#joseph p kennedy sr

[h-l-v-kennedy-blog]

Preface

pairing: john f. kennedy/oc (sabrina e. overstreet) word count: 514 warnings: none a/n: all right so no real plot yet, just backstory. if you want to join the taglist, please like this post.

The Overstreet's, young, wealthy and beautiful, decided to take up in a less Protestant neighbourhood in Cape Cod to summer away from New York, because even though their family was rich and successful, even in New York, the Irish heritage that was sewn into their family tapestry made them less desirable social partners. ‘McIver’ was too Irish, even if the family’s name was Overstreet and only the companies ‘McIver’. So, to Hyannis Port they went, a town not overly populated by the summer of 1928, and had a friendly neighbourhood. James had a fine house built on Marchant Avenue, where a wall street businessman by the name of Joe Kennedy also resided in a nearby house with his burgeoning family. Both families were members of the Hyannisport Club, that welcomed Brahmins kindly. 

Sooner than later the but large family brought in the Overstreet's, over to dinner and for the kids to play together. The men would talk business and politics while the women visited culture, faith and motherhood. The children romped, the oldest at least together, Sabrina being one of the older girls became joined at the hip with bright and active Kathleen ‘Kick’ who brought the quiet, but already quite tall for her age, blonde out of her shell. 

Over the years, both sets of parents thought of a plan. Even after the crash of 1929, both families remained extremely wealthy, and to secure future success, James and Kennedy family patriarch Joseph (most often in conversation called Joe Senior or Joseph) both men joked how good it would look if their oldest children married, mainly they meant Joe’s oldest son Joe Jr. And James’ Sabrina, both bright children, but if anyone looked closely saw they were of two different minds. Joe was more hard and serious from a young age. While Sabrina was shier, softer, but with gumption and wit that rivalled Kick’s in many cases as the girls grew. 

But the joke became a running gag that begun in the 1930s, when the children entered teenage hood. Joe Jr. first, then his younger brother by two years Jack, then Sabrina and the Kennedys first daughter Rosemary who exhibited learning difficulties, but who Sabrina in their close ages treated just as she would a sister. Kick and Anthony would follow. Joe, Jack and Kick were the family's golden children, close and tightly knit. But they also involved the Overstreet duo in their antics for their close ages. Many a sailing competition (often with Sabrina on one team and Anthony on the other) was held with the family sailing boats off the coast of Nantucket Sound. Word spread with the locals that when you saw a Kennedy kid, soon one or two Overstreet’s would follow. 

What neither father noticed was a different future bond form. The second born Kennedy son and first-born Overstreet daughter, shared more qualities between the two of them. Both big readers (Jack mostly from early youth spent in bedridden with any childhood illness you could think of), witty and independent thinkers. But also, private, shyer natures. Their connection came more to light later in life. But there were some earlier instances, too...

Go to Part One

///

Hope you enjoyed 🩵

taglist:

[kennedy-family-library]

The wedding of Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel Kennedy - June 17, 1950.

[dadsinsuits]

Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.

[mercurygray]

Friends, I have failed you all. I've seen a lot of posts over the last week with a lot of great biographical detail about many of the flyers and aircrew who've been name-dropped so far in Masters of the Air - and I haven't seen a single thing about the one name that is directly in the center of this blog's lane.

In Part 2, returning from their mission to Trondheim, Cleven and Egan walk into the Interrogation hut and Egan accepts a cup of coffee from a woman he thanks as Tatty. Later on, at the dance, James Douglass remarks that he will be 'coming in hot' on one of the American Red Cross women on the other side of the room, and one of his friends asks "General Spaatz's daughter? Or the other one?"

Katherine "Tatty" Spaatz was a member of the American Red Cross Clubmobile service and the daughter of General Carl "Tooey" Spaatz, who commanded the Eighth Air Force on its move to England. (General Spaatz later moved to overall command of the entire Army Air Forces in the Europe Theatre of Operations, or ETO. He is, as the kids say, rather important.)

But we're not talking about him here. We're talking about her.

Katherine was 22 years old when she arrived in Europe with the Red Cross. (One of her traveling companions that trip was Kathleen Kennedy, daughter of former U.S. Ambassador Joseph P Kennedy Sr., also coming to serve overseas with the ARC.)

The American Red Cross's mission in Europe had many facets during the Second World War - in addition to activities we might think of today, like collecting blood, providing disaster relief at home and running first aid seminars, they were responsible for collecting and distributing packages for Prisoners of War.

They also operated large canteens like the Rainbow Corner club, a recreational facility in London where soldiers on leave could get a room for the weekend, a bite to eat, and a number of other amenities. Smaller clubs called Donut Dugouts provided a space where a serviceman could always be assured of a cup of hot coffee, a donut, and a pretty girl to talk to, specially recruited for being friendly, fair, approachable, and specially trained to be the girl next door overseas. In addition to these more permanent installations, they also operated the Clubmobile service, a mobile version of their popular Dugouts that moved operations into retooled Green Line Bus Company buses to take donuts and a taste of home to the front line.

Tatty, as she was called, worked on the Clubmobile "North Dakota" along with Julia "Dooley" Townsend, Virginia "Ginny" Sherwood, and Dorothy "Mike" Myrick. Life Magazine did a full article on their clubmobile in February of 1943, which you can read online at the link. There is another lovely blog post with pictures here. She also worked for a time in a more permanent post at the USAAF base at Snetterton Heath, and was later sent to France. You can read a little bit more about her and see more pictures at her bio page at the American Air Museum in Britain website.

If you'd like more information about Tatty, Helen, and women like them, as well as the Clubmobile service, consider reading the following:

Slinging Doughnuts for the Boys by James H. Madison Battlestars & Doughnuts: World War II Clubmobile Experiences of Mary Metcalfe Rexford War through the Hole of a Donut, by Angela Petesch Goodnight, Irene (fiction) - Although this is a novel, it is based on Luis Alberto Urrea's mother's time as a Clubmobile worker and her personal papers.

[george-the-good]

I am very glad that you have gone into the matter of her religion so carefully, and that she has promised that the children shall be brought up as Protestants and that she herself may come over to the church later... I am sure the girl takes after her mother and not her father, as his behaviour here as ambassador in the early days of the war was anything but helpful.

George VI letter to Edward Cavendish, 10th Duke of Devonshire, 5 May 1944

This letter relates to the engagement of William Cavendish (Duke of Devonshire’s son) to Kathleen ‘Kick’ Kennedy (daughter of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. - U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain, 1938-40)

[mydaddywiki]

Ted Kennedy

Physique: Husky Build Height: 6′ 2″ (1.88 m)

Edward Moore “Ted” Kennedy (February 22, 1932 – August 25, 2009) was a United States Senator from Massachusetts and a member of the Democratic Party. He was the second most senior member of the Senate when he died and was the fourth-longest-serving senator in United States history, having served there for almost 47 years. The most prominent living member of the Kennedy family for many years, he was the last surviving son of Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. and Rose Kennedy; the youngest brother of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert F. Kennedy and the father of Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy.

Handsome, hairy chest, thick ass and drunk half the time, Kennedy was known for his charisma and oratorical skills, becoming recognized as “The Lion of the Senate” through his long tenure and influence. More than 300 bills that Kennedy and his staff wrote were enacted into law. Unabashedly liberal, Kennedy championed an interventionist government emphasizing economic and social justice.

The Chappaquiddick incident in 1969 resulted in the death of his automobile passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, hindered his chances of ever becoming president. Back in the 90s I had a seroius Ted Kennedy thing going after the William Kennedy Smith rape trial and later the Clarence Thomas appointment hearings. I was just realizing my attraction to older men at the time and he was the kind of man I liked. Stocky to down right fat, thick white hair and horny as hell. Thoughts of him running around my mind with no pants on was hot. Even when I see him on TV making a speech, all I could think of was him standing behind the podium with no pants on.

Twice married with three children with his first wife, Joan Bennett Kennedy. After accusations of philandering and alcohol abuse surfaced, they divorced in 1982. 10 more years of whoring and drinking. In 1992 he remarried second wife, Victoria Kennedy and credits his recovery to his new relationship. Together the couple had two more children. On August 25, 2009, Kennedy died of a malignant brain tumor (glioblastoma) at his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, at the age of 77.

[deadpresidents]

How many presidents have had both of their parents alive when they were president?

Three Presidents have had both parents alive when they became President:

•Ulysses S. Grant Grant was the first President with both of his parents alive at the time of his inauguration. His father, Jesse Root Grant, died on June 29, 1873 during Grant’s second term. His mother, Hannah Simpson Grant, survived both of his terms and died two years before he did, on May 11, 1883. •John F. Kennedy Not only were both of JFK’s Presidents alive when he became President, but they are the only parents of a President who both outlived him. JFK was assassinated in 1963. His father, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., died in 1969, and his mother, Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy died in 1995 at the age of 104. •George W. Bush Both of Bush’s parents were alive when he took office and survived his entire two-term Presidency. His father, former President George H.W. Bush, died on November 30, 2018, just six months after the death of his mother, Barbara Bush, in April 2018.

Several Presidents have had either their father or mother still alive when they became President:

FATHER •John Quincy Adams: The first son of a President to be elected President himself was also the first President whose father was still alive at the time of his inauguration. John Adams died July 4, 1826, a little over a year into JQA’s Presidency. •Millard Fillmore: Nathaniel Fillmore lived through his son’s entire Presidency (1850-1853) and died in his 90s during the Civil War, on March 28, 1863. •Warren G. Harding: Harding’s father, George Tryon Harding, lived through his son’s entire Administration and died on November 19, 1928. Harding, who died in office on August 2, 1923, was the first President who was outlived by his father. •Calvin Coolidge: Not only did Coolidge’s father, John Calvin Coolidge, live to see his son become President, but he actually administered the oath of office. Coolidge, the Vice President at the time, was visiting his father when President Harding died in office and the elder Coolidge, a notary public, administered the Presidential oath at the family home in Vermont. Coolidge’s father died on March 18, 1926 during President Coolidge’s second term.

MOTHER •George Washington: Mary Ball Washington died August 25, 1789, a little less than four months after his first inauguration. •John Adams: Susanna Boylston Adams died  April 21, 1797, just under two months after Adams became President. •James Madison: Eleanor Conway Madison lived through both of her son’s terms as President (1809-1817) and died February 11, 1829 at the age of 98. •James K. Polk: Polk was the first President who didn’t outlive his mother. She died on January 11, 1852, almost three years after Polk left office and died. •James Garfield: Garfield’s mother, Eliza Ballou Garfield, lived to see him become President and die in office. She died on January 21, 1888, almost seven years after he was assassinated. •William McKinley: McKinley’s mother, Nancy Allison McKinley, lived to attend her son’s first inauguration, but died several months later, December 12, 1897. •Franklin D. Roosevelt: FDR’s mother, Sara Delano Roosevelt, lived to see her son inaugurated three times. She died during her son’s third term, on September 7, 1941. •Harry S. Truman: Truman’s mother, Martha Young Truman, lived to see her son succeed to the Presidency in April 1945. She died during his first term, on July 26, 1947, at the age of 94. •Jimmy Carter: Lillian Carter lived through her son’s entire Presidency and was even sent to represent him at events overseas several times, which made her a celebrity in her own right during his Presidency. She died on April 30, 1983, two years after Carter left the White House. •George H.W. Bush: Bush’s mother, Dorothy Walker Bush, lived to see her son become President. She died on November 19, 1992, two weeks after her son lost his bid for re-election. •Bill Clinton: Virginia Cassidy Kelley, Clinton’s mother, lived to see him become President but died less than a year later, on January 6, 1994.

[evita-shelby]

Paper fucking Moon

Or this au where John Egan is stringing along both my oc, Diane from my peaky blinders/masters of the air crossover and @precious-little-scoundrel 's Lana Tierney/Julie Jean Turner from her series, Dear John.

I am afraid i might make you guys hate John for this one shot sorry

Cw: cheating, irresponsible drinking, mentions of a hangover. Slight bashing of eurocentrinc beauty standards and some internalized racism

(A/n: Jack Nelson is the character James Frecheville (Bill Veal)plays in Peaky Blinders who is based off on Joseph P Kennedy sr and in this universe is him)

“Oh, come on, let me see! I let you read my last letter to Janey Dogs, Bucky.” The dark-haired girl somehow managed to wrest the letter from his hands. She had managed to read a name, Jean, before Bucky swiped it out of her hands.

She had gotten it back, making use of her smaller size against his giant frame as they tried not to tumble out of his bed and onto the floor. The witch had read it then, in its entirety and felt her heart break in a way it hadn’t done before.

Diane has always had the misfortune of falling hard and fast for someone. From her best friend since she was five, Oswald Mosely, Britain's leading facsist’s son ---who hated his dad’s ideology fiercely--- one summer, a girl she met during her time at Oxford, Tom Bennett in Manchester in 1939 and now John Egan from Wisconsin.

It always ends badly; Di has never been lucky when it comes to love.

Especially something that hadn’t been intended as serious. Only a paper moon, she reminds herself.

A paper fucking moon, she confirms when she reads the salacious letter to Julie Jean Turner, alias Lana Tierney, who is the perfect white girl with blonde hair, big tits and two blue eyes. As always Diane’s unconventional looks and mixed blood pales against the quintessential white woman.

“So, I’m only here to pass the time then?” she doesn’t mean to sound hurt by the things she read in the letter to Julie Jean Turner, but she does because once again Di had been fucked over by her stupid heart. “Women now, as beautiful and charming and smart as they are, they do just to pass the time, but you are different.”

Same shit he’d said to her when it stopped feeling like just fooling around and he started to believe what she saw in the cards. When they sang Paper Moons together before Regensburg and he came back with the moon locket just as she had said he would.

“Di, I’m sorry, I —” he can’t seem to even find the words to justify or even explain himself as the nurse hastily dressed and left before he could stop her.

“Only a paper fucking moon, isn’t it?” she’s never felt more pathetic in her life as she resolves to forget John fucking Egan while pretending she is stronger than she looks. “Fuck me for thinking this was gonna be different. Fuck me for thinking you loved me.”

And what better to get over a guy by getting absolutely hammered and under his single friend.

Bill Veal looked like Jack Nelson in his younger years, back when he was merely a gangster businessman and not the American Ambassador to England. Di did always find Jack hot when she was a teenager and Veal was too good of a man to hurt her. He is nearly always of Egan’s left at the pub and would make it very uncomfortable for her now ex-fling.

Doesn’t work as she had hoped, between the sexy little number she sings and the drinks, she finds herself stabbing at Egan however she can until he confronts her outside of it. Bill knew better than to get caught up in their shit and turned her down but not before saying he wouldn’t do that to Bucky.

She’d sought out another, some nameless soldier who’s gonna die before the week is over, and John had pulled the boy off her by the scruff of his neck as if the man had any right to her anymore.

“Mhmm, angry aren’t you, daddy?” she stands on her tiptoes as if to kiss him, she hates him and herself and even that sad little twat across the sea. “Angry your little fuck toy found out she was just that, your dirty secret who can’t satisfy you like the fantasy of a white girl can?”

Because that was what hurt more, that when he had her, living, breathing and real beside him, he was writing this stranger who he’d only seen once and getting off dreaming of her. It fucking sickened her to know he had been lying to her since the beginning.

“You weren’t a toy to me; I should’ve been upfront with you sooner and her as well. Shouldn’t have led her on, never should’ve written that letter before I left for Regensburg, Di.” At least he knew he had fucked it all up.

He looks sorry, she knows he feels sorry too, but she can’t forgive him. Why forgive him when she won’t ever trust him again?

“I loved you; you know. And you weren’t man enough to tell me the fucking truth!” she shouts at him, tosses the locket in her pocket at him and leaves like the pathetic little girl she feels.

Diane is glad she won’t remember this tomorrow; sure she might as well kiss her job goodbye but at least she isn’t John’s stupid gypsy girl who was the last to know he had someone else.

But she can’t sleep, she’s tired of crying, of thinking about how much she hates everyone now.

The latest in her string of bad decisions tonight brings her to her little locker where her stationary is. Not the normal one for friends and family, but the one with her dad’s company that styles her as Miss Diane E. Shelby of Shelby Co. for when she writes to the Princess of Wales as her loyal pen pal.

The last Di remembers doing is writing:

“Dear Miss Julie Jean Turner…”

And now reading the botched drafts of the letter she tried to write, she is glad she never finished it.

She had gone off about how she met and started her relationship with John, how Winston fucking Churchill got her the post here, how she knows Tierney’s life is shit with lurid detail, and worse the two Buck special a few weeks ago.

These are all the words of a drunk and hurt pathetic girl who’s insecure about her looks, height, lack of breasts and having mismatched eyes. Its barely legible, her drunk self isn’t the damnably charming and classy daughter of a Member of Parliament who went to Oxford.

It's a good thing she didn’t write it all, by the looks of it. The address on the ruined envelope said Arrow House, the young witch wouldn’t hear the end of it if there had been a reply sent to her parents before it got to her.

“Sent your letters to the post before you woke up, the matron in charge wants to speak with you.” The nurse who sleeps next to her handed her a glass of water and aspirin as Diane shuts her eyes as her hangover is worsened by a fucking vision.

Usually, she can get those under control, keep them from affecting her so much, but this one of Lana fucking Tierney receiving a messy letter addressed to her by Miss Diane Shelby of Arrow House, Warwickshire has her tossing her head into her hands as she retched in a bucket by her bed.

What had she done?

What had she written?

“Oh, fuck. Oh, God, what the fuck did I write in it?”

Dear Miss Julie Jean Turner,

Do not worry I will not reveal your true name nor the nature of your letters to John, I am not like that no matter how much I wish I was. I could ruin your career and life but the torrid abuse your mother and hollywood dole out to you is something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemies. Hell I think you might thank me if I tanked your career now before it drains you of life.

It might surprise you to hear why I write to you, but I am sure you already know about the other girl our good major has strung along while writing to you. I was one of such girls he told she was the only one. Different from the rest, all that bullshit he tells you too.

I loved him, I am sure you do to, but it was all a paper fucking moon in a cardboard sky. I knew sex was all he wanted that night, and yet I fell for him, just as you did in his letters. Thought he was different, that maybe he felt like I did because that is what he told me to mu fucking face when he said it should’ve been a ring and not a locket.

But it fucking wasn’t, because he writes to you about all the filthy things he wants to do to you while not even bothering to say its not many girls. That it was one girl singular who he's been with since mere days after sending you that first letter. Before you ask, he didn’t tell me, I know this shit and so much more because God fucking cursed me with visions that didn’t tell me about you.

But of course, no man can resist you. You who are deemed perfect with your big teats, your blonde hair and perfect white skin, meanwhile me with my meager breasts, different colored eyes and tan skin am deemed nothing special, a toy for him to pass the time. As if I already wasn’t singled out for my foreign mother and romani father.

I let him fulfill his fantasy of fucking me and Buck for his birthday, did he tell you that? Did he ever tell you how he liked it when I wore the fleece for him, how he brought me back a locket from Algeria because he claimed he was falling in love with me? Does he tell you how I held him together and let him cry his heart out after missions that go badly? Does he tell you that Paper Moon is our song because we sang it together the first night and now it’s on my picture he takes with himself on his missions?

He sure as hell didn’t tell me he hides yours in his boot, that he gets off to the idea of you despite having me by him. He wasn’t man enough to tell either of us the truth, and here I am writing to you to tell you he’s not the vulgar charming yank we thought he was.

This whole experience has me relieved there is a whole ocean and social hierarchy that won’t have us cross paths anytime soon. So sorry for ruining the image you have of Egan, fuck knows you have very little going for you, but unlike him I at least have the balls to tell you the truth.

You can have him if you want, Miss Turner, he’d be a step up from the current men you have now.

I don’t forgive infidelity, but I don’t know of you are of the same mind.

So terribly sorry for this, I have drunk enough to kill a horse to nurse my broken heart and no longer give a shit about anything.

Yours truly,

Diane Elizabeth Shelby, alias Lady Di

P.S. feel free to tell Marjorie Spencer her fiancé is a lying hypocrite who covered for Bucky this entire time.

P.P.S. if you want to be free of shackles, I know a few people on your side of the pond who can help you with that.

[maximumwobblerbanditdonut]

Such sad news to hear today. An amazing, and enigmatic actor someone who deserved to be called a star.💫

British actor Tom Wilkinson, best known for his role in The Full Monty, has died aged 75 💔Wilkinson, who became an OBE for services to drama in 2005, was born in Leeds - Yorkshire in 1948 and grew up in Canada and Cornwall before attending the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) in the 1970s.

In 1994, he appeared as Pecksniff in the BBC's adaptation of Charles Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit. He is pictured alongside Maggie Steed.

Across an illustrious career spanning nearly 50 years, Wilkinson won a host of acting awards, as well as two Oscar nominations. He won a BAFTA for 'The Full Monty,' and he also appeared in 'Shakespeare in Love,' 'In the Bedroom,' 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' and 'Batman Begins', He won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his role as Benjamin Franklin in the 'John Adams' miniseries. A versatile actor won acclaim through decades of work in television and film and onstage. Recently he was reunited with his The Full Monty co-stars, Carlyle and Mark Addy, in a Disney+ series of the same name.

Who remembers this classic!

The original 1997 comedy about an unlikely group of male strippers in Sheffield won an Oscar for Best Original Musical or comedy score and was nominated for three others, including best picture and best director.

Wilkinson’s best roles. Here are his finest films, Lieutenant General Lord Charles Cornwallis was an officer of the British Army and one of the leading British generals in the American War of Independence.

Wilkinson played a British officer in The Patriot, a US film about the Revolutionary War co-starring Mel Gibson, Heath Ledger and Jason Isaacs. The film was nominated for three Academy Awards.

From The Full Monty to Michael Clayton: was a lawyer - Arthur Edens - in Michael Clayton film 🎥 co-starring George Clooney. Tom Wilkinson was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role for In The Bedroom in 2001, and Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Michael Clayton in 2007.

Wilkinson was winning acclaim again as a high-powered lawyer who has a breakdown in Tony Gilroy’s “Michael Clayton.” He was nominated for another Academy Award for his performance in that film.

In ‘Denial’, Confronting a Holocaust Revisionist in Court. Denial is a drama about a historian’s pursuit through the UK justice system by a Holocaust denier. It stars Rachel Weisz, Tom Wilkinson, Timothy Spall, Andrew Scott, Jack Lowden, Caren Pistorius and Alex Jennings.

On television, he played Benjamin Franklin in “John Adams,” James A. Baker in “Recount,” for which he was Emmy-nominated and Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. in “The Kennedys.”

In Ava DuVernay's 2014 historical drama Selma, Wilkinson portrayed President Lyndon B Johnson. The film tells of the protest marches held in Alabama in 1965 over voting rights for African Americans.

RIP Tom Wilkinson 💔 1948-2023

[xtruss]

The Top-Secret World War II Mission That Killed Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., The Heir Apparent To The Political Dynasty

In August 1944, the Older Brother of Robert and John F. Kennedy Died While Piloting a Drone Aircraft over England, Leaving His Younger Siblings to Fulfill Their Father’s Dreams

— Meilan Solly, Senior Associate Digital Editor, History

L to R: John F. Kennedy, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. in London in 1937 Keystone / Getty Images

By all accounts, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr.’s war should have been over.

As Allied forces advanced on the Western Front in the summer of 1944, the Navy lieutenant completed his 50th mission—twice the number required to fulfill a tour of duty abroad. Instead of returning home to the United States, however, he volunteered for a top-secret operation named after Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty.

“I am going to do something different for the next three weeks,” Joe Jr. wrote in a letter to his parents. “It is secret and I am not allowed to say what it is, but it isn’t dangerous, so don’t worry.” Somewhat wary in his response to his eldest son, the lieutenant’s father, former Ambassador to the United Kingdom Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., advised, “I can quite understand how you feel about staying there … but don’t force your luck too much.”

Three days after Joe Sr. wrote his reply, the hollowed-out aircraft carrying Joe Jr. and his co-pilot exploded over England, killing both men. The mission represented a fatal failure for Operation Aphrodite, which sought to transform battle-worn bombers into uncrewed, radio-controlled missiles—in essence, early drones.

The last known photograph of Joe Jr., taken on the day of his death, August 12, 1944. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Joe Jr. in uniform. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

On a more personal level, Joe Jr.’s death at age 29 dealt a staggering blow to his father’s grand dreams for the future. Groomed for the presidency since his birth, Joe Jr. had served as a delegate at the 1940 Democratic National Convention, with plans to run for Congress after the war. Upon hearing the news of his brother’s demise, John F. Kennedy, the family’s second-oldest son, reportedly remarked, “Now the burden falls on me.”

Previously “considered too ‘sloppy,’ fun-loving and physically unhealthy” for a career in politics, in the words of the London Times, John secured seats in the House of Representative and the Senate before narrowly winning the 1960 presidential election, becoming the first Irish Catholic commander in chief and the youngest person elected to the nation’s highest office to date.

“Just as I went into politics because Joe died,” John later said in an eerily prescient remark, “if anything happened to me tomorrow, my brother Bobby would run. … And if Bobby died, Teddy would take over for him.”

Born on July 25, 1915, Joe Jr. was the first child of Joe Sr., a wealthy businessman and prominent Massachusetts politician, and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, the daughter of a Boston mayor. The oldest of nine, Joe Jr. bore “a certain forcefulness of character that marked him as a natural leader” even in his youth, wrote Rose in her memoir. His younger siblings looked up to him, and he, in turn, set a strong example for them by excelling in school and sports. Still, Rose recalled, Joe Jr. “got into his share of mischief,” particularly when partnered with John, who was two years his junior. In 1923, the brothers wrote a song about bedbugs and cooties and started a club with a steep entry fee: To be initiated into the organization, new members had to consent to getting stuck with pins.

L to R: Joe Jr., Kathleen Kennedy, Rosemary Kennedy and John in Cohasset, Massachusetts, circa 1926 or 1927 © John F. Kennedy Library Foundation / Kennedy Family Collection/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

Both Joe Jr. and John attended Choate, a prestigious boarding school in Connecticut. There, Joe Jr. played football and edited the student yearbook. Before enrolling at Harvard University, his father’s alma mater, he spent the 1933 to 1934 school year studying under Jewish political scientist Harold Laski at the London School of Economics.

Joe Jr.’s time in Europe coincided with the rise of Adolf Hitler; when he visited Germany, he learned about the Nazis’ forced sterilization program—a policy he praised for doing “away with many of the disgusting specimens of men which inhabit this earth.” According to historian Kate Clifford Larson, Joe Jr. “held quite conservative views about the disabled,” a stance that was surprising given his close relationship with his younger sister Rosemary Kennedy, who had intellectual disabilities. Despite Joe Jr.’s similarly respectful attitude toward Laski, he also espoused antisemitic sentiment, claiming that Hitler had offered the “scattered, despondent and … divorced from hope” Germans a common enemy. “It was excellent psychology, and it was too bad that it had to be done to the Jews,” Joe Jr. wrote to his father. “This dislike of Jews, however, was well founded.”

Joe Jr. graduated from Harvard in 1938, then joined his family in London, where his father was serving as the U.S. ambassador. In February 1939, the 23-year-old traveled to Madrid, arriving soon after a shelling by insurgents fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Not dispatched on official business, he was “just looking around,” Joe Sr. told the Associated Press, adding, “His mother will die when she hears he is in Madrid.”

The Kennedy family at Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, in 1931. Joe Jr. is in the back row at right. Richard Sears/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

The following year, Joe Jr. made headlines as a DNC delegate who pledged to vote for Postmaster General James Farley over incumbent Franklin D. Roosevelt. Under pressure to switch his allegiance to the president, particularly as the son of an ambassador appointed by Roosevelt, he remained steadfast in his choice, believing that no commander in chief should be allowed to serve three terms. The burgeoning politician’s conduct at the convention won him the admiration of prominent attendees, one of whom told Joe Sr. that his son “seemed to gain the respect of everybody there,” adding, “I am sure he can have a political future if he wants one.”

Though Joe Jr. returned to Harvard for law school, he ultimately decided to enlist in the Navy as a pilot in June 1941 instead of finishing his degree. Prompted in part by his father’s staunch opposition to the U.S.’s entry into World War II—a scenario that seemed increasingly likely in the lead-up to Pearl Harbor—he defended his decision in a letter to Joe Sr.: “With your stand on the war, … people will wonder what the devil I am doing back at school with everyone else working for national defense.” John soon followed in his older brother’s footsteps, relying on his family connections to secure a position in the Naval Reserve, despite back issues that would normally have barred him from serving. When the U.S. finally joined the war in December 1941, both brothers were partway through naval training.

“Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. to Get Naval ‘Wings’ Today as Dad Looks On,” read a May 5, 1942, headline in the Boston Globe. The title telegraphed the family dynamics at play, underscoring the pressure placed on Joe Jr. by his father, whose presence and influence loomed large. Adding to the weight of Joe Sr.’s expectations was the surprising military success of John, who received a promotion to lieutenant and command of his own boat by the end of 1942. As his younger brother led a squadron patrolling for Japanese ships in the Solomon Islands, Joe Jr. was relegated to a naval air base in Virginia, where he launched lower-risk patrols in search of German U-boats.

Joe Jr. on the campus of Harvard University in 1938 Bettmann via Getty Images

On the night of August 1, 1943, a Japanese destroyer rammed into John’s boat, PT-109, knocking its crew into the water and ripping the starboard side clean off. Then 26 years old, Kennedy exhibited great bravery during the incident, leading the 11 surviving sailors to a nearby island before swimming, sometimes solo, to neighboring islands in search of food and aid.

The press, the Navy, and friends and family alike praised John as a hero. But while Joe Jr. was certainly glad that his younger brother had escaped death, he felt overshadowed and was eager to prove himself. “Colleagues commented later on his intense preoccupation with putting himself in harm’s way, and thus on the path to publicly recognized heroism,” wrote Edward J. Renehan Jr. in The Kennedys at War: 1937-1945. As fellow pilot Louis Papas later recalled, “There was never an occasion for a mission that meant extra hazard that Joe did not volunteer. He had everybody’s unlimited admiration and respect for his courage, zeal and willingness to undertake the most dangerous missions.”

Sent to Great Britain in September 1943, Joe Jr. spent the next several months flying patrols over the Atlantic, the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay, piloting PB4Y Liberator bombers on anti-submarine details. By May 1944, he’d flown the 25 missions required for reassignment to the U.S., losing his co-pilot and numerous colleagues to enemy anti-aircraft fire in the process. Though he had permission to return home, he opted to stay in the fight. As he told his parents in mid-June, “I now have 39 missions and will probably have 50 by the time I leave. It is far more than anyone else on the base, but it doesn’t prove a hell of a lot.”

John (left) and Joe Jr. in their naval uniforms Hulton Archive/Getty Images

In the summer of 1944, Joe Jr. volunteered first for Operation Cork, an air patrol connected to the Allied invasion of France, and then for Operation Aphrodite and its Navy counterpart, Operation Anvil. The top-secret project was aimed at taking down the Nazis’ steel-reinforced concrete bunkers in occupied France, from which the Germans were launching their devastating V-1 cruise missiles and V-2 ballistic missiles. Uncrewed, gyro-controlled jets packed with explosives, the projectiles offered a low-risk way of terrorizing the British from afar.

Commander James Doolittle, of the Army’s Eighth Air Force, suggested converting war-weary bombers into pilotless missiles. “Control and autopilot technology [were] sufficiently immature to make the … program incredibly risky, but the perceived benefits justified the potential costs,” wrote Roger Connor, a curator at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum, in a 2014 blog post. Though the bombers were remote-controlled, they required a two-person crew to get the aircraft off the ground and ensure it stayed on course.

When Joe Jr. heard about the operation, he readily volunteered for it. According to an account by a fellow officer, the lieutenant, “regarded as an experienced Patrol Plane Commander and … an expert in radio control projects,” was tasked with piloting “a ‘drone’ Liberator bomber loaded with 21,170 pounds of high explosives into the air and [staying] with it until two ‘mother’ planes had achieved complete radio control over the ‘drone.’” After completing this transfer of control, Joe Jr. and co-pilot Wilford J. Willy were supposed to bail out over England, parachuting to safety as the plane continued on to the V-1 bunkers.

The motley group of Allied aircraft needed for the mission—among them a Mosquito carrying the president’s second-oldest son, Elliott Roosevelt, who was tasked with capturing the flight on film—took off from a Royal Air Force base shortly after 6 p.m. on August 12, 1944. Eighteen minutes into the mission, Joe Jr. shared a message over the radio: “Spade Flush,” the code phrase for the bomber to be handed off to the mother ship. At approximately 6:20 p.m., as Joe Jr. and Willy awaited the signal to bail out, two explosions rocked the plane, killing the pilots and nearly destroying the other aircraft in the formation. The pair’s bodies were never found.

The accident was “the biggest explosion I ever saw until the pictures of the atom bomb,” a pilot on board the mother ship said. No one on the ground was hurt, but debris from the wreck rained down on the English countryside, with one local witnessing an “enormous black pall of smoke resembling a huge octopus, the tentacles below indicating the earthward paths of burning fragments.” The cause of the disaster was never identified, but mechanical failure was a leading theory.

Operation Aphrodite continued through January 1945, with little success. In recognition of the pilots’ sacrifice, the government awarded Joe Jr. and Willy the Navy Cross, the second-highest military decoration. John, meanwhile, won the Navy and Marine Corps Medal, the highest non-combat award for heroism, for his actions aboard PT-109.

Joe Jr. sitting in an aircraft during training in 1941 Bettmann via Getty Images

John and his wife, Jackie Kennedy, watch a boat race while on board the USS Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., a destroyer named in Joe Jr.'s honor Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

The Kennedys deeply mourned Joe Jr.’s death. With no body to bury and scant details of his final moments (the mission remained classified until after the war), the family commemorated their eldest son with a privately published book titled As We Remember Joe. In the text, John—now the heir apparent—wrote:

It may be felt, perhaps, that Joe should not have pushed his luck so far and should have accepted his leave and come home. But two facts must be borne in mind. First, at the time of his death, he had completed probably more combat missions in heavy bombers than any other pilot of his rank in the Navy and therefore was preeminently qualified, and secondly, as he told a friend early in August, he considered the odds at least 50-50, and Joe never asked for any better odds than that.

Despite the grief he felt over Joe Jr.’s death, Joe Sr. remained resolute in his ambitions for his family. “We’ve got to carry on,” he told his wife. “We must take care of the living. There is a lot of work to be done.” According to legend, Joe Sr. called John into a meeting, where he announced that the younger son would take his brother’s place as the family’s representative on the national stage. “It was like being drafted,” the future president later said. “My father wanted his oldest son in politics. ‘Wanted’ isn’t the right word. He demanded it. You know my father.”

Joe Jr., for his part, had seemingly predicted how events would play out in the event of his death. In a letter written just before his enlistment in the Navy, he wryly commented, “It seems that Jack is perfectly capable to do everything, if by chance anything happened to me.”

— 12 August 2022

[kwebtv]

Thomas Geoffrey Wilkinson OBE (February 5, 1948 – December 30, 2023) Actor known for his role on stage and screen, he received numerous accolades including a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Primetime Emmy Award as well as nominations for two Academy Awards and two Laurence Olivier Awards. In 2005, he was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.

In 2009, he won a Golden Globe Award and a Primetime Emmy Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or Movie for playing Benjamin Franklin in the HBO limited series John Adams (2008). His other Emmy-nominated roles were as Roy/Ruth Applewood in the HBO film Normal (2003), James Baker in the HBO film Recount (2008), and Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. in the limited series The Kennedys (2011).

Other TV series he appeared in were:

Crime and Punishment

Panorama

Spyship

Strangers and Brothers

Sharma and Beyond

Squaring the Circle

A Pocket Full of Rye

Travelling Man

Happy Families

First Among Equals

The Woman He Loved

The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank

The Ruth Rendell Mysteries

Inspector Morse

Counterstrike

Screen Two

Lovejoy

Prime Suspect

Stay Lucky

The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries

Performance

Martin Chuzzlewit

Eskimo Day

David Copperfield

The Gathering Storm

Normal

John Adams

Recount

A Number

The Kennedys

The Kennedys: After Camelot

Belgravia

The Full Monty

IMDb listing

[h-l-v-kennedy-blog]

Part One: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"

pairing: john f. kennedy/oc (sabrina e. overstreet) word count: 1,058 warnings: none, just some light bickering, but overall fluff summary: summer in Hyannis Port, 1936, a few months before Jack would enter Harvard, just as Sabrina would enter her freshman year at Wellesley College. a/n: part one, let's get this show on the road.

One summer, 1936, a few months before Jack would enter Harvard, just as Sabrina would enter her freshman year at Wellesley College. Jack was sick again, but not sick enough to be in a hospital, so he was just resting in his ground floor bedroom. Too much sun earlier, he had determined. A room that held the many books he had read or sought to read; from King Arthur to Marlborough. But at that moment it felt like the world was spinning if he kept his eyes open for too long.  

And then there was a knock on the door. Jack squeezed his eyes tightly shut before sighing and sitting up, reluctantly so and let out a “Come in” with that Bostonian drawl of his. 

The door creaked open and a head of sandy blonde hair peaked in. Sabrina, 17, dressed in a plaid shirt and beige shorts, greyish-blue eyes looking a bit embarrassed. “Were you sleeping?”  

Jack shook his head, though regretted it with a sharp pain in his neck, but he plastered on a pleasant smile.  “No... no.” He liked Sabrina...well of course he did. He liked girls, a lot. But Sabrina wasn’t like that. Firstly, he grew up with her, so she was like a sister to him. And secondly, she was too nice. Thirdly, she had been nursing a crush on his brother Joe for years (and it was very tempting to steal her away), but Kick had made it crystal clear that Sabrina was off limits to both boys (“She’s too good for you two, and otherwise I won’t have any friends at all who haven’t had their hearts broken by one of my brothers.” Kick’s voice rang through his ears). And to top it off, there was some strange joke between the adults that Joe Jr. and Sabrina would someday become a couple, even if Joe had only taken her to some courtesy outings to parties, which was only in group situations. So, he didn’t see an opening anywhere. 

“Oh, good.” She had a bashful smile on her face. 

“You don’t have to stay there, y’know? With only a floating head by the doorway.”  

She chuckled at his barb and nodded, pushing the door open wider so he saw her, head to toe. He rested on his elbows on the bed and couldn’t help himself from looking her over. Damn. 

“I...” She stuttered, a hand behind her back. 

“What are you hiding?” 

“Oh, I wasn’t hiding, I just finished Treasure Island and wanted to bring it back.” She brought the book out, his copy that he had only given her two days ago. 

“Put it where there’s room.” Jack wasn’t exactly the tidiest and his room reflected that, and the haphazardly lying articles of clothing was only one indication. 

She set it down on a desk and then looked around the room, wringing her hands slightly, as if looking for anything to say. “Can I...” But her voice was too soft, and Jack spoke before her anticipating pity and an offering for company which would be a part of said pity, “You don’t have to stay.” Which by her reaction he quickly got was not the right response.  

“I wasn’t...okay...” She stumbled over her words, murmuring the last bit and turning on her heel and shuffling to the door. Realizing his mistake he called out. 

“Wait, where are you going?” Which did make her stop. 

“Out.” Too vague. Not good.  

“Wait just a second, are you mad at me?” He ran a hand through his hair. She shook her head, but he couldn’t see her eyes to know the real answer. “Are you sure?” 

“Yes, I’m sure.” Sarcasm, he could hear it loudly in her usually gentle timbre. 

“You are mad.” 

“I’m not mad, Jack. I’m going because I can take a hint when to excuse myself.” Her voice held an undercurrent of frustration since he could really harp on the little things; like her tone. 

“I didn’t say that...” His voice trailed off. His voice was quieter with an ashamed embarrassed vulnerability attached to it. “...I wouldn’t mind the company.” 

“Would you now?” Now her tone definitely had sarcasm in it. He couldn’t hold back a rumble of laughter that escaped him. She turned her head, and he could see her confused eyes, irritation still floating in the pools of her eyes. “What’s so funny?” 

He quickly reeled himself in and shook his head. “Nothing, just stay and keep me company.” 

Her brows furrowed and tilted her head. “Just listen to me for once. Okay?” She scoffed at his words. Then a plea. Unfamiliar, but his. “Please.” She shook her head and sighed. 

“You Kennedys could talk a Republican into a Democrat if you so pleased.” Sabrina muttered under her breath. “And how shall I keep you company?” 

Jack shifted on the bed and pushed back the tantalizing thoughts that came to mind. No, no. “Read to me. There are plenty of options.” He gestured around the room. “Take your pick.” Please. 

Sabrina looked at the different titles around and picked something that wasn’t very “Jack”, but something more her taste, probably Kick had left it in his room. The Sonnets of William Shakespeare. Her fingers traced the spine of the book before picking it from a bookshelf and leafing through it. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” She started, making Jack chuckle as he lay with his hands behind his head, closing his eyes. “Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May/ And summer’s lease hath all too short a date...” She paced as her voice filled the air. Smooth, even, more confident with the Bard’s words of expression. Pictures of a dreamy fantastical fairytale crossed his mind as she read another sonnet, and he thought: staying behind from sailing wasn’t so bad after all. His eyes grew heavy, but he blinked them open enough to look at her disappearing off into those sonnets and not reading to him, but to some other...he saw it in her pace and the way the lines left her lips. Those weren’t for him, but he didn’t mind, he was there to hear it either way. But his eyes couldn’t stay open much longer. Her voice was the last thing he heard before drifting off. 

Part Two: (coming soon)

///

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[kennedy-family-library]

These moments will be forever remembered💖💝❤️✨️

[dadsinsuits]

Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.

[dreamofstarlight]

Did you see know how Disney added a “royal lives” clause: that grants them power based on “the death of the last survivor of the descendants of King Charles III, King of England living as of the date of this Declaration”

Now that made me go into a rabbit hole of Royal causes and apparently the Kennedys have their own clause “that has mentioned in thousands of documents setting the terms for billions of dollars in commercial trusts since” (that came from 2006 so I’m assume there’s a lot more)

Their clause almost always reads, "In no event shall the trust continue beyond the expiration of 21 years from the death of the last survivor of the descendants of Joseph P Kennedy Sr., the late Ambassador to the Court of St. James." Which is even more insane bc like Joe obviously has a whole lot of descendants 😭😭

I did see that! I didn't really understand it at first but I think it's a way for power/assets to be controlled basically forever to get around perpetuities.

Joe and Rose had close to 30 grandkids so yeah it's a pretty reliable statement that the bloodline will be here for awhile.

[askleonkennedy]

if you ever become a farmer will u be a potato farmer or a corn farmer

A farmer...? Probably I'd go to a colder island, make a grape farm and produce wine.

...

The Kennedys' rise to power began during the Prohibition era (1920-1933), when Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. amassed wealth by illegally importing and distributing alcohol, alongside other lucrative ventures.

You can say Im just "following my nature"