr. Griffin. You indicated to Mr. Hubert that this Exhibit No. 1 had been read by you and that it generally reflected your views.

Mr. Ruby. Yes; yes, sir.

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us in your own words generally what is set forth in Exhibit No. 1?

Mr. Ruby. Well, it goes into, it explains Jack’s thinking along the Jewish problem, and his obsession and his love of President Kennedy, his going out of the way to try to be an exceptionally good guy by helping gentiles as much as he possibly could, and in any way he could. It also explains happenings at the trial. The withholding of evidence by District Attorney Henry Wade that should have been presented to the court. That my brother had received psychiatric help when he was 10 years old and none of the family knew it except the FBI, who had turned this information over to Wade.

However, Wade never permitted this to be used at the trial, and it also goes into telling of many cases that were reversed because of incidents similar to those which took place at my brother Jack’s trial, and states for these many reasons that the verdict should be reversed for all of these mistakes or negligence or whatever you may call it on the part of the court and the State’s attorney.

Mr. Griffin. Is it correct, do I have the correct understanding then, that in a sense we can break this down into two parts: One part of the document deals with the facts that have to do with Jack’s obsession?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. And the other part has to do with the legal errors in the trial?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; right—correct.

Mr. Griffin. Let me direct myself to some of the factual issues that are raised by Exhibit No. 1. I have made some notes here as you have been talking, and I want you, after we cover this, to tell me if I have left anything out that you think is important, but I want to try to cover this in orderly fashion. I am going backward though.

One issue that you raised here was that District Attorney Wade had withheld certain psychiatric evidence at the trial that had been turned over to him by the FBI.

Mr. Ruby. By the FBI.

Mr. Griffin. And that was that your brother Jack had received psychiatric help at age 10 and none of the family members knew about it?

Mr. Ruby. That is right.

Mr. Griffin. Let me ask you to tell us what your present understanding is now as to how Jack happened to get this psychiatric treatment, and where it was administered, and for how long, and the other details?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know that but the FBI gave that information to Wade, and Tonahill has that information in Dallas but I don’t have the exact dates.

Mr. Griffin. Well, do you know where he got the psychiatric aid?

Mr. Ruby. In Chicago.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know what institution?

Mr. Ruby. No.

Mr. Griffin. You say Tonahill has this information?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know how this evidence happened to be given, or let me ask you this, how do you know this evidence was given by the FBI to Mr. Wade?

Mr. Ruby. Tonahill.

Mr. Griffin. Tonahill has told you?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; that it was given to Wade by the FBI.

Mr. Griffin. How did Tonahill learn about this?

Mr. Ruby. That I don’t know.

Mr. Griffin. Did Tonahill——

Mr. Ruby. Well, he handled all the contacts with the FBI.

Mr. Griffin. Tonahill did?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; more or less.

Mr. Griffin. It is your understanding that the work of the trial team was divided up in such a way that only Tonahill dealt with the FBI, for the most part?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; as far as I know.

Mr. Griffin. Now, so you have no personal information, further personal information, at this time about this psychiatric help which Jack got at age 10?

Mr. Ruby. No.

Mr. Griffin. When Jack was 10 was he living in the home?

Mr. Ruby. In a foster home, yes; so far as I can understand.

Mr. Griffin. Well, that would have made you 6, is that right?

Mr. Ruby. Would have made me 6.

Mr. Griffin. Where were you living at age 6?

Mr. Ruby. To tell you the truth, I don’t know but I think I was living in Chicago, of course, and I don’t remember the name. I think the name of the people were Speeves, but I don’t know if I went to the farm, they sent me to a farm for a year, whether I was on a farm at the time but anyhow we weren’t together those years.

Mr. Griffin. For how many years were you separated from the rest of the family as a child?

Mr. Ruby. To tell you the truth, I don’t know when it started. I would say 5, 6 years maybe. I was in three foster homes that I remember all together. I know I was on a farm, and then at two foster homes that I can distinctly remember.

Mr. Griffin. Do you remember how old you were when you returned to the home of your family, your mother’s and father’s home?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I think it was in 1928, 1928, so I must have been 13 years old.

Mr. Griffin. And that would have made Jack 17.

Mr. Ruby. Seventeen; I am not sure whether it was—I just don’t remember. It has got to be a little before that. Because I went to that Shepherd School for a few years, it had to be there from 1925 to 1928, but I don’t know exactly.

Mr. Griffin. Were you living in the home when you went to the Shepherd School?

Mr. Ruby. You mean was I living with the family?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Was Jack living with the family at that time?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; that is when we were all brought back together.

Mr. Griffin. Had Jack finished high school at that time?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; Jack didn’t finish high school.

Mr. Griffin. No; but was Jack still attending school when he returned to the home?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; he was.

Mr. Griffin. Are you able to recall how long Jack continued to attend school after you returned to the family, to your family?

Mr. Ruby. No; I know he graduated from that Shepherd School but when I don’t know. As far as I know he graduated from that school and then he went to Marshall High School for a while and then he dropped out.

Mr. Griffin. Another thing that you mentioned that we were discussing in Exhibit 1, that Mr. Dann had assembled some facts and had discussed Jack’s efforts to show that the Jews are good people by himself helping gentiles.

Now I want you to go back and comb your recollection of the period you lived with and worked with Jack for incidents when you can recall of your own knowledge of Jack helping gentiles, or helping people in general, let’s not limit it to Jews or gentiles.

Mr. Ruby. Well, even when we were in business, we had that problem which came up several times, where he would take some of the merchandise, like our pens that we were using, and salt and pepper shakers, and almost every day or two he would take a load of samples. When I asked him he would say, “Well, a nice guy here or there and I gave him one or two, what difference does it make”, in the meantime he was giving them out all the time. If anybody wanted one he would just give it to them. But at that time no remark was made as far as I can remember as to why he did it.

Mr. Griffin. Would you be able to give us names of any people who, you know might have been the beneficiaries of this?

Mr. Ruby. I wouldn’t remember, because I wouldn’t know where, but most of this took place or a great part of it anyhow in Dallas, and the names of those I think we could get.

Mr. Griffin. How about as far as you are concerned, of course, you knew him in Chicago, how about people that you can think of that Jack would have extended these kindnesses to in Chicago?

Mr. Ruby. I couldn’t remember any names because there was no reason to remember this, and this goes back so far. It is 20 years at the earliest.

Mr. Griffin. Well, you also mentioned that your brother had a great love for President Kennedy. Can you give us some examples of that?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I didn’t realize it, I mean, because I haven’t been with him since the Kennedy family and Kennedy himself, to really become involved in politics because he was in Dallas and I was in Chicago and in Detroit. However, I know that when they, I think it was the Dallas Morning News printed that full page, whatever you call that, statement——

Mr. Griffin. The black bordered advertising?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; the black bordered advertising which more or less definitely insulted the President, he went to the paper and asked them if they needed the money so bad that they had to print such a horrible thing even though the other paper had turned it down.

And I think you know he was so upset about seeing that sign on the roadside about “Impeach Earl Warren” that in the middle of the night he got his roommate out and got Jerry Crafard, I think his name was, to take a picture of it.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know why he was upset about it?

Mr. Ruby. Well, he couldn’t see why anything like that could happen. Here is another great man, and he just couldn’t understand it.

Mr. Griffin. Are you surmising this or did——

Mr. Ruby. Well, I talked to George Senator who was his roommate, he said he was infuriated that a sign like that should be put up. And that was brought out in the trial, of course, and proved.

Then he on the night of the assassination, or rather on the afternoon he immediately closed the club, and when he was asked if he—what about the other night club owners because there is another, I think one or two clubs on the same block as his, yes, there are two more, whether they are going to close or not, in a statement he made, he doesn’t care if they close or not, he is going to be closed in respect to the President.

Then he went to the services at the synagogue in Dallas.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know how long he was at that service?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know how long, but I know that he broke down terribly there.

Mr. Griffin. Did you talk to anybody who——

Mr. Ruby. I heard it from the Rabbi who was there, that he was—of course, most of the people there were broken up but he was most unusual because he was in deep tears, he really was. And he was so upset and so disgusted with this situation that he called my sister Eileen in Chicago and told her this is a good time to get out of Dallas. He is ashamed of it, that this thing could happen there, and he will probably—he wants to come up to Chicago for a few days, you know, to visit with her. Well, she discouraged him from coming up. He wanted to come to Chicago, and he also called my brother Hy in Chicago after the assassination, and told him how terrible it was, and he thinks he is going to get out of Dallas, he is coming back to Chicago altogether.

He also called his good friend, this was all brought out in the trial, not all of it but most of it, although those last two incidents about him calling my brother and my sister were never entered into evidence. We couldn’t understand that.

He also called a fellow in California, Al Gruber, I think is his name, and Gruber said he just couldn’t talk. He just couldn’t talk he was so broken up.

So we know he was really broken up, and he must have really loved him because otherwise you just don’t do these things. And the fact that he went to the newspaper and complained to them for even taking the ad, and I mean nobody else did this.

Mr. Griffin. Do you have any examples of his conduct in Dallas before the President was shot that would show his feeling toward President Kennedy?

Mr. Ruby. No; We don’t have—nothing that I know of. We don’t have anything that I know of.

Mr. Griffin. I wonder if you can give us some more examples of——

Mr. Ruby. There is a bit about his patriotism that might mean something.

Mr. Griffin. Tell us about that.

Mr. Ruby. This happened many years ago. They were playing the Star Spangled Banner in the stadium in Chicago before all sporting events, and a friend who was with him, a fellow by the name of Mr. Kolitz told me this himself, he was smoking.

Mr. Griffin. What is Mr. Kolitz’s first name?

Mr. Ruby. Ira. He was smoking when the Star Spangled Banner was playing and my brother insisted he put out his cigarette, that it wasn’t in good taste to be smoking when the Star Spangled Banner was being played.

Mr. Griffin. Your brother didn’t approve of smoking either, did he?

Mr. Ruby. No; he didn’t smoke at all. Well, neither do I, for that matter. But this I didn’t find out about until a couple of months ago because I ran into this party in Chicago, and you know talking about these things, and he says, “How could they accuse your brother of being a Communist”, and then he related this incident to me. He says, “I remember, you know at the stadium when this happened, and he actually insisted I put the cigarette out.”

Mr. Griffin. Did Jack in your dealings with him, did he strive to be important and did he strive for recognition, things like that?

Mr. Ruby. I would say, well, he tried to be a success. He always wanted to be a success in life.

Mr. Griffin. What was his idea of being a success?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, having a family and being happily married and earning a steady living.

Mr. Griffin. Did he talk to you about his desires to have a family?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; on a few occasions. Once when he had financial failure and he was terribly depressed back in the early fifties, I think, he came to Chicago. He was just terribly depressed and he says, “Well, it looks like it is the end for me.” And, you know, he had no—he was penniless, and I tried to help him out again there. I was trying to look around for a business for him, to be truthful with you because we were doing pretty well, making a living, a good living, and I thought I could help him out but he decided to go back to Dallas again.

Mr. Griffin. Well now, there have been reports that Jack was the kind of a person who liked, who wanted everybody to know him and liked to be a big shot, some people might say. Did you have any experiences with him that would indicate anything about those kind of observations?

Mr. Ruby. Well, he was pretty well known in Chicago. He always was a good athlete, a good ballplayer. He was a very great swimmer, and he was very close to Barney Ross, so I would say—and he had many friends, so he was pretty well liked, and maybe some people would get the impression that he was a big shot but actually I don’t think he ever went out of the way to try to show people he was a big shot.

However, maybe I didn’t notice it because I am his brother. And he was my older brother, and so maybe I just didn’t notice it.

Mr. Griffin. I wonder if you can explain what seems to be on the one hand signs of his obsessions about being a Jew, such as you pointed out as fighting the Bundists and things like that, and on the other hand, what appears to be a lack of regular devotion to going to church services every week and keeping the religious home, and so forth?

Mr. Ruby. Well, the reason for that is I am more or less the same way as I explained before because in the breaking up of our home we were drawn away from this life, you see. I was living with—on a farm—I was living with gentile people and there wasn’t any synagogue there to go to, and so we drifted away from the services. And because before that we used to go to the Hebrew school, before our home was broken up, we all went to Hebrew school.

Mr. Griffin. Did you learn Hebrew?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, sure. Jack and—we went only until our home was broken up.

Mr. Griffin. When you were living in your home, did your parents keep a kosher home?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; definitely.

Mr. Griffin. It was a kosher home?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; definitely. Oh, sure.

Mr. Griffin. To what extent was it a kosher home?

Mr. Ruby. We would call it orthodox, you know, change of dishes and all that.

Mr. Griffin. Dietary rules?

Mr. Ruby. Sure; that is right. Sure, sure. But, of course, when we——

Mr Griffin. What language was spoken in the home?

Mr. Ruby. To our parents Yiddish, you would call it.

Mr. Griffin. Did your parents speak English?

Mr. Ruby. Very little; very few words.

Mr. Griffin. Are you willing to make this statement that your conversations with your parents were always in Yiddish?

Mr Ruby. No, no; I can’t say that because my father spoke a little English.

Mr. Griffin. How about with your mother?

Mr. Ruby. My mother I would say in her conversations she threw in a word here or there in English; about 95 percent was Yiddish. My father picked up more English words because, in fact, he was working as a carpenter, and being out among English-speaking people more than, more so than my mother who was home all the time, he had an opportunity to learn some English words.

Mr. Griffin. Now, when the children got older, the family continued to live together, as I understand it, there was a home where all of the unmarried children and the parents lived?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. In that home up until the time that your mother died, did you observe, were the dietary practices observed all the time?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; sure. Every Passover we changed the dishes, and so on.

Mr. Griffin. Yes; but that is just once a year. What about on a daily basis, did you observe every day the dietary——

Mr. Ruby. Well, you don’t observe it every day.

Mr. Griffin. Well, some homes do.

Mr. Ruby. I don’t understand.

Mr. Griffin. Some homes keep separate dishes for meat and dairy products.

Mr. Ruby. Yes; we had separate dishes until my mother passed away.

Mr. Griffin. How about the regularity of attending church services, temple services, did you go every week to temple services?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; not all of us. I know I didn’t. My sisters did. My sister did.

Mr. Griffin. Which sister?

Mr. Ruby. Marion. My father did until he became ill, you know, and then he passed away.

Mr. Griffin. Was there any resentment in the home toward the practices that were maintained by your parents there, failure to converse regularly in English and perhaps their old world habits?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t understand.

Mr. Griffin. Which is common in all families, I think, in which the practices that are observed in the home are not the kind of practices that you see on television or in the movies. Was there resentment among any of the children toward the fact that here was a home in which a foreign language was spoken, and practices were observed which did not appear to be the same practices as the people who were on top in American society?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I would say so. However, my mother insisted that we follow the lines of the Orthodox Jew.

Mr. Griffin. Did any of you object to that insistence by your mother?

Mr. Ruby. No; nothing because there wasn’t too much to object to, because it was the same food. I mean there is really nothing—however, if we would take the wrong utensil, you know, because there are two separate ones, we would be bawled out for taking the wrong one.

Mr. Griffin. Well, Jack during the time that he was in Chicago lived for various periods outside the home, didn’t he?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. For example, I believe he lived with either Sam Gordon or Alex Gruber in a separate apartment in Chicago in the early thirties. Do you recall that?

Mr. Ruby. I know he lived with Gruber but I don’t know how long.

Mr. Griffin. Well——

Mr. Ruby. Because it was in the early thirties, I was going to high school.

Mr. Griffin. Was there any particular reason why Jack did not want to live with the family?

Mr. Ruby. None that I can remember. There may have been, but I may not be, you know, I wasn’t aware of it.

Mr. Griffin. He also was away from Chicago from about 1933 to 1937.

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I think he went to ’Frisco to work there; yes. I think he went there. I think my sister was there or he went first, I don’t remember.

Mr. Griffin. Did you know his friend Leon Cooke?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; very well.

Mr. Griffin. Was Leon Cooke of Jewish background?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Were you familiar with Jack’s activities with Leon Cooke in the labor union?

Mr. Ruby. A little bit. I think I knew——

Mr. Griffin. What can you tell us about that, what—how long did Jack work in the union?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I know as far as I know, I think he helped organize it. It was Leon Cooke’s idea. Leon Cooke was an attorney and his father, Mr. Cooke, was a scrap iron and junk handler, and for some reason or another of his own thinking he decided that it would be a good idea to organize a union because the—although he was doing very well as an attorney without it, the workers in this industry were being paid, I think at that time, 10 cents or 15 cents an hour, and it was actually slave wages practically, as you can easily understand, and so they organized the union or how they go about it I don’t even know, but they did, Leon Cooke and Jack helped organize it, but I think Leon did all the legal work.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know of anybody else who helped in the organizing efforts?

Mr. Ruby. Even I went out once to hand out those flyers, you know, “join the union.”

Mr. Griffin. Where did you hand them out and what would you do?

Mr. Ruby. Well, they would come out from work and I would just hand it to them, as they leave the plant, just hand it to them.

Mr. Griffin. Did you ever make any personal contacts with members, with employees?

Mr. Ruby. No; never. I just—— Mr. Griffin. Were there any other people that you know of who worked in the union with Jack?

Mr. Ruby. I think my brother Hy worked for a little while in the union.

Mr. Griffin. Did Sam work in the union?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t think so. I only went there on very rare occasions, very rare. I may have been to one or two meetings in all. I didn’t get paid for it either, just, you know, kicks just to hand out the flyers, that is all.

Mr. Griffin. Can you think of any other people who were involved in the union?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I know John Martin, he was the president.

Mr. Griffin. He is the fellow who was killed?

Mr. Ruby. No; he shot Leon Cooke.

Mr. Griffin. He shot Leon Cooke. Is John Martin still living?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. I know there was another fellow but I can’t think of his name. There was a fellow by the name—I can’t think of their names. They had odd names. Of course, that goes back in the thirties, I think, right in there somewhere. I don’t even remember where it was.

Mr. Griffin. Was Leon Cooke a fellow about your brother’s age?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I think so.

Mr. Griffin. So Jack would have been in the late twenties at the time that he and Leon formed the union?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. I don’t know what year it was even. I don’t even remember.

Mr. Griffin. It was in the late thirties, wasn’t it.

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. I really don’t know.

Mr. Griffin. Do you know of any girls that Jack dated?

Mr. Ruby. In Chicago?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. Offhand not even one because he was, as I said, 4 years older than I was and we didn’t run around together. I know of the one he went with in Dallas, which was, I think she was—I don’t know if she testified at the trial or not.

Mr. Griffin. That is Alice Nichols?

Mr. Ruby. Alice Nichols.

Mr. Griffin. She is not a Jewish girl, is she?

Mr. Ruby. No.

Mr. Griffin. Did it seem to be Jack’s practice to get interested in women who are, what do you call them, shiksas?

Mr. Ruby. No; I really don’t know because I don’t know too much. You see he traveled in a different—I am trying to think. When he was going to Marshall High School that is when you usually start going with girls. I don’t recall those days because I was too young.

Mr. Griffin. What I am interested in exploring with you, if you can in a somewhat objective fashion, is some of the contrast between evidence you have shown us with his obsession with the fact that he was a Jew, and other indications that, for example, his dating girls who were gentiles and his living outside of the home away from the Jewish practices which might indicate that he had some desire to escape his Jewish background. Did you see any evidence of that?

Mr. Ruby. No; that I wouldn’t—because believe it or not, when my mother passed away and also my father, you know, we have to go say services, we are supposed to say services for a year every day and I didn’t keep it up, but he did.

Mr. Griffin. Jack went to services after your——

Mr. Ruby. Mother died.

Mr. Griffin. Every day?

Mr. Ruby. Every day as far as I know.

Mr. Griffin. Where was this temple that he attended services at?

Mr. Ruby. Well, there was one, I know, up——

Mr. Griffin. Were these temples in Chicago?

Mr. Ruby. One was in Chicago, I can’t think of the name.

Mr. Griffin. Your mother died while Jack was still in Chicago. When was that?

Mr. Ruby. 1944.

Mr. Griffin. Jack was in the service?

Mr. Ruby. That is right.

Mr. Griffin. How did you know he did that?

Mr. Ruby. He told us he went to services. You can say services there too as long as the chaplain——

Mr. Griffin. Would he have to go before a rabbi or chaplain of some sort?

Mr. Ruby. Really not necessarily; it is not—because they say if it isn’t available, you can still say the prayer.

Mr. Griffin. This could be something he could have done on his bunk, his cot in the Army?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. There he had access to a chaplain though because it wasn’t a large camp.

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. When I say you don’t have access, I am thinking of overseas where it might be a small unit, like where I was there wasn’t a Jewish chaplain.

Mr. Griffin. What I am trying to get at is this occurred while he was in the service. In order for him to properly observe mourning for your mother would he have had to have done something so that somebody else would have to be aware he was doing this other than Jack simply telling them. Would he have done something in his area where he lived or light a candle or would he have gone to a chaplain or gone in some place and prayed where people could have seen him. What would there have been observed by other people?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. How can I answer that. I wasn’t with him.

Mr. Griffin. But you know what the requirements are of the Jewish faith to properly observe mourning for people.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. What would some of the things have been that Jack would have had to have done?

Mr. Ruby. Just say the prayer, to read it out of the book or if you know it from memory, by that time after a while you know it from memory.

Mr. Griffin. And he could have repeated that to himself?

Mr. Ruby. It is possible. But if a rabbi or services are available that is where you usually go. But if you are at a remote place where it isn’t possible to have services then you can say it.

Mr. Griffin. Do you actually recall Jack telling you that he was going to services for your mother?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; definitely.

Mr. Griffin. Where did he tell you that he went?

Mr. Ruby. He just said he was carrying on the services but I don’t remember now. This happened 20 years ago.

Mr. Griffin. What I am trying to get at is your not saying that you recall him telling you he went to a chapel or to a synagogue or a temple.

Mr. Ruby. No; all he said was that he said services.

Mr. Griffin. I see.

Mr. Ruby. But as to where I didn’t think it was at that time necessary to question him.

Mr. Griffin. Are there any other examples of this concern with his religious heritage?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I told you about he read all the books or as many books as he could on the Jewish atrocities, whatever you might call them.

Mr. Griffin. He did this down in Dallas?

Mr. Ruby. He did this in Dallas that I know, my sister told me. In fact, when I went there he had several books.

Mr. Griffin. What kind, do you remember the names of the books?

Mr. Ruby. He had one called “Eva” and “Exodus”, and another one there that he was reading, and then he would give them away after he finished. I can’t think of the other one. It was still there while I was there.

Mr. Griffin. When was this that you observed “Eva” and “Exodus”?

Mr. Ruby. Right after the incident I went down there.

Mr. Griffin. I see. So after the incident he was reading “Eva” and “Exodus”?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; it was before. I saw the books after but he had been reading them before because they were in my sister’s apartment. She had taken everything from his apartment.

Mr. Griffin. So it is your understanding that he had certain religious type books?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes.

Mr. Griffin. Books on Jews in the apartment that he was living in?

Mr. Ruby. Right; definitely. In fact, he went out of his way as I stated before, to go and listen to lectures at the synagogue on the Jewish problem and the atrocities in Germany, and they showed films, real detailed films on what actually took place and he made it a point to be there.

Mr. Griffin. When did this occur?

Mr. Ruby. This happened before the incident.

Mr. Griffin. How long before?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t know. I don’t know. But my brother Sam told me about this just last week that when his mother-in-law, his wife’s mother, was down in Dallas, Jack insisted she come along to see these films and hear the lecture.

You see, as I said, I have to get these, some of these things through a third party because I am in Detroit.

Mr. Griffin. Sure, sure. I want to get them straight as to where you got them so we can follow them out.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Do you recall, this is on another subject, that at one time when you were questioned about why Jack and you had a falling out with respect to Earl Products, that you stated that Jack was not spending full time on the business, and that was one of the reasons?

Mr. Ruby. Well, we didn’t think so. This was Sam’s and my opinion.

Mr. Griffin. Can you tell us what was happening?

Mr. Ruby. Well, we wanted him to sell our products that we were manufacturing, and he was, seemed to be always getting involved with selling somebody else’s product. Of course, there was a commission involved or whatever it was, but I didn’t—we didn’t approve of it. We wanted to push our products and so, of course, he and Sam had a real runout or whatever you call it and then we finally decided to buy him out.

Mr. Griffin. What other products was he selling?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I think he was selling costume jewelry. Well, we don’t manufacture that. We wanted him to devote his entire interest into the company.

Mr. Griffin. Would costume jewelry, could it be considered a companion line for anything you were selling. Would he go into the same stores to sell costume jewelry?

Mr. Ruby. You possibly could, you possibly could, but it was our opinion that he should devote all of his time to our products.

Mr. Griffin. What was Jack’s responsibility in Earl Products?

Mr. Ruby. He was actually the sales manager.

Mr. Griffin. Did he have employees working in there?

Mr. Ruby. I was just going to add, he didn’t have any, he was the only one.

Mr. Griffin. He managed himself?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; and he was a good salesman, too.

Mr. Griffin. Did this——

Mr. Ruby. Anyhow, with leading too we weren’t hitting it off so good, and my sister Eva was asking him to come down to Dallas, so between everything we finally decided to buy him out and he took his money and went down there.

Mr. Griffin. Did his sales activities require him to spend most of his time outside of the place of business?

Mr. Ruby. Of course; oh, yes.

Mr. Griffin. How much of your sales were on a mail-order basis and how much was this direct selling that Jack may have been involved in?

Mr. Ruby. Well, at this time, the time he was handling the sales, there was very little mail order. It was mostly accounts that he had secured or we had in one way or another.

Mr. Griffin. What area?

Mr. Ruby. Like Mar-Din.

Mr. Griffin. That was in St. Louis, wasn’t it?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; in Chicago.

Mr. Griffin. In Chicago?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Did he travel outside the Chicago area?

Mr. Ruby. Not too much; not too much, if I recall. I don’t recall. I don’t think he traveled too much.

I think, now that I think of it, that was one of our problems. We wanted him to go down or go out of town, to Milwaukee or any of the other cities, even close by, and definitely St. Louis where we eventually sold Katz Drug which is a big and good account for us and they turned out to be a pretty fair account. And anyhow as I said one thing led to another. Eva was wanting him in Dallas and he wasn’t getting along too well with us so it was decided to buy him out.

Mr. Griffin. The only other topic I want to cover with you now is the circumstances behind you changing your name from Rubenstein to Ruby. Did Mr. Hubert cover that with you?

Mr. Ruby. Sort of. Well, first off, there are two reasons. First of all, we were, I think, very conscious of the Jewish name of Rubenstein, and we had worked for another Jewish fellow who we all looked up to, an elderly fellow who had been very successful in business and his name was Stanley Eisenberg and he said, “When you send out mail orders you shouldn’t use a Jewish name because of the—some people won’t order even if they can use the merchandise,” and anyhow he suggested we use a different name, and so we finally decided since they were calling us Ruby anyhow, with that in mind, and business reasons, that is, and we finally decided to—Sam and I did first, you know.

Mr. Griffin. You did.

Mr. Ruby. Yes; and Jack did it down in Dallas.

Mr. Griffin. How much time elapsed between when you and Sam changed your name and Jack changed his?

Mr. Ruby. Gee, I don’t know.

Mr. Griffin. Did you ever discuss with Jack the reasons for his changing his name?

Mr. Ruby. No.

Mr. Griffin. Do you have any idea why he changed his name?

Mr. Ruby. No; it never came up. We never discussed it as far as I can remember, we just never discussed that.

Mr. Griffin. Is my understanding correct then that the changing of your name and Sam’s name was directly tied with your activity in connection with Earl Products, and thus since Hyman didn’t have any connection with Earl Products and Jack didn’t have any connection with Earl Products at the time you two changed your name, why there was no reason for those two at that time to change their name?

Mr. Ruby. Well, Hyman never changed his name, as you know.

Mr. Griffin. Yes; I know that.

Mr. Ruby. I really don’t know the reason for Jack. He may have had the same reason but since he did it there, and we never brought it up it just never was brought into our conversations, that I can remember. We may have—at that time it was nothing important to us, and it happened along about 15–16 years ago, I think. I think we changed ours in 1947, I don’t even remember.

Mr. Griffin. I think we can finish this off here now. I want to hand you what has been marked as “Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby, Exhibit No. 3.” This is a copy of a report which was prepared by two FBI agents, White and Lee of an interview they had with you on November 25 in Chicago, which consists of two pages. The pages are numbered at the bottom 171 and 172. I want to hand it to you and ask you if you had a chance to read that?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I have.

Mr. Griffin. Are there any changes or corrections that you think ought to be made in that?

Mr. Ruby. Well, here in the first paragraph it says, “In 1946 his brothers Jack Ruby” I think, I am not sure of the date. I think it was 1947, and Jack didn’t change his name when we did. He changed it later in Dallas.

Mr. Griffin. All right. Let’s read into the record the part you are talking about. In the second paragraph you are talking about the sentence which reads, “He said that in 1946 his brothers Jack Ruby and Sam Ruby along with himself legally changed their names from Rubenstein to Ruby for business purposes.”

Now the correct date of your changing your name is when?

Mr. Ruby. I think it was 1947.

Mr. Griffin. And in any event Jack did not change his name at the same time that you did?

Mr. Ruby. That is correct.

Mr. Griffin. Okay. Take your time and refer to them—you have notes, refer to them.

Mr. Ruby. Down here in the sixth paragraph it says, “following military service Jack returned to Chicago where he resided for several months and was not employed to his, Earl Ruby’s knowledge,” that is not correct.

When Jack came back from the service we immediately took him in as a partner in Earl Products Co., so that is wrong. And then they said about 1946. I think in 1947 he went to Dallas. However, I am not sure of that. You probably have that date.

I see on this next to the last paragraph where it says Earl Ruby stated he could give no reason why Jack Ruby shot Oswald except Jack is highly—is a highly emotional type and may have thought he was doing everyone a great service, I don’t remember that, the exact words. I don’t think I would have made that statement completely. I mean——

Mr. Griffin. Did you have some feeling at the time that Jack may have thought he was doing a service to the country?

Mr. Ruby. To tell you the truth, I was so upset that I may have made the statement but I am not sure. You know I was—when was this, this was the next day, right, Monday?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. That is it for this one. Some of them are almost exact duplicates.

Mr. Griffin. I am going to hand you what has been marked as “Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby Exhibit 4.” And that purports to be an interview that Mr. Robichau and Mr. Wilson of the FBI had with you on November 25 in Southfield, Mich. It consists of six pages and they are numbered consecutively at the bottom 173 to 178.

Have you had a chance to read that over?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Would you indicate what changes or corrections should be made thereon?

Mr. Ruby. Well, in the fourth paragraph I am not certain as to whether my father was born in Russia and as to whether my mother was born in Poland. I think my older sisters and brothers know more about that than I do.

Mr. Griffin. Was the experience of your mother and father in Europe a topic which was discussed very often in the home?

Mr. Ruby. My father’s experiences were, in telling about the hardships of it and the persecutions of the Jews.

I have one other correction here.

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. In the fifth paragraph it states here that Jack was employed by Earl Products after he first left the service. He wasn’t employed. He was a part owner. It clarifies it in the next sentence, however.

Now, on page 2, the third paragraph this states here that I may have said that A. Weinberg was a fourth removed cousin, but I find that that is not so. She never was a cousin of ours.

And then on page 5 in the first paragraph it states that from 1939 to 1942 I was employed as a carpenter at building the barracks at Great Lakes. The date is incorrect. I worked there from, on in the year of 1942.

Mr. Griffin. Would you want to take a pen and cross that off and correct it properly and then initial it, initial your deletion there?

Mr. Ruby. In the last sentence on page 6 it states that Earl and his three brothers had their names legally changed from Rubenstein to Ruby during 1947. That is incorrect. It should be Earl and Sam and Earl’s wife, Marge. Shall I change it?

Mr. Griffin. Yes; why don’t you?

Why don’t you sign that on the first page then. Sign Exhibit No. 4.

I will give you Exhibit No. 3 and ask you to sign that.

One other thing that occurred to me before we go on here. We have obtained various birth records and so forth, and in trying to identify which record pertains to which child, I noticed that your parents—actually your given names were Hebrew names.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Is my understanding correct that your given Hebrew name was Isadore?

Mr. Ruby. No; actually I was, the name listed was, Izzy, on my birth record. Is that what you are referring to?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

Mr. Ruby. Izzy, I-z-z-y, that is me.

Mr. Griffin. Do you recall what the given names of your various sisters are? Could you relate those to us?

Mr. Ruby. No; I couldn’t. Eileen I think was Ida, I think. The others I don’t know. You have to talk to one of the older members of the family.

Mr. Griffin. Incidentally, also in Exhibit No. 3, I noticed that you had, somebody has put some penciled mark numbers, were those your marks and did you wish to comment on those?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, it is just an error there—that should be scrap iron and junk handlers.

Mr. Griffin. All right, it is corrected for the record, you just state it for the record.

Mr. Ruby. Here is a repetition of that other one where it says I stated he was doing every one a great service. I don’t remember saying that and I am just not sure.

Mr. Griffin. All right.

Let me hand you what has been marked as Exhibit No. 5 and has been further marked “Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby” which purports to be a copy of an interview with you also at South Field, Mich., on November 26, 1963, with special agents Robichau and Wilson.

The exhibit consists of six pages, numbered in sequence 11 through 16. I will hand it to you and ask you if you have any corrections that you want to make in that?

Mr. Ruby. Here again on page 5 it states I worked at the building—the barracks at Great Lakes from 1942. It was only during 1942. Shall I change it?

Mr. Griffin. Yes; if you wish.

Do you want to sign Exhibit No. 5?

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. I am going to hand you what has been marked for identification as “Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby Exhibit No. 6.” This is a copy of an interview which Agent Robichau purports to have had with you on November 27 in Detroit, Mich.

Would you want to look at that and tell us if there are any changes or corrections that you would make?

Mr. Ruby. No; no corrections. Shall I sign it?

Mr. Griffin. All right, fine.

I will hand you what has been marked for identification as “Exhibit No. 7, Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby.” This purports to be a copy of an interview report prepared by Special Agent George Parfet of the FBI. The interview took place with you on November 28 in Chicago. It consists of two pages and it is numbered at the bottom pages 15 and 16.

Would you want to look at that and tell us if there are any changes or corrections that you would care to make?

Mr. Ruby. Here on page 2 it mentioned that I had never heard of Jack being mentally ill or depressed. However, I know he was depressed several years ago.

Mr. Griffin. Did you know that at the time you gave that interview report, gave that interview?

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I knew he was depressed but I didn’t understand it completely. I didn’t know that it was called depression at that time.

Mr. Griffin. How did it appear, how would you have described it at that time?

Mr. Ruby. Well, that he wouldn’t shave and he wouldn’t bathe, and he wouldn’t go out, but at that time I didn’t know what it was called. But after thinking it over, when he came up to Chicago once, he was terribly depressed, as I stated before.

Mr. Griffin. How would you have described him at the time you saw him— what would you have said was the matter with him?

Mr. Ruby. Well, I was just—let me see what words I can use to describe it—I would have said he was disgusted, not knowing that actually he was depressed until I really learned what the word “depressed” means.

Mr. Griffin. Was his attitude one more of hostility or belligerence toward what had happened rather than one of submission?

Mr. Ruby. No; it was one of submission. He wouldn’t go any places as I stated. He didn’t want to wash or clean himself up and I had to more or less force him to get in the shower and things of that sort.

Mr. Griffin. What about the things he said, though. Were these—you used the term “disgust”—did he speak in the manner of someone who was disgusted would speak?

Mr. Ruby. Well, he didn’t even have much to say, if I recall. He didn’t even have much to say. He tried to keep to himself.

Mr. Griffin. Where did he live at that time?

Mr. Ruby. I mean in my presence. In other words, he would go in another room or sit in a chair and just sit there without making—just thinking to himself about whatever was going through his mind. He was listless.

Mr. Griffin. Were you married at that time?

Mr. Ruby. Yes, I was married.

Mr. Griffin. Did Jack come and live with you?

Mr. Ruby. No, no.

Mr. Griffin. Where did he live at the time?

Mr. Ruby. He came to the family and that is where I came to see him. In fact, he was so depressed that I took him to try to cheer him up, I had to go to New York for a business trip, a show that was taking place there and I took him for a ride, we were driving anyhow, and I thought it would pep him up a little bit, you know, to go on a trip. But it didn’t help much.

Mr. Griffin. Was your attitude toward him this time one of sympathy or couldn’t you figure out what was eating this guy?

Mr. Ruby. No; I would say he was. I just thought he was disgusted with things, little realizing that he was in a state of depression.

Mr. Griffin. But were you sympathetic toward him at the time?

Mr. Ruby. Oh, yes; as I said, that is why I took him on the trip. I tried to encourage him. I told him “Maybe we can find something for you to get into,” as I mentioned before, “Some business we can get you started in or something.”

However, he decided, as I stated before, to go back to Dallas.

Mr. Griffin. Did he ever tell you why he decided to go back to Dallas?

Mr. Ruby. I don’t recall, he may have, but I can’t recall just now.

I see another, the last paragraph on page 2. I didn’t even remember that conversation with the agent.

Mr. Griffin. Would you read the paragraph?

Mr. Ruby. It states here, “Earl Ruby was specifically asked regarding his residence in New Haven, Conn., in 1940. He has stated that he had never been in New Haven, Conn., in his life and in that period was engaged in the drycleaning business on Cicero Avenue in Chicago.”

Mr. Griffin. Is that statement a correct statement?

Mr. Ruby. When we were selling we used to travel the east coast but I would have only been there—I don’t remember being there, but if I had been there, I would have been there only for a day. I think he asked me if I lived there for any length of time, if I recall, but I am not sure. I don’t recall this——

Mr. Griffin. Were you in the drycleaning business on Cicero Avenue at that time?

Mr. Ruby. As far as I know, yes; I had an independent cleaning route at that time. I used to call on friends and pick up their cleaning and deliver it right to their home.

Mr. Griffin. You didn’t operate a cleaning plant?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; but this is where I worked out of. Maybe he just cut it short. I brought my cleaning to this plant in Chicago, on Cicero Avenue, in Chicago, they cleaned it and charged me a wholesale price and I added on a profit, of course.

Mr. Griffin. I am going to hand you what has been marked as “Exhibit 8, Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby.” It consists of two pages numbered 210 and 211 and purports to be a copy of a report which Agent George Parfet prepared with respect to that interview he had with you on November 28 at South Field, Mich.

Mr. Ruby. I didn’t sign the other one.

(Earl Ruby Exhibits Nos. 5, 6, 7, and 8 were marked for identification.)

Mr. Griffin. I will state for the record then, you have just signed Exhibit No. 7, and if you will look at Exhibit No. 8, tell us if there are any changes or corrections you would make in that.

Mr. Ruby. Here again it is almost a duplicate of the previous, what do you call it again, number?

Mr. Griffin. Interview report.

Mr. Ruby. What is this?

Mr. Griffin. That is Exhibit No. 8, and this is Exhibit No. 7 that I have here.

Mr. Ruby. The last paragraph again as stated in the previous one. They are almost identical.

Mr. Griffin. Yes; it looks like they are identical copies and they were just included in different places in our materials.

Let me hand it to you then and let me ask you to sign it.

Mr. Ruby. Sign it anyhow?

Mr. Griffin. Yes; Exhibit No. 8.

Mr. Ruby. Yes.

Mr. Griffin. Yes; Exhibit No. 8.

I finally hand you what has been marked for identification as “Exhibit No. 9, Washington, D.C., June 3, 1964, deposition of Earl Ruby.” This is a copy of a report which Agent Robichau made with you of an interview he had on December 2, 1963, at Detroit, Mich.

Would you tell us if you have any additions or corrections or changes to make in that?

Mr. Ruby. No; this is correct. That she is not related in any way to our family.

Mr. Griffin. All right.

Now, that concludes all the questions that I have, and I presume that Mr. Hubert has or he would have come back in.

Are there any topics that we haven’t covered that you feel that we ought to—is there anything further that you would like to say? You have got the floor.

Mr. Ruby. Yes; I think, and this took place at the trial, and after the first policeman had testified as to statements made by my brother Jack, that evening when I saw Jack, he told me that he is going to the electric chair.

He said because he never made any of those statements, and now he knows what Wade has in mind, because if Wade wants to send you to the chair he can, and he always does, and that is why he has the record that he has.

Mr. Griffin. Do you remember who the first policeman was who testified?

Mr. Ruby. No; I don’t. And he told me on several occasions that he never made the statements the police testified that he did make, and in fact, if the record will be checked, it is proved that the statement that Dean made couldn’t have been true—Officer Dean.

Mr. Griffin. Why do you say that?

Mr. Ruby. Because at the time when he said he had been talking—that Jack made a statement, Jack, he is the one who said Jack told him 2 days before at 4 o’clock, I think the time was, that he stated, that Jack told him that he was going to get Oswald.

At that time Jack was at home with Eva, so Jack couldn’t have made that statement to him, and, of course, this has been brought out in the petition or motion for a new trial, so it is in the official record, so to say.

Mr. Griffin. Now, when Jack talked to you the first night after, or after the first police officer testified, was that first police officer Sergeant Dean, or was that another police officer?

Mr. Ruby. No; that was another police officer. Dean was the last police officer, if I recall correctly.

Mr. Griffin. Did Jack tell you what he did say?

Mr. Ruby. No; but he said he never made those statements.

Mr. Griffin. Did Jack——

Mr. Ruby. He repeated it several times on different occasions. He said, “I never made that—any of those statements and I know how Wade operates. He is going to send me to the chair. Now I know what he has got in mind.”

Mr. Griffin. Let the record reflect that I am going to give you a copy which we have made of your three-page statement which you have entered into the record and which is marked as Exhibit No. 2, and also a copy of Exhibit No. 1 which we have marked.

Mr. Ruby. You are giving that back to me because I have a copy of Exhibit No. 1.

Mr. Griffin. You can have that copy back.

Mr. Ruby. OK.

Mr. Griffin. Are there any other matters that you think ought to be covered that we haven’t covered?

Mr. Ruby. No; I can’t think of any. I think we have covered them all.

Mr. Griffin. Let me ask you one last question which I started to ask some hours ago.

That is this: Between the time you first saw Jack in Dallas, and the last time you saw him in Dallas, what changes did you see in him, if any?

Mr. Ruby. I think as I stated, he lost probably 25 or 30 pounds, and he couldn’t seem to grasp or understand conversations or questions. I have talked to him many times on the phone since then, and he still thinks—in fact as of now, he don’t even think I am alive. He thinks they killed me and my family, my children.

Mr. Griffin. When you first saw him in Dallas did he have these—did you have any trouble communicating with him, did he show any lack of understanding when you first saw him?

Mr. Ruby. No, no; it wasn’t—yes; I must change that. There was a slight hesitancy on his part to understand questions that I put to him. He would shake his head when I would ask him questions sometimes and as though he didn’t understand, and these were just ordinary questions of routine matters, just about the trial or Belli. We discussed Belli, and he said, even at the beginning there he said, “They don’t talk to me. Why don’t they talk to me longer,” and yet Belli was there for hours.

Mr. Griffin. This wasn’t the very first time you saw him. This was on an occasion later?

Mr. Ruby. That is right. It had to be later.

Mr. Griffin. All right. I have nothing more. And if you have nothing more I want to thank you very much for taking this time for us.

Mr. Ruby. I hope I can help you and I hope you can help us.

Mr. Griffin. We want to assemble all the facts that we possibly can and prepare a report that will be as fair and as impartial as can be.

Mr. Ruby. You want me to check on that professor at Northwestern University, correct?

Mr. Griffin. And if you would give us the names of those employees.

Mr. Ruby. The list I have on that. I can possibly get the information as to where my brother received the psychiatric treatment when he was about 10 years old. Do you want me to send that to you?

Mr. Griffin. If you would get us that we would appreciate it, yes.

Mr. Ruby. Shall I mail it just here the same address?

Mr. Griffin. Yes.

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