Fair Play for Cuba Committee materials on one uneventful occasion in Dallas sometime during the period April 6-24, 1963,316 Oswald's first public identification with that cause was in New Orleans. There, in late May and early June of 1963, under the name Lee Osborne, he had printed a handbill headed in large letters "Hands Off Cuba," an application form for, and a membership card in, the New Orleans branch of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee.317 He first distributed his handbills and other material uneventfully in the vicinity of the U.S.S. Wasp, which was berthed at the Dumaine Street wharf in New Orleans, on June 16, 1963.318 He distributed literature in downtown New Orleans on August 9, 1963, and was arrested because of a dispute with three anti-Castro Cuban exiles, and again on August 16, 1963.319 Following his arrest, he was interviewed by the police, and at his own request, by an agent of the FBI.320 On August 17, 1963, he appeared briefly on a radio program a and on August 21, 1963, he debated over radio station WDSU, New Orleans, with Carlos Bringuier, one of the Cuban exiles who bad been arrested with him on August 9.322 Bringuier claimed that on August 5, 1963, Oswald had attempted to infiltrate an anti-Castro organization with which he was associated.323

While Oswald publicly engaged in the activities described above, his "organization" was a product of his imagination.324 The imaginary president of the nonexistent chapter was named A. J. Hidell,325 the name that Oswald used when he purchased the assassination weapon.326 Marina Oswald said she signed that name, apparently chosen because it rhymed with "Fidel," 327 to her husband's membership card in the New Orleans chapter. She testified that he threatened to beat her if she did not do so.328 The chapter had never been chartered by the national FPCC organization.329 It appears to have been a solitary operation on Oswald's part in spite of his misstatements to the New Orleans police that it had 35 members, 5 of which were usually present at meetings which were held once a month.330

Oswald's Fair Play for Cuba activities may be viewed as a very shrewd political operation in which one man single handedly created publicity for his cause or for himself. It is also evidence of Oswald's reluctance to describe events accurately and of his need to present himself to others as well as to himself in a light more favorable than was justified by reality. This is suggested by his misleading and sometime untruthful statements in his letters to Mr. V. T. Lee, then national director of FPCC. In one of those letters, dated August 1. 1963, Oswald wrote that an office which he had previously claimed to have rented for FPCC activities had been "promply closed 3 days later for some obsure reasons by the renters, they said something about remodeling ect., I'm sure you understand." 331 He wrote that "thousands of circulars were distrubed" 332 and that he continued to receive inquiries through his post office box which he endeavored "to keep ansewering to the best of my ability." 333 In his letter to V. T. Lee, he stated that he was then alone in his efforts on behalf of FPCC, but he attributed his lack of support to an attack by Cuban