JFK Library

I make no secret about the fact that I think JFK was the greatest non-wartime president ever. It is my belief that if not killed Kennedy would have been one of the few world leaders to make the world a better place. If I would have been alive when he was assassinated, I believe I would have cried.

Since I took Sunday Oct 12 off from work because of my brother's wedding Saturday, I refused to waste my first Sunday off in a year. If Laurie would have been hung over, I would have gone to'gansett and fished all day. I was up and ready to go at 7:30. When I woke her up, she was okay. Our plan was to drive to the T and take the red line to the JFK stop. At the station we had to hop on a shuttle bus that comes every 20 minutes. It's only a short ride to the presidential library.

Admission is fourteen dollars for an adult. After we paid our admission we joined a tour group. The first stop was a movie about his early life. After that the docent explained the different rooms. Each room had a theme.

The space race was explained. The Bay of Pigs debacle, Cuban missile crisis and desegregation were a few of the things to learn about.

There is a lot of video footage. The debate versus Nixon was one thing I watched. There was also a tv with a lot of his press conferences. I stayed and watched most of that too. Some of it was pretty funny.

There was a lot of info and memorabilia about Jackie. She was extremely intelligent. She spoke conversational French and Italian and knew some Spanish. She cared about history and was an excellent writer. She loved the arts. Hell ya, I would have had crush on her. Fifty years later I can't help but admire her.

Learning more about my favorite president, I grew to respect him more. I did not know the whole story of PT 109. I knew he was borderline genius, but it was cool to see it put into action. I did not know he was an author writing a couple of books that you can bet I will read.

While I was there I took some photographs of photos of him. I was hoping to get a couple to put up in my house. I have photos of portraits of Washington and Teddy Roosevelt that I

took at the National Portrait Gallery in DC. However the portrait there of JFK sucked. So I took a few pictures of pictures while I was at the library.

Overall I had a great experience. We stayed about three and a half hours. For me, this is a special place since I think of JFK as one of the few truly great presidents. For any history buff, it is worth a visit.