EDWARD'S LECTURE NOTES:
More notes at http://tanguay.info/learntracker
C O U R S E
The Kennedy Half Century
Larry J. Sabato, University of Virginia
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C O U R S E L E C T U R E JFK's Rise to Power Notes taken on November 4, 2013 by Edward Tanguay |
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Kennedy family was combination of immigrant and success story
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grandparents on father's side came over after potato famine in Ireland in 19th century
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John Kennedy's father Joe Kennedy first one to make it big
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in stock market
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sensed stock market crash in 1929 and took his money out before if occurred
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family was very well set
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one of the richest families in America
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Joe Kennedy married Rose Fitzgerald
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also Irish Catholic
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her father had been congressman and mayor of Boston
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young JFK
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his environment was a combination from very early on of money and political power
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very sickly child
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period in which doctors wondered if he would live
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but always recovered
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joke of family was that he was always so sick, when a mosquito bit him, the mosquito died
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never very vigorous which is irony since most people see him has exceptionally vigorous as president
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growing up, he had everything but good health
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best schools, best food, best supervision, the best family
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however, Kennedy's weren't universally accepted
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the dominant strain was British, i.e. Old American, the Mayflower descendants
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Irish Catholics in particular were looked down upon
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caused the Kennedy family, especially Joe Kennedy, to be determined to "defeat the Brahmins"
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communicated this frequently to his children
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Joe Kennedy
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political ambitions
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Franklin Roosevelt's Chairman of the Security and Exchange commission
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U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain in late 1930s
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made great mistake
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believed that Hitler would prevail and supported the appeasement policy of Neville Chamberlain
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this ruined Joe Kennedy after war broke out
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always hoped his first son Joe Jr. would be the first Irish Catholic president
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Jack (John Kennedy) was a kind of backup, but was never very interested in politics.
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his own interests were publishing or journalism
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World War II
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John was hero who in war, saving crew member in ship
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Joe Jr. was jealous of younger brother's heroism was killed in action in plane that exploded
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Jack became the repository of father's political dreams for his son
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when he came back from the war, he worked for a newspaper
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early 1947, 29 years old, won his first election for Massachusetts's House of Representatives
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he was one of the WWII veterans who flooded congress