Oswald's alias was “Alek J. Hidell.”

By 1962, Lee Harvey Oswald had returned to the country and was employed in a Dallas, Texas, photo lab. He started creating a new identity under the name "Alek J. Hidell," including a Selective Service card, using the lab's picture equipment. Later, Oswald opened a post office box where he could have mail sent using both his real name and his alias. The American Communist Party newspaper The Worker and the Socialist Workers Party periodical The Militant were among the materials he received.

The FBI would later link the purchase of a rifle discovered inside the Texas School Book Depository to an A. Hidell after the Kennedy assassination. Oswald denied ever using the name when the Dallas Police questioned him about it. Oswald's wife Marina reportedly once questioned him about whether he chose the name "Hidell" because of its similarity to "Fidel," according to author Priscilla McMillen (as in Castro). Oswald "told her to shut up" because he was ashamed at being discovered.