On This Day | 29 May 1917: John F. Kennedy Is Born
President John F. Kennedy | Photo credit: White House Archives
29 May 1917: On this day in history John Fitzgerald Kennedy, descendant of Irish immigrants and son of an ambassador, would be born into one of the United States’ most formidable political families.
The future 36th President enjoyed an idyllic childhood in Massachusetts and spent a dilettante season as a ranch hand before enrolling at Harvard to study international affairs. He embarked upon a tour of Europe immediately before the outbreak of World War Two, and wrote a thesis on the Munich Agreement which would later be published under the title ‘Why England Slept.’
Despite the various health complaints which left him in lifelong pain, he served in the US Navy, and once had to swim to safety when his patrol boat came under fire from a Japanese destroyer. Following VE Day, Kennedy returned his attentions to politics, and was elected to the House of Representatives in the early days of the Cold War. A decade on, he announced his candidacy for the presidential nomination. Though many found him too green, he would defeat Richard Nixon to become, at 42 years old, the youngest elected president. His presidency would last for only half its term, before his assassination on November 22nd, 1963.
Berlin fondly remembers the speech which JFK gave at the Rathaus (town hall) in the American-occupied borough of Schöneberg, to an audience of 120,000, less than six months before he would be murdered. Speaking in solidarity with the West Berliners and promising to protect them from Communist encroachment, Kennedy proclaimed:
“All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin.
And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words,
Ich bin ein Berliner.”
Since a ‘Berliner’ is also a certain foodstuff (as is a hamburger, frankfurter, and so on) people to this day leave doughnuts on the steps of Rathaus Schöneberg each November 22nd.
This edition of On This Day in Berlin History was written by Berlin Guides Association member, Chris Cooke. It’s one of four noteworthy events he’s chosen to remember this summer. Keep an eye on our blog to see what else made the cut.
