On May 29, 1917, a momentous event occurred on Beals Street in Brookline, Massachusetts: the birth of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

His parents, not yet wealthy, lived in this modest home. They already had a bunch of kids, but were conscientious Catholics, and welcomed the new arrival enthusiastically.

Jack was born here in this room, his parents' bedroom.

Here is the cradle little Jack slept in, and the undergarment of his baptismal gown.

Here is their parlor. . .

. . . and their kitchen. I imagine they were well-off enough by this time to have a cook; it's hard to imagine Rose in the kitchen. This house is actually more of a shrine to Rose than to Jack.

The dining room.

The Kennedy family, becoming more affluent all the time, moved from this house while Jack was still a baby. The house they moved to is only a few blocks away, and is in private ownership.

Skipping over many years, we now come to the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum, south of Boston, the only presidential library in New England.

This magnificent edifice houses artifacts from the life of the Kennedy's, and is one of the most-visited of all the presidential libraries.

The library overlooks Massachusetts Bay. This is a spacious building with a huge collection of artifacts, papers, recordings, etc., of the entire Kennedy administration.

Here is Jack's actual baptismal gown.

Jack was in ill health all his life, and maintained his busy schedule with back pain as a constant companion. He had several rocking chairs; this is the one from the oval office.

He fought a hard battle for the presidency against Richard Nixon, and won only by the slimmest of margins. He once said his father refused to pay for a landslide victory.

Most (maybe all) of the presidential libraries have replicas of the oval office as it was during the presidency. Jack's has TV equipment from the era; he was the first president to use TV to any great extent.

More oval office artifacts.

And here is one of Jack's favorite paintings.

Jacqueline Kennedy painted this watercolor entitled "The White House Long Ago" as a gift for her husband. The president displayed the picture in the Oval Office. It was the least he could do.

All photos on this site ©Donald L. Mark 1973-2007

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