David Ferrie - Early Life

Early Life

Ferrie was born in Cleveland, Ohio. A Roman Catholic, Ferrie attended St. Ignatius High School, John Carroll University, St. Mary's Seminary, where he studied for the priesthood, and Baldwin-Wallace College. He next spent three years at the St. Charles' Seminary in Carthagena, Ohio. He suffered from alopecia areata, a rare skin condition, which results in the loss of body hair and whose severity increases with age. Later in life, to compensate for his hair loss, Ferrie wore a reddish homemade wig and fake eyebrows.

In 1944 Ferrie left St. Charles because of "emotional instability." He obtained a pilot's license and began teaching aeronautics at Cleveland's Benedictine High School. He was fired from the school for several infractions, including taking boys to a house of prostitution. He then became an insurance inspector and, in 1951, moved to New Orleans where he worked as a pilot for Eastern Air Lines, until losing his job in August 1961, after being arrested twice on morals charges.

Ferrie was involved with the Civil Air Patrol in several ways: He started as a Senior Member (an adult member) with the Fifth Cleveland Squadron at Hopkins Airport in 1947. When he moved to New Orleans, he transferred to the New Orleans Cadet Squadron at Lakefront Airport. There he served as an instructor, and later as the Commander. After a Ferrie-trained cadet pilot perished in a December 1954 crash, Ferrie's annual re-appointment was declined. He was asked to be a guest aerospace education instructor at a smaller squadron at Moisant Airport, and lectured there from June to September 1955. On July 27, 1955, 15-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald joined this squadron.

In March 1958, a former cadet-turned-commander invited Ferrie back to the New Orleans Cadet Squadron. Ferrie served unofficially for a time and was reinstated as Executive Officer in September 1959. Ferrie quit the squadron in June 1960 after a disagreement during a bivouac. In September 1960, he started his own unofficial squadron, called the Metairie Falcon Cadet Squadron. An offshoot of this group was the Internal Mobile Security Unit, a group formed for the fight against Fidel Castro's Cuba. Over the years, he used both his official and unofficial squadrons to develop improper relations with boys ranging in age from 14–18, and his August 1961 arrests caused the Falcons to fold.

Ferrie described himself as a liberal on civil rights issues, but he was "rabidly anti-Communist", often accusing previous U.S. Presidential administrations of "sell-outs" to communism. Ferrie initially supported Fidel Castro's campaign against Fulgencio Batista in Cuba, but by mid-1959 became convinced that Castro was a communist. According to the House Select Committee on Assassinations, Ferrie "...found an outlet for his political fanaticism in the anti-Castro movement." By early 1961, Ferrie was working with right-wing Cuban exile Sergio Arcacha Smith, head of the Central Intelligence Agency-backed Cuban Democratic Revolutionary Front in New Orleans. Ferrie soon became Arcacha Smith's "eager partner in counterrevolutionary activities." Both were involved in a raid in late 1961 on a munitions depot in Houma, Louisiana, "...in which various weapons, grenades and ammunition were stolen."

Ferrie often spoke to business and civic groups on political issues. In July 1961, Ferrie gave an anti-Kennedy speech before the New Orleans chapter of the Military Order of World Wars, in which "his topic was the Presidential administration and the Bay of Pigs Invasion fiasco." In his speech, Ferrie attacked President Kennedy for refusing to provide air support to the Bay of Pigs invasion force of Cuban exiles. Ferrie's tirade against Kennedy was so offensive that he was asked to leave the podium. Ferrie admitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, after the assassination, that when speaking about Kennedy, he might have used the expression: "He ought to be shot." Ferrie insisted, however, that these words were just "an off-hand or colloquial expression."

In the early 1960s, Ferrie became involved with Guy Banister, former Special Agent In Charge (SAC) of the Chicago office of the FBI, right-wing political activist, segregationist, and private investigator. Banister also worked with Ferrie's associate, Sergio Arcacha Smith. In early 1962, both Banister and Arcacha Smith maintained offices in the Newman Building at the corner address of 544 Camp Street / 531 Lafayette Street, New Orleans.

In February 1962, Banister assisted Ferrie in his dispute with Eastern Airlines regarding "...charges brought by the airline and local New Orleans police of crimes against nature and extortion." During this period, Ferrie was often seen at Banister's office. Banister testified to Ferrie's "good character" at an airline pilot's grievance board hearing in the summer of 1963.

According to several witnesses, Ferrie and Banister also worked together in the fall of 1963 for lawyer G. Wray Gill, on behalf of Gill's client, New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello, in an attempt to block Marcello's deportation to Guatemala. On a related matter, the House Select Committee on Assassinations stated that "An unconfirmed Border Patrol report of February 1962 alleges that Ferrie was the pilot who flew Carlos Marcello back into the United States from Guatemala after he had been deported in April 1961 as part of the U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy's crackdown on organized crime." Another report, this one by the FBI, "...indicated Marcello offered Arcacha Smith a deal whereby Marcello would make a substantial donation to the movement in return for concessions in Cuba after Castro's overthrow."