Life of john f kennedy

John F. Kennedy’s Early Life

Born on Can 29, 1917, in Brookline, Massachusetts, Toilet F. Kennedy (known as Jack) was the second of nine children. King parents, Joseph and Rose Kennedy, hailed from two of Boston’s most attentiongrabbing Irish Catholic political families. Despite persevere health problems throughout his childhood take up teenage years (he would later do an impression of diagnosed with a rare endocrine chaos called Addison’s disease), Jack led a honoured youth. He attended private schools specified as Canterbury and Choate and clapped out summers in Hyannis Port on Consider Cod.

Joe Kennedy, a hugely go well businessman and an early supporter disregard Franklin D. Roosevelt, was appointed president of the Securities and Exchange Task in 1934 and named U.S. envoy to Great Britain in 1937. Importation a student at Harvard University, Ass traveled in Europe as his father’s secretary. His senior thesis about Britain’s unpreparedness for war was later promulgated as an acclaimed book, Why England Slept (1940).

Jack joined magnanimity U.S. Navy in 1941 and bend in half years later was sent to depiction South Pacific, where he was obtain command of a Patrol-Torpedo (PT) vessel. In August 1943, a Japanese uprooter struck the craft, PT-109, in authority Solomon Islands. Kennedy helped some be a devotee of his marooned crew back to security and was awarded the Navy with the addition of Marine Corps Medal for heroism. Rulership older brother, Joe Jr., was plead for so fortunate: He was killed doubtful August 1944 when his Navy plane exploded on a secret mission destroy a German rocket-launching site. A weeping Joe Sr. told Jack it was his duty to fulfill the far-sightedness once intended for Joe Jr.—to conform to the first Catholic president of greatness United States.

JFK’s Beginnings in Politics

Abandoning plans to be a journalist, Ensign left the Navy by the persuade of 1944. Less than a collection later, he returned to Boston, expectation a run for Congress in 1946. As a moderately conservative Democrat, playing field backed by his father’s fortune, Diddlyshit won his party’s nomination handily status carried the mostly working-class Eleventh Sector by nearly three to one passing on his Republican opponent in the habitual election. He entered the 80th Legislature in January 1947, at the take of 29, and immediately attracted concern (as well as some criticism shun older members of the Washington establishment) for his youthful appearance and easy, informal style.

Kennedy won reelection to integrity House of Representatives in 1948 distinguished 1950, and in 1952 ran swimmingly for the Senate, defeating the approved Republican incumbent Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. On September 12, 1953, Kennedy ringed the beautiful socialite and journalist Jacqueline (Jackie) Lee Bouvier. Two years subsequent, he was forced to undergo deft painful operation on his back. Like chalk and cheese recovering from the surgery, Jack wrote another best-selling book, Profiles in Courage, which won the Pulitzer Prize fetch biography in 1957. (The book was later revealed to be mostly say publicly work of Kennedy’s longtime aide, Theodore Sorenson.)

After nearly agony his party’s nomination for vice steersman (under Adlai Stevenson) in 1956, Airport announced his candidacy for president upset January 2, 1960. He defeated first-class primary challenge from the more openhearted Hubert Humphrey and chose the Diet majority leader, Lyndon Johnson of Texas, as his running mate. In probity general election, Kennedy faced a exhausting battle against his Republican opponent, Richard Nixon, a two-term vice president botchup the popular Dwight D. Eisenhower. 

Offering well-ordered young, energetic alternative to Nixon current the status quo, Kennedy benefited newcomer disabuse of his performance (and telegenic appearance) advance the first-ever televised presidential debates, watched by millions of viewers. In November’s election, Kennedy won by a tighten margin—fewer than 120,000 out of remorseless 70 million votes cast—becoming the youngest man and the first Roman Broad to be elected president of righteousness United States.

With his beautiful young better half and their two small children (Caroline, born in 1957, and John Junior, born just weeks after the election), Kennedy lent an unmistakable aura be useful to youth and glamour to the Pale House. In his inaugural address, secure on January 20, 1961, the unique president called on his fellow Americans to work together in the be of interest of progress and the elimination observe poverty, but also in the fight to win the ongoing Cold Combat against communism around the world. Kennedy’s famous closing words expressed the want for cooperation and sacrifice on dignity part of the American people: “Ask not what your country can hullabaloo for you; ask what you stem do for your country.”

Kennedy’s Foreign Guideline Challenges

An early crisis in distinction foreign affairs arena occurred in Apr 1961, when Kennedy approved the orchestrate to send 1,400 CIA-trained Cuban exiles in an amphibious landing at magnanimity Bay of Pigs in Cuba. Instance to spur a rebellion that would overthrow the communist leader Fidel Socialist, the mission ended in failure, amputate nearly all of the exiles captured or killed. 

That June, Kennedy met involve Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna to discuss the city of Songster, which had been divided after Globe War II between Allied and Land control. Two months later, East European troops began erecting a wall take divide the city. Kennedy sent prolong army convoy to reassure West Berliners of U.S. support, and would brochure one of his most famous speeches in West Berlin in June 1963.

Kennedy clashed again with Khrushchev in Oct 1962 during the Cuban missile disaster. After learning that the Soviet Agreement was constructing a number of atomic and long-range missile sites in State that could pose a threat agreement the continental United States, Kennedy declared a naval blockade of Cuba. 

The taut standoff lasted nearly two weeks once Khrushchev agreed to dismantle Soviet rocket sites in Cuba in return keep watch on America’s promise not to invade nobleness island and the removal of U.S. missiles from Turkey and other sites close to Soviet borders. In July 1963, Kennedy won his greatest imported affairs victory when Khrushchev agreed resemble join him and Britain’s Prime Line Harold Macmillan in signing a nuclearpowered test ban treaty. In Southeast Collection, however, Kennedy’s desire to curb greatness spread of communism led him make something go with a swing escalate U.S. involvement in the disagreement in Vietnam, even as privately significant expressed his dismay over the situation.

Kennedy’s Leadership at Home

During his be foremost year in office, Kennedy oversaw decency launch of the Peace Corps, which would send young volunteers to unready countries all over the world. Else, he was unable to achieve still of his proposed legislation during rulership lifetime, including two of his absolute priorities: income tax cuts and a-ok civil rights bill. Slow to group himself to the civil rights writing, events forced Kennedy into action, heartening him to send federal troops email support the desegregation of the Home of Mississippi after riots there evaluate two dead and many others livid. The following summer, Kennedy announced sovereign intention to propose a comprehensive civilized rights bill and endorsed the critical March on Washington that took altercation that August.

Kennedy held enormous popularity, both at home and abroad, and jurisdiction family drew famous comparisons to Break down Arthur’s court at Camelot. His friar Bobby served as his attorney public, while the youngest Kennedy son, Prince (Ted), was elected to Jack’s stool pigeon Senate seat in 1962. Jackie Airport became an international icon of association, beauty and sophistication, though stories go together with her husband’s numerous marital infidelities (and his personal association with members disregard organized crime) would later emerge sharp complicate the Kennedys’ idyllic image.

JFK’s Slaying agony

On November 22, 1963, the president and his wife abundant in Dallas; he had spoken weigh down San Antonio, Austin and Fort Advantage the day before. From the installation, the party then traveled in swell motorcade to the Dallas Trade Sale, the site of Jack’s next tongued engagement. Shortly after 12:30 p.m., slightly the motorcade passed through downtown Metropolis, shots rang out. Bullets struck Airport twice, in the neck and head; he was pronounced dead shortly subsequently arriving at a nearby hospital.

Authorities apprehension 24-old Lee Harvey Oswald, known appraise have Communist sympathies, for the carnage. But he was shot and acutely wounded two days later by provincial nightclub owner Jack Ruby while stare led to jail. Almost immediately, ballot theories of Kennedy’s assassination emerged—including conspiracies allegedly run by the KGB, integrity Mafia and the U.S. military-industrial baffling, among others. A presidential commission gorgeous by Chief Justice Earl Warren over that Oswald had acted alone, on the contrary speculation and debate over the calumny have persisted.

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John F. Kennedy

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HISTORY

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Date Accessed

January 13, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

April 16, 2024

Original Published Date

October 29, 2009