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Read Ebook: Warren Commission (09 of 26): Hearings Vol. IX (of 15) by United States Warren Commission
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Mr. RAIGORODSKY. No; that was a California concern, specializing in the building of gasoline plants and refineries. Then, I worked for Newton Process Manufacturing Co. and for Signal Oil and Gas Co.--just, that is, progressive--you see, it was going from one to another, getting higher pay and things like that, and then in 1928 the Newton Process Manufacturing Co. was sold out and three of us, I was at that time chief process engineer, and the other man was chief construction engineer, and the third one was chief operational engineer--we organized a company called Engineering Research and Equipment Co., and we started to build gasoline plants and refineries. Then, I was sent to Dallas because our business was good--I was sent to Dallas.
Mr. JENNER. Your business was growing?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Oh, yes; growing. I was sent to Dallas and I organized an office here. Then, we moved the company from Dallas and made the Los Angeles office a branch office. Then, I went to Tulsa and opened an office of our company there, and that way we were building lots of plants in Louisiana, in Texas, in Oklahoma. Then, I sold out my third in 1929. It was a good time to sell out, and I organized the Petroleum Engineering Co., which company I have had ever since, until just now--it is inoperative.
Then, I continued to--I opened an office in Houston and continued to build gasoline plants and refineries under the name of Petroleum Engineering Co. and built about 250 of them all over the world and in the United States--lots of them--even in Russia, though I never went there, we had a protocol , under which we were supposed to have given them some refineries and gasoline plants--you know the "chickens and the eggs" situation. The fact is I had an order from the Treasury Department and one of them was sunk. Maybe this should be off the record?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Let's see, now, Pearl Harbor was in 1939?
Mr. JENNER. 1941; December of 1941.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. 1941?
Mr. DAVIS. 1941.
Mr. JENNER. December 8th.
Mr. DAVIS. The war started in 1939.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Yes.
Mr. JENNER. The Germans invaded Poland in September 1939.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Already then we had the War Production Board, though to begin with it was the Defense Board, and then War Production Board, but I was asked to come to Washington. Now, let's see, which year was it? Probably 1941--before the war.
Mr. JENNER. Before the war with Japan, you mean?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Before Pearl Harbor.
Mr. JENNER. All right.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. I was asked to come to Washington to organize the Department of Natural Gas and Natural Gasoline Industries for the United States, which I did, and then I had to open--I worked under DeGolyer. I organized the Department from nothing until I had five offices. We had districts in California and Tulsa and Chicago, Houston and New York, and then in 1943 I resigned, and in the meantime I got ulcer, you know, working like you do, until 11:30 nights, so in 1943 I resigned and came back to my business.
Mr. JENNER. Here in Dallas?
That's very interesting what I am going to tell you--in an ambulance from Houston--and there was a Dr. Paul Williams--he told me that without operation he would put me on my feet. I never went back to Houston, even to close my apartment or to close my office, but I moved my apartment and my offices here to Dallas and I offered people that worked with me, that I would pay them for whatever loss they had, because in selling their houses and moving here, lock, stock and barrel, I never went back. I was so mad, and I have lived here ever since with one exception. I believe it was in 1952--in 1952 I was asked by--you know General Anderson, by any chance?
Mr. JENNER. No.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. He was what we call--there was an organization in Europe called SRE, Special Representatives to Europe. There was an Ambassador Draper at the head of it, and Ambassador Anderson is a Deputy, and in 1952 Ambassador Anderson asked me to come to Europe and help them with production, so I went to Europe to improve the production of tanks, planes, ammunition, et cetera for all the NATO countries.
Mr. JENNER. With the Longshoremen?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. That has nothing to do with the Longshoremen. And off the record now.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. In fact, I just came from the wedding. That's the second marriage. Then, I have another daughter--maybe you know my son-in-law, Howard Norris?
Mr. DAVIS. Where is he--in Washington?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Howard Lee Norris, he graduated, I think, in 1951 or 1952.
Mr. DAVIS. No, I don't think so. What business is he in?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Lawyer of the University of Texas.
Mr. DAVIS. No, I don't think so.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. I am very proud of that. That's my child.
Mr. JENNER. This is your daughter on the left?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Yes. And, I will answer anything else you want to now.
Mr. JENNER. All right. While living in the Dallas area, and I listened to your splendid career, I assume that--and if this assumption is wrong, please correct me--that the people of Russian descent who came into this area of Texas would tend to seek your advice or assistance, that you in turn voluntarily, on your own part, had an interest in those people in the community and that in any event you became acquainted with a good many people from Europe who settled in this general area--in the Dallas metropolitan area and even up into Houston?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Yes--Louise, will you get me my church file?
Mr. JENNER. Will you be good enough to tell me first, and Mr. Davis, in general of the usual--if there is a usual pattern of someone coming in here? How they become acquainted? What is the community of people of Russian descent, and I do want to tell you in advance that the thought I have in mind in this connection is trying to follow the Oswalds.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. That's right.
Mr. JENNER. What would be the common manner and fashion in which the Oswalds would become acquainted, or others would become acquainted with them, and before you get to that, that's kind of a specific, I want you to give me from your fund of knowledge and your interests--tell me what your interests have been, what the expected pattern would be of people coming--like Marina Oswald, for example, into this community?
Let's not make it Marina Oswald--I don't want to get into a specific, but let's take a hypothetical couple?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. All right. I can just summarize what happened in the many years that I have been both in Houston and in Dallas.
There are methods of, I would say, of immigration into the communities in Dallas of the Russians I'm talking about. One is via friendship, acquaintanceship somewhere in Europe or in China or somewhere else, but with different Russians and the order by the Tolstoy Foundation--you are acquainted with the Tolstoy Fund?
Mr. JENNER. I think for the purposes of the record, since the reader may not be acquainted with it, that you might help a little bit on the Tolstoy Foundation.
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Well, Miss Alexandra Tolstoy is a daughter of our great novelist, Leo Tolstoy, and I guess you know him, and she came to this country and she organized a Tolstoy Foundation, which takes care of Russian refugees throughout the world wherever they may be. They process them, which means that they know all about them before they come into here through their own organization or your different organizations. Like, you have a church in the United States--you have a church organization or all kinds of benevolent organizations that want to help refugees and they don't know who to help so they go to the Tolstoy Foundation and therefore the Tolstoy Foundation is able to place many, many Russians in this country, not only in this country but--I am on the Board of Directors of the Tolstoy Foundation--but also in European countries. Sometimes they cannot bring them to the United States, not enough money perhaps. Now, anybody who comes to the Tolstoy Foundation, you know right off of the bat they have been checked, rechecked and double checked. There is no question about them. I mean, that's the No. 1 stamp.
Mr. JENNER. That's the No. 1 stamp of an approval or of their genuineness?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Of approval--in fact, the U.S. Government recognized that and has been up until about a year or two ago giving the Tolstoy Foundation as much as 0,000 a year subsidy for this kind of work.
Now, of the other Russians that come here, as I said, they come in through acquaintanceship--most of them.
Mr. JENNER. They come because of prior acquaintanceship?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. With some.
Mr. JENNER. With some people who are here?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. That's right--correspondence you see. Like we have in Houston--we had a bunch of people coming from Serbia, you know, Yugoslavia--the few we have that left Russia and went to Yugoslavia and then they had to escape Yugoslavia, and there was quite a Russian colony there and some of them drifted to the United States and settled in Houston, and of course they start correspondence and working and lots of other people came to Houston and to Dallas through that channel.
Mr. JENNER. They followed?
Mr. RAIGORODSKY. Then, there is a small bunch of Russians that appear from nowhere. I mean, they don't come with any approval from Tolstoy Foundation or do they come through the acquaintanceship of people here. They just drift and there's no place, believe me, in the world where you cannot find one Russian. Now, I would like this off the record.
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