biography of jfk jr

Biography of John F. Kennedy Jr.

• People & Events
• Fads & Fashions
• Early 20th Century
• American History
• African American History
• African History
• Ancient History and Culture
• Asian History
• European History
• Latin American History
• Medieval & Renaissance History
• Military History
• Women's History

John F. Kennedy Jr. (November 25, 1960–July 16, 1999), the son of President John F. Kennedy , was considered the heir to one of America's greatest political dynasties until his death in a plane crash at age 38.

In one of the most iconic photographs in American history, the 3-year-old Kennedy is seen saluting his father's casket three days after the assassination of John F. Kennedy .

Fast Facts: John F. Kennedy, Jr.

• Known For : Attorney, journalist, and son of President John F. Kennedy
• Born : Nov. 25, 1960 in Washington, D.C.
• Died : July 16, 1999 off the coast of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts
• Education : Brown University, B.A.; New York University, J.D.
• Spouse : Carolyn Bessette
• Key Accomplishments : Criminal prosecutor in New York City, founder and publisher of George magazine, and founder of non-profit Reaching Up
• Famous Quote : “People often tell me I could be a great man. I'd rather be a good man.”

John F. Kennedy Jr. was born on November 25, 1960—the same month his father, John F. Kennedy , was elected to his first term as president. He became an instant celebrity, despite his parents' attempts to give him as normal an upbringing as possible. Despite spending his first few years of life in the White House, however, Kennedy later said that he had lived a "pretty normal life."

Kennedy was the second of three children born to the Kennedys. His older sister was Caroline Bouvier Kennedy ; his younger brother, Patrick, died in 1963, two days after birth.

On his third birthday, in 1963, JFK Jr. became the subject of one of the most iconic scenes in American history: standing on a Washington street, wearing a dress coat, saluting his father's flag-draped coffin as it passed by on a horse-drawn carriage on the way to the Capitol. Kennedy's father had been assassinated three days earlier in Dallas, Texas.

The president's widow moved the family to the Upper East Side of New York, where JFK Jr. attended a Catholic elementary school. He later attended Collegiate School for Boys in New York and Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. Meanwhile, much of the American public waited for the young Kennedy to join the political world that had already been shaped by his family.

Careers in Law and Journalism

JFK Jr. graduated Brown University in 1983 with a degree in American history. He then attended law school at New York University, graduating in 1989. Many considered his law degree a precursor to a political career, but JFK Jr. instead went to work in the Manhattan district attorney's office for four years.

In 1995, Kennedy launched a magazine, George , which blended celebrity and public affairs. The magazine was meant to be a mass-market political journal, or, as one of its editors explained, "a political magazine for Americans turned off by political magazines." Kennedy wrote and served as editor-in-chief for George . Its publication ended in 2001, after Kennedy's death.

Marriage to Carolyn Bessette

In 1996, JFK Jr. arranged a secretive wedding to Carolyn Bessette, a fashion publicist. The couple went to extraordinary lengths to conceal their nuptials from the public. The wedding was held on an island 20 miles off the coast of Georgia; they chose that particular island in part because it had no access by road or telephone, and almost no lodging. The public learned of their marriage a week after it happened. The couple had no children.

On July 16, 1999, Kennedy was piloting a small single-engine airplane headed towards Martha's Vineyard, with his wife and her sister onboard. The plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. The bodies of the three crash victims were found off the coast of Martha's Vineyard five days later, on July 21.

One year later, in 2000, the National Transportation Safety Board ruled the crash an accident caused by Kennedy's "failure to maintain control of the airplane during a descent over water at night, which was a result of spatial disorientation." The government agency said haze and darkness were factors in the crash.

Kennedy was raised to abide by a scriptural passage found in Luke 12:48: "Of those to whom much is given, much is required." It was in that spirit that, in 1989, he founded a nonprofit called Reaching Up, which helps low-wage health and human-services professionals attain higher education, training, and career advancement. Reaching Up continues to help students pay for tuition, books, transportation, child care, and other education costs.

• Blow, Richard. American Son: A Portrait of John F. Kennedy, Jr. Henry Holt & Co., 2002.
• Grunwald, Michael. “JFK Jr. Feared Dead in Plane Crash.”  The Washington Post , WP Company, 18 July 1999, www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/jfkjr/stories/kennedy071899.htm .
• Seelye, Katharine Q. “John F. Kennedy Jr., Heir To a Formidable Dynasty.”  The New York Times , The New York Times, 19 July 1999, www.nytimes.com/1999/07/19/us/john-f-kennedy-jr-heir-to-a-formidable-dynasty.html .
• Biography of Caroline Kennedy
• Biography of John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the U.S.
• John F. Kennedy Printables
• Biography of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, First Lady
• 10 Things to Know About John F. Kennedy
• Timeline of the 1990s and the Last Hurrah of the 20th-Century
• Biography of Robert Kennedy, US Attorney General, Presidential Candidate
• President John F. Kennedy's Assassination
• The Aftermath of John F. Kennedy's Assassination
• John F. Kennedy: Reading Comprehension for Advanced ESL
• Famous Americans Killed in World War II
• Who Was Aristotle Onassis, Jackie Kennedy's Second Husband?
• 8 of the Scariest Days in America
• Biography of Lyndon B. Johnson, 36th President of the United States
• JFK's Accomplishments in Education and the Space Program
• Biography of Walter Cronkite, Anchorman and TV News Pioneer

• True Crime Blog

Biography: JFK Jr. The Final Year

• A&E Classics
• A&E Crime Central
• Link A&E on facebook
• Link A&E on twitter
• Link A&E on youtube
• Link A&E on instagram
• Link A&E on tiktok

Examines the last year of John F. Kennedy Jr.'s life in an entirely new way.

Related content.

John F. Kennedy Jr.'s Remarkable Life in Photos

The Last Days of JFK Jr.

July 16, 2019 marks the 20-year anniversary of John F. Kennedy Jr.’s death. This two-hour documentary special, airing on the anniversary, reframes the last year of his life in an entirely new way. Inspired by Steven M. Gillon’s upcoming book, America’s Reluctant Prince: The Life of John F. Kennedy Jr., this captivating special is the most substantive documentary to date and includes convincing new evidence regarding his political aspirations before his untimely death. This compelling documentary shines an unexpectedly poignant light on 1999, his last year, as he coped with the fatal illness of his closest friend and cousin, Anthony Radziwill, struggled to save his marriage and tried to rescue his political magazine, George.

With the guidance of historian and longtime friend Steven M. Gillon, along with never-before-seen footage and the recollections of Anthony Radziwill’s widow, Carole Radziwill who is speaking in-depth for the first time, a new story emerges. As the story unfolds, viewers are given a behind the scenes look at memorable moments in JFK Jr.’s life including his speech at the 1988 DNC convention with never-before-broadcast footage of Kennedy rehearsing for the event, exclusive stories and photos from his wedding, reflections on George and more.

The documentary also features extensive on-camera interviews with former U.S. President Bill Clinton, former George publisher David Pecker, friend Gary Ginsberg, former assistant and close friend RoseMarie Terenzio as well as childhood friend Sasha Chermayeff.

Get Instant Access to Free Updates

Don’t Miss Out on A&E news, behind the scenes content, and more!

• Privacy Notice
• Terms of Use

Need help with the site?

Don’t miss out sign up now to get email updates on the latest premieres, including title ..

Email Address

Create a Profile to Add this show to your list!

John F. Kennedy Jr.'s Close Friend Sheds Light on the Former First Son's Final Days in New Biography

In the last year of JFK Jr.'s life, America's golden boy was considering a run for governor.

Every item on this page was chosen by a Town & Country editor. We may earn commission on some of the items you choose to buy.

• Gillon shares details about the difficulties John Kennedy Jr. was having in his marriage to Carolyn Bessette .
• Previously unreleased Secret Service letters show Jackie Kennedy's tense relationship with the Secret Service after JFK died.
• In the last year of his life, JFK Jr. was contemplating running for governor of New York.

It's been twenty years since John F. Kennedy Jr. died when the tiny plane he was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard on July 16, 1999. Also killed in the crash were his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, and his sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette . As the anniversary of their deaths draws near, a new biography by historian Steven Gillon sheds new light on the life of America's "reluctant prince." An A&E documentary—with appearances from those who knew John best, including Carole Radzwill who was married to his cousin and best friend Anthony —will also premier on July 16.

America's Reluctant Prince: The Life of John F. Kennedy Jr.

Gillon was actually a close friend of John's—the two met in the 1980s when Gillon was a teaching assistant at Brown University, where John majored in American studies. The author spoke with T&C about his memories of John, what Jackie Kennedy really thought about the Secret Service, and whether John would have followed in his father's footsteps.

You knew John from his college days. How well did you know his wife Carolyn?

I met Carolyn twice, one was at this very elegant dinner for G eorge magazine at Federal Hall in New York. I was sitting next to her, I was the fill in at John's table. As people like Puff Daddy would show up, they were late and I would move from chair to chair because John didn't want his table to look empty. [laughs] So I was seated next to her for a while.

She was so refined and so elegant, and was just mesmerizing. She looked at you with those eyes and made you feel like you were the only person in the universe.

It's clear they were not prepared for the obsessive paparazzi.

I think neither Carolyn nor John believed that the press would remain interested in him once he got married . John thought they would say "oh he's a married man, he's no longer the sexiest man alive or the most eligible bachelor" and that they would just let them be. And just the opposite happened. Carolyn was fragile to begin with, and this became the dominant issue in their relationship.

.css-4rnr1w:before{margin:0 auto 1.875rem;width:60%;height:0.125rem;content:'';display:block;background-color:#9a0500;color:#fff;} .css-gcw71x{color:#030929;font-family:NewParis,NewParis-fallback,NewParis-roboto,NewParis-local,Georgia,Times,serif;font-size:1.625rem;line-height:1.2;margin:0rem;}@media(max-width: 64rem){.css-gcw71x{font-size:2.25rem;line-height:1.1;}}@media(min-width: 48rem){.css-gcw71x{font-size:2.625rem;line-height:1.1;}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-gcw71x{font-size:2.8125rem;line-height:1.1;}}.css-gcw71x b,.css-gcw71x strong{font-family:inherit;font-weight:bold;}.css-gcw71x em,.css-gcw71x i{font-style:italic;font-family:inherit;} "I think she never found her identity as John's wife. She felt captive."

The paparazzi treated her horribly. Her life was pretty miserable while she was married to John and it wasn't anything that John did, it was because of who he was and what people expected of him. I think she never found her identity as John's wife. She went from being this vivacious and energetic person, and now she feels captive.

What was their relationship like in the last year of their lives?

Not long after that George dinner, John and I had dinner at the Odeon and he told me about this letter he'd received from Hachette that was really critical of his leadership at George . I was a contributing editor but I wasn't in the office day in and day out, and he wanted an objective opinion. His apartment on North Moore was just a few blocks from the restaurant so we walked over and went up into the apartment. It was really dark and the curtains were drawn.

Carolyn was sitting in the sofa in an oversized Columbia University sweater. John and I were at the kitchen counter and he showed me the letter, and they were passing a cigarette back and forth while I read it. And then she just exploded on him. She was completely different. I was struck—she wasn't angry with Hachette for writing this incredibly abusive letter to her husband. She was mad at John for not fighting back. That was her big complaint, that he just let people walk all over him and he didn't stand up for himself. She felt that many of his friends were using him and she was trying to push many of his friends out of his life.

You found a chilling letter Jackie Kennedy wrote to the Secret Service saying "if anything happens to John, I won't be as nice to you as I was after Dallas."

He spent the first 16 years of his life living in a bubble. The Secret Service was required by law to make sure nothing happens to John, but where did their rights end and Jackie' s parental rights begin? I actually sued the Secret Service and they turned over 500 pages of documents that no one has seen before—not only the letters between Jackie and the Secret Service, but also the internal debates among the Secret Service about how to handle her.

"I think John as an adult had a pent up desire for freedom."

They asked her on a few occasions to give up the protection if she wanted John to grow up like a normal child, but she didn't want to do that. Every time John left the house there was this movement of people and resources. When he went skiing he had a secret service agent skiing next to him. They had agents at the house, on vacation. So I think John as an adult—being on his bicycle and being able to ride around New York City wherever he went—that was a pent up desire for freedom.

There were always rumors that John would run for office. Did he ever talk about that?

He had this exploratory meeting in March 1999 about whether to run for the Senate so he was definitely thinking about it but George was in a bad state, his marriage was in a bad state. He wasn't ready. He's fighting with his sister. His best friend is dying. He had a lot on his plate. But also, he didn't want to be a legislator—he always saw himself as an executive. Maybe he would run for governor of New York.

Is that something he actually wanted or he felt was his destiny?

"I think he was finally embracing that politics was in his DNA and he could be good at it."

My view is he did not want to go into politics because he was a Kennedy. He wanted to do things that no one expected him to do. He wanted to really find out who he was based on his own experiences. When I first met him in the 80s he always referred to his father as "President Kennedy." Almost as if he's trying to keep his memory at a distance. Later on in the early 90s he's referring to him as "my father." The last time I spoke to him he called him "my daddy." I think he was finally embracing that politics was in his DNA and he could be good at it.

What do you think he would be doing now?

Everyone asks that, but I want John to be remembered for the life that he lived and not for what he might have become. When you think about John, you don't have to think about the unfulfilled potential. You can think about the life of dignity that he led.

What do you miss most about John?

John was so generous. He helped friends out financially when they were in a jam, but he also was available to them if they needed emotional support or were looking for a job. He knew what clout he had, and he rarely used it for himself, but he would be the first one to use it for other people. The Friday before he died, I went to the doctor because I thought I had ALS. I called a mutual friend and I said "don't tell anybody." But he told John and that Friday night I get two phone calls from him but I didn't want to talk. Then Saturday morning I get a call and it's John and he's like "Stevie I hear we have something to talk about." And he said, "Stevie, I'll take care of you." And he repeated it a second time. "Stevie, I'll take care of you." That's who John is.

Liz Cantrell is the assistant to the Editor in Chief of Town & Country , covering arts and culture, and has previously written for Esquire.

@media(min-width: 40.625rem){.css-1jdielu:before{margin:0.625rem 0.625rem 0;width:3.5rem;-webkit-filter:invert(17%) sepia(72%) saturate(710%) hue-rotate(181deg) brightness(97%) contrast(97%);filter:invert(17%) sepia(72%) saturate(710%) hue-rotate(181deg) brightness(97%) contrast(97%);height:1.5rem;content:'';display:inline-block;-webkit-transform:scale(-1, 1);-moz-transform:scale(-1, 1);-ms-transform:scale(-1, 1);transform:scale(-1, 1);background-repeat:no-repeat;}.loaded .css-1jdielu:before{background-image:url(/_assets/design-tokens/townandcountrymag/static/images/diamond-header-design-element.80fb60e.svg);}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-1jdielu:before{margin:0 0.625rem 0.25rem;}} Heritage @media(min-width: 40.625rem){.css-128xfoy:before{margin:0.625rem 0.625rem 0;width:3.5rem;-webkit-filter:invert(17%) sepia(72%) saturate(710%) hue-rotate(181deg) brightness(97%) contrast(97%);filter:invert(17%) sepia(72%) saturate(710%) hue-rotate(181deg) brightness(97%) contrast(97%);height:1.5rem;content:'';display:inline-block;background-repeat:no-repeat;}.loaded .css-128xfoy:before{background-image:url(/_assets/design-tokens/townandcountrymag/static/images/diamond-header-design-element.80fb60e.svg);}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-128xfoy:before{margin:0 0.625rem 0.25rem;}}

Environmental Protesters at Grosvenor Wedding

Olivia Henson's Blue Bridal Shoes

Photos of the Duke of Westminster's Wedding

Princess Eugenie's Low-Key Wedding Guest Style

The Tiara at The Westminster Wedding

Duke of Westminster’s Wedding to Olivia Henson

Why Harry Didn't Go to Hugh Grosvenor's Wedding

Olivia Henson Wears Fabergé Myrtle Leaf Tiara

William Attends the Duke of Westminster's Wedding

Meet The Duke of Westminster

Princess Marie of Denmark Wore A Zara Dress

• History Classics
• Your Profile
• Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window)
• Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window)
• Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window)
• Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window)
• Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window)
• This Day In History
• History Podcasts
• History Vault

This Day In History : July 16

Changing the day will navigate the page to that given day in history. You can navigate days by using left and right arrows

JFK Jr. killed in plane crash

On July 16, 1999, John F. Kennedy, Jr.; his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy; and her sister, Lauren Bessette, die when the single-engine plane that Kennedy was piloting crashes into the Atlantic Ocean near Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Jr., was born on November 25, 1960, just a few weeks after his father and namesake was elected the 35th president of the United States. On his third birthday, “John-John” attended the funeral of his assassinated father and was photographed saluting his father’s coffin in a famous and searing image. Along with his sister, Caroline, he was raised in Manhattan by his mother, Jacqueline. After graduating from Brown University and a very brief acting stint, he attended New York University Law School. He passed the bar on his third try and worked in New York as an assistant district attorney, winning all six of his cases. In 1995, he founded the political magazine George, which grew to have a circulation of more than 400,000.

Always in the media spotlight, he was celebrated for the good looks that he inherited from his parents. In 1988, he was named the “Sexiest Man Alive” by People magazine. He was linked romantically with several celebrities, including the actress Daryl Hannah, whom he dated for five years. In September 1996, he married girlfriend Carolyn Bessette, a fashion publicist. The two shared an apartment in New York City , where Kennedy was often seen inline skating in public. Known for his adventurous nature, he nonetheless took pains to separate himself from the more self-destructive behavior of some of the other men in the Kennedy clan.

On July 16, 1999, however, with about 300 hours of flying experience, Kennedy took off from Essex County airport in New Jersey and flew his single-engine plane into a hazy, moonless night. He had turned down an offer by one of his flight instructors to accompany him, saying he “wanted to do it alone.” To reach his destination of Martha’s Vineyard, he would have to fly 200 miles—the final phase over a dark, hazy ocean—and inexperienced pilots can lose sight of the horizon under such conditions. Unable to see shore lights or other landmarks, Kennedy would have to depend on his instruments, but he had not qualified for a license to fly with instruments only. In addition, he was recovering from a broken ankle, which might have affected his ability to pilot his plane.

At Martha’s Vineyard, Kennedy was to drop off his sister-in-law Lauren Bessette, one of his two passengers. From there, Kennedy and his wife, Carolyn, were to fly on to the Kennedy compound on Cape Cod’s Hyannis Port for the marriage of Rory Kennedy, the youngest child of the late Robert F. Kennedy . The Piper Saratoga aircraft never made it to Martha’s Vineyard. Radar data examined later showed the plane plummeting from 2,200 feet to 1,100 feet in a span of 14 seconds, a rate far beyond the aircraft’s safe maximum. It then disappeared from the radar screen.

Kennedy’s plane was reported missing by friends and family members, and an intensive rescue operation was launched by the Coast Guard, the navy, the air force, and civilians. After two days of searching, the thousands of people involved gave up hope of finding survivors and turned their efforts to recovering the wreckage of the aircraft and the bodies. Americans mourned the loss of the “crown prince” of one of the country’s most admired families, a sadness that was especially poignant given the relentless string of tragedies that have haunted the Kennedy family over the years.

On July 21, navy divers recovered the bodies of JFK Jr., his wife, and sister-in-law from the wreckage of the plane, which was lying under 116 feet of water about eight miles off the Vineyard’s shores. The next day, the cremated remains of the three were buried at sea during a ceremony on the USS Briscoe, a navy destroyer. A private mass for JFK Jr. and Carolyn was held on July 23 at the Church of St. Thomas More in Manhattan, where the late Jackie Kennedy Onassis worshipped. President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton , were among the 300 invited guests. The Kennedy family’s surviving patriarch, Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, delivered a moving eulogy: “From the first day of his life, John seemed to belong not only to our family, but to the American family. He had a legacy, and he learned to treasure it. He was part of a legend, and he learned to live with it.”

Investigators studying the wreckage of the Piper Saratoga found no problems with its mechanical or navigational systems. In their final report released in 2000, the National Transportation Safety Board concluded that the crash was caused by an inexperienced pilot who became disoriented in the dark and lost control.

HISTORY Vault: JFK Jr.: The Final Year

This Biography special shines a light on 1999, JFK Jr.'s last year before his untimely death, as he coped with the illness of his closest friend and cousin, struggled to save his marriage and tried to rescue his political magazine.

Also on This Day in History July | 16

Existence of watergate tapes is revealed in live testimony, amazon opens for business.

This Day in History Video: What Happened on July 16

The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded

First catholic mission in california dedicated, apollo 11 departs earth.

Wake Up to This Day in History

Sign up now to learn about This Day in History straight from your inbox. Get all of today's events in just one email featuring a range of topics.

By submitting your information, you agree to receive emails from HISTORY and A+E Networks. You can opt out at any time. You must be 16 years or older and a resident of the United States.

More details : Privacy Notice | Terms of Use | Contact Us

World’s first parking meter installed

Congress declares washington, d.c. new capital, president bush unveils strategy for homeland security, "catcher in the rye" is published, earthquake wreaks havoc in the philippines, jeffrey macdonald is accused of stabbing his family to death, draft riots continue to rock new york city, anthony wayne launches risky attack against british forces, romanov family executed, ending a 300-year imperial dynasty.

• Biographies & Memoirs

Buy new: .savingPriceOverride { color:#CC0C39!important; font-weight: 300!important; } .reinventMobileHeaderPrice { font-weight: 400; } #apex_offerDisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventPriceSavingsPercentageMargin, #apex_offerDisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventPricePriceToPayMargin { margin-right: 4px; } -45% $16.00 $ 16 . 00 FREE delivery Tuesday, June 18 Ships from: eStore4u Sold by: eStore4u

Save with used - good .savingpriceoverride { color:#cc0c39important; font-weight: 300important; } .reinventmobileheaderprice { font-weight: 400; } #apex_offerdisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventpricesavingspercentagemargin, #apex_offerdisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventpricepricetopaymargin { margin-right: 4px; } $9.50 $ 9 . 50 free delivery tuesday, june 18 on orders shipped by amazon over $35 ships from: amazon sold by: zbk wholesale, return this item for free.

Free returns are available for the shipping address you chose. You can return the item for any reason in new and unused condition: no shipping charges

• Go to your orders and start the return
• Select your preferred free shipping option
• Drop off and leave!

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required .

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

Image Unavailable

• To view this video download Flash Player

Follow the author

America's Reluctant Prince: The Life of John F. Kennedy Jr. Hardcover – July 9, 2019

Purchase options and add-ons

• Print length 464 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Dutton
• Publication date July 9, 2019
• Dimensions 6.23 x 1.53 x 9.27 inches
• ISBN-10 1524742384
• ISBN-13 978-1524742386
• See all details

Frequently bought together

Similar items that may deliver to you quickly

Editorial Reviews

About the author, excerpt. © reprinted by permission. all rights reserved., product details.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Dutton; First Edition (July 9, 2019)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 464 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1524742384
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1524742386
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.63 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.23 x 1.53 x 9.27 inches
• #171 in Journalist Biographies
• #489 in Rich & Famous Biographies
• #635 in Political Leader Biographies

About the author

Steven m. gillon.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.

To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.

Reviews with images

• Sort reviews by Top reviews Most recent Top reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. please try again later..

Top reviews from other countries

• Amazon Newsletter
• About Amazon
• Accessibility
• Sustainability
• Press Center
• Investor Relations
• Amazon Devices
• Amazon Science
• Sell on Amazon
• Sell apps on Amazon
• Supply to Amazon
• Protect & Build Your Brand
• Become an Affiliate
• Become a Delivery Driver
• Start a Package Delivery Business
• Advertise Your Products
• Self-Publish with Us
• Become an Amazon Hub Partner
• › See More Ways to Make Money
• Amazon Visa
• Amazon Store Card
• Amazon Secured Card
• Amazon Business Card
• Shop with Points
• Credit Card Marketplace
• Reload Your Balance
• Amazon Currency Converter
• Your Account
• Your Orders
• Shipping Rates & Policies
• Amazon Prime
• Returns & Replacements
• Manage Your Content and Devices
• Recalls and Product Safety Alerts
• Conditions of Use
• Privacy Notice
• Consumer Health Data Privacy Disclosure
• Your Ads Privacy Choices

News | Remembering the life of John F. Kennedy Jr. on…

Share this:.

• Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on X (Opens in new window)

Daily News e-Edition

Evening e-Edition

• E-Newspaper
• National News
• Puzzles & Games

News | PHOTOS: Remembering the life of John F. Kennedy Jr.

More in News

East Harlem man clinging to life with gunshot wound to the head

National News | Former Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders dies in plane crash

Crime and Public Safety | Brooklyn car thief fleeing cops wreaks havoc with demolition derby wrecking five cars

National News | Dad who disrupted daughter’s graduation says it wasn’t about race

Featured Topics

Featured series.

A series of random questions answered by Harvard experts.

Explore the Gazette

Read the latest.

Examining the duality of Israel

One way to help big groups of students? Volunteer tutors.

Footnote leads to exploration of start of for-profit prisons in N.Y.

Congressman John Fitzgerald Kennedy (circa 1946-47) in his Congressional Office.

Courtesy of John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston

A portrait of JFK, in full

Brett Milano

Harvard Correspondent

New biography aims to chronicle a complex life amid a pivotal time for a nation

One of the revelations about John F. Kennedy in Fredrik Logevall’s new biography, “JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, 1917‒1956,” is that the man was an excellent letter-writer and diarist. The Laurence D. Belfer Professor of International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School and professor of history makes effective use of the collection at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, part of which has become available only recently.

“He always had a knack for the English language, even if he was an indifferent student in prep school and in his first years at Harvard,” Logevall says. “His teachers, frustrated by his lack of application overall, were always impressed by his way with words. It is an interesting contrast with his older brother, Joe Jr., the family’s supposed golden child, whose writings had a more dutiful, less imaginative quality.”

The first of a two-volume set, “JFK” aims to give the clearest picture yet available of the 35th president set against the historical, political, and cultural context of a pivotal age. The book begins with great-grandfather Patrick Kennedy’s arrival in Boston during the Irish potato famine and runs through Jack’s childhood, studies at Harvard, and military duty, and finally his rise in politics in 1956, when he almost became the Democrats’ vice presidential pick. Logevall spoke with the Gazette recently about the man and the book.

Fredrik Logevall

GAZETTE: There have certainly been many books written about JFK. What were you able to find that hadn’t been found before?

LOGEVALL: You’re quite right. There are a lot of excellent books out there on various aspects of his life and career, and especially the presidency — one thinks, for example, about the many studies of the Cuban missile crisis, Civil Rights, the Bay of Pigs disaster, the marriage with Jackie, and the assassination in Dallas. But we don’t have many true biographies, even one that is a full-scale examination of the entire life and that looks closely at his early life, in particular his teens and 20s, which I believe were key years for him (as they are for most of us). Mine is a “life and times” biography that places Kennedy in his own context, that of a rising American power in world affairs. I guess the conceit of the book is that I can tell two stories together: the story of John F. Kennedy’s rise and the story of America’s rise. I believe we can better understand the first half of the so-called American Century through the lens of Kennedy’s life.

Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. (from left), Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., and John F. Kennedy in Southampton, England, July 2, 1938.

Courtesy of John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

GAZETTE: What did you find that people have missed about JFK in the past?

LOGEVALL: One thing that people have underplayed is the degree to which he was a serious student of democracy and world affairs at an earlier point than we imagine. We tend to think of him as a callow playboy, not serious about public policy or his career until quite late, until he runs for Congress in 1946, and maybe not even then. But you can look at the papers he wrote as an undergraduate at Harvard, some of which are available, and you can look at his senior thesis which became a best-selling book [“Why England Slept”] and see a young man already thinking deeply and in sustained fashion about important issues. A second finding is that the young Jack Kennedy was in important respects his own master. Though his father was a towering force in his life and those of his eight siblings, Jack proved willing and able, to a degree I did not expect, to chart his own course. The Harvard years are interesting in this regard: In 1939‒40, as World War II began and debate raged in the U.S. about how to respond, Jack showed himself willing in a way his older brother, Joe Jr., never was to separate himself from his father. Long before Pearl Harbor, Jack had become an interventionist while his father adhered throughout to a staunch isolationist position. Later, during his political campaigns, Jack always kept the key decision-making role for himself, notwithstanding the common misconception that his father called the shots. [gz_soundcloud title=”John F. Kennedy recording for public speaking class at Harvard, 1937″ track_id=”321147626″ playlists=”” height=”350″ show_artwork=”false”] [/gz_soundcloud]

GAZETTE:   Another family relationship we learn more about is with his brother Bobby, and how this became increasingly important.

LOGEVALL:  Yes, the age difference between the two brothers was such — 8½ years — that in the early years, when Jack was at prep school and then at Harvard, they weren’t particularly close. But what we see especially in 1951, when they traveled together along with their sister Patricia on an extended tour of the Middle East and Asia, is that they developed a strong bond. Bobby admired his brother to no end, and Jack could now see Bobby’s intelligence and loyalty and good cheer. Then in 1952 Bobby, all of 26 at the time, came aboard to take charge of Jack’s floundering Senate campaign against Henry Cabot Lodge and helped to turn the thing around. Jack could now see just how important Bobby could be to his career, could see the powerful combination of doggedness, shrewdness, and ruthlessness that his brother possessed.

The Kennedy family at Hyannisport, Mass., 1931. Robert (from left), John, Eunice, Jean (on lap of) Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy (behind) Patricia, Kathleen, Joseph, Rosemary.

Photo by Richard Sears, courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

GAZETTE: He was quite a complex character. He did have his playboy side, but some of his war actions can be called heroic.

LOGEVALL:  Yeah, I think that is right. There is a seriousness of purpose which you see in his letters home from the South Pacific, and more dramatically in the actions he took to help save his crew after his boat, the PT-109, was rammed by a Japanese destroyer. Was there heroism there? I believe so, even if he deserves no accolades for allowing his boat to be rammed. The efforts he made in the succeeding days to try to save his crew were really quite extraordinary. We might note here as well that he came back from the war, as many of the servicemen did, with a seriousness of purpose evinced to some degree before but deepened as a result of seeing combat. He was convinced that the U.S. would need to play a leading role in world affairs, even as he also had a skepticism about the use of the military’s power that he would carry with him for the rest of his days.

GAZETTE: His coming out against Joseph McCarthy seems to be a bit of a political turning point.

LOGEVALL: Well, he never fully came out in stark opposition, which was a problem. The relationship with McCarthy was complicated, partly because of family ties. He never felt the kind of personal connection to McCarthy that Joe Sr. felt and that Bobby felt. And there were a lot of aspects of McCarthy’s political persona that he found off-putting — the disdain for senatorial good manners, the disregard for facts, for reasoning from evidence. That said, liberals at the time had good reason to be frustrated by JFK’s reluctance to really condemn McCarthy. Even in 1954, when McCarthy’s influence was in decline and the Senate held a censure vote, JFK, recovering in the hospital following a serious surgery, did not instruct his aide Ted Sorensen to register his position on the vote. He could have done so, but he didn’t, and that caused a lot of grief for him with liberals later on. He preferred to sidestep the issue, aware that there were an awful lot of Irish Catholic voters in Massachusetts who still backed McCarthy. He didn’t want to get on their bad side.

A page in Kennedy’s diary from fall 1951. The first part reads: “Oct. 3 — Paris — I talked with General Eisenhower Biddle and MacArthur at SHAEF Headquarters. Eisenhower looking very fit — seemed disturbed at news of last few days.” Lt. Kennedy on board PT 109, July 1943.

Photo by Joel Benjamin (left), courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

GAZETTE: The book deals a lot with the influence of World War II on his character development. Do you think he took a lot from other aspects of American life at the time, including popular culture?

LOGEVALL: To a degree, certainly. When he returned from the war and was figuring out what he wanted to do, he had a fascinating stint as a journalist. He showed good reporting instincts and could have made it a career. In this period he also liked to pal around in Hollywood, where his father had been a movie mogul in the 1920s and still had connections. Jack dated actresses like Gene Tierney and liked to be on the set, liked to go to movies. Popular music I think interested him less, and until Jackie came along he evinced little interest in art. He did like poetry, and he memorized a lot of it starting already in prep school at Choate. But the Hollywood connection is interesting to me, and probably plays some role in his later skill at using images and film to advance his political career. He was among the first politicians to see that images matter, that the right use of film can make a powerful difference. Television was a huge emerging thing as his career builds, and he had that savvy understanding of the medium and how he could use it to his advantage, kind of like FDR used radio so effectively.

GAZETTE: Many of the reviews I’ve read have focused on his womanizing, which we already knew about. Do you think that’s ultimately that important a part of his character?

LOGEVALL:  Yes, the womanizing is an important part of who he is. His father led by example, carrying on with innumerable women in the 1920s and 1930s, and the older kids knew very well what was going on. Joe Sr. made clear he expected his sons to follow his ways. But I can’t have it both ways: If I’m going to argue that JFK was able to resist his father’s pressure and be his own man when it came to politics and career choices, I have to maintain that he could have broken with him on this issue too. Here he was his father’s son, with a tendency to see women as objects to be conquered. But there are paradoxes here, among them the fact that his administration took important progressive steps, establishing, for example, the President’s Commission on the Status of Women, with Eleanor Roosevelt as chair. In 1962, at the urging of the commission, Kennedy ordered federal agencies to cease sex discrimination in hiring.

Sen. John Kennedy and his then-fiancée Jacqueline Bouvier in Hyannis Port, Mass.

Photo courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection

GAZETTE: In the second volume you’ll have to unravel the mystery around the assassination. Do you have a sense of how you will approach that?

LOGEVALL: There is certainly a fascination, and it shows few signs of fading. It is a vexing issue to any biographer of JFK, and it has spawned a whole cottage industry of its own. I haven’t yet written Volume 2 so I haven’t fully decided how I will proceed on this. But certainly I will talk about Lee Harvey Oswald’s background, about what led him to take this action, and will give the reader a full sense of how it all culminated in this terrible moment. And I think I will owe the reader my assessment of what I believe happened. So I will provide it. I don’t think I will get heavily into the deliberations of the Warren Commission or the various conspiracy theories that have sprouted up over the years. That’s another book, not to mention a potential morass.

GAZETTE: What do you think happened?

LOGEVALL: My reading of the evidence we have indicates pretty clearly to me that Oswald was the lone gunman. Claims to the contrary all come up short. Oswald’s associations and meetings in the weeks leading up to the assassination are worthy of investigation, however, and have been examined in recent studies. I will delve into that material and be interested to see what I find.

Interview was lightly edited for clarity and length.

Share this article

More like this.

JFK speaks from his Harvard past

A room fit for a president

Thoughts on JFK at 100

You might like.

Expert in law, ethics traces history, increasing polarization, steps to bolster democratic process

Research finds low-cost, online program yields significant results

Historian traces 19th-century murder case that brought together historical figures, helped shape American thinking on race, violence, incarceration

Women who follow Mediterranean diet live longer

Large study shows benefits against cancer, cardiovascular mortality, also identifies likely biological drivers of better health

Bringing back a long extinct bird

Scientists sequence complete genome of bush moa, offering insights into its natural history, possible clues to evolution of flightless birds

Harvard-led study IDs statin that may block pathway to some cancers

Cholesterol-lowering drug suppresses chronic inflammation that creates dangerous cascade

• ADMIN AREA MY BOOKSHELF MY DASHBOARD MY PROFILE SIGN OUT SIGN IN

• Seen & Heard

Oral Biography of JFK Jr. Coming This Summer

BY Michael Schaub • Jan. 25, 2024

A new book will tell the life story of John F. Kennedy Jr. through the words of the people who knew him well, People magazine reports .

Gallery Books will publish RoseMarie Terenzio and Liz McNeil’s JFK Jr.: An Intimate Oral Biography this summer. The press describes the book as “an extraordinarily intimate, comprehensive look at the real man behind the myth.”

Kennedy, the son of President John F. Kennedy, was born in Washington, D.C., just two weeks after his father won the 1960 presidential election. A photograph of Kennedy saluting his father’s coffin after the 1963 assassination became one of the most enduring American images of the 20th century.

He was educated at Brown University and worked as an attorney and journalist before his death in 1999, when the airplane he was piloting crashed near Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts. His wife, Carolyn Bessette, and his sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette, were also killed.

In their biography, Terenzio, Kennedy’s former executive assistant, and McNeil, a People editor-at-large, share stories from Kennedy’s “closest friends, confidantes, lovers, classmates, teachers, and colleagues,” Gallery says.

“There was no one like John F. Kennedy Jr.,” McNeil told People . “He was so curious, not only to learn about other people but also to figure out who he was apart from his famous family. This book is our exploration into who John really was from the voices of those who knew him best.”

JFK Jr. is scheduled for publication on July 16, the 25th anniversary of his death.

Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.

• Seen & Heard Biography of Mitch McConnell Coming in October

• Seen & Heard Memoir by Stanley Tucci To Be Published This Fall

• Seen & Heard Costco To Limit Sales of Books in Stores

• Book to Screen Hulu’s ‘Queenie’: A Better ‘Bridget Jones’

Our Take On This Week's Bestsellers

Our Verdict

More Seen & Heard

Featured Interviews

• podcast Episode 375: Summer Reads With Nicola Yoon

• podcast Episode 374: Emma Copley Eisenberg

• podcast Episode 373: Guest Host Christopher Paolini

• podcast Episode 372: Miranda July

• podcast Episode 371: Best May Books With Aimee Nezhukumatathil

The Magazine: Kirkus Reviews

Featuring 313 industry-first reviews of fiction, nonfiction, children’s, and YA books; also in this special Science Fiction & Fantasy issue: Jeff VanderMeer, M.K. Asante, Erin Entrada Kelly, Kalynn Bayron, and more

The Kirkus Star

One of the most coveted designations in the book industry, the Kirkus Star marks books of exceptional merit.

The Kirkus Prize

The Kirkus Prize is among the richest literary awards in America, awarding $50,000 in three categories annually.

Great Books & News Curated For You

Be the first to read books news and see reviews, news and features in Kirkus Reviews . Get awesome content delivered to your inbox every week.

• Discover Books Fiction Thriller & Suspense Mystery & Detective Romance Science Fiction & Fantasy Nonfiction Biography & Memoir Teens & Young Adult Children's
• News & Features Bestsellers Book Lists Profiles Perspectives Awards Seen & Heard Book to Screen Kirkus TV videos In the News
• Kirkus Prize Winners & Finalists About the Kirkus Prize Kirkus Prize Judges
• Magazine Current Issue All Issues Manage My Subscription Subscribe
• Writers’ Center Hire a Professional Book Editor Get Your Book Reviewed Advertise Your Book Launch a Pro Connect Author Page Learn About The Book Industry
• More Kirkus Diversity Collections Kirkus Pro Connect My Account/Login
• About Kirkus History Our Team Contest FAQ Press Center Info For Publishers
• Privacy Policy
• Terms & Conditions
• Reprints, Permission & Excerpting Policy

© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Popular in this Genre

Hey there, book lover.

We’re glad you found a book that interests you!

Please select an existing bookshelf

Create a new bookshelf.

We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!

Please sign up to continue.

It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!

Already have an account? Log in.

Trouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.

Almost there!

• Industry Professional

Welcome Back!

Sign in using your Kirkus account

Contact us: 1-800-316-9361 or email [email protected].

Don’t fret. We’ll find you.

Magazine Subscribers ( How to Find Your Reader Number )

If You’ve Purchased Author Services

Don’t have an account yet? Sign Up.

The Museum will close early on Sunday, June 9, 2024 at 2:00 p.m. and will reopen for regular admission on Monday, June 10, 2024 at 10:00 a.m.

Biography of John F. Kennedy

About this resource.

• Updated Terms of Use
• New Privacy Policy
• Your Privacy Choices
• Closed Caption Policy
• Accessibility Statement

This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2024 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset . Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions . Legal Statement . Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by Refinitiv Lipper .

Princess Diana's death haunted John F. Kennedy Jr.'s wife before couple's tragic plane crash: book

Elizabeth beller has written a new biography on carolyn bessette-kennedy, 'once upon a time'.

John F. Kennedy Jr. was ready to pursue politics, determined to save his marriage before plane crash, says pal

Historian Steven M. Gillon recalls his friendship with John F. Kennedy Jr. on the 20th anniversary of his fatal plane crash.

Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy was haunted by Princess Diana’s death a few years before her own death.

On Aug. 31, 1997, the Princess of Wales died from injuries she sustained in a car crash. She was 36.

That summer, a group of paparazzi camped outside the Hotel Ritz in Paris in hopes of getting shots of Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Fayed. They pursued their car to the Pont de l’Alma tunnel, where their driver, who attempted to outrun the photographers, lost control of the vehicle.

All three perished. Diana’s bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones, suffered severe facial trauma.

JOHN F. KENNEDY JR. AND CAROLYN BESSETTE WERE WORKING ON THEIR MARRIAGE BEFORE TRAGIC PLANE CRASH, BOOK CLAIMS

Princess Diana, the glamorous mother of Prince William and Prince Harry, died in 1997. She was 36. (Tim Graham Photo Library via Getty Images)

Like Diana, the wife of John F. Kennedy Jr. grappled with relentless photographers eager to scrutinize her every move. Elizabeth Beller, author of a new biography, "Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy," told Fox News Digital Diana’s tragic death affected the Calvin Klein publicist during her final years.

Princess Diana was being pursued by paparazzi on motorcycles before her death. (Vincent Amalvy/AFP via Getty Images)

"She realized right away that Diana was being chased by paparazzi, and that was something Carolyn was struggling with herself every single day," said Beller. "Diana’s death left a profound mark on her. She was already terrified, but Diana’s death terrified her even more. I believe it led her to seclude herself at home."

A "rattled" Bessette-Kennedy urged her husband to call Diana’s sons — Prince William and Prince Harry — to give his condolences. 

The lawyer and magazine publisher was all too familiar with losing a parent so suddenly. His father, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in 1963. Kennedy Jr. turned 3 years old at his father’s funeral.

Members of the Kennedy family at the funeral of assassinated president John F. Kennedy in Washington, D.C. From left: Sen. Edward Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, 6, Jackie Kennedy (1929-1994), Attorney General Robert Kennedy and John Kennedy Jr., 3, (1960-1999).  (Keystone/Getty Images)

"She suggested John offer his condolences to William and Harry," said Beller. "Diana’s death affected John too. He didn’t know them, but it wasn’t an outlandish thing to do. The Kennedys had been around the royal family . There was a monument to JFK in London. There are photos of Little John holding Prince Philip’s hand. The families were very much intertwined, even if John didn’t know William and Harry personally."

Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip with Jackie Kennedy and her children John Jr. (1960-1999) and Caroline during the inauguration of Britain's Kennedy memorial at Runnymede, circa 1965. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Despite his wife’s urgency, Kennedy Jr. never called the grieving princes.

"It sounded like something John would have been quick to do, but I think he, too, was so rattled by Diana’s death and realizing it was because of the paparazzi," Beller explained. "He also realized how much it frightened Carolyn. It was too much for him in his life. And seeing someone deal with their parent being mourned in a public way was, I think, overwhelming for him and everything he had been through.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR THE ENTERTAINMENT NEWSLETTER

Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy urged her husband, John F. Kennedy Jr., to call Prince William and Prince Harry following the death of their mother, Princess Diana. (Stephane Cardinale/Sygma via Getty Images)

"It was unusual for him, but he stepped back," Beller continued. "Some George [magazine] staffers mentioned they had discussions that they needed to run something about Diana’s death . John missed the first meeting about it. He was upset, understandably so."

This file photo from Aug. 31, 1997, shows the wreckage of Princess Diana's car in the Alma Tunnel of Paris. Britain's Princess Diana, her friend Dodi Fayed and driver Henri Paul were all killed in the crash.  (Pierre Boussel/AFP via Getty Images)

Beller said Bessette-Kennedy reportedly wondered if she would suffer a similar fate. At the time, the couple was being hounded by photographers outside their Tribeca home in New York City.

According to Beller’s book, Bessette-Kennedy kept commenting "those poor boys" to her husband, referring to William and Harry. However, Kennedy Jr. insisted that "their situations greatly differed."

Prince William (left) and Prince Harry, the sons of Diana, Princess of Wales, bow their heads as their mother's coffin is taken out of Westminster Abbey in September 1997 following her funeral service. (Adam Butler/AFP via Getty Images)

"I was able to lead a normal life from about the age of 5," he said, as quoted in Beller’s book.

Elizabeth Beller's biography, "Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy," is now in bookstores. (Gallery Books)

Beller said it’s likely Kennedy Jr. may have regretted not reaching out to the princes.

"They struggled with the news," Beller said of the couple. "It was a difficult summer."

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE READING? CLICK HERE FOR MORE ENTERTAINMENT NEWS

John Kennedy Jr. and his wife, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, struggled with fierce media scrutiny after their 1996 wedding. (Lawrence Schwartzwald/Sygma via Getty Images)

Beller said, at the time, the press depicted Bessette-Kennedy as "a harpy" who was "manipulative and controlling." But those who knew and loved her insisted she was anything but.

"She was described as a caretaker," said Beller. "She tried to always be a helper to the people in her life. She would go out of her way to make someone comfortable. … There was this misconception because paparazzi would catch [the couple] outside abruptly and go wild if they saw them arguing. Unfortunately, their argument in Washington Square Park was etched in stone. … But that’s not who she was.

John F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife Carolyn walk with their dog Jan. 1, 1997, in New York City.  (Evan Agostini/Liaison/Getty Images)

"We all know couples fight," said Beller. "Maybe both have tempers. But I think if couples don’t fight, you’re not living in the same house. I think the public assumed that every moment between them was toxic because of a fight they saw on video. That’s just not the case. They had many, many, many more times together where they laughed and enjoyed one another. They helped each other grow."

Paparazzi were quick to capture John F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy arguing in public. (Evan Agostini/Liaison Agency)

But a happily ever after wasn’t meant to be. On July 16, 1999, the couple was killed when a plane, piloted by Kennedy Jr., crashed into the waters off of Martha’s Vineyard. Her sister Lauren Bessette, who was with them, also died.

Beller said, before the tragedy, Kennedy Jr. "really did try to protect" his terrified wife from the paparazzi, who refused to leave her alone.

A Coast Guard helicopter hovering over the ocean during the search for John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn and her sister Lauren. (Steve Liss/Getty Images)

"He asked them to back off. It interfered with everything," said Beller. "They did not leave her alone. They camped out every single day. It became another thing they had to contend with between the press and all the outside forces in their lives. … God knows people are struggling with many larger things in this world, but I think when you’re doing it in a fishbowl and everyone’s watching you, it just adds this extra pressure. And she brought her vulnerabilities to it. The media scrutiny just exacerbated any tension.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Elizabeth Beller told Fox News Digital John F. Kennedy Jr. tried to protect Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy from the intense media scrutiny they endured. (Ron Galella/Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images)

"Celebrities often break because of the intense media scrutiny," Beller reflected. "I hope that, this time, the media can be kinder and gentler. We’re at a very interesting juncture right now with the media, AI and the internet, which can sort of get to this toxic herd mentality. But we’re also at a juncture where we have a chance to do better. … It’s the only way to move forward."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Stephanie Nolasco covers entertainment at Foxnews.com.

Pat Sajak plans next move after final ‘Wheel of Fortune' episode

Billy Ray Cyrus shares 'best' memory with daughter Miley amid rumored family feud

'Wheel of Fortune' host Pat Sajak ends final episode with a surprise: ‘It’s been an incredible privilege’

Celine Dion describes feeling 'like somebody is strangling' her when singing with Stiff Person Syndrome

10 Hollywood stars who have been the focal point of college courses

Pat Sajak shares 6-word message to fans in 'Wheel of Fortune' farewell

Who's making headlines in television, music, movies and more from Hollywood to the Heartland.

You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!

John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy, the 35 th U.S. president, negotiated the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty and initiated the Alliance for Progress. He was assassinated in 1963.

Quick Facts

U.s. navy service, u.s. congressman and senator, wife and children, 1960 presidential campaign, u.s. president, assassination and death, release of assassination documents, who was john f. kennedy.

John F. Kennedy served in both the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate before becoming the 35 th American president in 1961. While in the White House, Kennedy faced a number of foreign crises, especially in Cuba and Berlin, but managed to secure such achievements as the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty and the Alliance for Progress. On November 22, 1963, Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. He was 46 years old.

FULL NAME: John Fitzgerald Kennedy BORN: May 29, 1917 DIED: November 22, 1963 BIRTHPLACE: Brookline, Massachusetts SPOUSE: Jaqueline Kennedy (1953-1963) CHILDREN: Caroline Kennedy , John F. Kennedy Jr. , and Patrick Kennedy ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Gemini

John Fitzgerald Kennedy was born on May 29, 1917, in Brookline, Massachusetts. Both the Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys were wealthy and prominent Irish Catholic families in Boston. John’s paternal grandfather, P.J. Kennedy, was a wealthy banker and liquor trader, and his maternal grandfather, John E. Fitzgerald, nicknamed “Honey Fitz,” was a skilled politician who served as a congressman and as the mayor of Boston. Kennedy’s mother, Rose Elizabeth Fitzgerald , was a Boston debutante, and his father, Joseph Kennedy Sr. , was a successful banker who made a fortune on the stock market after World War I. Joe Kennedy Sr. went on to a government career as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and as an ambassador to Great Britain.

John, nicknamed “Jack,” was the second oldest of a group of nine extraordinary siblings. His brothers and sisters include Special Olympics founder Eunice Kennedy Shriver, U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy , and Ted Kennedy , one of the most powerful senators in American history. The Kennedy children remained close-knit and supportive of each other throughout their entire lives.

Joseph and Rose largely spurned the world of Boston socialites into which they had been born to focus instead on their children’s education. Joe Sr. in particular obsessed over every detail of his kids’ lives, a rarity for a father at that time. As a family friend noted, “Most fathers in those days simply weren’t that interested in what their children did. But Joe Kennedy knew what his kids were up to all the time.”

Joe Sr. had great expectations for his children, and he sought to instill in them a fierce competitive fire and the belief that winning was everything. He entered his children in swimming and sailing competitions and chided them for finishing in anything but first place. John’s sister, Eunice, later recalled, “I was 24 before I knew I didn’t have to win something every day.” John bought into his father’s philosophy that winning was everything. “He hates to lose at anything,” Eunice said. “That’s the only thing Jack gets really emotional about—when he loses.”

Despite his father’s constant reprimands, young Kennedy was a poor student and a mischievous boy. He attended a Catholic boys’ boarding school in Connecticut called Canterbury, where he excelled at English and history—the subjects he enjoyed—but nearly flunked Latin, in which he had no interest. Despite his poor grades, Kennedy continued on to Choate, an elite Connecticut preparatory school. Although he was obviously brilliant, evidenced by the extraordinary thoughtfulness and nuance of his work on the rare occasions when he applied himself, Kennedy remained at best a mediocre student, preferring sports, girls, and practical jokes to coursework.

His father wrote to him by way of encouragement, “If I didn’t really feel you had the goods, I would be most charitable in my attitude toward your failings... I am not expecting too much, and I will not be disappointed if you don’t turn out to be a real genius, but I think you can be a really worthwhile citizen with good judgment and understanding.” John was, in fact, very bookish in high school, reading ceaselessly but not the books his teachers assigned.

He was also chronically ill during his childhood and adolescence; he suffered from severe colds, the flu, scarlet fever, and even more severe, undiagnosed diseases that forced him to miss months of school at a time and occasionally brought him to the brink of death.

After graduating from Choate and spending one semester at Princeton University, Kennedy transferred to Harvard University in 1936. There, he repeated his by then well-established academic pattern, excelling occasionally in the classes he enjoyed but proving only an average student due to the omnipresent diversions of sports and women. Handsome, charming, and blessed with a radiant smile, Kennedy was incredibly popular with his Harvard classmates. His friend Lem Billings recalled, “Jack was more fun than anyone I’ve ever known, and I think most people who knew him felt the same way about him.” Kennedy was also an incorrigible womanizer. He wrote to Billings during his sophomore year, “I can now get tail as often and as free as I want, which is a step in the right direction.”

Nevertheless, as an upperclassman, Kennedy finally grew serious about his studies and began to realize his potential. His father had been appointed ambassador to Great Britain, and on an extended visit in 1939, John decided to research and write a senior thesis on why Britain was so unprepared to fight Germany in World War II . An incisive analysis of Britain’s failures to meet the Nazi challenge, the paper was so well-received that upon Kennedy’s graduation in 1940 it was published as a book, Why England Slept , selling more than 80,000 copies. Kennedy’s father sent him a cablegram in the aftermath of the book’s publication: “Two things I always knew about you one that you are smart two that you are a swell guy love dad.”

Shortly after graduating from Harvard, Kennedy joined the U.S. Navy and was assigned to command a patrol torpedo boat in the South Pacific. On August 2, 1943, his boat, PT-109 , was rammed by a Japanese warship and split in two. Two sailors died, and Kennedy badly injured his back. Hauling another wounded sailor by the strap of his life vest, Kennedy led the survivors to a nearby island, where they were rescued six days later. The incident earned him the Navy and Marine Corps Medal for “extremely heroic conduct” and a Purple Heart for the injuries he suffered.

However, Kennedy’s older brother, Joe Jr., who had also joined the Navy, wasn’t so fortunate. A pilot, he died when his plane blew up in August 1944. Handsome, athletic, intelligent, and ambitious, Joseph Kennedy Jr. had been pegged by his father as the one among his children who would some day become president of the United States. In the aftermath of Joe Jr.’s death, John took his family’s hopes and aspirations for his older brother upon himself.

Upon his discharge from the Navy, John worked briefly as a reporter for Hearst Newspapers. Then in 1946, at the age of 29, he decided to run for the U.S. House of Representatives from a working-class district of Boston, a seat being vacated by Democrat James Michael Curly. Bolstered by his status as a war hero, his family connections, and his father’s money, the young Democrat won the election handily.

However, after the glory and excitement of publishing his first book and serving in World War II, Kennedy found his work in Congress incredibly dull. Despite serving three terms, from 1946 to 1952, Kennedy remained frustrated by what he saw as stifling rules and procedures that prevented a young, inexperienced representative from making an impact. “We were just worms in the House,” he later recalled. “Nobody paid attention to us nationally.”

In 1952, seeking greater influence and a larger platform, Kennedy challenged Republican incumbent Henry Cabot Lodge for his seat in the U.S. Senate. Once again backed by his father’s vast financial resources, Kennedy hired his younger brother Robert as his campaign manager. Robert put together what one journalist called “the most methodical, the most scientific, the most thoroughly detailed, the most intricate, the most disciplined and smoothly working state-wide campaign in Massachusetts history—and possibly anywhere else.”

In an election year in which Republicans gained control of both houses of Congress, Kennedy nevertheless won a narrow victory, giving him considerable clout within the Democratic Party. According to one of his aides, the decisive factor in Kennedy’s victory was his personality: “He was the new kind of political figure that people were looking for that year, dignified and gentlemanly and well-educated and intelligent, without the air of superior condescension.”

Kennedy continued to suffer frequent illnesses during his career in the Senate. While recovering from one surgery, he wrote another book, profiling eight senators who had taken courageous but unpopular stances. Profiles in Courage won the 1957 Pulitzer Prize for biography, and Kennedy remains the only American president to win a Pulitzer Prize.

Otherwise, Kennedy’s eight-year Senate career was relatively undistinguished. Bored by the Massachusetts-specific issues on which he had to spend much of his time, Kennedy was more drawn to the international challenges posed by the Soviet Union’s growing nuclear arsenal and the Cold War battle for the hearts and minds of Third World nations.

Shortly after his Senate election, Kennedy met a beautiful young woman named Jacqueline Bouvier at a dinner party and, in his own words, “leaned across the asparagus and asked her for a date.” They were married on September 12, 1953, until John’s death a decade later.

The couple first expected to become parents in 1956, but Jackie delivered a stillborn girl they intended to name Arabella. John and Jackie then welcomed their daughter, Caroline , in November 1957 and their son John Jr. in November 1960. In August 1963, their son Patrick was born prematurely and died two days after his birth.

In 1956, Kennedy was very nearly selected as Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson’s running mate but was ultimately passed over for Estes Kefauver from Tennessee. Four years later, Kennedy decided to run for president himself.

In the 1960 Democratic primaries, Kennedy outmaneuvered his main opponent, Hubert Humphrey, with superior organization and financial resources. Selecting Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson as his running mate, Kennedy faced Vice President Richard Nixon in the general election. The election turned largely on a series of televised national debates in which Kennedy bested Nixon, an experienced and skilled debater, by appearing relaxed, healthy, and vigorous in contrast to his pallid and tense opponent.

On November 8, 1960, Kennedy defeated Nixon by a razor-thin margin to become the 35 th president of the United States of America. Kennedy’s election was historic in several respects. At the age of 43, he was the second youngest American president in history, second only to Theodore Roosevelt , who assumed the office at 42. He was also the first Catholic president and the first president born in the 20 th century.

Delivering his legendary inaugural address on January 20, 1961, Kennedy sought to inspire all Americans to more active citizenship. “Ask not what your country can do for you,” he famously said. “Ask what you can do for your country.” During his brief tenure as president, Kennedy did much for America.

Foreign Affairs

Kennedy’s greatest accomplishments came in the arena of foreign affairs. Capitalizing on the spirit of activism he had helped to ignite, Kennedy created the Peace Corps by executive order in 1961. By the end of the century, over 170,000 Peace Corps volunteers would serve in 135 countries. Also in 1961, Kennedy created the Alliance for Progress to foster greater economic ties with Latin America, in hopes of alleviating poverty and thwarting the spread of communism in the region.

Kennedy also presided over a series of international crises. On April 15, 1961, he authorized a covert mission to overthrow leftist Cuban leader Fidel Castro with a group of 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban refugees. Known as the Bay of Pigs Invasion , the mission proved an unmitigated failure, causing Kennedy great embarrassment.

In August 1961, to stem massive waves of emigration from Soviet-dominated East Germany to American ally West Germany via the divided city of Berlin, Nikita Khrushchev ordered the construction of the Berlin Wall , which became the foremost symbol of the Cold War.

However, the greatest crisis of the Kennedy administration was the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962. Discovering that the Soviet Union had sent ballistic nuclear missiles to Cuba, Kennedy blockaded the island and vowed to defend the United States at any cost. After several of the tensest days in history, during which the world seemed on the brink of nuclear annihilation, the Soviet Union agreed to remove the missiles in return for Kennedy’s promise to not invade Cuba and to remove American missiles from Turkey.

Eight months later, in June 1963, Kennedy successfully negotiated the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty with Great Britain and the Soviet Union, helping to ease Cold War tensions. It was one of his proudest accomplishments.

Domestic Policy

President Kennedy’s record on domestic policy was rather mixed. Taking office in the midst of a recession, he proposed sweeping income tax cuts, raising the minimum wage, and instituting new social programs to improve education, health care, and mass transit. However, hampered by lukewarm relations with Congress, Kennedy only achieved part of his agenda: a modest increase in the minimum wage and watered down tax cuts.

The most contentious domestic issue of Kennedy’s presidency was civil rights . Constrained by Southern Democrats in Congress who remained stridently opposed to civil rights for Black citizens, Kennedy offered only tepid support for civil rights reforms early in his term.

Nevertheless, in September 1962, Kennedy sent his brother Attorney General Robert Kennedy to Mississippi to use the National Guard and federal marshals to escort and defend civil rights activist James Meredith as he became the first Black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi on October 1, 1962.

Near the end of 1963, in the wake of the March on Washington and Martin Luther King Jr. ’s “I Have a Dream” speech , Kennedy finally sent a civil rights bill to Congress. One of the last acts of his presidency and his life, Kennedy’s bill eventually passed as the landmark Civil Rights Act in 1964.

On November 21, 1963, President Kennedy flew to Fort Worth, Texas, for a campaign appearance. The next day, November 22, Kennedy, along with his wife and Texas governor John Connally, rode through cheering crowds in downtown Dallas in a Lincoln Continental convertible. From an upstairs window of the Texas School Book Depository building, a 24-year-old warehouse worker named Lee Harvey Oswald , a former Marine with Soviet sympathies, fired upon the car, hitting the president twice. Kennedy died at Dallas’ Parkland Memorial Hospital shortly thereafter at age 46.

A Dallas nightclub owner named Jack Ruby assassinated Oswald days later while he was being transferred between jails. The death of President Kennedy was an unspeakable national tragedy, and to this date, many people remember with unsettling vividness the exact moment they learned of his death. While conspiracy theories have swirled ever since Kennedy’s assassination, the official version of events remains the most plausible: Oswald acted alone.

For few former presidents is the dichotomy between public and scholarly opinion so vast. To the American public, as well as his first historians, Kennedy is a hero—a visionary politician who, if not for his untimely death, might have averted the political and social turmoil of the late 1960s. In public-opinion polls, Kennedy consistently ranks with Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln as among the most beloved American presidents of all time. Critiquing this outpouring of adoration, many more recent Kennedy scholars have derided Kennedy’s womanizing and lack of personal morals and argued that, as a leader, he was more style than substance.

In the end, no one can ever truly know what type of president Kennedy would have become had he finished out his first term or been reelected. Nor can we say how the course of history might have been different had he lived into old age. As historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote , it was “as if Lincoln had been killed six months after Gettysburg or Franklin Roosevelt at the end of 1935 or Truman before the Marshall Plan.”

The most enduring image of Kennedy’s presidency, and of his whole life, is that of Camelot , the idyllic castle of the legendary King Arthur . As his wife, Jackie Kennedy, said after his death, “There’ll be great presidents again, and the Johnsons are wonderful—they’ve been wonderful to me—but there’ll never be another Camelot again.”

On October 26, 2017, President Donald Trump ordered the release of 2,800 records related to John F. Kennedy’s assassination. The move came at the expiration of a 25-year waiting period signed into law in 1992, which allowed the declassification of the documents provided that doing so wouldn’t hurt intelligence, military operations, or foreign relations.

Trump’s release of the documents came on the final day he was legally allowed to do so. However, he didn’t release all of the documents, as officials from the FBI, CIA, and other agencies had successfully lobbied for the chance to review particularly sensitive material for an additional 180 days.

• For time and the world, do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past, or the present, are certain to miss the future.
• Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.
• We need men who can dream of things that never were and not ask why.
• If we cannot now end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.
• Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.
• A man does what he must—in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles, and dangers, and pressures—and that is the basis of all human morality.
• The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high—to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future... For the world is changing. The old era is ending. The old ways will not do.
• If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
• The cost of freedom is always high—and Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose and that is the path of surrender or submission.
• We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.
• The greater our knowledge increases, the greater our ignorance unfolds.
• Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
• Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
• [O]ur most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.

Fact Check: We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn’t look right, contact us !

The Biography.com staff is a team of people-obsessed and news-hungry editors with decades of collective experience. We have worked as daily newspaper reporters, major national magazine editors, and as editors-in-chief of regional media publications. Among our ranks are book authors and award-winning journalists. Our staff also works with freelance writers, researchers, and other contributors to produce the smart, compelling profiles and articles you see on our site. To meet the team, visit our About Us page: https://www.biography.com/about/a43602329/about-us

U.S. Presidents

Oppenheimer and Truman Met Once. It Went Badly.

Who Killed JFK? You Won’t Believe Us Anyway

Jimmy Carter

Inside Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter’s 77-Year Love

Abraham Lincoln

Who Is Walt Nauta, the Man Indicted with Trump?

Hunter Biden and Other Presidential Problem Kids

Controversial Judge Aileen Cannon Not Out Just Yet

Barack Obama

10 Celebrities the Same Age as President Joe Biden