John F. Kennedy
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John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917–November 22, 1963), often referred to as Jack Kennedy or JFK, was the 35th (1961–1963) President of the United States.
Kennedy was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, the son of Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr As a young man he attended Choate Rosemary Hall, a boarding school in Wallingford, Connecticut. In 1935, he studied at the London School of Economics, then moved to Princeton University, but was forced to leave the latter during Christmas break because of an attack of jaundice. He then attended Harvard University, enrolling in the fall of 1936, but he severely injured his back playing football. He traveled to Europe twice during his study at Harvard. The second was to the United Kingdom, while his father was serving as ambassador to that country. Kennedy returned, and wrote his honors thesis on analyzing the British portion of the Munich Pact of 1938. He graduated cum laude from Harvard in June 1940.
In the spring of 1941, Kennedy volunteered for the US Army, but was rejected, mainly because of his injured back. However, he worked to strengthen himself during the summer, and was accepted by the US Navy in September of that year. He participated in various commands during World War II, but his most famous one was during March 1943. With the rank of lieutenant, he received command of a patrol torpedo boat, or PT boat.
While his boat, PT-109, was cruising west of New Georgia (near the Solomon Islands) on August 2, it was rammed by a Japanese destroyer. He was thrown across the deck onto his already injured back, but somehow rallied the survivors onto a nearby small island, himself towing a wounded man three miles through the ocean. After a few days of searching, he found two friendly islanders, whom he sent for aid with a message carved on a coconut. For these actions, Kennedy received the Purple Heart, Navy Medal and Marine Corps Medal. However, his back injury had been aggravated after being thrown on his boat, and he also contracted malaria. He was honorably discharged in early 1945, just a few months before the Japanese surrender.
In May 2002 a National Geographic expedition found what is believed to be the wreckage of the PT-109 in the Solomon Islands [1]).
In 1952, Kennedy decided to run for the Senate. He defeated the Republican incumbent, Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr, by a margin of about 70,000 votes. He made good his slogan, "Kennedy will do more for Massachusetts", having voted and passed many ordinances that helped its citizens, especially its businessmen. However, he diverged from his constituents by speaking for censure of Senator Joseph McCarthy, who was most famous for his advantageous manipulation of the Red Scare. Although Kennedy was ill during the 77-22 vote (the other 99 senators all voted), he had spoken repeatedly with the majority.
Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier on September 12, 1953. He underwent many spinal operations in the two following years, and had a prolonged absence from the Senate. However, while recovering from an operation, he wrote about acts of political courage by eight U.S. Senators, and published the book, Profiles in Courage. This book later received the Pulitzer Prize for Biography. When he returned to the Senate in 1955, many critics called him an "untrue liberal". He had adopted many moderate positions; however, two years later, he adopted an extremely liberal position on labor, but was forced to accept a more moderate bill, the Landrum-Griffin Bill. In 1956 he was a unsuccessful candidate for the Vice Presidential nomination at the Democratic National Convention, together with Tennessee senator Estes Kefauver and New York Governor W. Averell Harriman. This helped bolster the young Senator's reputation within the party, and was part of his success four years later.
In 1960 he declared his intent to run for the office of President of the United States, his main rivals being Senator Hubert H. Humphrey, jr of Minnesota and Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas. An early favourite had been Adlai E. Stevenson, the Democratic nominee in 1952 and 1956, but Kennedy went on to win key primaries like Wisconsin and West Virginia, before finally landing the nomination on first ballot at the Democratic National Convention in 1960.
President Kennedy, together with his wife and two children, brought a new, youthful spirit to the White House. The Kennedys believed that the White House should be a place to celebrate American history, culture, and achievement. They invited artists, writers, scientists, poets, musicians, actors, and athletes to visit them. Jacqueline Kennedy also shared the same interest in American history as her husband. Gathering the finest art and furniture the United States had produced, she restored all the rooms in the White House to make it a place that truly reflected America's history with a sense of beauty. Everyone was impressed and appreciated her hard work.
The White House also seemed like a fun place, because of the Kennedys' two young children, Caroline and John (who came to be known as "John-John"). There was a pre-school, a swimming pool, and a tree-house outside on the White House lawn. President Kennedy was probably the busiest man in the country, but he still found time to laugh and play with his children.
The Cuban Missile Crisis was probably the most important event during Kennedy's presidency. Through skill and steadfast thinking, Kennedy was able to both control the warmongers in his cabinet who wanted war (to redeem themselves for the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba), and to prevent the ambitious Soviets from using threat to gain strength (much like Hitler did 25 years earlier through appeasement). Many people consider the Cuban Missile Crisis to be the time when the world came closest to Nuclear War. The crisis all began on October 14, 1962 when American spy planes took photographs of the construction site of a Nuclear missile silo in Cuba. If Kennedy had attacked the sites it would have lead to nuclear war. If the U.S. did nothing, it would appear to the world that the U.S. was weak. A peace settlement was nearly impossible. Everyone remembered the days leading to WWII, when appeasement only made the aggressor more aggressive. A temporary solution was found, a naval blockade of war materials. A solution came a week later, while the world stood on the brink. The Soviet Union agreed secretly to remove the missiles if the U.S. both agreed never to invade Cuba, and removed its missiles six months later from Turkey. Kennedy was honored for decades after the crisis for preventing a nuclear war.
President Kennedy worked long hours, getting up at seven and not going to bed until eleven or twelve at night, or later. He read six newspapers while he ate breakfast, had meetings with important people throughout the day, and read reports from his advisers. He wanted to make sure that he made the best decisions for his country. I am asking each of you to be new pioneers in that New Frontier, he said. The New Frontier was not a place but a way of thinking and acting. President Kennedy wanted the United States to move forward into the future with new discoveries in science and improvements in education, employment and other fields. He wanted democracy and freedom for the whole world.
One of the first things President Kennedy did was to create the Peace Corps. Through this program, which still exists today, Americans can volunteer where help is needed. They can help in areas such as education, farming, health care, and construction. Many young men and women have served as Peace Corps volunteers and have won the respect of many people throughout the world.
President Kennedy had to deal with many serious problems here in the United States. The biggest problem of all had to do with racial discrimination. The U.S. Supreme Court had ruled in 1954 that segregation in public schools would no longer be permitted; that black children and white children should go to school together. However, there were many schools, especially in southern states, that did not obey this decision. There also remained the practice of racial segregation on buses, in restaurants, movie theaters, and other public places.
For various reasons, Kennedy was, during the time he served, perhaps the most popular president in U.S. history. He was a handsome, photogenic man who seemed open and accessible, and his administration marked a notable increase in direct media exposure of the president to the public at large, through television broadcasts from the Oval Office, televised press conferences, and numerous photo spreads in popular magazines. His glamorous wife "Jackie" was as newsworthy as he was, and the way they handled personal tragedies, especially the death of their newborn son Patrick Bouvier Kennedy in August 1963, enhanced their public image. The "charisma" Kennedy and his family projected posthumously led to the figurative designation of "Camelot" for his administration.
Information released after his death leaves no doubt that he had at least one, and probably several extramarital affairs while in office, including liaisons in the White House. Such things were not then considered fit for publication, and in Kennedy's case, they were never publicly discussed.
President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. This was a shattering and extraordinary event in the lives of most Americans who lived through it; "Where were you when Kennedy was shot?" was a frequent question in the years that followed, and could still be heard for many decades afterwards. Lee Harvey Oswald, apprehended for the crime, was himself fatally shot by Jack Ruby before he could be formally charged or brought to trial. Four days after Kennedy and Oswald were killed, President Lyndon Johnson created the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination. See John F. Kennedy assassination for further details of the circumstances surrounding Kennedy's death.
On March 14, 1967 Kennedy's body was moved to a permanent burial place and memorial at Arlington National Cemetery.
Kennedy's life and the subsequent conspiracy theories surrounding his death have been the inspiration for many films. Recent ones include Nigel Turner's 1988 mini series The Men Who Killed Kennedy, Oliver Stone's 1991 blockbuster, JFK, and 1993's JFK: Reckless Youth, which looked at Kennedy's early years.
Kennedy was the most recent Democratic president to push for income tax cuts to improve the economy. He was also the most recent Northern Democrat to win the Presidency.
In November of 2002 long-secret medical records were made public, revealing Kennedy's physical ailments were more severe than previously thought. He was in constant pain from fractured vertebrae despite multiple medications, in addition to suffering from severe digestive problems and Addison's disease. Kennedy received multiple injections of procaine before press conferences in order to appear healthy.
Kennedy's portrait appears on the U.S. half dollar.
Early life
Military service
Early political career
1960 Presidential election
hand before a televised debate.President of the United States
inauguration speech.
Lyndon Johnson.
Attorney General Robert Kennedy.
various civil rights leaders.
Assassination and Aftermath
Cabinet appointments
Supreme Court appointments
Related articles
External links
Preceded by:
Dwight D. EisenhowerPresidents of the United States
Succeeded by:
Lyndon Johnson
