The events of 55 years ago today, as recounted in The New Yorker: Read more
In 1963
‘We should not all be painted with the same brush’
Sandra writes:
Now reading “The Ghost . . .”.On page 145, Jefferson Morley states, “In Columbus, Mississippi, high school students cheered the death of the liberal president . . . ”
Sandra wants to make an important point about the South and JFK’s assassination. Read more
Tour the White House with Jackie Kennedy
On Feb. 14, 1962, First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy took CBS News and a national television audience on a tour of the newly remodeled White House.
Let’s tag along.
Memories of the CIA in Miami
A faithful reader sent a link to a telling new story about the CIA in Miami in the 1960s when the presence of one of the largest CIA stations in the world was an open secret — yet officially unknown.
4 CIA lies: New JFK files show how assassination investigation was controlled, not ‘botched’
In May 1964, top CIA officials stonewalled the official investigation of the murder of President John F. Kennedy by concealing or downplaying evidence about the Cuban contacts of the accused assassin, according to newly declassified documents.
The documents, released online last month by the National Archives, show how two CIA spymasters concocted a series of false and misleading statements that served to steer the Warren Commission investigation away from evidence that might point to a conspiracy.
The long-secret records, stamped with the words “Reproduction Prohibited,” shed new light on two key issues related to the death of JFK: 1) the agency’s plots to kill Cuban leader Fidel Castro at the time JFK was killed; and 2) the CIA’s pre-assassination knowledge of Lee Harvey Oswald, the 24-year-old ex-Marine, who was arrested for killing Kennedy.
The new files show the JFK investigation was not “botched” as Politico and NPR have reported. Rather, the documents show hwo the probe was controlled by two top CIA officials.
JFK’s last birthday: Gifts, champagne and wandering hands on the presidential yacht
On May 29, 1963, Kennedy and about two dozen others boarded the 104-foot Sequoia, the presidential yacht, for a dinner party cruise down the Potomac River. It was a family-and-friends-only affair. Aside from a few Secret Service agents, the roster of guests gleamed with a touch of Hollywood — actors David Niven (“Separate Tables” and “The Pink Panther”) and Peter Lawford (a Rat Packer who was married to Patricia Kennedy, the commander in chief’s sister).
RFK’s secret campaign to become LBJ’s Vice President
By late July, Johnson could no longer risk waiting until the Democratic convention to remove Kennedy from vice presidential consideration. The president called his attorney general on Monday, July 27, and asked him to come to the White House—Tuesday, if he could—to talk over “some other matters.”
Source: Robert Kennedy’s Secret Campaign to Become Lyndon Johnson’s Vice President
Even though they had killed her husband
“Yesterday morning, at 11:15, Jacqueline Kennedy started toward the grave. She came out from under the north portico of the White House and slowly followed the body of her husband, which was in a flag-covered coffin that was strapped with two black leather belts to a black caisson that had polished brass axles. She walked straight and her head was high. She walked down the bluestone and …
53 years ago, ‘Dr. Stranglove’ premiere was postponed
When asked about the nuclear-mad antics of Dr. Strangelove, Pentagon whistleblower Dan Ellsberg said, “For those of us who worked in the Pentagon, the movie was a documentary.” As nuclear historian Eric Schlosser has written, “almost everything” in the movie was true. JFK was disturbed at the laxity of U.S. nuclear control regime, and sought to tighten command and control and dissolve the Cold War, especially in 1963.
Love Field on the morning of November 22
A haunting photo gallery from Robin Unger, curator of the best online collection of JFK Assassination Photographs.
The message in the Kennedy Kards
The now poignant Kennedy Kards deck was published in early 1963 when the public infatuation with JFK had been revitalized by his statesmanship in the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962.
JFK was the Jack of Hearts, First Lady Jackie the Queen of Hearts, and Bobby Kennedy, the King of Diamonds.
“Long live the King, Queen and Jack,” proclaimed an informational card that came with the deck.
Within the year, the Jack of Clubs, Vice President Lyndon Johnson, would be president. Read more
Jacqueline Kennedy’s pink Chanel suit: then & now
One of the most haunting images from November 22, 1963, is Jacqueline Kennedy’s pink suit smeared with President Kennedy’s blood in Dallas.
A motorcade and rifle but this wasn’t Dallas
Two men, brothers-in-law aged 20 and 16, were taken into custody. The report continued, “A .22 caliber semi-automatic rifle and a full box of .22 long rifle ammunition was seized.” Both men admitted “pointing the gun out the window on the parade route.”
Source: History News Network | JFK. A Motorcade. A Rifle. But this Wasn’t Dallas.
Move over, Adele—JFK is actually the fastest-selling artist ever
“This week, 52 years ago, John Fitzgerald Kennedy: A Memorial Album sold an astonishing 4 million copies in its first six days of availability, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. …It cost 99 cents a copy.”
Move Over, Adele—JFK’s Actually the Fastest-Selling Artist Ever – The Daily Beast
