Jack Kennedy
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160 “Black Jack” Bouvier: Leaming, pp. 4–5.
160 Jackie, who’d spent: Ibid., pp. 5–8.
161 While he was wooing her: Ibid., pp. 8–9.
162 “Jack appreciated her”: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 193.
162 “Jackie was certainly very”: Forbes OH.
162 “There was this beautiful girl”: Bartlett int.
162 “Well, she knew what”: Ibid.
163 “I gave everything a good deal”: Fay, p. 160.
163 In fact, with an eye: O’Donnell and Powers, p. 95.
163 “They haven’t seen you since”: KOD.
164 “I said, ‘God, she’s a fantastic-looking woman’ ”: Red Fay, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.
164 “Almost across the street from”: Fay, p. 152.
165 “I want to tell you”: Ibid., p. 153.
165 “Torby Macdonald stood up”: Fay OH.
165 “There were only a few political”: KOD.
166 “She was terribly young”: Pitts, p. 137.
166 Chuck Spalding had his own telling: Spalding OH.
166 “This would be a helluva”: Thomas Reeves, A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy (New York: Free Press, 1991), p. 114.
166 “When Jack and Jacqueline”: Fay, p. 151.
167 “they spoiled him”: Bartlett int.
167 “He saw her as a kindred spirit”: Collier and Horowitz, p. 233. Based on interview with Lem Billings.
CHAPTER EIGHT: SURVIVAL
171 “The story circulated”: KOD.
171 “I knew Jack was serious”: O’Neill, p. 90.
171 “After he had been in the Senate”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 145.
171 Kennedy had come upon accounts: John Quincy Adams story, Kennedy, Profiles in Courage, 29–50.
172 “If we do not stand firm”: Remarks of Senator John F. Kennedy at Boston College, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, February 1, 1953.
173 He also challenged the Republicans’: Parmet, p. 282. “Under these circumstances, we must ask how the new [Secretary of State Jim Foster] Dulles policy and its dependence upon the threat of atomic retaliation will fare in these areas of guerilla warfare. At what point would the threat of atomic weapons be used in the struggles in Southeast Asia—in French Indochina—particularly where the chief burden is carried on the one side by native communists and on the other by the troops of a Western power, which once held the country under colonial rule?”
173 “To pour money, material”: JFK speech on the Senate floor, April 6, 1954.
175 “My good friends”: Joseph R. McCarthy in response to Edward R. Murrow, CBS, April 6, 1954.
176 “The reason why we find”: Joseph R. McCarthy speech, Wheeling, West Virginia, February 9, 1950.
177 “not fit to wear that uniform”: McCarthy quote, Zwicker hearing, February 1954.
178 A close friend of Bobby’s: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 152.
179 “Senator McCarthy and Mr. Cohn”: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, p. 113.
180 “He was told to sit down”: KOD.
180 “political suicide”: Ibid.
180 “to avoid the vote”: Ibid.
181 “I was in the Bellevue bar”: Ibid.
182 “JFK knew that if he voted”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 152.
182 According to the historian: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 196. “He could not bend down to pull a sock on his left foot and he had to climb and descend stairs moving sideways.”
183 “I don’t understand Jack’s”: Bartlett int.
183 “This is the one that kills”: O’Brien, No Final Victories, p. 45.
183 “They said the best thing”: Galvin OH.
184 “empty suit”: Sorensen, Counselor, pp. 127–28.
185 “ ‘sometimes party asks’ “: Ibid.
185 Late that summer: KOD.
185 “Furcolo told him”: Ibid.
186 “We’d been building up”: Ibid.
187 On October 10: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 196.
187 “I kept pushing and”: KOD.
187 “the only wrong political move”: Powers and O’Donnell, pp. 85–86.
187 The back operation: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 196.
187 The odds made by the political wise guys: KOD.
188 “the doctors didn’t expect him”: Evelyn Lincoln notes.
188 “That poor young man is going to die”: Conversation with Rex Scouten, Aitken, p. 137.
188 “The doctors don’t understand”: Evelyn Lincoln notes.
188 “The tenor of his voice”: KOD.
188 “feared the wrath”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 154.
189 “You know, when I get downstairs”: Parmet, p. 310.
189 Junior Chamber of Commerce dinner: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, pp. 115–16.
189 When the senator died: Ibid., p. 173.
189 “In January 1955, Bobby”: Fay, p. 159.
190 Oil painting and Monopoly: JFK’s oil painting described, Rose Kennedy, p. 127; Monopoly playing, Jean Kennedy Smith int.
190 “I think we hit it off”: Peter Lawford, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.
190 “I don’t think anybody ever”: Ibid.
190 “He was really ill”: Ibid.
191 “He was enormously well read”: Fraser OH.
191 “I think the whole concept”: Bartlett OH.
191 “Kennedy played an especially serious role”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 146.
191 The theme and the bulk: Ibid., p. 38.
191 nowhere as well read: Author interview with Ted Sorensen.
191 “Where else, in a non-totalitarian society”: Kennedy, Profiles in Courage, p. 7.
192 the prospect of forced retirement: Ibid.
192 “One senator, since retired”: Sorensen, Counselor, pp. 146–47.
192 “He must have been getting”: Ormsby-Gore quote, Lord Harlech, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.
193 “Shut that door!”: Martin Dowd interview.
193 “Larry and I got a call”: KOD.
CHAPTER NINE: DEBUT
198 Onions was a John McCormack guy: Parmet, pp. 347–51, 354.
198 For Jack to woo: Ibid.
199 “Anybody who’s for Stevenson”: O’Donnell and Powers, p. 109.
199 “ You’re either going to get”: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, p. 131.
200 “We argued that Onions shouldn’t be allowed”: O’Brien, No Final Victories, p. 50.
201 “He and his millions”: Parmet, pp. 347–51, 354.
202 To camouflage the effort: Ibid., p. 359.
202 “You know, about the Catholic vote”: Finnegan quote, Sorensen, Counselor, p. 160.
203 The applause in the hall: Parmet, p. 356.
203 “I didn’t even know Senator Kennedy existed”: Edmund Reggie, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.
204 Kennedy and Sorensen then: Parmet, p. 359.
204 The knock on Vice President: Ibid., p. 372.
205 “Call Dad and tell him I’m going for it”: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, p. 132.
205 Bellowing what an “idiot”: Joe Sr. to Jack, O’Donnell and Powers, p. 140.
205 “Just talk about the war stuff”: Smathers int.
206 “If we have to have”: Parmet, p. 362.
206 “America is not ready”: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, p. 132.
207 “troubled”: Eleanor Roosevelt quote, Matthews, p. 108.
207 “My name is Mary Jones”: KOD.
207 “After Stevenson had thrown”: Bartlett OH.
208 “Texas proudly casts its fifty-six”: Robert Dallek, Lyndon B. Johnson: Portrait of a President (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 96.
208 “I’m going to sing ‘Dixie’”: JFK quote, Collier and Horowitz, p. 181.
208 “The second ballot was already under way”: Reeves, p. 466.
209 “He’s not our kind of folks”: O
klahoma governor quote, Sorensen, Kennedy, p. 89.
210 “He hated to lose anything”: O’Donnell and Powers, p. 142.
211 “I’ve learned that you don’t”: JFK quote, ibid., p. 144.
211 “It was too damned close”: Kennedy interview with Ben Bradlee, January 5, 1960.
212 “Magic”: Nickname given to Jack by Jackie, Parmet, p. 194.
212 “She wasn’t the carefree”: Pitts, p. 142.
CHAPTER TEN: CHARM
216 “Kefauver has never done”: Stevenson to Schlesinger, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Journals: 1952–2000 (New York: Penguin Press, 2007), p. 8.
218 “I know I’ll never be more”: JFK to Fay, Perret, p. 238.
219 “For Christmas that year”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 172.
219 “The smaller states”: Ibid.
219 “It was more than a list”: Ibid., p. 175.
220 “When we said good-bye”: Ibid., p. 174.
220 “Those early trips were”: Ibid., p. 178.
221 Many of their stops: Ibid.
221 By late 1959: KOD.
221 “My main job, in those early months”: O’Brien, No Final Victories, p. 60.
221 “I introduced myself as a representative”: Ibid.
221 “I paid a courtesy call”: Ibid., p. 61.
222 “Senator Kennedy has every”: Ibid., pp. 61–62.
222 “As I moved from state”: Ibid., p. 62.
223 “I don’t think anybody realizes”: Bartlett OH.
223 “He was urged to accept”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 160.
223 “As hard as it is”: Ibid., pp. 186–87.
223 Kennedy’s physical condition: Medical records of Janet Travell at the John F. Kennedy Library.
224 For everything that ailed him: For a list of Kennedy’s treatments in 1955, see Dallek, An Unfinished Life, pp. 212–13.
224 The cortisone he took: Sutton int. More than save his life, the cortisone he had taken during the 1950s had transformed his face, fleshing out his features until they coalesced into the radiant handsomeness, the familiar JFK image, that would linger in the nation’s fantasy years later. Billy Sutton, who had lived with Kennedy those early years in Washington, would remark that he never looked better than he did in those months of running for president against Richard Nixon.
224 “In the late 1950’s”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 106.
224 “In retrospect, it is amazing”: Ibid.
224 “On the political circuit”: Ibid.
225 “best suited to fanatics, egomaniacs”: Ibid., p. 187.
225 It was still the age: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 225.
225 “Senator Kennedy, do you have”: Ralph Martin and Ed Plaut, Front Runner, Dark Horse (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1960), pp. 461–62.
225 “You could go to the A&P Store”: Hubert Humphrey, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.
226 While the stillbirth: Pitts, pp. 150–52.
226 “to promote Senator John F. Kennedy as a man of intensive”: Sorensen, Counselor, p. 145.
227 “Careful spadework”: Rose Kennedy quote, Laurence Leamer, The Kennedy Women: The Saga of an American Family (New York: Villard Books, 1994), p. 467.
227 “who was on the committee”: Ibid.
227 “Things don’t happen”: Ibid.
228 “The most powerful single force”: JFK on Senate floor, July 2, 1957.
228 “The war in Algeria”: “Facing Facts on Algeria” speech, p. 3.
229 In the same year he gave: Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954–63 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), p. 221.
230 “Well, I wondered why more people”: Forbes OH.
230 “always greatly interested”: Smathers OH.
230 “I remember very late”: Forbes OH.
231 July 19—Jack Kennedy called up around noon: Schlesinger, Journals, p. 56.
232 “I think he genuinely thinks he was wrong about it”: Ibid., p. 58.
233 “All his golfing pals are rich men he has met since 1945”: Ibid.
233 “He won’t stand by anybody”: Ibid.
233 “No one who has Addison’s disease ought to run for President”: Ibid.
233 The Senate Select Committee: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, pp. 147–60.
234 “If the investigation flops”: O’Donnell and Powers, p. 132.
234 The result of this rout: KOD. On the 1958 elevating of O’Donnell and O’Brien in eyes of Joe Sr.: “We had had some disagreements with him during the campaign. Mr. Kennedy has never been noted for his willingness to brook disagreements from someone whom he considered young kids who are hardly wet behind the ears. In addition, his sources of information about our conduct during the campaign had not always been friendly to us . . . The test had always been the score at the end of the game as far as he was concerned . . . He was very profuse in his congratulations to both of us. He could not have been warmer, kinder, or more grateful now that everything had turned out.”
234 The Rackets Committee managed: Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times, pp. 147–60.
235 “Would you tell us anything”: RFK interrogates Giancana, ibid., p. 165.
235 “We shall not flag or fail”: RFK banner, Thomas, p. 83.
235 “John F. Kennedy had clearly done his homework”: Pierre Salinger, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.
236 “was not only good in terms of defending the union”: KOD.
236 “I think that his performance”: Muskie OH.
236 “the Presidency is the source of action”: Kennedy Transcript, January 5, 1960, Bradlee, 16.
237 The image remains suspended: Photo of RFK and JFK in the Rackets Committee, courtesy of John F. Kennedy Library.
237 Jack Kennedy made few new personal friends: Ben Bradlee, Conversations with Kennedy (New York: Norton, 1975), p. 21.
237 “Nothing in my education”: Ben Bradlee, A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), p. 206.
238 “the mines”: Ibid.
CHAPTER ELEVEN: HARDBALL
Ken O’Donnell’s oral history provides the dominant source for the Kennedy presidential campaign’s hardball tactics. It gives a strategist’s look at the methods used to organize what was a breakthrough political effort. Where not otherwise identified, this chapter is based on O’Donnell’s account.
241 “Together, the two of them”: O’Neill, p. 86.
242 “There’s nothing there in 1960”: Bartlett OH.
242 “ ‘wounded tiger’”: Salinger OH.
242 It was Salinger’s first exposure: Ibid. “John F. Kennedy had the exterior façade of such an easygoing nature, and yet with this one remark he revealed something to me that I was later to find in him in other situations.”
243 “At Palm Beach, the senator was in full command”: Sorensen, Kennedy, p. 120.
246 “The truth of the matter is that Brown”: Frederick Dutton, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.
246 “There was no bullshit to the man”: Author interview with Pat Brown. 246 “His complete familiarity with California politics”: Dutton OH.
249 “Mike, it’s time to shit or get off the pot”: Dallek, An Unfinished Life, p. 247, from Abraham Ribicoff Oral History, Columbia University.
249 “just another pretty boy”: Ben Bradlee, Conversations with Kennedy, pp. 17–18.
251 “I always had a feeling”: Bartlett int.
251 “He hated the liberals”: Author interview with Ben Bradlee.
251 “You have no idea”: Author interview with Joan Gardner.
251 “did make it out there”: Ralph Martin, A Hero for Our Time: An Intimate Story of the Kennedy Years (New York: Macmillan, 1983), p. 221.