Lee Harvey Oswald’s Gravestone Back in Texas

The once lost, now found, and much traveled gravestone of Lee Harvey Oswald has been returned to Texas. Oswald secured his place in history books on November 22, 1963 when he allegedly assassinated President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. He was also charged with the murder of Dallas police officer J.D. Tippitt on that same day.

After being held in Illinois at a museum for roadside attractions, an out of court settlement has been reached between David Card and historic Auto Attractions in Roscoe, Illinois.

The 140 pound granite grave marker was driven about a thousand miles to Card’s home in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

In an interview with KTVT/CBS-11, Card said “I’m very relieved and happy to have the stone back here in Texas where it belongs.” He added, “touching this gravestone is like reaching six feet down and right into Lee Harvey Oswald’s coffin.”

Oswald’s tombstone turned up missing from Fort Worth’s Rose Hill Cemetery on November 22, 1967, the fourth anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination. It was allegedly taken as a prank by some Oklahoma teenagers and later recovered.

Card claims Lee Harvey Oswald’s mother, Marguerite, put the stone in the crawl space of her Fort Worth home because she feared it would be stolen from the cemetery.

After Marguerite Oswald died in January, 1981, Card’s father and stepmother, bought the house, which is when the headstone was found.  Another distant relative in 2011 sold the marker to the Illinois museum.

Card argued in court that the relative did not have the authority to sell the gravestone.

 

The headstone was not the first case of morbid profiteering involving Oswald artifacts. In February, Bretibart Texas’ Bob Price reported a Texas judge put a stop to an attempt by a funeral home to profiteer on a Lee Harvey Oswald casket. The funeral home obtained the casket after Oswald’s body was exhumed in 1981 to confirm the body in the casket was actually Oswald. The original casket was so decomposed, the funeral home replaced it and kept the old one. The judge ordered over $87,000 in damages to Oswald’s brother, Robert Oswald.

As for the future, Card says he might place the marker in the Sixth Floor Museum, dedicated to history of Kennedy’s assassination and located in the former Texas School Book Depository, where Oswald shot at Kennedy as the president’s motorcade made its way through Dealey Plaza in downtown Dallas.

As for Lee Harvey Oswald’s grave in the Shannon Rose Hill Cemetery off Lancaster Ave. or Highway 180, east of Fort Worth, his mother lies next to him. Following his burial on November 25^th 1963, and fearing vandalism or desecration, his grave site was later moved within the cemetery. As late as the 1970’s it was unmarked. Subsequently, a dark brown, polished granite marker simply reading “Oswald” marks his mortal remains.

Rob Milford is a news contributor to Breitbart Texas. You can follow him on Facebook.