All the Way with JFK: An Alternate History of 1964

by F. C. Schaefer

  Wade L. Harbinson

  September 1964

  If I were going to up the ante and compete with Kennedy money, then I would need to bring in some big artillery myself. My first call was to H.L. Hunt, a fellow Texas oilman, and someone truly after my own heart; he hated Kennedy almost as much as he hated Communism and he was most interested in what I had to say. The other was to a mutual associate who would pass a message along to the head of the United Brotherhood of the Teamsters, James R. Hoffa. I have no use for unions and the lowlifes who populate them, but if there was anybody in this great country who hated the Kennedys more than Jimmy Hoffa, I don’t know who they would be.

  Mr. Hunt was quite enthusiastic after I described the details of the material Harlow had presented me, but he wanted to see the real thing before he committed any dough. Mr. Jimmy Hoffa was quite cagey at first. I had to go back and forth with some underlings, but with Bobby Kennedy’s justice department trying to send him to the Big House for a long, long stretch, he couldn’t afford to let pass a chance to take down the Kennedy brothers. And after I finally got a face to face meeting in Nashville the week Kennedy got re-nominated, I got an assurance of generous support, no doubt from the Teamsters’ pension fund. I never had a worry that I could get both Hunt and Hoffa to commit; you’re not a success in the oil business in Texas without being a good salesman.

  With both Hunt and Hoffa in my corner, I was able to assure Harlow at our next meeting that I would beat any price the other side might be offering; I gave him a substantial figure, one which he claimed the “sundry individuals” would find more than reasonable. The next problem would be the how and the where the transaction would take place. This was a real sticking point; because of the risks involved, the “sundry individuals” would only come to me in a place where they felt absolutely comfortable. “Otherwise,” Harlow said, “they are willing to make a deal with the other party and take less, figuring it is preferable to be somewhat less rich, but very free.”

  Harlow had a solution. “If you want to get Kennedy, and get him good, you need to do it right before one of the debates, have all the shit break hours before he has to get on the stage and stand next to Senator Goldwater and look the American people in the eye. Something he cannot duck out of, not if he wants to survive politically.” The thought of John F. Kennedy refusing to take the stage at a debate out of fear of questions about his criminal and immoral behavior truly put a smile on my face, and something well worth the risk to make it happen.

  “You can do it right here in Dallas,” Harlow continued, “just before the debate on the first of October. The Adolphus Hotel would be a perfect place; it’s public - which makes it neutral ground - but affords the right measure of privacy.” He went on to say I should rent out the entire top floor, it had easy access to the freight elevator; if any of the rooms were already rented, then offer the hotel double what they were getting, if it was still a problem, make it triple - no hotel manager would turn down that kind of money.

  “Now,” he added, “this is the most important thing: this must appear as if you are there conducting legitimate business; make it look like you are soliciting investors to drill on some land you own, I’ll get a lawyer I know who’ll go along and write up some phony contracts that will make it all appear nice and legal. Everyone’s ass will be covered; that’s the main part. But be sure to spend some money, put out a spread, buy the best whiskey, and hire the finest whores - whatever it is you do in Texas to loosen wallets. The reason you need to do this is that if any time in the future, you have to put your hand on a Bible and answer questions as to what transpired at the Adolphus Hotel on a certain date, you won’t face a perjury charge when you tell the court it was nothing but you and some fellow investors going about the business of making your next million.”

  By the time I left the Carousel Club, I was certain that goal was within grasp. Once the documentation was in my hands, it would only be a matter of lining up friendly contacts in the press who could guarantee front page stories in some of the biggest morning and afternoon dailies in the country. The Goldwater campaign had few if any friends at the big networks run out of New York, but there were lots of editors, especially in the Hearst and Pulliam papers, along with the Los Angeles Times, who already had investigative reporters digging into Kennedy’s dirty secrets. They were getting nowhere because they didn’t have the deep pockets of my friends and me, but they were about to get the scoop of the year courtesy of us.

  The mood in the Goldwater campaign was upbeat at the end of the summer, despite being 6 points behind Kennedy; money was pouring in, and Dirksen proved to be a big help in getting the party unified behind the Senator.

  Then on Labor Day weekend, Kennedy’s chickens came home to roost when a significant part of Los Angeles went up in flames thanks to a rampaging mob of blacks. That such a thing would occur not 30 days after that Communist-inspired Civil Rights Bill was signed by the President came as no surprise to me or anyone else who knows how this country works. The black man cannot handle the burden of legal and social equality with whites, and it does him no good to pass draconian laws which attempts to mandate such nonsense. The proof was evident in the newsreel footage of black mobs looting and burning - equality with such lawless cretins would be the utter and final ruin of America. To make matters worse, Kennedy actually flew to Los Angeles in a feeble attempt to appear “in charge” after he had signed blatantly unconstitutional legislation which had been the direct cause of the riot. The man actually got out and walked the streets, even talking with some of those looting and arsonist bastards. It was enough to make a true patriot puke. What Kennedy should have done was send in the National Guard, with orders to shoot on sight anyone caught looting. If any citizen refused a command to clear the street, they were to be encouraged to do so with the crack of a rifle butt upside the head, anyone refusing after that would get the sharp end of a bayonet. That’s how we would have done it in Texas.

  A lot of us in the campaign told Senator Goldwater he needed to take full advantage of the riots, tragedy though it was for many Americans, for they showed the country exactly what Kennedy’s Civil Rights policy was leading us into. He had to hit Kennedy hard on the riots, tie him to the arson and looting, show Americans what their future would be if they re-elected this man. It was disrespect for authority, disrespect for the police, and a total undermining of essential order. The Senator was reluctant at first to see things our way, he thought he could win black votes by telling the story of how he integrated his family department store in Phoenix, but when the argument was put in those terms, he warmed up to the theme, the day after Labor Day, the same day Kennedy flew to Los Angeles, Karl Hess tore up the Senator’s stump speech and wrote him a new one which ripped into Kennedy for giving aid and comfort to criminals. It went over like gangbusters before the surging crowds in mid-September.

  Behind the scenes, I went about putting things in order, for what I was sure would be a most profitable evening at the Adolphus Hotel on the 30th of September. The required number of hotel rooms was snagged at the last moment without any extra expense. By a fortunate coincidence, I was planning to make a bid on Swift Drill and Dye, the largest maker of oil drilling equipment in the USA and was able to arrange for a group of investors to be there earlier in the evening. If the question was ever to be raised, Mr. Hunt and Mr. Hoffa were simply looking to get in on a good deal.

  I had another meeting with Harlow at that strip joint, one I sincerely hoped would be the last, on the 17th of September; he informed me that everything was a go on his end, that the “certain individuals” would be there at the hotel at the exact time agreed upon with the evidence I wanted and with every intention of making a deal.

  It was just like Gypsy Rose Lee sang; everything was coming up roses. Before we were through with him, Kennedy was going to wish Oswald’s bullet had blown his brains all over that Dallas Street.

  Dorothy Jean Brennan

  September 1964

  I w
ill make no excuses, Senator Goldwater did not knock it out the park in those first days of the campaign, the man had to find his groove, so to speak and it took some time. Looking back, he was simply trying too hard in his speeches, which were all over the place in his attacks on Kennedy for not being tough enough on the Communists, for wasting taxpayer’s money, for enacting unconstitutional legislation, and for presiding over the moral decay of the nation. Before large crowds on his first campaign swing, his speeches were filled with references to Cuba, Castro, Khrushchev, Iran, the Red Chinese, the sellout at New Delhi, rights of property, his personal distaste for segregation, state’s rights, the coddling of switchblade-wielding criminals - not necessarily in that order. There were plenty of stories in the press of how Goldwater was not “connecting” with voters.

  It did not help that the Democrats flooded the airwaves with a barrage of anti-Goldwater adds, chiefly one that used a bunch of totally out of context quotes spoken over a black and white photo of the Senator with a particularly truculent expression that made him sound like he would begin bombing the Soviet Union on Inauguration Day. There were other ads that made it sound as if he would abolish the minimum wage and force the American worker to labor for a dollar a day while doing away with Social Security for good measure. It was all delivered by the best Madison Avenue minds the Kennedy’s money could buy.

  And we got a crash course in how rough the Kennedy’s played hardball, which included having federal meat inspectors visit the St. Louis sausage factory owned by head of the Goldwater campaign in Missouri three times in the month of August; more than a dozen of the biggest contributors to Goldwater for President in Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania had their tax returns audited for the past ten years; the co-chairman for Citizens for Goldwater in Florida had three serious complaints lodged against him with the state bar association. There were overtures made to certain Republican Governors and Senators whose lack of enthusiasm for Goldwater was well known with offers of favors in return for an endorsement across party lines.

  We got a break, such as it was, when part of Los Angeles went up in flames over Labor Day weekend. I know it sounds opportunistic and cynical, but that event was a real opening Senator Goldwater, a real chance for him to draw a stark contrast with the America of Kennedy and the America of Barry Goldwater. There were some closed doors meetings to discuss strategy and afterward, the candidate was truly more focused with a clear line of attack. “I can promise you this,” he said in a speech in Columbus, Ohio, on the 7th of September, “if I am your President, I will never drop everything and scurry across the country to hold the hands of rioters and looters, instead I’ll leave them to the National Guard.” The audience loved it, and he managed to work a variation of that line into every one of his speeches, always getting the same response, especially before crowds in the factory towns and cities of the Mid-West and North East. These were the voters that were crucial if we wanted to win, and those out of control criminals in Los Angeles had given us a way to reach them.

  The polls began to reflect what we were seeing on the campaign trail; Kennedy dropped four points in the week after the riots, according to Gallup, while Goldwater gained three to pull within the margin of error. We were going to win and the road to victory was laid out in front of us.

  Of course, it would not be that easy, at a rally at Wrigley Field for Kennedy in mid-September broke all records for a political event in that city according to people who were there at the time. “We’re matching Kennedy with the crowds,” Dean Burch explained to me, “that’s good as far as it goes, but it does not mean we’re winning, it just means we’re not losing.”

  On account of our momentum, the first Presidential debate in San Francisco became even more crucial. The debate, held on the campus of Stanford University on September 17th, and to our disappointment, was called a draw in the popular press. This was cited as a victory for us by some because it meant that Senator Goldwater held his own against a supposedly popular and charismatic incumbent. The topic was to be domestic issues, but more than half the time was spent on the Los Angeles riots. I thought our candidate scored a direct hit on Kennedy when he said, “In America, public safety cannot be compromised anyplace, at any time; it is the number one job of all public officials, from the court house to the White House is to preserve law and order. In that job, Mr. President, you failed the citizens of Los Angeles, and you failed America.” Kennedy’s response to say something pompous about America still fighting the Civil War nearly a hundred years after Appomattox, it was widely quoted after the debate by many of the President’s acolytes in the media. I thought the debate moderator, Eric Severed, was openly favoring Kennedy, which was only natural since he was a protégé of Edward R. Morrow, a well-known leftist.

  If he didn’t score a knockout at the San Francisco debate, Barry Goldwater at least proved he was Kennedy’s equal.

  That was the public face of my job during September of 1964, what was happening behind the scene is a story that has never been told in full. What I will say is this, I was approached by Wade Harbinson the day after the Republican National Convention adjourned and was told of the scheme to obtain the “lowdown dirty truth on John F. Kennedy” which once revealed to the public, would guarantee the election of Goldwater. What he was talking about was documented proof of “adultery, deliberate perjury, and criminal conspiracy” committed by the Chief Executive of the United States. This scheme was in Harbinson’s own words, “deep undercover” and not involving anyone else in either Goldwater ’64 or the Republican National Committee, it was a solo operation, but he was bringing me aboard because I had inadvertently learned some sensitive info.

  I pressed Harbinson for details and was informed about the scheme to purchase evidence of Kennedy’s misdeeds by working with Vance Harlow; I was thrilled at the thought of Kennedy going down in flames along with the prospect of Barry Goldwater being elected by a landslide. Despite some reservations and a serious dislike of both Harbinson and Harlow, I was in.

  That was how I came to be at the Adolphus Hotel on the eve of the second televised debate in Dallas; Senator Goldwater suspended the campaign two days before so he could go back to Phoenix and prepare for the all-important second confrontation with the President where the subject would be foreign affairs. I was supposed to fly to Dallas with the Senator on the morning of the debate, but a few days before, Harbinson took me aside during a rally in Cleveland, Ohio and told me to be at the hotel the night before. “Think up a reason to be part of the advance team,” he told me, “I need you to be at the Adolphus on Wednesday night, that’s when we finally drive the nails in Jack Kennedy’s political coffin.”

  When I asked why I needed to be there, he replied, “I need a witness who can back up my side of the story, just in case it ever becomes necessary - which it won’t.”

  He was clearly implying there might be legal consequences down the road, something I had not truly considered; it was frightening.

  Before I could voice my concerns, Harbinson said he did not expect me to do this solely out of devotion to Senator Goldwater and made a promise of ample compensation. Those were welcome words when all you have in your bank account is a thousand dollars and some change.

  It was easy enough to find a reason to fly to Dallas a day ahead of everyone else; the networks and the big daily papers were already encamped at the Trade Mart, the site of the debate, and I could better brief them on the Senator’s debate preparations in Phoenix (which included huddling with William F. Buckley and Brent Bezel) from there.

  I was staying at the Sheraton, but Harbinson sent a taxi to bring me over to the Adolphus, and that is how I came to be present at one of the most fateful encounters in American history. This is the first time I’ve told what I saw and heard at the Hotel Adolphus in Dallas, Texas on the last day of September in 1964.

  Wade L. Harbinson

  September 1964

  There was no damn way anyone would have mistaken my get together at the Adolphus as a
nything other than a gathering of men of means with the intention of acquiring even more means. I followed Harlow’s plan to the letter and rented out the top floor of suites at the Adolphus, paying for it out of my own company’s accounts - making sure there were receipts for everything, right down to the fine whiskey served to be stocked at the bar the main suite where it would all go down.

  Despite all his hard work to make it come about, Vance Harlow himself was not in attendance at the Adolphus on that evening, as he explained to me, “I’m the designated middle man in all this, my fingerprints, figuratively and literally are all over this thing and I can tie you directly to some pretty unsavory dealings, so my presence there would put you in a dicey situation legally and make it hard to keep up the pretense this was just a meeting of rich Texans doing what rich Texans do best.” Nevertheless, he hired a lawyer, whose discretion he vouched for, to be in attendance and give the proceedings a gloss of legality while hiring a pair of technicians to sweep the place to make sure it wasn’t bugged.

  I was joined in my suite at the right time by Mr. Hunt and Mr. Hoffa, who had brought along with them the cash they had promised; their money, along with mine, was in a room down the hall guarded by professionals who were being well paid to not remember anything they might see or hear. I would dare say that never before under one roof in Texas had there been so much cash.

  The plan went like this: at different appointed times, the “sundry individuals” would be let in through the back service entrance and make their way to our floor by way of a freight elevator; they would then be directed to a suite where they would wait until summoned. Once everyone had arrived and was in place, they would be sent for and escorted to my suite where they would present the “smoking gun” evidence for my partners and me to examine up close to our satisfaction. We would hear them all out and if we liked what we saw and were convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt of its authenticity, an offer would be made, there would be back and forth until a price was agreed upon. Once that was arrived at, paperwork would be signed and money would change hands. This is where an all but defunct holding company I’ve owned for five years came in very handy, for the paperwork was for leases to drill for oil on parcels owned by Dallas Properties - my holding company - by the “sundry individuals,” who to anyone looking at these contracts in the future, where now wild-cat oil drillers.