Marguerite Oswald visited her son and his family at the first apartment which he rented after his return, and tried to help them get settled there. After she had bought some clothes for Marina Oswald and a highchair for the baby, Oswald emphatically told her to stop. As Marguerite Oswald testified, "he strongly put me in my place about buying things for his wife that he himself could not buy." 261 Oswald objected to his mother visiting the apartment and became quite incensed with his wife when she would open the door for her in spite of his instructions to the contrary.262 Oswald moved to Dallas on about October 8, 1962, without telling his mother where he was going. He never saw or communicated with her in any way again until she came to see him after the assassination.263

Even though Oswald cut off relations with his mother, he attempted for the first time to learn something about his family background when he went to New Orleans in April of 1963. He visited some of his father's elderly relatives and the cemetery where his father was buried in an effort to develop the facts of his genealogy.264 While it does not appear that he established any new relationships as a re-suit of his investigation, he did obtain a large picture of his father from one of the elderly relatives with whom he spoke.265 Oswald's interest in such things presents a sharp contrast with his attitude at the time of his defection, when he evidenced no interest in his father and hardly mentioned him, even when questioned.266

Employment

Oswald's defection, his interest in the Soviet Union, and his activities on behalf of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee not only caused him difficulties in his employment relations, but they also provided him with excuses for employment failures which were largely of his own making. Oswald experienced some difficulty finding employment. Perhaps this was partially because of his lack of any specific skill or training.267 Some of his acquaintances, feeling that Oswald tried to impress people with the fact that he had lived and worked in Russia, were led to the belief that his employment difficulties were caused by his telling prospective employers that he had last been employed in Minsk.268 While he might have expected difficulty from such an approach, in fact the evidence indicates that Oswald usually told his prospective employers and employment counselors that he had recently been discharged from the Marine Corps.269

Oswald obtained a job in July of 1962 as a sheet metal worker with a company in Fort Worth. His performance for that company was satisfactory.270 Even though he told his wife that he had been fired, he voluntarily left on October 8, 1962, and moved to Dallas.271

On October 9, 1962 he went to the Dallas office of the Texas Employment Commission where he expressed a reluctance to work in the industrial field.272 He indicated an interest in writing. An employment counselor testified, on the basis of a general aptitude test Oswald had taken, that he had some aptitude in that area, "because the verbal score