Born on May 29, 1917, in Brookline, Massachusetts, John F. Kennedy was the second of nine kids. His parents, Joseph and Rose Kennedy, were associates of two of Boston's most famous Irish broad political families. In spite of unrelenting health problems during his babyhood and teenaged years, Jack led an advantaged youth, presence private schools such as Canterbury and Choate and expenditure summers in Hyannis Port on Cape Cod.
Joe Kennedy, a hugely winning entrepreneur and an early follower of Franklin D. Roosevelt, was selected chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1934 and in 1937 was named U.S. representative to Great Britain. As a student at Harvard University, Jack traveled in Europe as his father's escritoire. His senior thesis about British's unpreparedness for war was later published as an commended book, "Why England Slept" (1940).
Jack joined the U.S. Navy in 1941 and two years later was sent to the South Pacific, where he was given authority of a Patrol-Torpedo (PT) boat. In August 1943, a Japanese destructive force struck the dexterity, PT-109, in the Solomon Islands.
John F Kennedy’s Politics:
Abandoning plans to be a reporter, Jack left the Navy by the end of 1944. Less than a year later, he was back in Boston preparing for a run for legislative body in 1946. As a reasonably traditional Democrat, and backed by his father's affluence, Jack won his party's recommendation handily and approved the mostly working-class Eleventh District by nearly three to one over his Republican adversary in the general election.
He entered the 80th parliament in January 1947, at the age of 29, and instantly attracted notice (as well as some disapproval from older members of the Washington firm) for his youthful facade and relaxed, familiar style. Kennedy won reelection to the House of legislative body in 1948 and 1950, and in 1952 ran effectively for the Senate, defeating the admired Republican incumbent Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. On September 12, 1953, Kennedy wedded the beautiful socialite and reporter Jacqueline (Jackie) Lee Bouvier.
Two years later, he was forced to experience a painful process on his back. While improving from the surgery, Jack wrote one more best-selling book, "Profiles in Courage," which won the Pulitzer Prize for memoirs in 1957. (The book was later exposed to be mostly the work of Kennedy's longtime assistant, Theodore Sorenson.)
