Newnam estimated that Ruby departed from the Morning News at about 1:30 p.m., but other testimony indicated that Ruby may have left earlier.[C6-869]
Ruby’s alleged visit to Parkland Hospital.—The Commission has investigated claims that Jack Ruby was at Parkland Hospital at about 1:30 p.m., when a Presidential press secretary, Malcolm Kilduff, announced that President Kennedy was dead. Seth Kantor, a newspaperman who had previously met Ruby in Dallas, reported and later testified that Jack Ruby stopped him momentarily inside the main entrance to Parkland Hospital some time between 1:30 and 2 p.m., Friday, November 22, 1963.[C6-870] The only other person besides Kantor who recalled seeing Ruby at the hospital did not make known her observation until April 1964, had never seen Ruby before, allegedly saw him only briefly then, had an obstructed view, and was uncertain of the time.[C6-871] Ruby has firmly denied going to Parkland and has stated that he went to the Carousel Club upon leaving the Morning News.[C6-872] Video tapes of the scene at Parkland do not show Ruby there, although Kantor can be seen.[C6-873]
Investigation has limited the period during which Kantor could have met Ruby at Parkland Hospital on Friday to a few minutes before and after 1:30 p.m. Telephone company records and the testimony of Andrew Armstrong established that Ruby arrived at the Carousel Club no later than 1:45 p.m. and probably a few minutes earlier.[C6-874] Kantor was engaged in a long-distance telephone call to his Washington office from 1:02 p.m. until 1:27 p.m.[C6-875] Kantor testified that, after completing that call, he immediately left the building from which he had been telephoning, traveled perhaps 100 yards, and entered the main entrance of the hospital. It was there, as he walked through a small doorway, that he believed he saw Jack Ruby, who, Kantor said, tugged at his coattails and asked, “Should I close my places for the next three nights, do you think?” Kantor recalled that he turned briefly to Ruby and proceeded to the press conference at which the President’s death was announced. Kantor was certain he encountered Ruby at Parkland but had doubts about the exact time and place.[C6-876]
Kantor probably did not see Ruby at Parkland Hospital in the few minutes before or after 1:30 p.m., the only time it would have been possible for Kantor to have done so. If Ruby immediately returned to the Carousel Club after Kantor saw him, it would have been necessary for him to have covered the distance from Parkland in approximately 10 or 15 minutes in order to have arrived at the club before 1:45 p.m., when a telephone call was placed at Ruby’s request to his entertainer, Karen Bennett Carlin.[C6-877] At a normal driving speed under normal conditions the trip can be made in 9 or 10 minutes.[C6-878] However, it is likely that congested traffic conditions on November 22 would have extended the driving time.[C6-879] Even if Ruby had been able to drive from Parkland to the Carousel in 15 minutes, his presence at the Dallas Morning News until after 1 p.m., and at the Carousel prior to 1:45 p.m., would have made his visit at Parkland exceedingly brief. Since Ruby was observed at the Dallas Police Department during a 2 hour period after 11 p.m. on Friday,[C6-880] when Kantor was also present, and since Kantor did not remember seeing Ruby there,[C6-881] Kantor may have been mistaken about both the time and the place that he saw Ruby. When seeing Ruby, Kantor was preoccupied with the important event that a press conference represented. Both Ruby and Kantor were present at another important event, a press conference held about midnight, November 22, in the assembly room of the Dallas Police Department. It is conceivable that Kantor’s encounter with Ruby occurred at that time, perhaps near the small doorway there.[C6-882]
Ruby’s decision to close his clubs.—Upon arriving at the Carousel Club shortly before 1:45 p.m., Ruby instructed Andrew Armstrong, the Carousel’s bartender, to notify employees that the club would be closed that night.[C6-883] During much of the next hour Ruby talked by telephone to several persons who were or had been especially close to him, and the remainder of the time he watched television and spoke with Armstrong and Larry Crafard about the assassination.[C6-884] At 1:51 p.m., Ruby telephoned Ralph Paul in Arlington, Tex., to say that he was going to close his clubs. He urged Paul to do likewise with his drive-in restaurant.[C6-885] Unable to reach Alice Nichols, a former girl friend, who was at lunch, Ruby telephoned his sister, Eileen Kaminsky, in Chicago.[C6-886] Mrs. Kaminsky described her brother as completely unnerved and crying about President Kennedy’s death.[C6-887] To Mrs. Nichols, whose return call caused Ruby to cut short his conversation with Mrs. Kaminsky, Ruby expressed shock over the assassination.[C6-888] Although Mrs. Nichols had dated Ruby for nearly 11 years, she was surprised to hear from him on November 22 since they had not seen one another socially for some time.[C6-889] Thereafter, Ruby telephoned at 2:37 p.m. to Alex Gruber, a boyhood friend from Chicago who was living in Los Angeles.[C6-890] Gruber recalled that in their 3-minute conversation Ruby talked about a dog he had promised to send Gruber, a carwash business Gruber had considered starting, and the assassination.[C6-891] Ruby apparently lost his self-control during the conversation and terminated it.[C6-892] However, 2 minutes after that call ended, Ruby telephoned again to Ralph Paul.[C6-893]
Upon leaving the Carousel Club at about 3:15 p.m., Ruby drove to Eva Grant’s home but left soon after he arrived, to obtain some weekend food for his sister and himself.[C6-894] He first returned to the Carousel Club and directed Larry Crafard to prepare a sign indicating that the club would be closed; however, Ruby instructed Crafard not to post the sign until later in the evening to avoid informing his competitors that he would be closed.[C6-895] (See Commission Exhibit 2427, [p. 339].) Before leaving the club, Ruby telephoned Mrs. Grant who reminded him to purchase food.[C6-896] As a result he went to the Ritz Delicatessen, about two blocks from the Carousel Club, and bought a great quantity of cold cuts.[C6-897]
Ruby probably arrived a second time at his sister’s home close to 5:30 p.m. and remained for about 2 hours. He continued his rapid rate of telephone calls, ate sparingly, became ill, and attempted to get some rest.[C6-898] While at the apartment, Ruby decided to close his clubs for 3 days. He testified that after talking to Don Saffran, a columnist for the Dallas Times-Herald:
I put the receiver down and talked to my sister, and I said, “Eva, what shall we do?”
And she said, “Jack, let’s close for the 3 days.” She said, “We don’t have anything anyway, but we owe it to—” (chokes up.)
So I called Don Saffran back immediately and I said, “Don, we decided to close for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.”
And he said, “Okay.”[C6-899]
Ruby then telephoned the Dallas Morning News to cancel his advertisement and, when unable to do so, he changed his ad to read that his clubs would be closed for the weekend.[C6-900] Ruby also telephoned Cecil Hamlin, a friend of many years. Sounding very “broken up,” he told Hamlin that he had closed the clubs since he thought most people would not be in the mood to visit them and that he felt concern for President Kennedy’s “kids.”[C6-901] Thereafter he made two calls to ascertain when services at Temple Shearith Israel would be held.[C6-902] He placed a second call to Alice Nichols to tell her of his intention to attend those services[C6-903] and phoned Larry Crafard at the Carousel to ask whether he had received any messages.[C6-904] Eva Grant testified:
When he was leaving, he looked pretty bad. This I remember. I can’t explain it to you. He looked too broken, a broken man already. He did make the remark, he said, “I never felt so bad in my life, even when Ma or Pa died.”
So I said, “Well, Pa was an old man. He was almost 89 years. * * *”[C6-905]