A fascinating figure, he is one of the most remembered politicians of the 20th century by Americans. A President who lived a life full of glamor and intrigue, lights and shadows. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, wanted to take the US to the primacy of the world order, maintaining a strong pulse with the Soviet Union in the conquest of space. The results could never be seen, everything was cut short in Dallas in 1963, when some shots ended the life of the President. A premature death, a fascinating life, a contradictory character, some somewhat atypical friendships, all this contributed to converting John F. Kennedy in a myth of the 20th century.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy | a powerful family
patrick kennedy, was a young Irishman who crossed the Atlantic, like many other Europeans, in search of the opportunities that the United States offered. Patrick settled in boston, managing to start a family with Bridget Murphy, his lifelong girlfriend. The couple had 5 children John, Mary, Johanna, Margaret and Patrick.
After a terrible cholera epidemic that devastated the city of Boston, the Kennedy family was reduced, Patrick the patriarch and his eldest son John, died. The mother of the clan, Bridget, acquired a stationery business and a haberdashery, where Patrick, the couple’s youngest son and only living son, took over the family business that was beginning to prosper, after the stationery came a grocery and liquor store.
Joseph Patrick Work as stevedore in the port of Boston, in order to be able to save money and be able to start his own business, getting it in 1880, with the purchase of a saloon, he was little by little buying new businesses and thus entering the American high society, with only 30 years already owned a whiskey import business. Businesses in the coal and banking sectors, they made Patrick an influential person both financially and politically.
Joseph Patrick Kennedy, known more familiarly as Joe, he married Rose, daughter of the former mayor of Boston, a wealthy stock speculator who had amassed a fortune in housing management. Rose was a young entrepreneur and regular at high society events.
joe was a person very astute for business, knew where to invest his money and dedicated part of it to finance Roosevelt’s presidential campaignin exchange he got special permission to sell liquor “for therapeutic purposes”, during the Dry Law.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy | Childhood and Youth
In this environment is born John Fitzgerald in Brooklyn the May 29, 1917, John was the second son of 9, JJoseph P. Kennedy, Jr., John F. Kennedy, Rosemary Kennedy, Kathleen Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Patricia Kennedy Lawford, Robert F. Kennedy, Jean Kennedy Smith, Edward Kennedy. Polite very strictly, promoting competition and discipline.
Joe the older brother was the opposite of poor John, while Joe was a strong boywith people skills and ease with words, John was a sick boy weak, shy, who spent long periods hospitalized. John was not interested in politics, it was Joe who was destined to start his career towards the White House.
During his studies he did not stand out too much, unlike Joe. He only got good grades in the last year of his studies in economics and political science.
In 1932, the patriarch of the family decided to try his luck in politics, getting to be president of the federal commission of the merchant marine, shortly after he was appointed ambassador to Great Britain. From then on, Joseph Patrick Kennedy began to travel around Europe with his two eldest sons, and even on some occasions they represented their father on the trips they made.
It was on a trip on behalf of his father that John made to the Soviet Union that he really his interest in politics was aroused, a fact that coincides with his improvements in qualifications, finishing his career at the university.
He began to be interested in the problems that Europe was experiencingproblems that would later lead to the Second World War.
In the year 1939, everything changes for the Kennedy family, the position of the American ambassador in Great Britain did not like a Great Britain that was not capable of reacting to what was beginning to happen in Europe, in addition to the lack of collaboration, Joseph Patrick Kennedy was forced to leave the embassy.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy | World War II
With the outbreak of Second World War, Joe, older brother Joe, enlisted where heroes enlisted, in the air force, while John tried his hand at the Navy, rising to commander of a torpedo boat in the Pacific.
He fought against the Japanese until in 1943, a Japanese destroyer hit the patrol boat, splitting it in half and causing the death of several crew members. John, who was one of the survivors, managed to bring a wounded soldier to shore with what made him a war hero.
John who was already carrying a major back injury since childhood, he saw how this old injury had worsened, there was little he could do with his poor health, his political career had no future.
In 1944, a new tragedy shakes the family, Joe the older brother dies in a combat accident, while trying to destroy some German bases where the fearsome V-1 and V-2 were being built. The family position for the political career had become vacant, Joe the favorite and the great gift for politics had passed away and John was the one called to conquer the Presidency of the United States.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy | The Political Career
John had to overcome his shyness and learn to smile at journalists and onlookers, shake hands and give occasional one-liners that would get the press talking. Soon the Democratic party he saw a leader in him, because of his sad eyes and boyish appearance, being so young and with the trail of a World War II hero.
in 1946John F. Kennedy managed to become MP for the Democratic Party of Boston, something that I would not have achieved without the family council and their financial support. John managed to keep his seat in the next two elections.
John F. quickly carved out a prominent place on the political scene, even though his legislative action was unimportant. He presented different social projects that were rejected, supported international aid for countries that were occupied during the war, loans to Great Britain, Greece, The Marshall Plan, etc.
criticized US policy regarding China, just as it showed his anti-communist faceta speech that would later be used by others such as Joseph McCarthy.
In 1952, he ran for senator for the state of Massachusetts, always supported by his family, the objective was to dispute the post with Cabo Lodge, who had held the position since 1935. The battle was more teleproduced What a policy, Kennedy invaded every home in the state. “Coffee at the Kennedy House” It was a television program that served to see how the Kennedy family lived, the family unit of the clan, the elegance, the poise, the Kennedys were already in all the homes, with impressive popularity and a lifestyle that was the American dream. Charities, family unity, home peace, everything sold and everything added to young John’s brilliant career.
Banquets where the great figures of the economy, business, society, met to discuss the country’s problems and their possible solutions. It was at one of those parties where John met a pretty journalist named Jacqueline Lee Bouvier. A woman who perfectly combined beauty and intelligence, educated, fluent in several languages, the French aroma of elegance that she distilled and also of course, the gift of a famous New York financier father, made John fall madly in love.
On September 12, 1953, the couple married, From this moment on, Jackie would become her husband’s best ally and a key player for the future president. But a new setback in 1954, forced him to withdraw again from political life, his back pain worsened, being forced to use crutches, something that he tried to hide so as not to give advantages to his political opponents.
In 1955, he underwent a new operation, after which he returned to his political career, ready more than ever to present his candidacy for the vice presidency of the Democratic Party, after a tough campaign, John was defeated.
After Eisenhower’s victorythe Democratic Party, saw that it was time to launch Kennedy as a candidate suitable, but not for the Senate, if not for the presidency of the nation. In 1960, The whole family got going, intensifying their activity, in order to elevate John to the best positions. But Kennedy had been able to rub shoulders with highly influential people and surround himself with the most effective advisers and collaborators he had been able to recover from his college days.
His electoral campaign was based on the fundamental idea of a new era for americathe America of the New Frontier, where the feeling of the first settlers had to emerge, a feeling of homeland, of opportunities, hopes of renewal for a country somewhat aged by the old policies of Roosevelt.
He was a young man who breathed a new, renovating and innovative air into society. The image of him, along with that of a very young Jackie, traveled all over the world. a family image. marriage, little Caroline and a slogan that read “Kennedy is in the change”all this moved a society eager for change, giving it a great advantage in the primary elections, achieving victory over candidate Nixon on November 8. John F. Kennedy got the presidency.
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