Walter F. Graf and The Gun That Didn’t Smoke
My tribute and biographical sketch from my book, The Deep State in the Heart of Texas
Walter F. Graf was born in Boston; he was raised in Martha’s Vineyard and West Palm Beach, Florida. He was a graduate of West Palm Beach High and Dartmouth College, class of 1937. He was a strong swimmer and still holds the record swimming from Martha’s Vineyard to the main land. He served in the United States Army Air Corp from 1939 to 1945.
He moved to Quincy, Massachusetts in 1945, where he remained for over 50 years. He worked for the New England Motor Rate Bureau until his retirement to Florida. Mr. Graf is a descendent of Francis Eaton of the Mayflower.
He served in the military during all of WWII. As we noted in endnote 174 of “The Gun That Didn't Smoke,” citing his letter to me of Jul. 9, 1997: “I have not been around small arms in recent years, but was up to my ears in weapons from 1938-1950...” He mentioned to me several times that during this time he became very familiar with every small arm in the world. It was this expert knowledge of small arms that allowed Mr. Graf to be the first researcher to raise the crucial questions regarding the mechanics of the alleged JFK murder weapon, so artfully hidden in the Warren Report, as my further research proved.
“George Michael Evica has characterized this study as one of the most important in the history of the case.”
Mr. Graf and I maintained a professional contact for 18 years, discussing anything directly related to our paper, and a few less-direct subjects, like the Lincoln assassination, on which he was an expert at the time of the JFK assassination, and powerhouse college football in Florida and Texas. He and I met at Jerry Rose’s “Third Decade” conference June 16-19, 1993, where I delivered my research paper, “Possible Discovery of an Automobile Used in the JFK Conspiracy.” He was 77 when we met, 40 years my senior.
We started corresponding because he had been trying to interest other researchers in his findings on the alleged JFK murder weapon for several years. Also, as you well know, it is typical that writing and research in deep politics is rarely a collaboration, and more rarely a successful collaboration. I understood that well by 1993, having presented my first paper at the conference where we met.
When Mr. Graf wrote to me about his JFK-assassination ballistics discoveries, I was intrigued, and soon astounded. I told him he had to write about it. He said he could have as a younger man, and I understood. I could see he was just learning to use an electric typewriter when desktop publishing was the standard. I immediately offered to write it, and he accepted. We worked together easily because we were like-minded.
By the start of 2002, George Michael Evica had read our paper and offered to help expand and update it. His expert editing made the paper what it is today. Mr. Graf and I considered him an uncredited co-author ever since. It didn’t surprise Mr. Graf and me that Dr. Evica immediately understood it, since we had extensively cited his groundwork in “And We Are All Mortal.”1 As noted in the editor’s note of its online publication: “George Michael Evica has characterized this study as one of the most important in the history of the case.”2
Mr. Graf died July 12, 2011. Dr. Evica preceded Mr. Graf in death, November 10, 2007. For me, it is the honor of a lifetime to have worked with both great men.
ENDNOTES:
George Michael Evica, And We Are All Mortal (Hartford, Conn.: University of Hartford, 1978)
Walter F. Graf and Richard R. Bartholomew, “The Gun That Didn’t Smoke,” The Deep State in the Heart of Texas: The Texas Connections to the Kennedy Assassination. San Antonio, Tx: Say Something Real Press, 2018, pp. 26-136; Original online publication: http://www.assassinationresearch.com/v1n2/gtds.html