Famous or well known Relatives

So I thought I'd create this thread as I found out that I have a family member linked towards the JFK assassination. That person is my Great Granduncle William James Lowery. I will leave this spoiler of info about him from a site I found.

Spoiler: Bill Lowery info

On the 17th of April, 1978, James P. Kelly and Harold Rose interviewed one William James Lowery of Dallas, Texas. Lowery had been an FBI informant from 1945-1963 after he infiltrated the Communist Party USA. His control in Dallas was James P. Hosty.

In the interview by Rose and Kelly, Lowery stated he worked undercover for the FBI for 19 years in the Communist Party in Texas. He joined the Party in San Antonio and rose to the rank of Secretary-Treasurer of the State apparatus. Lowery was also heavily involved with the American GI Forum from it very beginning and stated that although it wasn't a Communist front organisation it was at one time dominated by Communists. He claimed never to have met Lee Oswald but became apprehensive when he learned that Oswald had been apprehended armed with a pistol in the Texas Theater on West Jefferson Boulevard, Oak Cliff, Dallas on 11/22/63. He felt that Oswald was probably on his way to kill him in reprisal for exposing the Party in Texas. Lowery was a shoe salesman who worked at a store called the Shoe Haven at 620 West Jefferson Boulevard which was approximately three blocks west of the Texas Theater and also three blocks away from Hardy's Shoe Store where another shoe salesman called Johnny Brewer worked.

Lowery was such an important informer for the FBI that on September 23, 1963, he testified at an open Justice Department hearing in Washington and "surfaced as an FBI spy" on the front page of newspapers on the 26th of September in Dallas.

It is also of note that during the open Justice Department hearing both Lowery and Rosalie Urquizo of San Antonio testified against John W. Stanford Jr.. Stanford was represented during the hearing by none other than John Abt.

Lowery did say that the only time Oswald could have been in the same room as him was at the YMCA in Oak Cliff because the CP held meetings there occasionaly.

Lowery was paid $2500 a year by the FBI for working undercover and he received increments of about $200 a month in cash from the local Dallas office. We shall recall that this is the same amount that Waggoner Carr claimed that Oswald was getting each month. Lowery recalled that SA James Hosty was his control in Dallas and paid him on street corners or park benches. Special Agents Harlan Brown and Ed Kuykendall were other agents with whom he dealt.

When interviewed in 1978 Lowery was employed as manager of the shoe section of Margo's La Mode, a women's shoe store at 1708 Elm Street, Dallas, just a few blocks north of the TSBD.

Lowery was tightly linked with Joseph Rodriguez Molina, who worked at the Texas School Book Depository with Lee Oswald, and who was "interviewed" in connection with the assassination and was initially connected as a co-conspirator with a close relationship to Oswald. As most of us are aware, Molina himself believed he was fired from the TSBD in December, 1963, due to what amounted to his "subversive" background however Roy Truly claimed it was because they were getting in a new payroll system.

In attendace at the GI Forum meetings in 1962 and 1963, in addition to Bill Lowery and Joe Molina, was a woman called Ruth Lowery. I can find nothing in any documents that suggests that Lowery was married or had relatives involved with the Forum but the name Ruth sure sticks out like a sore thumb to me. EDIT: I believe Ruth Lowery was Bill's younger sister. The reason Ruth Lowery perks my interest is because I believe she was DL T-4 informant who was formerly DL 15-S and Margaret Landin, also a CP USA member along with her husband Joe, was DL T-2 informant.

The Lowery's were instrumental in the success that the CP USA had in Texas and it concentrated its recruitment efforts on college students, minority groups and labor unions. All the names of which found their way into the hands of the FBI.

http://www.maryferre...011&relPageId=2
http://www.maryferre...011&relPageId=3
http://www.maryferre...011&relPageId=4

http://www.maryferre...653&relPageId=2 (17 pages)

http://www.maryferre...bsPageId=870155 (4 pages - mentions a Dixie-crat named JOHNSON who paid for fees and travel who was connected to Lone Star Steel)

http://www.maryferre...bsPageId=288839

http://www.maryferre...026&relPageId=1 (Joe Molina's FBI file)

http://contentdm.bay...3158&CISOPAGE=5

How interested were the Warren Commission with Bill Lowery? Well it can be seen here how much interest they had in him:

Mr. MOLINA. I just wanted to state in the record that I want to deny any accusations if there is any doubt in anybody’s mind.
Mr. BALL. No; there is nobody I ever heard has accused you of anything.
Mr. MOLINA. I know there’s a fella that I talk with that belongs to the or had worked with the FBI that knows my position in this thing.
Mr. BALL. I never heard anybody accuse you of any wrong doing in connection with this matter.
Mr. MOLINA. In fact, Bill Lowery worked with the FBI.
Mr. BALL. You don’t have to worry about that: no one is accusing you of anything.

That's how interested they were.

As John Dolva pointed out on his "Ford Hardtop" thread, is it yet another co-incidence that Lowery was a shoe salesman who worked on West Jefferson Boulevard? A man who was being passed $200 a month on park benches by SA James Hosty working just three blocks away from another shoe salesman who fingered Lee Oswald going into the Texas Theater just at the end of the block where his own shoe shop was situated? The same Oswald who it was alleged was also picking up $200 a month from the FBI? Johnny Brewer who, as mentioned by Thomas Purvis, "had just taken delivery of a brand new car - a 1964-model Ford Galaxie XL500 - and it was his intention to spend the day [11/22/63] putting it through its paces." "A pretty nice car for a shoe salesman", said Annti Hynonen. The problems we encounter with Brewer's IBM friends who closed his shop for him as he went hunting Oswald. The FBI informer down the street who was convinced Oswald was gunning for him when he was arrested in the Texas Theater. The same FBI informer who was close friends of Joe Molina who was in daily contact with Oswald as the TSBD. The same informer that gave testimony against other members of the Communist Party that he was an integral part of building in Texas and the people who he testified against in September, 1963, were represented by John Abt.

Did Oswald get the shoe shops mixed up? Was he really looking for William James Lowery for some reason, and instead stumbled upon Johnny Calvin Brewer? Was Lowery connected to Oswald in some way? Was Lowery one of his contacts? Was Oswald given the wrong shoe store address on purpose? Are we to believe that prior to the assassination neither Joe Molina, and more importantly Bill Lowery, didn't know that Lee Oswald was a former defector to the Soviet Union?

So do you have any relatives that are famous or involved directly in significant events? Then share it here