Talk:Mary Pinchot Meyer

message: Most of this looks more or less supported, however it's still a mess and needs lots of cleanup, citing and some growth. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:09, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: cleanup

message: Folks, I added a dubious tag to the following quote:
:These were given to Angleton, who later claimed he burned the diary, in which he said Mary Meyer wrote she and Kennedy had taken LSD before "they made love."
That statement is sourced back to http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKmeyerM.htm.  That page in turn cites a JFK forum post (http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=11208) as the source.  The guidelines tell us that self-published sources such as forum posts are "largely not acceptable" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SPS).  If someone would like to contact Mr. Simkin and get a source for that statement, that'd be grand.  The same claim has surfaced a few times in post 2007 material, usually citing wikipedia.
I'm further bothered by the fact that the claim seems to run counter to published sources and the characterizations how Angleton handled the letters by the Meyer family, journalists and ex-CIA folks that went on the record. 
Reve (talk) 06:25, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Angleton confirming affair and LSD. 

message: "Her mother Ruth was Pinchot's second wife, a journalist who worked for magazines such as The Nation and The New Republic. She was also the niece of Gifford Pinchot, a noted conservationist and two-time Governor of Pennsylvania."
This should probably be rewritten. It reads as if "her mother Ruth" was "niece of Gifford Pinchot". That sounds kind of incestuous.
--WithGLEE (talk) 19:34, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Who is "she"? 

message: "former wife" in lede seems a bit of an awkward phrase for someone who is no longer alive. Would you call Catherine of Aragon the "former wife of Henry VIII"? - Jmabel | Talk 17:33, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Former wife" 

message: I have removed the following per WP:REDFLAG, WP:UNDUE, and WP:RS:
:In February 2001, Cord Meyer told writer C. David Heymann, "My father died of a heart attack the same year Mary was killed. It was a bad time." When asked who had murdered Mary Pinchot Meyer, the retired CIA official, six weeks before his own death from lymphoma, reportedly "hissed" back, "The same sons of bitches that killed John Kennedy."[citation needed]
It appears as though Heymann claimed he was told that, and Heymann had "a reputation for not letting the facts stand in the way of a good story". Location (talk) 22:32, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Cord Meyer's allegations

message: The Robert Anton Wilson book Everything Is Under Control: Conspiracies, Cults, and Cover-Ups does not even make a pretense of the assertions it contains being true.  It is a catalog of conspiracy theories.... many of which are very outlandish and does not differentiate between ones that might be plausible and ones that are very dubious.  It's not really an appropriate source for the rather strong claims made in this article.
Klaun (talk)  —Preceding undated comment added 02:54, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: see Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Robert Anton Wilson.27s Everything Is Under Control: Conspiracies.2C Cults and Cover-ups. - Location (talk) 03:29, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:  Neither of us think this is a good source and the two editors who responded on WP:RSN seem to agree. I have removed the source and the material attributed to it. - Location (talk) 02:41, 16 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Sourcing

message: The diary section of the article seems largely unsubstantiated.  The reference for the whole section is an essay hosted on University web server.  Further, the essay does not substantiate the last statement in the section and in fact does not contain a claim that anyone read the diary.  http://articles.latimes.com/1995-11-12/books/bk-2048_1_anne-truitt-cicely-angleton-james-angleton Provides a primary source on the fate of the diary (that is, it was in Angleton's possesion and then destroyed by Tony Bradlee.    Klaun (talk) 23:46, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Diary 

message: This article is built almost entirely on Janney's book Mary's Mosaic. This is an extremely problematic source. It should be replaced, as much as possible, with Nina Burleigh's biography of Pinchot Meyer. Conspiratorial claims without reliable sources behind them should be pruned, bloat removed, and the article trimmed back to a more reasonable length. Rgr09 (talk) 11:26, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. I had removed that source once before, but it's back with a vengeance. - Location (talk) 16:02, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

text: Skyhorse, the publisher of Mary's Mosaic is generally not RS. They are the main publisher of most JFK conspiracy books. Not surprisingly, there are many, many problematic citations and sources used throughout Mosaic. Burleigh is not a great book perhaps, but it does not suffer from this problem at least. It is certainly more reliable than Mosaic. Rgr09 (talk) 22:52, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mary's Mosaic 

message: The article has a lengthy section on claims about Pinchot Meyer Timothy Leary made in his 1983 autobiography:
:In 1983, former Harvard University psychology lecturer Timothy Leary claimed that in the spring of 1962, Pinchot Meyer, who, according to her biographer Nina Burleigh "wore manners and charm like a second skin",Burleigh, Nina, A Very Private Woman (NYT excerpt), Bantam, 1998 told Leary she was taking part in a plan to avert worldwide nuclear war by convincing powerful male members of the Washington establishment to take mind-altering drugs, which would presumably lead them to conclude that the Cold War was meaningless.Leary, Timothy F., Flashbacks, Tarcher, 1983, p. 194.Janney, Peter. Mary's Mosaic: The CIA Conspiracy to Murder John F. Kennedy, Mary Pinchot Meyer, and Their Vision for World Peace. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2013, pp. 222-226.
:According to Leary, Meyer had sought him out for the purpose of learning how to conduct LSD sessions with these powerful men, including, she strongly implied, President John F. Kennedy, who was then her lover. Leary alleged that Pinchot Meyer told him she had shared in this plan with at least seven other Washington socialite friends who held similar political views and were trying to supply LSD to a small circle of high-ranking government officials. Leary also claimed that Pinchot Meyer had asked him for help while in a state of fear for her own life after the assassination of President Kennedy.
:In his biography Flashbacks (1983), Leary claimed he had a call from Pinchot Meyer soon after the Kennedy assassination during which she sobbed and said, "They couldn't control him any more. He was changing too fast ... They've covered everything up. I gotta come see you.  I'm afraid.  Be careful."Leary, Timothy F., Flashbacks, Tarcher, 1983, p.194
This description is heavily influenced by Janney's book Mary's Mosaic. Quotes and presentation all have problems. Revisions coming up. Rgr09 (talk) 03:01, 27 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Related to this, I have removed Category:People associated with the assassination of John F. Kennedy from this article. That category appears to be a dumping ground for conspiratorial links. - Location (talk) 21:00, 29 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leary autobiography 

message: The article now has a lengthy section on Meyer's murder which relies almost completely on citations from the original trial transcript. This is a primary source and should not be used. There is a careful description of the Meyer's murder and the subsequent trial which gives more than enough detail for the article. I will replace the current section with a summary from Burleigh. There are also several points where what seems to be original research/unsourced claims are made. I will remove these and note here. Rgr09 (talk) 13:03, 27 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Confusion about the critical forensic issue of blood on or near the victim arose decades later after publication of a 2008 Smithsonian Magazine article by writer Lance Morrow, who was present at the murder scene as a cub reporter and who recalled the victim's head wound as "almost bloodless." Smithsonian Magazine, December 2008, "44 Years Later, a Washington, D.C. Death Unresolved" However, trial testimony by Washington DC Deputy Coroner Linwood L. Rayford indicated "profuse bleeding" from the victim's head wound.United States District Court for the District of Columbia: United States vs. Ray Crump, Jr., Defendant; Criminal Case No. 930-64.  Washington, D.C., July 20, 1965, pp. 71-75. A nearby tree limb, introduced into evidence by the prosecution, was spattered with Meyer's blood.United States District Court for the District of Columbia: United States of America vs. Ray Crump, Jr., Defendant; Criminal Case No. 930-64.  Washington, D.C., July 20, 1965, pp. 6-7 and pp. 75-76 
No source is given for anyone mentioning the supposed contradiction between the trial testimony and Morrow's article, written 44 years after the trial. This is the editor's personal opinion. Again the details of the trial presentation are given from the trial transcript. None of this belongs in the article. Adding to all this is a strong element of special pleading. Meyer was shot in the head, but still was able to ran across the path before she fell and was shot again in the back. The blood from the tree was from where she was shot in the head, not from where Morrow saw her after she fell. Rgr09 (talk) 13:26, 27 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Murder section 

message: This article is so slanted around her relationship with Kennedy and the murder that I could not find a spot to mention that she is in the collection of the Smithsonian. That is a very large accomplishment for an artist, although you would not know it from this article. --- Possibly (talk) 04:46, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Art career 

message: This and this indicate that WhoWhatWhy is not a reliable source. JoJo Anthrax (talk) 19:49, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  WhoWhatWhy.com is not a reliable source 

message: under relationship with Kennedy Mary's sister's name is spelled Tony. Under early life it is spelled Toni. Ellteethom (talk) 20:45, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Toni, Tony