Here's Where It Gets Interesting - The Enduring Legacy of JFK with Fredrik Logevall

Episode Date: January 14, 2022

In this episode, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and Harvard historian Fredrik Logevall joins Sharon to discuss the life and career of the 35th President, John F. Kennedy. Professor Logevall shares expertise and research from his latest book, JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, which captures the glamor and beauty of the Kennedy family, as well as the moments of hesitation and darkness. Kennedy struggled with health issues for much of his life, but did not let it deter him from pursuing his interests, most notably, international and world affairs. Brush up on your knowledge of one of America’s favorite presidents as Logevall articulates JFK’s trajectory from a slacking schoolboy to a wildly popular world leader. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey friends, welcome. So excited you're here and I am so excited to share this conversation with Frederick Logevall, who is a Harvard historian who has written an absolutely mesmerizing book about JFK. If you like presidential history, you will love his new book about JFK, which is really more about his formative years, but there is so much good stuff to unpack here. I just found Fred to be so warm, so easy to talk to. We could have chatted for hours. Let's dive into my conversation with Frederick Logevall. I'm Sharon McMahon, and welcome to the Sharon Says So podcast. Thank you so much for coming today. I am thrilled to be speaking with you. And I know we're going to be talking about a lot of amazing stuff from an era of history that

Americans find fascinating. So thank you so much for being here. Delighted to be with you. So good. First of all, can you introduce yourself? Can you tell us a little bit more about who you are and what you do in case somebody has not read your book yet? Yeah. So my name is Frederick Logevall, and I'm a historian at Harvard. I'm jointly appointed here in the John F. Kennedy School of Government and in the Department of History. And I'm primarily a historian of U.S. foreign relations, American political history, and am now embarked upon this two-volume study of our 35th president of John F. Kennedy. People love Kennedy, clearly. He's always really highly ranked in terms of who's your favorite president. Kennedy is always in people's top five,

right? Certainly in people's top five and even historians, which is pretty interesting, He's certainly in people's top five and even historians, which is pretty interesting, typically have him certainly in the top 10. So, yeah, you're right. He fares pretty well in these in these assessments. Do you feel like his assassination is part of his enduring popularity or was it his youth, his beautiful wife, his brilliant oration? Was it the perfect storm of all the things that made him enduringly popular? I think those things certainly factor in. When you think about the assassination, the timing of it, here's a guy who seems to be in the prime of life. Of course, he had health problems, but nevertheless, in the minds of not only Americans, but people around the world. This is a guy who was in the prime

and then he's cut down and it's captured on film. Yes. I think you're totally right that that factors in as does the glamour, as you point out, the beauty of the family, his oration. I do think though, Sharon, that it's about something else too, this legacy. I think it's about the degree to which John F.

Kennedy inspired people. We have so much evidence of people who were maybe young at the time, maybe they were in college at the time of his inauguration, and were so moved by his inaugural address, and what he said about American democracy, and what he said about politics and about government. that inspirational part of the Kennedy message, I think is also key to understanding his legacy. That's such a great point. Like, I just want to do what he, I want to answer the call. I mean, it's really true. And he is, as I show in the book, and I will show all, so volume one has come out, came out last year, and volume two I'm working on now. But, you know, I show that he's a flawed figure. In a sense,

what I'm trying to do is to humanize him. So it's to show the good sides, and there are many good sides, but also to show the degree to which he failed, both in personal terms and in political terms. But as you say, the degree to which he inspired Americans, and by the way, people around the world, I'm originally from Sweden. And my parents who have both passed, would tell me about the degree to which this young president and his beautiful wife, inspired Swedes to believe in what politics can accomplish. And when, of course, he was assassinated, not just in Sweden, but around the world, people mourned to a remarkable degree his passing. Because JFK was tremendously popular in Europe as well. You can fill these details out probably even

way more eloquently than I can, but they were beloved by people the world over. Oh, absolutely. And my mother, I have pictures. So I was born in the year that he was assassinated, but I have pictures of myself with my mom when I'm a baby and she looks, she's dressed just like Jackie. So that fashion sensibility. And then of course, Jack Kennedy's sensibility. I think you're absolutely right. And there was something that was uniquely powerful. Maybe Obama had some of the same effect on Europeans when he visited Europe and people turned out in masses to see him.

But Kennedy had that, you know, when he visited Berlin just about six months before his assassination, absolutely enormous crowds were out to see him in West Berlin and to hear his remarkable speech. And it speaks to what you're saying, this global reach that he had. All right, well, take us back to the beginning. Tell us more about Jack's childhood. We always refer to him as JFK, but obviously he was not called that by his parents. No, he was Jack. Yes. He was the second born.

So the older brother, Joe Jr., who I write a lot about him and who was the presumed golden child, he was the one who was going to be president. He was the one who was straight to be president. He was the one who was, you know, straight from central casting in terms of looks. And Jack was the second child and the second son, sickly as a kid. I think that had a big effect on him, by the way, but grew up under his brother's shadow. Little by little, as I show in the book, he emerges from, he comes out of that shadow. And their rivalry between the two brothers, which I think is always more important to Joe Jr. than it is to Jack, especially as Jack begins to outshine him a little bit. That's an important

sub theme in the book. But what we see is a young man who becomes little by little, deeply interested in the world around him, deeply interested in politics. He's very smart. He has a phenomenal memory, a little bit of a slacker in prep school and even in college, but becomes then the student of world affairs, the student of politics. And in this book, I trace that path, also the complicated relationship with his parents, maybe in particular, his father. And it ultimately leads him after World War Two, in which he serves heroically to choose politics. After his brother is killed in the war in 1944, Jack becomes, now he's the one. Now he's the golden child. Yes, exactly. And so his father

in particular pins all of his hopes on Jack's political career. And it is a remarkable story that then ultimately leads him, of course, to the White House. If his parents didn't have aspirations for him before, then once his brother died, now, man, the weight, the pressure that had to be on his shoulders, like you have to make good, not just for yourself and for this family, but you have to make good for your brother. Yeah, no, you really do. And you know, when I began the research, there's a common sense in the, I think in the literature that this is all about the father, that it's the father who's a kind of puppeteer in a sense. He is basically telling all of his kids, nine kids, but in

particular, he's telling Jack, this is what you're going to do, and this is why you're going to do it. That's the end of the discussion. And what I found, in fact, is quite the contrary. Jack is pursuing politics ultimately, partly because his dad wants it, no question. His mother is deeply interested in politics. But I also argue that he does this for his own reasons. He becomes, as an undergraduate here at Harvard, really interested in politics.

And I think even if Joe Jr. had survived Sharon, I think at some point in time, Jack Kennedy would have also entered politics. It might have changed the timing a little bit. And it leads to an important theme in the book, which is that he is really his own political boss in many respects. He makes his own decisions. And his father, to his credit, allows them to make their own decisions about their world philosophy, about

their careers. And I think it's as much Jack himself as his father's pressure that leads him to choose to run for Congress here in the 11th district in 1946. And then he's on his way. You mentioned that he was a little bit of a slacker in prep school. Do you have any insights or stories that you can share with us about his adolescent experience? I think our teens and our twenties, at least most of us, maybe not all of us, but for most of us are such formative years. And I think it's totally true of JFK. And one of the marvelous things about this story, and one of the reasons I wanted to write this biography, is that the source material is so fabulous. This was a family that wrote letters all the time. So we have marvelous materials. I think what we see is somebody who is

at Choate, where his older brother also goes, this is the prep school in Connecticut. And though Joe is not more gifted than Jack, in fact, Jack, I think, is the one who's more naturally talented. Joe is dogged. He perseveres. He becomes a standout both on the football field at Choate

but also in the classroom to a degree. And so here too, he's in his brother's shadow in a sense. But I do think that he gains confidence at Choate and becomes much more aware and gets into trouble on occasion, is not particularly focused as a student, but already shows teachers. This is a guy with an uncommon ability, a great memory. And when he puts his mind to it, he can be phenomenal. He begins at Princeton for college,

And when he puts his mind to it, he can be phenomenal. He begins at Princeton for college, but because of health problems, crashes and burns. Then goes ultimately where his father wanted him to go all along, which is Harvard, but begins at Harvard there for a year later. He effectively has a kind of gap year, as we would call it today. Begins then and little by little becomes this serious student of world affairs, travels a lot. And one thing we need to mention is that his father becomes ambassador to England at a point, just as the war clouds are gathering, as the war really begins. Totally interesting story.

And I think it's critical to shaping his sort of sensibility, his interest in international affairs. And one of the conceits of the book, in a sense, is that I think we can tell the story of America and of world affairs in the middle decades of the 20th century. We can understand it better through the lens of JFK. Mm-hmm. Do you think he is perhaps more interested in foreign affairs than other presidents that have come after him or to his predecessors? Do you feel like he is unique in that and that he truly was not just interested from an academic perspective, but that was one of his passions?

Yeah, I think he is. If he's not unique, he's close. if he's not unique, he's close. The only person who I think could maybe match him in this special interest would be the elder Bush, George H.W. Bush, whose life in some ways is interestingly similar. But I think for Kennedy, it even outshines in terms of this special attachment to passion for foreign policy, it's probably even greater than it is for Bush. And as you imply with your question, very few other presidents, certainly in the 20th century, could even come close to the two of them in terms of this special interest. I'm Jenna Fisher. And I'm Angela Kinsey. We are best friends. And together we have the podcast Office Ladies, where we rewatched every single episode of The Office with insane behind the scenes stories, hilarious guests and lots of laughs.

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and listen to Office Ladies on the free Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts. I would definitely want to get more into JFK's military service. But before we do that, I would love to hear more about his illnesses and to the extent to which he hid them from the public. Because that was probably necessary, right? It was probably necessary. Yeah. I mean, it's a really important subject because really almost from the day of his birth or certainly soon thereafter, he is sickly.

His brother, Bobby famously said later that my brother was in pain. This is a slight paraphrase, but he essentially said was my brother was in pain every day of his life. And, you know, at several points, as I write in the book he had last rights administered in other words he was at death's door several times and it was bound to have an effect on him and two things in particular I might suggest first I think these illnesses made him more empathetic. Like FDR with polio, after the polio, I think FDR had greater empathy, had a greater understanding of other people, an ability to put himself in somebody else's shoes, which is what empathy is. And I think it had that effect on JFK, that there's at least a cognitive

kind of empathy that he develops that I think serves him very well as a politician. The second interesting aspect of the health issue, it seems to me, is that he compensates for this by working even harder as a candidate for political office in terms of what he does in his daily life. It's almost as though he wants to convince others and convince himself that I'm not going to let my health problems hold me back. And so if you look at his campaigns, both for the House, then for the Senate, then for the presidency, He is working harder than his advisors. He is willing to go from dawn until midnight, day after day after day. It's almost as though he wants to, as I say, compensate for the illnesses and prove everybody wrong. And for that reason,

I guess it would be a mistake for us to make too much of the illnesses in terms of its effect on him as a politician. He overcomes the health problems to an extraordinary degree. For somebody who's not familiar with his health issues, most people know that FDR had polio. But I don't know that everybody knows exactly what was wrong with JFK. Well, and there's still some, you know, I've tried to get to the bottom of this. It's still a little bit hard to pin some of this down. He suffered from Addison's disease, which as you pointed out earlier, they were very careful about keeping secret. I think for good reason, they didn't want to test how that would be received by voters. He wasn't diagnosed with that until 1947, so relatively late. But that's a key problem. He has serious back problems from an early age. And it turns out that this is something he was

born with, that one side of his body was slightly longer than the other side. It created a kind of, I don't know what to call it, a kind of rocking motion when he walked, which over time created real problems for him. He had a football injury at Harvard, hard to know how serious that was. He may have made that injury worse in the South Pacific when he served in the war. And he had stomach issues. This was a Kennedy family malady, if you will. So a sort of sensitive stomach, which also added to all of this. Can you share a little bit more about his military service? Well, so this was great fun to research and to write about. And it's principally

in 1943, he serves in the South Pacific in the Navy. And the very story of him, how he gets into the Navy, given his health problems, is fascinating. And his father, who's an influential figure, as we've discussed, wants desperately to keep both of his sons out of the service, his older sons, who are the only ones that are of age. And both of them choose to serve. And again, to Joe Kennedy's credit, he doesn't stand in their way. In fact, he helps Jack to get into the Navy. But then he serves in the Solomons in the South Pacific. And one night, his PT boat, his torpedo boat, is rammed by a Japanese destroyer. Very dark night. And it's a dramatic story, which I tell. And in the week after that ramming, I think it's very fair to say, and I detail the reasons why in the book, that the skipper of that craft, which was Lieutenant

Jack Kennedy, really performed heroically in saving himself and his crew. Apart from two crew members who died right away in the ramming. The rest are saved. And he gets a lot of credit for this. And if you look at what his mates had to say, both at the time and afterwards, they credit Jack Kennedy with basically with saving them. The other thing that's worth saying about his military service, I think, is that he comes out of the war convinced of two things. And in a sense, they could almost seem contradictory, but I don't think they ultimately are. The first conclusion he draws is that the military instrument is a very blunt instrument that can't really solve political problems. So he's in a sense, I think, for the rest of his life,

a skeptic about the utility of military force to solve these problems. But the second conclusion he draws is that he comes out of the war convinced that the United States must play a leadership role in world affairs. It cannot do what it did after World War I in Jack Kennedy's judgment. And he wrote about this in college papers, which was to kind of withdraw from world affairs after World War I. Uh-uh, that's not going to work. Now the United States needs to be basically first among equals because of its power and it needs to lead the world. And that too is something that I think that stays with him for the rest of his days. The story of how he saves his crewmates is just, and then, you know, the awards that he accrues afterwards. I don't know that that is, that enough people know about that. We just view him as this, like, ask not what your country can do for you kind of man.

I don't know if he leads heavily enough into that. You know, like if I were his campaign manager today, I would be front and center with that story. Yeah. Well, you know, he is reticent, which I think is to his credit. He has to be convinced by his father and by campaign aides in 1946 when he's running for the House, this neophyte politician. He's not actually a very good campaigner, by the way, doesn't really know what he's doing. He gets nervous. He talks too fast, but he has to be convinced by these people. No, listen, your service and the awards that you received really needs to be front and center in our campaign literature. And, you know, I think we should acknowledge that JFK comes quietly to agree with them, and he does not object when this is trumpeted in not only in that campaign, but in subsequent campaigns.

But you're quite right, Sharon, to suggest that he is initially quite reluctant. He has a kind of winning response when people ask him about, you know, why did you, why did you do this? And he basically says, well, they rammed my boat, but he comes to see that, no, no, this is too good a story not to make known to people. Yes, it is too good a story. Like the swimming, like it's too, it's too, give us like a 10 second version of the swimming episode. So, so, so they, the, the, the, the boat has been rammed and it's slowly starting to sink. And so he has to make a decision. What are they going to do? They are in Japanese controlled waters, also shark infested water.

Yes. Like at night. And it's just an unbelievable story. And so he makes the decision. He says, we're going to swim to that small island over there in the distance. And we're going to hope to get there. And they proceed with a three to four hour swim in which he has to drag a injured crew member. He has to basically not just swim for himself, but he's dragging this injured fellow.

And he had competed in swimming for Harvard. but he's dragging this injured fellow. And he had competed in swimming for Harvard. So he was a, he was an expert swimmer, but he's kind of a scrawny guy with a bad back, but they make it over there. And then over the next three or four days, they have to elude the Japanese. Ultimately they are rescued. It's an amazing. It is like, why is there not a movie of that, of just, you know, just that, like are rescued. It's an amazing. It is. Like, why is there not a movie of just that? Like that story. There's a movie in, I think, 62, I think, or 61 is when it's coming out. So he's actually in the White House.

I want to say maybe Burt Lancaster stars. I can't recall exactly. But they did make a movie of this it was a hit because it was the president but i kind of wondered you know how hollywood likes to redo films yes uh maybe it's time for another crack at pt 109 that's the name of the boat pt 109 pt 109 story interesting i have not seen that movie, but yes, maybe like with updated special effects. And also, you know, because Kennedy was in the White House, perhaps there was a little bit more romanticizing where you felt like you needed to paint a favorable portrait.

I think it is, it is that kind of a film. You're exactly right. And so if one did it now, I think it is that kind of a film. You're exactly right. And so if one did it now, it would be, I think, a bit grittier. It would perhaps focus on more members of the crew. I can imagine taking quite a different approach to this, or maybe even the Japanese bring. Because that commander of that Japanese destroyer, you know, there's controversy. Was he trying to ram the boat? Was he trying to avoid ramming the boat? It would be pretty interesting to explore in a film. A hundred percent. So we all know that JFK has a reputation as a bit of a playboy. To what extent is that reputation deserved in your opinion? Yeah, no, it's certainly in terms of the latter part of that, it's deserved. That is to say, he dated a lot of women, was really interested as a prep school kid. He was interested in girls. And this continues when he gets to Harvard, finds that he has a winning way,

if I can put it that way, with co-eds. Also interesting here, Sharon, is that he is pressured. This is a troubling part of the story. I think he's pressured by his father, as is Joe Jr. And young Bobby is going to feel some of this too. And Ted, basically to try to compete with the old man when it comes to womanizing. And so as a father myself, I find it troubling to say the least that Joe Sr. would basically dare his sons to see, can you compete with me in this area? So he feels that, but I'm not blaming this on the father, but the way he pursues women and including after he meets Jackie, cheats on her before the wedding, cheats on her after the wedding. This is obviously something I'm going to delve into more in volume two.

That's on him. The part of the story that I think is not quite accurate is that there is a common perception out there that he's mostly a playboy. That this is sort of the essence of Jack Kennedy, at least for a large part of his life, that he is a serious student of world affairs, serious student of politics from, well, from his college time at Harvard and certainly after college. This is a guy who, as I put it in the preface to the book, treats serious things seriously. I would love to hear from your perspective as

a historian who studies politics. This is something that I know a lot of people in my audience wrestle with, not just about JFK, but about historical figures in general. To what extent is it fair to judge historic figures by today's standards? That is, I think, one of the questions of our time, is to what extent do we say, how fair is it for us to judge the fact that Thomas Jefferson was a massively successful slaveholder, many of our founding fathers, et cetera, did things that by today's standards, we find morally reprehensible. And to what extent is it fair to judge people by today's standards? Is it imperative that we do? Is it unfair that we do? What is your perspective on that? I think it's inevitable that we do so. And I think that that's fine.

That's as it should be. However, I do think we have an obligation as historians, and this is something I teach my own students, is to evaluate the historical actors that we are studying according to their own time. This is in part about empathy, what I used before, about being able to put yourself as a historian or as a student writing a history paper into the shoes of the people you're studying. And so I do think it's incumbent upon us, whether it's Thomas Jefferson, as you say, or John F. Kennedy, much more recently, to try to see the world as they saw it and try to experience to the best

of our ability, that world and recreate that world for the reader, which I think is a fascinating exercise. Yeah, let's judge them in part by what we would expect to see today, but let's also be fair to the time in which they lived. I think that Jackie Kennedy, a formidable woman, deeply intelligent, multilingual, and I show in the book how much she helped her husband's political career. But she understood, and I think to some extent accepted, it's fascinating to look at the oral histories that she gave soon after his assassination, in which, you know, in so many words, she questioned whether women were cut out to be politicians. So she bought in, at least to a degree at that time,

into those norms. Later, she changed and I think became a champion of equal rights. But she bought into some of this. And that still exists. Those rigid differences, as you put it, are still there in the early 1960s. Mm-hmm. This is the question that I'm sure you will be addressing very much in the second volume of this biography, but everybody wants to know, who killed JFK? That's what everybody wants to know. Where was it? The man in the grassy knoll?

Who was it? Was it a government conspiracy? What? Have you uncovered the truth? Well, I'm not sure that I have. And I'm keeping an open mind on this particular question. I think that, you know, the evidence that I've seen to this point suggests to me that Lee Harvey Oswald was the gunman. But of course, a conspiracy can be as few as two people. What do we know about his activities in the months before Dallas? We know that he was in Mexico City a couple of months before. He met with Cuban and Soviet officials. They might have motives, organized crime figures might have that same motive. So I still want to try to figure out to the best of my ability what occurred in those weeks and days leading up to this terrible event.

But, you know, one of the things that's just unbelievable on some level about this is that there's so many what ifs, Sharon. If the Secret Service, just to give an example, had prevailed upon JFK to have the bubble top up on the car, which they wanted, and he rejected. If the motorcade hadn't slowed down, as it was forced to do outside the school book depository, and of course, if Oswald hadn't been employed exactly where he was, would he have traveled across town to do this? An interesting question. So I think one of the reasons why conspiracies are attractive to people is that they help us make sense of the world. They give the sense there must be an important reason for why something important like this happened. And so people latch on to them for that particular reason. I've gone away from your question, but suffice it to say, I'm still doing research on this.

question, but suffice it to say, I'm still doing research on this. Yeah. It is interesting. And it also helps people, like you say, it helps them make sense of the world, but it also helps them feel like they are the purveyor of secret truth. And within that secret truth, they have a community. They have the other knowers of the secret truth and that feels special. And that feels like social capital. I have just a couple more questions. One of the things I'm also curious about is the effect of JFK's Catholicism on his formative years, on his presidency. How does being Catholic, and of course, he's famous for being the first Catholic president, one of only two we've ever had. What effect does that have on his political beliefs, his political career, on who he was as a man? I think it's really important. I'm glad you asked that question. He was not particularly devout as a Catholic, much to his mother's chagrin. He had siblings who were more fervent in their

religious belief, but he was a Catholic throughout his life. Jackie talked about the fact that even in the White House, her husband, the most powerful man in the world, would get on his knees to pray before bed. So that faith is ultimately important to him in a sense in religious terms. But the other thing that matters here is, of course, that he grew up in Massachusetts, heard stories from his parents and grandparents about the discrimination that they suffered as Irish Catholics, experienced some of that discrimination himself. There were final clubs here at Harvard who would never think of admitting a Catholic in other ways too, subtle ways that he himself even experienced this discrimination.

I think when he becomes a politician, and especially when he begins thinking about potentially the White House, could this be an office that I, Jack Kennedy, could in fact hold? Then of course, he has to think more about this. And he actually has aides, notably Ted Sorensen, who we haven't discussed, but who's really important. He has aides like Sorensen look into what it would mean for a Catholic to be vice president. This is initially the possibility in 1956. And then after that, to go all the way and to win the presidency. And so he is, in a sense, almost fixated upon what it means to be a Catholic. And as you say, we had never had a Catholic

president in this country. And, you know, I think what he believes as he gets closer to 1960 is that the one thing that could keep him from getting the nomination, the Democratic nomination, is the fact that he's Catholic. But maybe, just maybe, if I can get the nomination, my Catholicism will actually help me more than it'll hurt me in terms of the general election. And totally fascinating here, Sharon, is that he might be right about that. I'm still going through the evidence in terms of 1960. And it seems fair to say that it helped him in some states, hurt him in other states. On balance, it was probably a net plus by a very tiny margin that he had that Catholic vote. But the point is, understanding John F. Kennedy as a politician and as a leader means understanding his Catholicism,

no question. Do you think he was perhaps more religious than other leaders of his time? I mean, do you feel like he was perhaps other people who were in the Senate at the same time as he was, or other people on the national stage? Did he hold his religion more closely? Was that more important to him? As I think about the other contenders, say for the presidency in 1960, if we use that as a measurement, no, I don't know that his religion was more important to him, that he was more religious, as you say. Some of them, I think, and of course, in terms of serious contenders, they were exclusively Protestant. I think in terms of their daily lives, their Christianity mattered more to them than his did. Or at least maybe they were on par.

contenders in 1960, as I think about it, were, I would say, notably religious in terms of how it shaped their political worldview, how they acted as politicians accordingly. But yeah, I don't think I would say he's more religious. Just as an aside, who do you think our most religious president has been? you think our most religious president has been? Well, it might be Jimmy Carter, who was deeply committed to his Christian faith, made policies, at least I think partly according to that faith. Of course, he understood the separation of church and state. So I don't mean to suggest anything else, but it's pretty clear that Jimmy Carter, his faith was extremely important to him. And of course, what's ironic about that is that a lot of Christian voters came to reject Carter, voted against him in very large numbers in 1980 in the race against Ronald Reagan. But I would, you know, if you if since you're asking, I would maybe put him in terms of our recent presidents,

perhaps at the top. So interesting. If there was something that you would hope that everybody who reads this incredibly well-written, fascinating story about JFK, what would you love for the reader to take away? Well, I mean, on a, on a very basic level, I hope they take away what I feel. And one of the reasons I decided to do this, I think it's one of the great American stories. I really think that the story of the Kennedys, but in particular JFK, is just a remarkable story. But more seriously, more substantively, I think what I would like for people to take away is that this is a flawed human being, but an extraordinary one. As I said, a serious thinker, somebody who cared deeply about politics, believed in politics precisely because it's important, believed in government. Not that

government can solve all our problems, but I think John F. Kennedy felt and governed according to a philosophy that says that government has a critical role to play in making this a more just society. I hope readers take that away from the first volume, and of course, this is going to be, I think, a theme also in the second one, first volume. And of course, this is going to be, I think, a theme also in the second one. And is an inspirational figure, as you and I discussed a little while ago, when he says, ask not what your government can do for you, or what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. I think we need a little more of this in our own day. And it's one of the reasons why I think John F. Kennedy's message, ultimately a kind of centrist message, one that emphasized the importance of good faith bargaining between

the parties, that emphasized the need to reason from evidence. This was something that he stressed. That also stressed the importance of political opponents to come together for the good of the country. I think that's a powerful message for today. And I think it's a theme in volume one, and it'll be a theme also in my second. I love it. There's a reason that enduring that message has been enduring. It really is. There's a reason it does inspire you to more. I think so true. And, you know, he liked to quote Lincoln and to remind people of what Lincoln said, which is in effect, I'm paraphrasing, but that nobody has a monopoly on good or evil. And we all have to learn from one another. And that it's in some

ways what democracy is about. I think John F. Kennedy believed deeply in American democracy. He understood that it had flaws and that in particular, I think by the end of his life, came to believe that African-Americans had not experienced that and other minorities had not experienced that to the degree that they should have, but came to see civil rights by the end of his life as a moral issue, which I think is why he's ultimately also important on that issue, but believed in American democracy for all of its flaws. It had accomplished great things and could accomplish much more. Do you think Kennedy could get elected today?

I think he could have. I do think that he was somebody who had, a lot of people talk about this, who saw him up close, not just supporters, by the way, but also political opponents saw that he had something special that he could connect with voters. He became, through hard work, because he wasn't initially a great speaker, he became a very effective orator. And he could speak in ways that I think connected with people. And again, it's an optimistic message that John has about what America is and what it can be. And I think that message could still resonate today and would resonate today. The issue would be that in a 24-7 news cycle, the kinds of risks that he took in his personal life

would be just impossible. And I think that he was very smart and very savvy. He would understand in 2020 or 2021 or 2024 that you simply cannot engage in that kind of behavior. In those days, journalists who understood that he had women on the side, they basically chose not to publicize that. It's clear that some reporters knew what was going on, but today that just wouldn't work. So the answer to your question is he could not be elected today if he chose to pursue the same kinds of, shall we say, activities that he did then. But I think he would not be doing that. And I think if you bracket that, and if you consider his message, his approach, his appeal,

yes, I think he could be elected. His charisma. His charisma, yes. Youth, his beautiful wife, all the things that coalesced into a perfect storm of making JFK who he was. Tell everybody the name of your book again, because if you want to understand who he was, this is, I feel like a must read. Well, I thank you for that. So the title is JFK, and the subtitle is Coming of Age in the American Century, 1917 to 1956. And so volume two, still in the working stages. If the first one covers more or less the first 39 years of Kennedy's life, this second volume, for obvious reasons, will cover a much shorter period. So this second volume will be 1957 to the assassination in 1963.

It's only about seven years, but a lot happens, including, of course, when he's president. When do you estimate volume two will happen? I think I probably still have a couple of years. We're still a ways away, but I'm having a great time with it and making the progress that I can. This was absolutely fascinating. Thank you so much for doing this. I am really grateful for your time. Thanks for being here today. Well, you're so good to have me on and it's great to chat with you. Thanks so much. Thank you so much for listening to the Sharon Says So podcast. I am truly grateful for you.

And I'm wondering if you could do me a quick favor. Would you be willing to follow or subscribe to this podcast or maybe leave me a rating or review? Or if you're feeling extra generous, would you share this episode on your Instagram stories or with a friend? All of those things help podcasters out so much. This podcast was written and researched by Sharon McMahon and Heather Jackson. It was produced by Heather Jackson, edited and mixed by our audio producer, Jenny Snyder, and hosted by me, Sharon McMahon. I'll see you next time.