Author: Carter McLellan – Date: June 30, 2025

CONTENTS

1. Intro
2. Background Information
3. Early Years (1947-1949)
4. Connection to the Garrison Investigation
5. Appendix I: Key Members
6. Notes

Intro

On the surface, very little information appears to have been published about the New Orleans Petroleum Club. I first heard about it after reading ISGP’s JFK assassination article, in which an organization known as Truth & Consequences, Inc. is briefly mentioned as being a source of funding for District Attorney Jim Garrison’s JFK investigation in New Orleans.

T&C is listed in ISGP’s Supranational Society index of NGOs, as well as the Petroleum Club, in which case there is total overlap between the two groups. The main gist to be gathered is that a certain part of this group of oilmen in New Orleans played a key role in the impetus of and funding for Garrison’s investigation, which ultimately failed as key witnesses ended up dead, and, as is evident, Garrison tanked his own investigation.

Background Information

The founding date of the New Orleans Petroleum Club appears to be in the spring of 1947.¹ Unlike the Dallas Petroleum Club, documentation is significantly lacking. Furthermore, it is not clear whether or not the club still exists. There are newspaper articles mentioning the club dating back to 1948 and continuously until 1977.² There also appears to be a menu document at the New Orleans Public Library dating to 1984.³ There is also an old Facebook post with user reminiscing about the club.⁴

The majority of information easily available online about the club can be found on Newspapers.com. Upon searching through some of the oldest articles accessible, I found that the New Orleans Petroleum Club actually appears to have been founded in the spring of 1947.⁵ What can be concluded is that the club existed between the 1940’s to 1970’s.

Early Years (1947-1949)

Without attempting to reconstruct the membership of the club through Newspaper.com articles, and to save myself time for now, I’ve only examined the first two years. The President in 1948 was Robert L. Keyes.⁶ A lot of familiar names pop up in association with certain members, speakers, visitors and officers. In 1949, the President was H.C. Teasdel, President of California Co., a subsidiary of Rockefeller’s Standard Oil, he was on executive committee of the Louisiana Arkansas division of the Mid-Continental Oil and Gas Association, and was on the board of directors of International House and New Orleans Association of Commerce.⁷

Connection to the Garrison Investigation

The key to understanding the impetus behind Jim Garrison’s JFK investigation was outlined in New Orleans Magazine:

“In November, 1966, three friends sat squeezed into tourist class seats of an Eastern Airlines jet six miles above the earth. … [The men] were bound for an American Petroleum Institute convention in New York, where Mr. [Joseph] Rault and Henry Zac Carter, Sr., president of Avondale Shipyard, Inc., of New Orleans, were to host a luncheon in the senator’s honor. … Senator Long said he doubted the findings of the Warren Commission. It was about these doubts that Garrion questioned the senator on the flight to New York. … Both Garrison and Rault felt that the senator’s theories were quite parallal if not exactly the same, as their own. … Throughout the convention in New York, the assassination and The Warren Report were the principal topics of conversation among the three. It was at this time that several national magazines carried feature stories on the assassination, and several newspapers and syndicates printed their own versions. … Shortly after that trip. Jim was hard to find,” said Rault. “We couldn’t find him even for lunch…” … Rault says that it was only after the local press broke the investigation story in mid-February that he had any direct knowledge of the probe.”⁸

So, according to this story, it was Senator Russell Long, a member of the Warren Commission and son of the controversial Louisiana politician Huey Long (assassinated in 1935), who raised doubts about the official story of the JFK assassination. But more important seems to be the presence of John M. Rault, Jr., President of Rault Petroleum Company and reported member of the New Orleans Petroleum Club.⁹ The New Orleans Magazine explains:

“Three days after that, Rault went to the financial aid of Garrison. He explained why: “After the press released information about Mr. Garrison’s then incomplete investigation and made such a point of scrutinizing the expenditure of the public fluids that had to be used, it became very obvious to me and a number of other businessmen that it would be very difficult, if not impossible, for him to continue his investigation in a goldfish bowl. I read in the newspapers over the weekend that he might have to resort to his own private funds, or even a bank loan, so I called him and offered help.” The offer was accepted, and Rault, along with Willard Robertson and Cecil Shilstone, organized their now famous “Truth and Consequences” group. They invited over fifty of the top businessmen in the community to a private luncheon and explained the problem. … Rault has been supporting Garrison throughout a friendship spanning eighteen years since they were contemporaries at Tulane Law School [where Rault was a member of Kappa Delta Phi].”¹⁰

It is a matter of public record that Jim Garrison’s District Attorney’s Office received funding from this Truth and Consequences (T&C) group, which brought together some 50 top local business men and raised anywhere from $30,000 to $100,000. Of high intrigue is the fact that Rault, as the primary organizer was himself oddly close to the principal target of what became the Garrison probe. In the 1960s, he was a director of the Inter-American Municipal Organization (IAMO), which was chaired in the 1960s by Dr. Alton Ochsner, a close associate of Clay Shaw at the International House/International Trade Mart. Rault Jr.’s father was a director at the International House and a friend of Ochsner.¹¹

Yet it gets even stranger as we look at the other T&C co-founders. The chairman of T&C was one Willard E. Robertson, a major auto dealer and reported member of the New Orleans Petroleum Club. Robertson was a founding director of the Information Council of the Americas (INCA), which was chaired by Alton Ochsner. The third T&C co-founder, Cecil Shilstone, a chemical firm owner, was also a reported New Orleans Petroleum Club member and director of INCA. Another key player in T&C was Eberhard Deutsch, a lawyer and a reported New Orleans Petroleum Club member. Deutsch was a close mentor and law partner of Garrison, who named one of his children after him. Additionally, Deutch was also a director of INCA.¹²

Here we key financial backing of Jim Garrison’s probe in the form of T&C being literally ran by New Orleans Petroleum Club members, all with ties to Dr. Alton Ochsner through INCA and the IH/ITM. What makes that so bizarre, is not only did Oswald have direct contact with INCA managing director Ed Butler months before the JFK assassination, but INCA and its leaders as Ochsner and Butler were avidly opposed to Jim Garrison’s investigation, yet they all maintained ties through the late 1960s. If anyone is familiar with INCA, you’ll be aware of its multiple connection back to Oswald and through Ochsner to the Murchisons of the Dallas Petroleum Club. We keep going in circles here.

This strange set of circumstances has never been fully explained from what I’ve seen. But it raises serious questions about Jim Garrison, his failed trial against Clay Shaw, and the activities and connections of the New Orleans elite.

Appendix I: Key Members

New Orleans Petroleum Club

Listed in ISGP’s Index: “John M. Rault, Jr. (Rault Petroleum) | Willard E. Robertson | Cecil Shilstone | Eberhard Deutsch (mentor of Garrison).”

Additional: Jim Braden (May 16, 1978, HSCA interview; arrested at Dealey Plaza on Nov. 22, ‘63) |

Truth & Consequences, Inc.

Members listed in ISGP’s index: “Joseph Rault, Jr. (primary organizer; son of International House director and Ochsner friend) | Willard E. Robertson (co-founder and chair; INCA director) | Cecil Shilstone (co-founder; INCA director). Known financial contributor: Eberhard Deutsch (law partner of Jim Garrison, his political mentor and INCA director).”

Notes

1. March 8, 1948: New Orleans States-Item explicitly mentions the New Orleans’ Petroleum Club, stating it “has been in existence only since last spring, less than a year as tine is measured by the calendar. ↩︎
2. https://www.newspapers.com/search/results/?city=New+Orleans&county=Orleans&keyword=%22new+orleans+petroleum+club%22&region=us-la ↩︎
3. https://archivesnolalibrary.as.atlas-sys.com/repositories/3/archival_objects/58978 ↩︎
4. Ain’t There (dere) No More – New Orleans | Anyone remember The Petroleum Club in NOLA | Facebook ↩︎
5. Mar 08, 1948, page 6 – New Orleans States-Item at Newspapers.com™ – Newspapers.com™ ↩︎
6. Mar 08, 1948, page 6 – New Orleans States-Item at Newspapers.com™ – Newspapers.com™ ↩︎
7. Oct 19, 1949, page 27 – New Orleans States-Item at Newspapers.com™ – Newspapers.com™ ↩︎
8. April 1967, New Orleans Magazine, ‘The Garrison Investigation: How and why it began’ ↩︎
9. ISGP Studies, Supranational Society ↩︎
10. April 1967, New Orleans Magazine, ‘The Garrison Investigation: How and why it began’ ↩︎
11. ISGP Studies, Supranational Society ↩︎
12. Ibid. ↩︎