Truant: Young Lee Harvey Oswald in New York

The year 1953 was the starting point in establishing the "legend" of Lee Harvey Oswald by the CIA. After the assassination of President Kennedy, the Warren Commission cemented the portrait of the truant with a violent predisposition who was drawn to Marxism during his year in New York. While residing in the Bronx, Oswald was arrested for truancy, taken away from his mother, and placed in the Youth House where he underwent psychiatric examination. The conclusions of the psychiatrists are some of the most startling revelations of this book. A close scrutiny of this single year sheds light on the so-called "defection" of Oswald to the Soviet Union that would occur at the end of the decade. The New York experience was preparing him for that assignment. Oswald's year in New York demonstrates how his "legend" was a product of the earliest stage of the Cold War. In assembling the evidence, the book exposes the truth about the identity of Oswald and what really happened to him in New York in 1953.