Do You Remember . . . . ?

Chit-chat, current events
Post Reply
klondike

Do You Remember . . . . ?

Post by klondike »

50 years ago, JFK sworn in
By JAIME CONE / Reformer Staff


Thursday January 20, 2011
BRATTLEBORO -- It’s been 50 years since the presidential inauguration of John F. Kennedy Jr., and Brattleboro, Vermont, attorney Timothy O’Connor can still remember attending the ceremony with its famous speech.

O’Connor and his friend Tony Giacobbe, now a judge in New York City, stood among the crowd that amassed outside the White House to watch Kennedy be sworn in as the 35th President of the United States on Jan. 20, 1961. He said he still gets chills when he remembers the president delivering the now famed line, "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."

"It set a tone for his administration," O’Connor said.

He said that Kennedy had the ability to capture the imagination of his generation. "He mentioned something about the new frontier, and his new frontier was to have a man on the moon someday," O’Connor said.

He was astonished to hear the president speak of an astronaut on the moon; he had never really thought about the possibility of such an event before that day, he said.
"These were things people may not have ever thought about," O’Connor said, adding that shortly afterwards (a year and one month to the day), John Glenn was the first astronaut to orbit the world.

As a 24-year-old law student at Georgetown University, O’Connor couldn’t get tickets and almost missed out on the inaugural event. He was admitted at the last minute thanks to the nasty weather. "The night before we got seven inches of snow, and the city was basically under siege," O’Connor said. "They brought 3,000 Marines up from Quantico, Va., to clean up the streets.

"So many people couldn’t get into the city because of the snowstorm," he said. "I was lucky enough that myself and my friend, we saw an usher that we knew who directed us into an area where not a lot of people were attending." He remembers the frigid weather.
"We were cold where we were sitting; it was a typically snowy Washington day." And he recalled that while outgoing President Dwight D. Eisenhower wore a top hat during the ceremony, Kennedy wore no hat and took off his coat to give his speech in just a suit and tie.

He cherishes the experience to this day, he said.

"It’s something that I have fond memories of, even though I can’t remember all of the details like I used to," O’Connor said. "It was a nice, big parade and every state was represented."

The parade featured Vermont Gov. Frank Ray Keyser Jr., a Rutland marching band and cadets from Vermont’s Norwich University.

Two years before his death, 87-year-old poet Robert Frost recited his poem "The Gift Outright" at what was to be one of his last public appearances. O’Connor said the family of his wife, Martha O’Connor, knew Vermont Sen. George Aiken, which allowed him and Giacobbe to attend a reception and dinner at the congressional offices.

"Going to law school, a free meal was always a delight," he said with a laugh.

Other local residents remember seeing Kennedy in Brattleboro the previous year, when he was a senator campaigning for the Democratic Party. The future president spoke right across the street from the Main Street law offices of Robert Gannett, 94, of Brattleboro. They weren’t close friends, but Gannett and Kennedy knew each other from the days when they attended Harvard together.

Though he is a Republican, Gannett took the opportunity to speak with Kennedy.

"I went over to say hello to him," Gannett said. "It was a year when Eisenhower was running for president, and I had my Eisenhower button on my lapel, so when I shook hands with him I pointed to my button. He didn’t disagree with my emphasizing that I favored General Eisenhower."

Despite his support for the opposite political party, Gannett said he was not surprised to see Kennedy win the presidential election. "I think it was a very exciting time for the country," he said. "He pulled a new generation into his presidency, and he was very popular and a very appealing person."

Francis Speno, 83, of Brattleboro, was deeply involved in local politics at the time and worked for the Democratic committee in Brattleboro to bring Kennedy to the area. He met him briefly when he first arrived in town that day.

From the few interactions he had with the man, Speno said he also expected Kennedy to win the presidency because of "his mannerisms, the way he spoke and, of course, his aggressiveness in the U.S. Senate."

He remembers Kennedy’s inauguration well. "I thought it was just terrific," Speno said. "His speech was just out of this world, and it’s been repeated so many times over the past 50 years. No question, he was one of our greatest presidents."

The president’s assassination left O’Connor wondering what might have been if Kennedy hadn’t died with his work left unfinished.

As president he served for 1,300 days, O’Connor said, and the big question in his mind, and a lot of people’s minds, is what would it have been like if he could have finished his term and then been re-elected for another? "The 1960’s, with Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination and Robert Kennedy’s assassination, were a traumatic time to live in," O’Connor said. "(Kennedy) had some sort of a persuasion and a vision as to how things should be resolved. I still sometimes wonder where we would have been if he hadn’t been assassinated."
Post Reply