Read Online Kennedy Wives: Triumph and Tragedy in America's Most Public Family by David Batcher Amber Hunt, David Batcher - Free Book Online
Authors: David Batcher Amber Hunt, David Batcher
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gradually morphed from campaign appearances for Jack to fund-raising appearances for charity and back to campaign appearances for Jack by the later part of the decade. As early as 1957, when she did a short speaking tour of Iowa, Rose started speaking in states that Jack would need to focus on in the 1960 presidential contest. It was typical of Kennedy political savvy that Rose’s good works on behalf of the developmentally disabled, while genuine, simultaneously furthered her son’s presidential ambitions.
Jack announced his campaign for the presidency in January of 1960. Rose campaigned for him in the lead up to the New Hampshire primary, traditionally the nation’s first. After ensuring his resounding victory—he received 85 percent of the vote—they headed to Wisconsin, which promised to be a much more difficult enterprise. Hubert Humphrey, senator of neighboring Minnesota, all but had the state locked up; he was often referred to as Wisconsin’s third senator. But the Kennedys, including Rose, fanned out across the state, using their sheer numbers to make the Kennedy name more recognizable in several places at once. Patrick Lucey, then the leader of the state’s Democratic Party, remembered that Kennedy’s campaign was “just an effective presentation of celebrity. . . . The family was an asset . . . genuinely glamorous as well as glamorized, so the people were anxious to meet them wherever they went.” However, Jackie would remember their reception in Wisconsin somewhat differently: “They just stared at us, like some sort of animals .”
Nevertheless, Humphrey felt outnumbered and outgunned by the Kennedy phalanx. The Kennedys are “all over the state,” he moaned. “And they look alike and sound alike. . . . I get reports that Jack is appearing in three or four different places at the same time.”
On April 5, Kennedy won Wisconsin with 56.5 percent of the vote, thanks in no small part to Rose’s help. She sat out the hard-fought West Virginia primary that followed but campaigned for Jack throughout the election, generally campaigning three days on and then four days off, and taking a rest in Hyannis Port in the summer months after Jack received the Democratic nomination. Despite the lighter schedule, it still must have been punishing for a woman who turned seventy during the campaign. By the time Jack was elected, she’d traveled more than thirty-five thousand miles on his behalf, a woman talking to women.
On November 8, 1960, Rose Kennedy’s eldest surviving son was narrowly elected president of the United States. The next morning the family gathered in the main house at Hyannis Port for a photo to celebrate the occasion. Seated in the front of the tableau, looking twenty years younger than she was, Rose beamed. Twenty years previous, the Kennedy name was in ruins. That morning she was the mother of the president-elect of the United States. Her eldest living child, whom she’d come so close to losing to illness and to war, was now one of the most powerful men in the world.
9
The First Mother
Jack presented his mother with a map. There were forty-six pins in it, one for every spot where she’d campaigned, and an inscription: “To Mother—With Thanks.” In Palm Beach, as the president-elect prepared for his term and Jackie recovered from the Caesarean delivery of her second child, John Jr., Rose adjusted grudgingly to the constant presence of Secret Service, press, and, anytime she went beyond the perimeter of the estate, gawking tourists and well-wishers.
On January 5, photographer Richard Avedon arrived to capture the next first family. Rose’s diary entry captures how disorienting and irritating the interregnum must have been for her, and how, in the midst of it, she coped by attending to details:
After my hair had been set and combed out I had to walk back through the living room in my long blue bathrobe. I nodded to one of photographer’s assistants and warned her about the
Jack announced his campaign for the presidency in January of 1960. Rose campaigned for him in the lead up to the New Hampshire primary, traditionally the nation’s first. After ensuring his resounding victory—he received 85 percent of the vote—they headed to Wisconsin, which promised to be a much more difficult enterprise. Hubert Humphrey, senator of neighboring Minnesota, all but had the state locked up; he was often referred to as Wisconsin’s third senator. But the Kennedys, including Rose, fanned out across the state, using their sheer numbers to make the Kennedy name more recognizable in several places at once. Patrick Lucey, then the leader of the state’s Democratic Party, remembered that Kennedy’s campaign was “just an effective presentation of celebrity. . . . The family was an asset . . . genuinely glamorous as well as glamorized, so the people were anxious to meet them wherever they went.” However, Jackie would remember their reception in Wisconsin somewhat differently: “They just stared at us, like some sort of animals .”
Nevertheless, Humphrey felt outnumbered and outgunned by the Kennedy phalanx. The Kennedys are “all over the state,” he moaned. “And they look alike and sound alike. . . . I get reports that Jack is appearing in three or four different places at the same time.”
On April 5, Kennedy won Wisconsin with 56.5 percent of the vote, thanks in no small part to Rose’s help. She sat out the hard-fought West Virginia primary that followed but campaigned for Jack throughout the election, generally campaigning three days on and then four days off, and taking a rest in Hyannis Port in the summer months after Jack received the Democratic nomination. Despite the lighter schedule, it still must have been punishing for a woman who turned seventy during the campaign. By the time Jack was elected, she’d traveled more than thirty-five thousand miles on his behalf, a woman talking to women.
On November 8, 1960, Rose Kennedy’s eldest surviving son was narrowly elected president of the United States. The next morning the family gathered in the main house at Hyannis Port for a photo to celebrate the occasion. Seated in the front of the tableau, looking twenty years younger than she was, Rose beamed. Twenty years previous, the Kennedy name was in ruins. That morning she was the mother of the president-elect of the United States. Her eldest living child, whom she’d come so close to losing to illness and to war, was now one of the most powerful men in the world.
9
The First Mother
Jack presented his mother with a map. There were forty-six pins in it, one for every spot where she’d campaigned, and an inscription: “To Mother—With Thanks.” In Palm Beach, as the president-elect prepared for his term and Jackie recovered from the Caesarean delivery of her second child, John Jr., Rose adjusted grudgingly to the constant presence of Secret Service, press, and, anytime she went beyond the perimeter of the estate, gawking tourists and well-wishers.
On January 5, photographer Richard Avedon arrived to capture the next first family. Rose’s diary entry captures how disorienting and irritating the interregnum must have been for her, and how, in the midst of it, she coped by attending to details:
After my hair had been set and combed out I had to walk back through the living room in my long blue bathrobe. I nodded to one of photographer’s assistants and warned her about the
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