Mrs. FORD. School, yes.
Representative FORD. Primary school?
Mrs. FORD. That is right.
Representative FORD. Following that she went on to a secondary school.
Mrs. FORD. You don't have to finish primary school. Russian High School
is 10 years, and if you want to specialize in some sort of assistant or
technical work you would finish 7 or 8 years and then you would go 4
years after that, it is a finishing technical school, whether you would
call it, where you would actually finish high school and at the same
time you acquire some sort of a profession or technician, assistant to
engineer or in this case assistant to a pharmacist.
Representative FORD. But those were the only schools that she has ever
indicated to you that she attended?
Mrs. FORD. I think so, that is right.
Representative FORD. Did she ever indicate to you the participation
that she had in the Komsomol.
Mrs. FORD. She said that she did join it and then she was kicked out or
something.
Representative FORD. Did she ever give you any reason why she was
kicked out?
Mrs. FORD. She told me that one time but I don't--I have forgotten the
reason, I really don't remember.
Representative FORD. Was it an ordinary thing for a person to be kicked
out of the Komsomol, so far as you know?
Mrs. FORD. Yes; I believe you have to be the sort, if you join it you
have to perform your duty, you have to go the meetings and be sort of
a leader in the community or in school or take on their work so if you
don't do that, I think they just consider you not being a good young
Komsomol. They wouldn't keep you there.
Representative FORD. Did Marina ever tell you that she did or didn't
join the Communist Party in the Soviet Union?
Mrs. FORD. She couldn't join it.
Representative FORD. Why couldn't she join it?
Mrs. FORD. Well, not from my own experience but from what I know about
it, I think you have to be over 20 years and you have to be 5 years,
you have a 5-year waiting period until they check your background and
see if you are good enough person to get by their standards to join the
Party.
Representative FORD. Did Marina ever discuss with you any schools or
training programs that Lee participated in while he was in the Soviet
Union?
Mrs. FORD. No; she never has said anything of that sort. I think she
said one time that they wanted to send him to a school which would give
him a profession but it had nothing to do with military or anything
like that but somehow he didn't go there. But I have forgotten what he
had to be so he was just working regular labor in the factory.
Representative FORD. You don't recall anything, any details?
Mrs. FORD. I don't recall any details of the school.
Representative FORD. You don't recall any of the details of the kind of
school?
Mrs. FORD. Yes; but it was some sort of a civilian, it had nothing to
do with military or espionage or anything like that that I remember.
Representative FORD. At the time that Marina and June stayed with you
and your husband in October or November of 1962, did Lee Oswald visit
her at your home?
Mrs. FORD. No. He did not.
Representative FORD. He called her?
Mrs. FORD. He called on the telephone.
Representative FORD. Did anyone else visit her while she was staying at
your home on this occasion?
Mrs. FORD. On this occasion, I think the only person who visited was
Anna Ray to whom she was to go later after she stayed with me.
Representative FORD. Excuse me, I didn't hear you.
Mrs. FORD. Anna Ray, that is another Russian-born person to whom Marina
would go from my house, she came to visit her.
Representative FORD. The individual who kept Marina after she left you?
Mrs. FORD. That is right, that is correct.
Representative FORD. And his name was what?
Mrs. FORD. Her name.
Representative FORD. What is the name?
Mrs. FORD. Anna Ray.
Representative FORD. That is the only person who visited Marina during
this period?
Mrs. FORD. At my house; yes.
Representative FORD. I would like to clarify the time and the
circumstances of this discussion you had with Marina about the Nixon
affair.
Mrs. FORD. Yes.
Representative FORD. You had gone to Mr. McKenzie's office with Marina?
Mrs. FORD. That is right. I had gone translating for her; yes.
Representative FORD. You were in Mr. McKenzie's office?
Mrs. FORD. Yes.
Representative FORD. With Marina. Who else was there?
Mrs. FORD. And at that time she had a date with the FBI, and we were
doing, I was translating some legal work for her about dismissing her
old attorney and manager and the FBI called me to come later after we
finished with that, and they told Marina why they wanted to talk with
her, and McKenzie took us in that other office and he asked Marina
about that, and told her that that is what she had to talk about, and
she was really angry. She said the thought Robert had said, I mean she
did not tell anybody about it, and she didn't want to talk about it,
and now she has to talk about it to the FBI since Robert mentioned it.
Representative FORD. In this meeting there was Mr. McKenzie?
Mrs. FORD. That is right. Mr. McKenzie, Marina and I.
Representative FORD. Just the three of you?
Mrs. FORD. Yes.
Representative FORD. In a room in Mr. McKenzie's office?
Mrs. FORD. Yes; in one of the rooms in his office.
Representative FORD. And Mr. McKenzie said what?
Mrs. FORD. Oh, I think that maybe--frankly, I don't know what he was
telling her.
Representative FORD. Was this meeting only about the Nixon affair?
Mrs. FORD. I am very sorry, but I think that during that time when
we were talking about that it was when he was talking about General
Walker, that he was--it was not about Nixon that they talked about.
Representative FORD. This meeting with Mr. McKenzie, when Marina and
you were discussing matters----
Mrs. FORD. That was about General Walker.
I think Mr. McKenzie didn't know what they would talk about but he
advised her "They will ask you if there were two guns, you tell them
there was one gun that was used," he told her.
Representative FORD. One gun used where?
Mrs. FORD. For Walker, I mean the same one they had at the house or
something, frankly this is what I had----
Representative FORD. I think you just said at the outset of this
meeting the prime purpose or the principal purpose was to discuss the
Walker affair.
Mrs. FORD. Yes; that is right.
Representative FORD. How did the Nixon affair come up?
Mrs. FORD. I just can't recollect how.
Representative FORD. Did McKenzie raise the question or did Marina
raise it?
Mrs. FORD. How it was raised, I didn't get to discuss it with her about
the particulars about it, except one time in the car, I don't remember
how it came up and I was asking well how did that happen, and she was
rather hesitating to talk about it, but she said, "Well, I locked him
in the bathroom, and he was screaming or something, he was wanting to
get out", and she tried to talk him out of it and he said, "if you are
going to keep me in here just let me have a book to read", and I told
her how did he get out later, she said, "Well, he rather cooled off and
I talked him out of it."
Representative FORD. You say this conversation took place in the car?
Mrs. FORD. Yes; this conversation right now took place in the car but I
don't know how it got started, I have forgotten.
Representative FORD. When you say it took place in the car, was it in
the car going from Mr. McKenzie's to your home?
Mrs. FORD. That is right, to my home. She was staying at my place at
this time.