[redheadkennedy]

here to spread my agenda that john fitzgerald kennedy, 35th president of the united states, was ginger

[redheadkennedy]

I have to come clean: I’ve been quiet the last few days because I started trying to write a post re. some of my thoughts about Jack and Lem, their relationship and Lem’s connection with the Kennedys. Mainly about my frustration with how Lem is either disregarded or persistently viewed by historians as little more than a tragic, wounded and slightly pathetic figure even now, and trying to present an alternative view by examining Lem’s life and the time period under a lens of our modern ideas of queerness and queer relationships.

It has spiralled into a four THOUSAND word f-ing thesis without my permission, with quotes and sources, and it’s only part one of what was supposed to be two parts at most 😭 I am sort of impressed with myself but also sort of scared. I won’t even bother to accurately stress how little time I have to be doing shit like this, how it’s 3pm and I have done very little else today. I haven’t written an essay in roughly 8 years and I haven’t written a specific history-related essay in about 15 years 🫠 (this is not an accurate reflection of its quality, I am in fact incredibly smart and it is very good and interesting and insightful, just: I cannot believe I was driven to do this from absolutely nowhere. Am I possessed? Is this Lem trying to regain control the narrative with me as a mere conduit?)

Obviously I’m absolutely not going to post 4k words in one go, but… would anyone actually be interested in reading this if I try to perhaps organise it and post it in multiple parts? I would really appreciate any thoughts and feelings, otherwise I do not know wtf to do with it or even why I got so caught up in it 😭🫠🫡

[redheadkennedy]

still thinking abt them… specifically how, despite even the gossip that surrounded them at the time in society and in magazines and even in their social circles… Bobby and Jackie never got defensive about their relationship, or told the press to knock it off and not ask them questions about each other, they always spoke about one another with thee most love and appreciation, never hid their smiles and affection for each other in public… oh

[redheadkennedy]

A letter from Joe Snr to Jack while Jack was at school.

Far be it from me to be on the side of Joe Snr in anything and I love nothing more than hearing stories about how scatty and scruffy Jack was, but I just googled how much $10.80 is adjusted to today and it is $263 (!!!!)

Nearly $300 spent on having your suits ironed in ONE MONTH!!!! Jack be so fuckin fr. You’re in high school why do you even have a suit. Why do you even have $263 dollars.

(From JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century by Frederik Logevall)

[redheadkennedy]

I like collecting photographic evidence of Jack's red (“auburn”) hair purely for my own amusement, and this is a new favourite I hadn't seen before.

This is JFK with his friend Paul Fay. You probably know Paul better by his nickname, "Red" Fay, which he was called almost exclusively, thanks to his... you guessed it... red hair! You can see here that their hair colour was actually incredibly similar.

I enjoy doing this because early colour film mostly struggles to reproduce red tones accurately - especially once film degrades and prints begin to fade with time. Red/ginger/auburn hair also changes dramatically depending on the light source, and thick hair often appears darker than it actually is, so it's fun (to me) to try and find pictures that look like they might be accurate to how his hair would have looked in person, which to my eye this one does!

[handheart1d]

jfks smile brings me joy

april 1962 (from jfk library)

[redheadkennedy]

Ugh I know even if it ever happens it’ll be a long, longgggg time away and they haven’t even cast them yet but I’m just imagining the Netflix Kennedy series showing Bobby going to take care of Jackie in the hospital after she miscarried Arabella 🥹

[redheadkennedy]

Jack’s handwriting was such a headache, and this is one of the best/worst examples I could find:

(Letter from the JFK Presidential Library)

This letter was written on 14th June 1934 by Jack to Lem whilst Jack was receiving treatment at the Mayo Clinic for his stomach woes, and Lem was in Cape Cod Hospital recovering from burns he sustained after an accident in the Kennedy's shower in Hyannis Port (more on that after).

(disclaimer: am not a transcriber. Also slight TW for er… teenage boy grossness?)

Dear Moynee, Here I am in the hottest place, except the Kennedy's shower, in the country. We had a great trip out only being kept awake the whole night by a squeak. The plane flight was OK, though I about tossed my cookies. The other passengers were looking at me very strangely. This place is great and I'll tell you about it when I see you. A fellow stuck his finger up my rectum today and I, much to my embarrassment, burst out laughing. That rather upset the dignity of the whole place. How are you feeling? I hope you're having a pleasant stay. They are going to fix my leak. They commence blasting the boogies out tomorrow and as I sit in my window with my arm around a Rochester babe all I can hear is the rumble of dynamite trucks as they come from near and far bearing the explosive which will will pave the way for the men to start drilling. People are flocking from hither and yon on horse and foot to be at the explosion. I ought to be out of here Monday and home Wednesday or Thursday. Write wire me your plans if you know them before Monday to the hotel. Miss Cahill has your money. They ask me the most personal questions and I am blushing terribly, especially when they ask me the color of my stool. They also gave my penis a tremendous jerk and I began to giggle coyly. I am stuffing my pockets full of trash ect. to hang in our room next year as souvenirs. Well, LeMoyne, will write you tomorrow. A stiff upper lip, my lad, and a clean neck as Hard-Tack, the sailor says are necessary for to achieve burning* success. As ever, For the last time, "Boogie" *rather clever

Hilariously, Lem called this letter "juvenile but not dirty" and if you've read any of their other letters, yep - not even the tip of the iceberg. This is tame - dare I say: mundane - for them.

Re. the shower incident:

(From Jack and Lem by David Pitts).

Jack’s response to this news was: “Tough about your burns but to get back to a much more interesting subject… my bowels have utterly ceased to be of service”. He then goes into some graphic detail about his "treatment" before saying "Burn this when you get finished and for God's sake don't leave it around because if you do I'll have all your letters wrapped up and sealed to be presented to your sister's un-born baby at the age of 21 so she can see what a dirty-minded shit his god-damn uncle was" (From JFK: Reckless Youth by Nigel Hamilton).

They both would say that their letters needed to be hidden or destroyed but tbh Jack's handwriting is lowkey doing enough.

JFK: They'll never know the real me if they can't read a word I say 😏

Also gotta wonder what he'd make of Lem handing over these letters to the Presidential Library so the entire world can see what dirty-minded shits they BOTH were.

[redheadkennedy]

Some of my favourite cursed JFK portraits gifted to him during his presidency.

Would adore to know where all these cursed artworks ended up, and how Jack reacted to them in private.

(All pics taken from the JFK Library).

[redheadkennedy]

Finally reading Coming of Age in the American Century and I’m getting such a hard-on for the footnotes. Cmon sources! Cmon evidence! Cmon proof of critical thinking! Truly love to see it.

Don’t ask me why I’ve avoided it up until now — basically just because it’s very telling when some of the more informed and balanced takes you can find on the Kennedys are all on tumblr dot com (don’t get me wrong, some of you lot have an agenda for sure lollllll, but at least you’re not claiming otherwise!)

Like, it is frankly astounding to me how much historical non-fiction and biography gets away with presenting itself as accurate, authoritative + unbiased when there is often no objective way to verify large portions of what is being claimed. And how much of this third-hand gossipy slop makes up about 95% of the books written about the Kennedy family……..

[indulginginterests]

Bobby photographed at the Kennedy family home in Bronxville, NY, 1935

[redheadkennedy]

Omg it’s baby Bobby Helmet-Head 🥹

(As mentioned in my prev Ireland post: Kennedy literally translates to Helmet Head in Irish/as Gaeilge!!)

[redheadkennedy]

When your mum sends you off to school with a fresh uniform and brand new stationery vs when you come home for summer with nothing but chewed up pens and a single sock that wasn’t yours to begin with

(These pics came up one after the other on my Pinterest last night and made me laugh — my favourite thing about fashion icon jfk is that he was in actual fact such a scatty scruffbag way before his son made it cool).

[redheadkennedy]

Also here to spread the Irish Kennedy agenda. Fun fact about me, my family are also Kennedys from Co. Wexford. We’re not in any way meaningfully related as far as I know, we’re from the opposite side of the county. I’m perfectly, incandescently happy to never discover even an extremely tenuous genetic link between me and Joe Snr.

So, I was in Wexford last summer and on a walk in my tiny tiny village, population ~250. As I said, it’s in the opposite end of the county to Dunganstown and is not historically linked to the Boston Kennedys at all. There is nothing there apart from a big hill, a Spar (kind of like a convenience store with a deli counter, like an extremely rural bodega?) and a graveyard. Most Irish people would probably even struggle to tell you where it is. So on the big hill I was very surprised to find this:

There are tonnes of Kennedy memorials in Wexford, but mostly in the south near the homestead and New Ross. There is even the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Bridge, and the Fitzgeralds were from Limerick lmao. But Jean personally planted this tree on the site of a 1700s rebellion and she visited not just once but twice, choosing to give a speech there during the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

I knew very little about her before I found this tree, but she’s a significant and beloved figure in modern Irish history in her own right, and I was very pleased to discover this memorial to an often overlooked member of the Kennedy family in an overlooked part of the county. Wexford itself is also pretty overlooked by the rest of Ireland, but I won’t go into that now.

Anyway: did you know that “Kennedy” is generally interpreted to mean something along the lines of “helmeted chieftain”, but the most literal translation is “helmet head” or “ugly head” hahahaha. John Fitzgerald Helmet-Head really makes me laugh. It sounds like it could have been his nickname at school.

[redheadkennedy]

Did anyone listen to the United States of Kennedy podcast btw? Would love to know your thoughts. I have several but I’ll wait to compare.

Oh and if anyone has any recs for other podcasts or specific podcast episodes I’m all ears! I’ve listened to all the relevant the rest is history eps and those are the only ones I’ve found worth any salt, anything else I’ve found has been pretty dire unfortunately

[redheadkennedy]

Can I just say, it makes me so unbelievably pissed off just how prominent a figure rfk jr has become. To the point where as soon as you mention RFK to anyone under the age of ~50 (maybe 40 at a push), or try to look up anything about him using any version of his name, that fucking GHOUL junior is the first thing that pops up!! Saying he’s destroying RFK’s legacy doesn’t even cut it.

Google I’m begging you, if I do not specifically use the ‘jr’ suffix do not tell me anything about that weenie hut dickhead:

Go away ghoul!!

Petition to start calling him something gross like Bert Skakel.

[castiwls]

I feel like it’s a rite of passage to get obsessed with the Kennedys through Jack and then fall down the Bobby rabbit hole and just never come back up

[redheadkennedy]

There’s Something About Bobby, and it’s shit like this specifically!!

And even more importantly this:

(From Robert Kennedy: His Life by Evan Thomas)

[redheadkennedy]

I am so happy I stumbled upon kennedy tumblr. As someone who has had a very scholarly and not at all strange fascination with them for years, it’s so hilarious and fun and interesting and y’all on here are actual eminent historians and archivists so thank you. I’ve been lurking here for a while, I surf the tags to help me sleep lollllllll. So, hello!