The President Has Been Shot!: The Assassination of John F. Kennedy

John F. “Jack” Kennedy was born on May 29th, 1917. His father Joseph was a wealthy businessman who served as an ambassador to Britain in the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration, while his mother Rose was the daughter of John F. Fitzgerald, a Boston mayor and a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

The Kennedys lived in the city of Boston and were Irish Catholics by descent. This placed them at odds with much of the elite in the northeastern United States, who tended to be Protestant. This was also a time when anti-Catholic and anti-Irish prejudice was still rife, although not as prevalent as it had been in the 19th century. Kennedy studied at Harvard, where he got a Bachelor’s degree in government. While there, he played football. In one game, he suffered a back injury that would affect him for the rest of his life.

After college, Kennedy joined the U.S. Navy during World War II. His family’s connections got him a post, even though his back problems would have disqualified him from serving. He served in the South Pacific, where he was badly injured and had to save his crew when their boat was rammed by a Japanese vessel. Kennedy’s injuries from football and World War II would cause him lifelong pain that required constant medication. In 1953 Kennedy married Jacqueline “Jackie” Bouvier, a photographer and interviewer who came from a rich New York family. They would have four children, although two died in infancy. Kennedy was also alleged to later have had a number of affairs, most famously with the actress Marilyn Monroe.

With his father’s encouragement, Kennedy ran as a Democrat and won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1946. In Congress, Kennedy supported labor unions and advocated for the United States to find indirect and non-military means to combat Communism. He also supported the Immigration and Nationality Act, which would have required Communists migrating into the United States to put their names on a government registry. By 1952, Kennedy had joined the U.S. Senate. Kennedy was criticized by his future Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson for not doing much as a senator. However, he and his brother Robert “Bobby” Kennedy, who worked as a lawyer for the Senate, investigated Mafia influence on labor unions—something that would fuel conspiracy theories that the Mafia was involved in the assassinations of both Kennedy brothers.

In 1960, Kennedy ran for the presidency against the Republican candidate, Richard Nixon. Famously, he and Nixon participated in the first televised debate between presidential candidates. Kennedy is widely thought to have made a better impression on the television audience because he appeared more youthful and charismatic. He won the election by a narrow margin. As president, Kennedy focused on the Cold War. Most notably, he gave permission to the CIA to attempt overthrowing the Communist government of Cuba through the Bay of Pigs invasion, and had a stand-off with the Soviet Union over nuclear missiles stationed in Cuba, known as the Cuban Missile Crisis. Kennedy also increased U.S. support of the government of South Vietnam, which helped trigger the Vietnam War. At the same time, Kennedy also negotiated a nuclear test-ban treaty with the Soviet Union, the first such international treaty limiting the use of nuclear weapons.

On the domestic front, Kennedy proposed a number of bills he called the “New Frontier.” These included raising the federal minimum wage, increasing federal funding for impoverished regions and cities of the United States, and lowering the tax rate for both individuals and corporations. An attempt to create a federal insurance program providing healthcare to the elderly was defeated in Congress.

Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas, on November 22nd, 1963. At the time of his assassination, Kennedy was a popular president: Kennedy had an average 70 percent approval rating while the average approval rating for all presidents between 1938 and 2012 is 54 percent (Coleman, David. “JFK’s Presidential Approval Ratings.” History in Pieces). This means that Kennedy was and remains the most popular President of the United States since World War II and to the present day.

Born on July 28th, 1929, Jackie came from a wealthy Catholic New York family, the Bouviers. A precocious and intelligent child, she grew up learning French, Italian, and Spanish. She studied at Vassar College in New York, the University of Grenoble and the Sorbonne in France, and George Washington University in Washington, DC. At GWU, she earned a Bachelor’s degree in French literature. After college, she worked as a photographer and interviewer for The Washington Times-Herald. In 1953, Jack and Jackie Kennedy were married. They would have four children, although two died in infancy. Their two surviving children were Caroline and John Jr.

As the “First Lady,” Jackie Kennedy became involved in restoring the White House, whose upkeep and historical value had been neglected by previous presidential administrations. She also worked on beautifying the grounds. She commissioned Rachel Lambert Mellon to radically redesign an existing garden on the White House lawn into the famous White House Rose Garden. Drawing from her background with languages and culture, Jackie also served as an unofficial cultural ambassador to other countries for the United States and hosted public events at the White House involving writers, artists, and intellectuals. The American public also liked her for her distinctive French-style fashions, which helped make her a celebrity in her own right. Like her husband, Jackie was aware of the power and potential of mass media: She was the first First Lady to have her own press secretary.

After her husband’s assassination in 1963, Jackie tried to retire from public life, eventually leaving Washington, DC. In 1968, she married again to the Greek millionaire Aristotle Onassis. This gave her the nickname she is still widely known by today, “Jackie O.” This actually hurt her popularity, as many Americans saw it as a betrayal of her marriage to Jack Kennedy. However, her popularity soon recovered. After Aristotle died from illness in 1975, Jackie moved to New York City, where she worked as a book editor for Viking Press and Doubleday and was an activist for historic preservation. She passed away from cancer on May 19th, 1994, at the age of 64.