That day, from his location in a nearby two-story tower, railroad employee Gavin Lindhardt had a clear view of Dealey Plaza's grassy knoll — an elevated area near the assassination site. Lindhardt spotted a man fitting Lehnsherr's description walking toward the knoll before the shooting.

Lehnsherr's presence would be later confirmed by a photograph taken by Dallas resident Marie Ellen Dodge. Dodge, then 12 years old, stood near the knoll with her parents. The Dodges and another family — Bill and Gayle Oldman, and their two sons — were the closest civilian eyewitnesses to Kennedy's assassination.

As the president's limo approached, Dodge snapped photos with her Kodak Instamatic 100. But Dodge wasn't taking pictures of the president. She was photographing "the strange, squinty man" staring at something behind the president, at the Book Depository.

"The focus in his eyes, you could feel it," Dodge, now 62, now recalls. "He wasn't angry, but he was glaring. Intent. And then I saw... Well, I saw what I saw. For the longest time, no one believed me."

According to the Warren Commission, there was no second gunman on the grassy knoll that day, as some conspiracy theorists believe. There was only Lehnsherr, trying to bend the bullet.