>> i've been married to the same woman for 31 years. it's because of her i'm a christian. we have two incredible daughters and a wonderful son-in-law. so that box, the personal legacy, is checked. i started thinking about, well, what about my professional one? i decided to go back to that weekend in 1963. i like to talk to people, so i made a list of a hundred people i wanted to ask about john kennedy and picked up the phone and started calling. over the next two and a half years, i talked to a hundred people -- not the original hundred from the list, but many of them. the first two i tried and tried and tried to get but couldn't. those were fidel castro and bill clinton. i even talked to che get very rah's widow and tried to get to fidel and still got turned down.

the third person on the list was helen thomas. she wound up writing the forward. she passed away in july. in fact, she's one of ten people in my book who have passed away since i've interviewed them. i want to show you a brief slide show of some of the about 90 people who are in the book and some of their reflections on john kennedy. afterward, i'll come back for a few minutes, and then scott will come up and speak. >> and i suppose i am a -- [inaudible] in that 24 hours for the first couple of days. i would think that i, you know, became more realistic as a journalist and saw the larger screen probably and the consequences of during action and the evil that can come even to america. so i do think it was a seminal time for me. the television set was, if you will, the centrifuge for the

country. everybody -- >> yes. >> -- drew from it in some fashion. i think his legacy was in the boldness of his rhetoric and declaration. >> i met him as a young high school student. i was visiting my father at the united states capitol, and he and my father were talking, the photographer took a picture of -- [inaudible] he would sit in the rocking chair talking politics and sipping whiskey. they talked about running against each other and decided that instead of wasting a lot of money, they would travel around together and stop at different towns and cities and debate each

other. and it would have been very entertaining and would have set a high standard for future campaigns. they ought to be doing that today. >> as time went on in the months -- not the years, the months before he was killed, he had begun to shift direction a bit. and you could see him becoming a different person. he watched the pictures of young people being hosed, fire hosed in the streets of birmingham, and he told onlookers, he said this makes me sick. and it must have had that effect on everybody who saw or most people who saw it. but, you know, for him to say it means he was moved by it, and it shifted him. >> i was a huge enthusiast. in fact, i recently found -- and then, of course, you find something like that when you're going through your stuff -- my

notebook from the period be which contained all my material, had a very carefully-hand-lettered kennedy for president message on it. >> in the conservative world, i found a lot of people -- it's become almost common place to suggest that john kennedy would be a republican today. because he was pro-tax cuts, he clearly was pro-business. and because of the support for a strong defense -- >> yes. >> -- a strong foreign policy. >> when jfk jr. was born, the chief of the anesthesia department held him up by the ankles and slapped his buttocks. after doing this for several minutes, the infant became very sigh nottic, which is blue in color. and i told him the baby needed to be intubated. he handed the babe to me, and i passed a tube into the trachea of the baby.

i then handed the infant back to him to breathe into the baby since he was the chief of anesthesia. however, he was a bit nervous and knocked the tube out. i then grabbed the baby back, reinserted the tube and for about six minutes breathed air into the lungs of the baby. after i left the delivery room, one of the reporters asked me the sex of the baby, and i replied i could not give out any information and that he'd have to talk to pierre salinger, president kennedy's press secretary. it was later written in the paper that a young doctor came out of the delivery room and did not know the sex of the baby. [laughter] >> it was really good weather, and he came in and sat in my station. there were three of them with him, and he looked up at me, and he says do you mind having your

picture made with me? and i told him i was -- i was pouring that coffee, and i said, it's my pleasure. and when i said it's my pleasure, he just busted out laughing. laugh i guess because of -- [laughter] i guess because we talked kind of south like. and he said he just died laughing. [laughter] and that's when they snapped the picture. of -- someone ran in, come in the restaurant and told us that he had been shot, and i just balled. i cry -- bawled. i cried and i cried, and i still cry. that was the only president that i really loved. >> it was a very, it was a seminal film for we because of the attention it got and because of the respect that kennedy had

gotten from the american public. and after we'd finished it, i got a call from the white house asking me would i like to come back and meet the president. i said, you bet. so i went down to washington. i arrived two hours early. i wasn't about to be late. so i was honored. he had an innate ability to make you feel very comfortable. it was surprising, because all of a sudden a door opened behind me -- >> uh-huh. >> -- the voice, hi, cliff, just as casual as that. he knew people that i knew, so -- >> right. >> but we were complete strangers -- wasn't like we were complete strangers. anyway, he said very nice things. he couldn't have been more generous and more helpful. >> jack kennedy figured out how

to use television. >> yes, he did. >> and i've always had this theory that the most successful politicians are the ones who mastered the dominant media -- medium of their time. i mean, kennedy came along, and he had this great wit and verve, and he was so good that it changed, it changed the presidency forever. i still think nobody has quite mastered it the way, the way he did. it's hard to say anybody was better on television than ronald reagan. he was very, very good. but i still think that kennedy was the one -- i mean, he could, he could do the interview, he could do the press conference, he could make the speech. and he was just all around better at it. i think he set a style and he set a tone for the presidency.

he brought glamour to the presidency. he made a lot of to young people -- a lot of young people want to take part in public service and serve their cup. serve their country. >> doing the interviews for this book, november 22, 1963: reflections on the life, assassination and presidency of john f. kennedy, for me was a labor of love. in addition to contacting people whose names you know -- walter mondale, tom brokaw, billy graham -- i also wanted to find people who had interesting, funny or poignant encounters with john kennedy but who aren't very well known. people like priscilla johnson mcmillan, probably the only person who ever lived who knew both john kennedy and lee harvey oswald. there's only one. people like dr. ira styler whom

you saw there, a second year pediatric resident who happened to be in the delivery room when john f. kennedy jr. was born not breathing and who saved his life. and another gentleman whom i admire very, very much. as many of you may know, the kennedys had a second son born in august 1963. he lived only 40 hours. the surgeon who tried to save his life for 30 of those hours had never spoken publicly, pardon me, about this incident ever before. he gave me his first-ever interview. i told people i would not ask them any questions about john kennedy's sex life or assassination conspiracy theories. more than enough has been written about both. and people were very appreciative of that aspect. there are two or three family members who are in the book, including a nephew, christopher kennedy lawford.

he is a actor, a film maker and an author on various books on addictions. he lives in southern california. i've contacted him and said what i wanted to do, and like the other people i sought after, i hailed him a letter. mailed him a letter. i made sure the first thing he opened when he saw that letter was a photo of him that hyde found at the kennedy -- that i'd found at the kennedy library in boston just after his uncle was awarded the nomination in 1960. so i called him a week later, and i said did you get the letter? yes. where did you get that photograph? i've never seen it before. will you send me a copy? i said, will you do an interview? he said, yes, and i said, yes. that's how i got one of the two nephews of john kennedy. the other is robert kennedy jr. so again, this was a labor of love. and, um, frankly, i'm still pinching myself it all really

happened. because it was so much fun, so interesting. i met only a few of the people whom i interviewed in person, but i've developed some friendships that i know will last many, many years. so i'm going to turn it over now to scott farris to talk about his second book, and then we'll take questions from all of you. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, dean. i would also join dean in thanking powell's in beaverton for hosting us tonight, i thank c-span as well who are here tonight to record this. so it's a great evening. the shooting of a president, a sitting president, is rare and traumatic. five sitting presidents have been shot, four -- lincoln, garfield, mckinley and kennedy -- died and one, reagan, survived his wounds. now, despite these different

outcomes, the shootings of ken key and reagan have multiple parallels and similarities and viewed on a timeline, they serve as a sort of bookends to a very tumultuous and sometimes disturbing period in american history. kennedy's murder was the first in a series of tragic events that dismayed the nation this the 1960s and 1970s, shocking incidents that included the assassinations of martin luther king jr. and robert kennedy, both in 1968. in the public consciousness even though the killers of king and the kennedy brothers each had different motives, the murders are seldom considered unrelated acts. they're instead viewed conspirator y'allly as though they were collectively moment to frustrate liberal hopes for a more racially-just society. conversely, less than two months after reagan's shooting and survival, pope john paul ii also survived an assassination attempt likely approved if not orchestrated by the kgb. compared to the calamities of the previous two decades, it seemed as if the world's luck

had suddenly changed for the better. unlike lincoln who was killed a the pinnacle of his presidency the very week of the union victory in the civil war, neither kennedy's, nor reagan's shooting occurred at a key moment in history, but both became a key event in our national life. the assassination of kennedy and the near assassination of reagan profoundly shaped how we view each man. without these shootings, neither might have been considered a successful president, let alone great ones. the idea for my book sprang from a news story that i read in february 2011 in which gal line up announced that consistent with other polls taken during the previous 12 years, americans surveyed considers kennedy and reagan our two greatest presidents. they sometimes shared this position with lincoln, but they were consistently ranked ahead of washington, jefferson, fdr and everybody else. this is not, by the way, the judgment of most historians. there are a few historians that rank one or the other man as great or near great and some

consider one or the other below average or even worse. but collectively, surveys of historians show that most believe kennedy and reagan were average presidents who had some significant achievements but also a number of failures. but i was interested in the public perception and what especially fascinated me is that their popularity is growing and now seems bipart saab. -- bipartisan. 85% of americans surveyed today believe kennedy did a good job as president while reagan's retrospective job approval rating is 74%. kennedy, the liberal icahn, must have -- icon must have many public admirers. they clearly each possessed some qualities that continue to resonate with americans, and this has caught the attention of those most atubed to public telephone -- attuned to public opinion and their politicians. every presidential cycle we hear republicans search for the next reagan while democrats look for

someone who can rekindle kennedy's camelot. respective candidates of each party go to considerable lengths to show they are worthy of inheriting one or the other hand's malt l in -- mantles from policies to haircuts, from their eloquence to their optimism. my book, which is the first dual biography of both men who were, after all, contemporaries born just six years apart, uncovers some surprising parallels in both men's lives and their policies -- which may dismay some people -- as well as some key differences that continue to define what separates our two major parties today. and i hope you'll read the book to discover more about those surprising similarities. but tonight i want to briefly discuss how they became larger than life in a way that no politician would want to emulate, they both were shot. we these to recall that kennedy's murder in dallas on november 22, 1963, and reagan's wounding in washington, d.c. on march 30, 1981, both occurred at moments when each man's presidencies seemed adrift, even flailing.

the passage of each man's legislative agenda in congress was far from guaranteed. in fact, in each case their agendas were languishing in congress. but each shooting then provided the embe we discuss for creating their presidential legacies, kennedy's camelot, and reagan's revolution. in the fall of 1963, kennedy's job approval rating had dropped to 56%, the lowest point of his presidency, and it seemed destined to fall even more. much of this was from his loss of white support in the south over the issue of civil rights, but vennly, the nation seemed -- generally, the nation seemed stalled. kennedy had not won even 50% of the popular vote in 1960 and was sure he would lose the entire south in 1964, a region he had carried in 1960. and he worried many other states were at risk as well. look magazine was just one of many publications that ran articles in the fall of 1963 that explained kennedy could lose his re-election bid. kennedy's entire legislative package in congress -- not just civil rights legislation, but

also proposals for tax cuts, health insurance for the elderly, federal funding for education, foreign aid and just routine appropriations -- were stalled and going nowhere. in words that will seem too familiar today, the columnist walter litman worried that congressional dysfunction in 1963 seemed a grave danger to the republic. and kennedy had no immediate plans for breaking through that impasse. so much of what we recall as the kennedy legacy, especially the civil rights act of 1964, the tax cuts some credit with the economic boom of the 1960s and the commitment to ending poverty this america, all occurred when lyndon johnson was president, but all were justified in large measure as memorials to kennedy, the martyred president. had kennedy lived, it is conceivable much of his legacy would never have occurred. certainly no civil rights legislation would have been approved in 1964. perhaps it might have come later, but it is an open question which direction the civil rights movement might have gone had that legislation within

been further delayed and delayed. for activists were already moving away from nonviolence. even martin luther king in his speech at the lincoln memorial during the famed march on washington in an oft-overlooked passage warned that america would be in for, quote, a rude awakening if there were no strong actions taken soon to redress the grievances of african-americans. it was the tragedy of kennedy's assassination that was the rude awakening that finally prompted congress to act. now, kennedy had been president for two years and ten months when he was assassinated. reagan had been president bare hi ten weeks when he was shot. but he was in a situation similar to where kennedy had been nearly 20 years before. like kennedy, reagan had not won a great mandate in his first election to the oval office. reagan had won 50.175 percent of the popular vote, and only 11% agreed with his conservative principles. 38% said they voted for him just because he was not jimmy carter. now, democrats held a 53-vote

majority in the house, and speaker tip o'neill and majority leader jim wright were confident they could thwart the president's plans for massive reductions in income tax rates which they believed unfairly benefited the rich. finish reagan's job approval rating was 59%, the lowest of any president at such an early point in his presidency since such surveys had begun in the 1940s. and on the very day he was shot, roland evans and robert novak had a syndicated column published that was headlined the reagan honeymoon is truly over. but a month after ray taliban was shot by a deranged young man outside a washington, d.c. hotel, they conceded the democratic-controlled house would have no choice but to pass reagan's tax cut agenda. the shooting had made reagan too popular and too great a hero with the public to refuse his request. reagan had displayed what kennedy himself quoting hemingway had defined as courage. grace under pressure. most americans did not be realize and is still do not

realize how close reagan came to dying. he lost more than half of his blood, and the bullet that entered his chest came within an inch of his 70-year-old heart. he was at george washington university hospital waiting for the surgery that would save his life, reagan joked to his wife, honey, i forgot to duck. asked how he felt, he quoted w.c. fields, on the whole, i'd rather be in philadelphia. even when he lost his voice when a tracheotomy tube was inserted into his throat, he scribbled notes to the doctors and nurses in the recovery room writing, if i had had this much attention in hollywood, i'd have stayed there. and when he was assured he should relax, the government was running fine be, he said what makes you think i'd be happy to hear that? now, democrats would continue to contest other reagan proposals in part by asserting he was insensitive to the less fortunate, but they had a difficult time making such charges stick. as david broder wrote, as long as people remember the

hospitalized president joshing his doctors and nurses, and they will remember, no critic will be able to portray reagan as cruel, callous or heartless man. reagan had personified what we think of as the finest qualities of american character. with kennedy's assassination, that role fell to his widow, jacqueline. there are many reasons why kennedy's assassination was such a traumatic event. while much of the ledge gemmed is about what might have been, he did, in fact, inspire many americans with the founding of the peace corps, initiating the moon landing and avoiding nuclear war during the cuban missile crisis. and it was also because by 1963 television had infiltrated virtually every living room in america and because satellite technology had become newly available, his assassination also became the first globally-shared news event this human history. but i've come to the conclusion that it hit americans so hard and at such a deeply personal level was the reasons and

conduct of jackie kennedy. that she was even in dallas that day was an anomaly. the trip to texas was the first time since the 1960 election that mrs. kennedy had joined her husband on a domestic political trip. in fact, since 1960 she had never been -- had not been west of middleburg, virginia, where the kennedys had a horse country estate. when it was announced that mrs. kennedy who was still recovering from the loss of an infant son who died at childbirth, when she would accompany jfk to texas, it was big news. she became even more so than her husband the focal point of all news coverage, and it was unprecedented coverage. a.c. nielsen estimated that the average american family watched 32 hours of coverage of the assassination and funeral, and this is the days when television channels went off the air at midnight. and their eyes were focused on the grieving first widow. a survey of college students conducted in the week withs after the assassination found that attention to mrs. kennedy's actions and deportment boarded

on the -- bordered on on the obsessive. the most powerful and enduring images from those days this november 1963 were of mrs. kennedy's expression of ineffable tragedy first in her blood-spattered pink dress and matching pillbox hat and and later dressed all in black, her beautiful, sad face framed by a mourning veil, her two heartbreakingly young children in each hand. mrs. kennedy worried that her husband's murder lacked meaning. told that her husband had been killed by a deranged young man, she wished he had been martyred for the cause of civil rights or something similarly noble. despite a marriage that was often unhappy, jackie became determined to invest her husband's death with meaning. she directed the arrangements so that they mimicked lincoln's funeral of a century before, consciously linking her husband to the great emancipator. and it was she who came up with the idea first of the eternal flame to mark her husband's

grave and then the conceit of her husband's presidency as a modern day camelot. the image stuck and changed the legacy of her husband to a human politician burdened by missteps, faults and promise into an ageless sage whose survival we believe would have insured an hearn golden age. jackie took what had been a day of national shame that such a senseless, violet act could occur in america and instead restored the country's pride by showing that grief could be borne with extraordinary grace and resolve. a poet wrote that wills kennedy had made the darkest days the deepest revelation of their inward strength. lady jane campbell said that mrs. kennedy's poise and dignity had given the american people from this day on the one thing they always lacked, majesty. frank sinatra said jackie had become america's queen. there was majesty during those four days in november with the muffled drums and the riderless

horse, but the 34-year-old jackie also made the funeral seem personal. a reminder not just a president had been killed, but also a young family had been felled with two children left fatherless. a typical sentiment was on a new york city news stand, closed because of a death in the american family. by the time almost 6-year-old caroline was heard consoling her mother, you'll be all right, momny, don't -- mommy, don't cry, and we watched still-2-year-old john jr. saluting his father's coffin, 80% of americans surveyed said they felt as if they had personally lost someone very close and dear. nine in ten that grief caused them physical discomfort. the sense of personal grief is captured in the famous exchange when washington star columnist mary mccrory cheerfully told some dinner guests the day after assassination, we'll never watch again, to which one of her guests gently replied, oh, we'll laugh again, mary, but we'll

never be young again. mrs. kennedy's dignity generated many classical illusions during those days. her nobility, one biographer wrote, represented all the hero's widows, and cbs newsman dan rather predicted kennedy's assassination will still be discussed a thousand years from now. none of us will live long enough to know whether that prediction will come true, but here we are 50 years later still discussing that dark friday afternoon, but perhaps we still have not fully grasped its ramifications. thank you. [applause] ..

you have to make choice every day that the country won't like no matter what you do. whether you are no longer responsible for that, both sides can imagine he would have got us out of vietnam. he would had the race riot and watergate, all the things that happened later. that wouldn't have happened obviously. he was flesh and blood. he would have made mistakes. he might have had a successful term and grown to a president we considered great. but you couldn't expand on the legacy given what we have invested. >> very well stated, scott.

i would add his assassination is part of his legacy. an important part of the legacy. as scott said, his widow made an intentional effort to make sure that people remembered her husband in exact way she wanted. the whole camelot mystique. >> don't be shy. the lovely lay i -- lady back there. >> a particularly happy marriage. it seems like they did at times, but what lead you to that conclusion? >> thank you for that question. i'm going borrow a line who said it was about them not between them unfortunately i think that's sadly true. certainly there was an attraction there. she was lovely. are he was handsome. they were both educate. i think their marriage was a marriage of convenience. jack kennedy was, of course, a

renowned happy bachelor. he realized he could not run for president if he doesn't have a wife. we a number of widowers run for presidency but the only one bachelor. he faced constant inwindow. he was looking far beautiful, intelligent, cultured wife who would make a good political wife. and met jacqueline and thought she fit the bill. i think there's also sort of -- gary make the point. jack kennedy picked somebody who tolerated his many affairs. jackie was looking to get married because she needed the money. she knew about jack's reputation but she also had a father who had been a philander. and so she kind of believed that men were just kind of this way. she would be able to deal with it and move on. her father, she adored her husband. he was named john -- they called him blackjack.

he lost his fortune. she had grown up accustom to a nice lifestyle. now it was gone when her father lost the money. and her stepfather knead clear he wasn't going support the children. he had his own children. they would have to make their way. when jackie met jack she was working for the president and she was making $42. for a woman who liked the finer things in life, it wasn't the life she envisioned for herself. they married each other for convenience. jack often left her home alone. she seldom traveled with him on the trips even braf he became president. there were two thing that started to change their marriage. the first was the trip to paris in 1961. jackie took paris by a storm. she spoke french, studied in france, she loved french designers. everything french. the welcome she received really impressed her husband.

i really -- she's fabulous. now i am starting to appreciate her many virtue. the second was the death that dean mentioned of their infant son patrick who was born and died prematurely died in august of '63. there was a tenderness. jackie lost her first child. but senator kennedy was on a cruise and on a good time. he didn't want to go home after he heard about her miscarriage. one of his friend said, jack, if you don't go home, you might as well forget about being president. he started out as a callous by 1963 developed a tenderness. he liked to think the last part of their marriage was happier than before. i would add that in particular on that point about the death of their infant son patrick, i

would refer do you thur stone clark's book jfk's last 100 days. he talks about that extensively and how the death effected president kennedy, and changed, i think, his view of his marriage, life style, and brought the family closer together. more questions, please. >> why was joe -- why was she interested in having john kennedy or the older brother run for president? >> i can start. >> joe kennedy, i think, himself, wanted to be president. and became, as you probably know, the ambassador to england during franklin roosevelt's administration. and later fell out of favor with roosevelt because of his

support, if not flat out opposition to adolf hitler and his rise to power in germany. he was -- his oldest son joseph kennedy junior to be running for president. of course he died in in an airplane in world war ii deemed a suicide bombing mission. a mantle of the expectations to become president foal jack kennedy. the father really -- from what i've read and talked to, people was an extraordinarily controlling individual, and well, to give you an example, in the book, john, who was first amendment specialist worked as a journalist also worked for both

the kennedy administration and also for robert kennedy. talks about how he was present when president elect kennedy had breakfast with his brother to try to convince the brother to become attorney general. the brother, robert, had the day before gone visit several political people in washington, members of the west supreme court j. edgar hoover and others. hoover was the only one who encouraged robert kennedy to assume the role as attorney general. the next day he asked his friend to accompany him to the president elect's home to have breakfast. on the drive there from their home in mclean, virginia, to the kennedy's home in georgetown -- in washington, he knew he did not want to take the job. he knew, he said, his father was going to be really, really

angry. the father wanted robert to become attorney general. that morning over breakfast jack kennedy of would have nothing of his brother's opposition. he wanted him to be attorney general. i think largely both because of his own interest to have an insider whom he could trust completely for advice and counsel. but also to extent with pressure from his father. >> joe kennedy, sr. was an -- 259 he was a bank president. he knew he was smart. he was very bitter that he was never fully accepted in boston society or at harvard because he was irish catholic. there was a great divide in boston. it was his goal in life to get his revenge to if not becoming president himself getting one of his kids to be the first catholic president.

why joe junior? they had domineering older brothers that the fathers liked before than the guys who became president. joe kennedy junior was -- describes him as the golden child. he was tall, handsome, a good student, a good athlete. and kathleen kennedy, one of the sisters said it was -- to suggest there was anything that jack could cobetter than his brother joe. it was a tremendous tragedy for the parents when joe died. all the hopes for the family was invested in joe junior. it took awhile to decide they were going transfer them to john. there was a rumor they went over they thought he was shy and reserved. they thought he was. sometimes parents don't know their kids as as well as they think they do. reagan's older brother taller, more handsome, more leadership. john ken i --

with john and robert they didn't. it was an interesting parallel. he wanted the idea of getting an irish catholic president was the thumb in the nose of the snobs back in boston. >> thank you. how did -- [inaudible question] >> how does this still not really [inaudible question] >> very interesting question. the reason is he knew when to play dumb. people say what were the surprising things you learned writing the book. one is -- i don't mean to be condescending. ronald reagan was a bright man. he had a photographic memory. it will tell you one thing. he taught hymn to read by the

age of five. he became one of the most popular sports caster in america. broadcasting hundreds of baseball games. he never actually saw in person. he would be in the radio studio and telegraph would send symbols. two or three letters then he would make up the rest of the game and broadcast it for two or three hour. that requires a special kind of intelligence that i can't grasp. but he liked to play like he wasn't quite up on things. whenever he was in trouble he would pretended i don't remember it. i don't know. and so the iran contract came up. a lot of liberals underestimated him. because of the false image believed him. oliver said when he wrote the memoirs cam dadly said president

reagan knew everything. because when president reagan cared about something he was involved in the detail. he cared a lot about iran. he cared most about getting the hostages out of lebanon. he was involved in that. but he got a pass near the end of his presidency. a lot of -- >> yes. the question -- sorry. >> right. i think at that point legacy even though the truth come out. it's after the fact. once an image the image was there. maybe he did, maybe he didn't. it's over with. the advantage obviously of having the summit of gorbachev.

is that the motive behind this? his father bade a lot of money to have the union and the mob. that was part of the -- there was so much speculation about why each was -- there was extraordinary rumors beyond belief about the mote lives of the alleged assassins. we just don't know. we never fully will know about

president kennedy's assassination. even if it's announced next week it's the definitive word on who was behind president kennedy ice assassination there would be immediate speculation that wasn't true. it was the grassy follow. it was the person from the tall, old, red building. i was in dallas to do research on what dallas was plan forking the los angeles times. you meet people on the street who claimed to have been there. they probably weren't. i think it's a little bit more cut and dried. the individual accused of his assassination tried and sentenced to prison did it. his motives. it was behind the mob, et.

cetera, we don't know. i care not to speculate on things -- i recommend a book. "reclaiming history. he put chairlts manson away. he wrote a one and a half million book he takes each conspiracy. and he comes to the conclusion i come to oswald tried to shoot a famous general. he had actually stalked jimmy carter for awhile trying to shoot him. i think part doesn't rebel steer.

we think of kennedy as the liberal icon. the guy who likes civil right. the guy on the left. sometimes our minds go it doesn't make sense. it's a troubled young man. and so we just look far bigger reason to that. >> certainly. the best book on that is robert unfinished life. he was given the first full

access of the president's medical records by the kennedy family. his health condition was serious. he had a disease that is not curable entirely. when he was first diagnosed for him in 197 47 they told him probably live another ten years. we don't know that. it was pretty serious. it was a constant concern of his. his brother robert said there wasn't a day on earth where my brother wasn't in severe florida pain. it seems to be true. >> over here.

i remember the event today. sometimes we joke or make gas about turning 40. but he was not joking. i don't know quite why. i know, damn well that he was not happy. i was not aware as others were about his medical and physical problems. he might have thought i'm going up here and now i'm going downhill. it was a rude awakening, especially for a lot dog like he was.

how much credit given for the civil rights initiative that follow his presidency? his love was foreign affairs. he worried civil rights demonstrations embarrassed the united states abroad. he was made at the black activists for causing the incidents. he thought generated bad hmm. he made a number of token things he thought more than anything could hope to do in that environment. because as i mentioned the congress was controlled by a

coalition of conservative and democrats of the south. conservative republicans from the midwest. he felt he was pushing as hard as he could. he didn't want to lose support. and then the spring of '63 several things happened. thrption all of these things. no progress was being made. martin luther king and the other leaders played the last card. they asked 1,000 black school children to lead the marches. and bull connor, the famous public safety officer brought out the police dog and fire

houses and the picture of that sickened the whole nation including the president. it began to click. lyndon johnson went to him and said it's time for you to do something on civil rights. we think of johnson is a southerner was far more -- that was because he spent a lot of his life teaching in segregated schools, mexico-american kids and said you need to the moral authority of the presidency behind civil rights. finally, the federal government was able to pressure university of alabama to integrate peacefully unlike the situation in mississippi the year before. there weren't riots that killed people. george wallace made a big show and stepped aside. so that day kennedy said i want to go on tv tonight and propose civil rights. these people have been bugging me about. they hasn't written a speech. it was being written as he was on live tv. they were handing him paper. and he said it's a moral issue.

that's when he finally teed it up. not a political issue but a moral issue. it was an important turning point. it take him awhile to get to the point. [inaudible question] did you interview other people who were children when it happened? >> oh, gosh. y. i interviewed several people who had children and their comments about how it affected their families were also very poignant to me as well. as scott mentioned, it really -- people today young people today can't fathom what was like that weekend. i remember if vividly.

there was nothing else on television the three channels we had then. storeses closed, sports evented were canceled. people didn't go out of their homes. or they went to other people's homes to watch the coverage of the funeral. and then on sunday morning, i'm sitting in front of my parent's television in the livering room of our home and i see a man get shot live on television. it never happened before in the history of this country. television, as mr. brokhaw mentioned during the slide show was the center fiewj for the country. we drew from it in some way. it was an extraordinary event. far beyond, i believe, as he says in his book "reclaiming history." far beyond what happened with the september 11th attacks. tragically more than 2,000

people died that day, but very few people knew who they were. as scott mentioned. kennedy's assassination was a death in the family. it was that moving. it was that tragic. it was that extraordinary, and it affected everyone. and for for me at age 7 it was the catalyst for my career in journalism and in communications. >> i wasn't sure i was going pull it out. i was 6. i was in first grade. as the dean mentioned, we got sent home. i was in wyoming and i remember the principal saying we're sending you home. the president has been shot. we'll let you know when school resume. i went home and realized it was a big deal saturday morning there was no cartoons. but i remember being fascinated. i sat down -- a number of drawings my mother saved over the year of a 6-year-old view of the funeral procession. you can see the flag coffin and

over here. i was assassinated by the horse with the boots backwards and the riderless horse. ic it did. one of the -- i mentioned most things. i mention the children. and caroline was roughly our age. john a little sooner. if you were a kid you could identify with it. the kids were on tv with the mother, and so i think it really did have a strong impact on children of a certain age, if they remember it. and i don't know that it put me in a profession i was going to be in. i remember it being a big dream and having extremely vivid memories. it was unique. >> thank you. there are 37 images in my book, five of which john ken i can have never been seen before. publicly. my favorite image is not a photograph. it's a drawing. it's a drawing that was give to the son of robert mcnamara,

who was a play mate then of john junior and caroline. and a month after his father was assassinated, john jr. drew pictures for his friend, young mr. knack mara and dick dictated a letter to him that his mother wrote. and the picture is particularly poignant. the illustration. john jr. drew his favorite thing, airplanes. of course, years later he died in an airplane crash. that was very moving to me. >> two last questions. with all of your interviews you have done and the research, both of you. kind of heard scott what is the most shocking or surprising with

reagan's intelligence? but can both of you maybe share something that you both shocked or surprised learning? >> i think the one thing that surprised me the most they had not heard about much was extraordinary research probably knew about this. one of the very interesting people i interviewed was a close friend of john kennedy. who introduced him to jacqueline . they were close friends all through his life. the gentleman was a reporter far newspaper in tennessee with the d.c. bureau. the night before the kennedys left for texas, he just had a funny feeling about it and called his friend jack, the president. and jack had no qualm about going to dallas. at least he said he doesn't. but he was angry sell and had been for the previous five or six weeks at israel. israel had acquired the

knowledge to create an atomic bomb or nuclear bomb. one of the two. and was very angry that he had to find out about this from the cia. and was determined not to let israel actually create the bomb and detonate it. that was one thing i had not known about john kennedy's presidency previously. >> i think the most surprising thing was the premise of the book how much similar so many ways reagan and kennedy. how they were raised, the families, rakish fathers, pious mothers, big brothers that beat them up all the time. and the policy. certainly republicans wanted to use jack kennedy. he kept -- before reagan did. this is okay. so there's that. and specifically to john ceb i did i think sad to me was how the strange the kennedy marriage. as i grew up looking at any time you go 0 to the supermarket.

the greatest love affair in history to find out they had a strange relationship was sad to me. .. that was the soulmate he was looking for. i think if he had been more open to jackie they might have had that relationship too, but they didn't.

see one more? no, we need the microphone. >> i believe in your book you mentioned they never really met each other, reagan and kennedy. >> oh that is true. it's very odd that they hadn't met. they both were close in age. they were both very much of hollywood. joe kennedy senior was a heavy investor in hollywood. people think he made his money as a bootlegger. that's not true. he bought and sold studios and created the rko