Dear Ma

Pieces from the nomadic, neurotic past of Lee Harvey Oswald were still being filled in. Among them were copies of 15 letters Oswald had written to his mother, Mrs. Marguerite Oswald, in 1961-62, when he was in Russia, where he unsuccessfully sought Soviet citizenship, and married a Russian girl named Marina Prusakova. What the letters mostly proved was that Oswald was not much on grammar, spelling or punctuation. Excerpts:

> "If you decided to send a package please send the following; One can Rise shaving cream (one razor (Gillet). Pocket novels westerns and scienace fiction--TIME or Newsweek magazine. Chewing Gum and chocolate bars. Thats about all. Ha-ha I very much miss sometime to read you should try and get me the pocket novel '1984' by Wells."

> "Last weekend we went up into the forest about 50 miles from Minsk to look for mushrooms, everybody does this in the fall, we only found a few but we had a good time, Marina collected flowers at the time also."

> "Well, it looks like I'm going to be a papa. We expect the baby at the beginning of March. We would like a boy. What do you think of that? I notice where you say you would like to come to the Soviet Union. I don't recommend it, in my case! You said something about more cans of shaving cream, its not necessary because one can last for a very long time (1 1/2 years)."

> "Well, I have pretty good news We shall recive our visa's about the middle of Febuary, which means we may arrive in the U.S. about the 1st of March give or take a month or so. I would like you to do something important for us, get in touch with the Red Cross in Vernon, ask them to contact a organization, called 'International rescue committee,' or any organizations which aids persons from abroad get resettled. There are many such organizations. We need $800.00 for two tickets from Moscow to New York and from N.Y. to Texas. You show them the enclosed letter from the American Embassy. I want you to try to get the money through some organization, and not try to collect it yourself, alone. Do not, of course, take any loan only a gift. And Don't send your own money."*

"Viva Fidel." National headquarters of the pro-Castro Fair Play for Cuba Committee in Manhattan also turned up letters from Oswald. The first, written from Dallas last April, said: "I do not like to ask for something for nothing but I am unemployed. Since I am unemployed I stood yesterday for the first time in my life, with a placard around my neck, passing out fair play for Cuba pamphlets, etc. I only had 15 or so. In 40 minutes they were all gone. I was cursed as well as praised by some. My home-make placard said 'Hands off Cuba, Viva Fidel.' I now ask for 40 or 50 more of the fine basic pamphlets." The material was sent to Oswald.

Meanwhile, Oswald's widow Marina said that she wanted to continue to live in the U.S., preferably in Dallas. Still in protective seclusion, under guard by Secret Service agents, she was described as overwhelmed by the generosity of U.S. residents, who have contributed some $12,000 toward the future support of herself and her two children. Similar contributions to the widow of Patrolman J. D. Tippit, who was slain by Oswald after the President's assassination, now total more than $226,000.

On the formal legal front, events moved slowly. The presidential commission investigating the events of Nov. 22 named former U.S. Solicitor General J. Lee Rankin, 56, as its general counsel. A Nebraska native who owns a 16,000-acre horse and cattle ranch near Fort Pierre, S. Dak., but practices law in Manhattan, Rankin was top government spokesman before the Supreme Court during the second Eisenhower Administration. The commission plans no report until February, at the earliest. Nightclub Operator Jack Ruby, charged with the murder of Oswald, also acquired a well-known attorney: San Francisco's remarkable Melvin Belli (see THE LAW).

*Mrs. Marguerite Oswald failed to secure $800. Oswald borrowed $435.71 from the U.S. embassy in Moscow, got home with his wife and child on that. He later repaid the loan.

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