That Time That JFK Came to Town
MEA CULPA FOR THIS EPISODE:
I - one hundred percent - know that Gavin Newsom is currently the governor of California. I have no idea why I say it’s Jerry Brown at one point. I mean, it was Jerry Brown, until January 2019…maybe I was just wistfully living in the past for a brief second…
People tend to remember that time that John F. Kennedy showed up in Dallas to make a speech. The drive from the airfield through town, with crowds lining the streets just to get a glimpse of his car, a wave, as he drove past. Well, it turned out he did that sort of thing all the time.
Duluth, MN. Tillamook, OR. Milford, PA. Lots of places have stories about that time that JFK came to town. And, it turns out, so does Alameda, CA.
Although it was not so much what he did while he was here, but rather what he did when he left, that has captured our imaginations for the past 60 or so years.
JFK drops off the missus at the airport in Washington. 8 March 1962.
Cecil Stoughton. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston (Public domain).
Jackie at the Taj Mahal, Agra, India. 15 March 1962
Cecil Stoughton. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston (Public domain).
Kennedy inspecting the troops behind the Control Tower, Alameda CA. The rear sides of Rock Wall Winery, Natel Energy, and Faction Brewery can be seen at the left. 23 March 1962.
White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston (Public domain).
Leaving the Alameda Navy base and turning onto Webster Street, Alameda CA. 23 March 1962.
White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston (Public domain).
President John F. Kennedy addresses a Charter Day crowd of 88,000 in Memorial Stadium. 23 March, 1962.
Sidenote about Salinger:
When JFK went to visit Eisenhower, he took along a couple staff members, including his press secretary, Pierre Salinger. Salinger was an interesting guy. A San Francisco native who attended Lowell and then SF State, he had been a child prodigy on the piano. He would attract the notice of Robert Kennedy in the 1950s, and his work on Kennedy’s presidential campaign shoehorned him into the press secretary role, where he managed to impress everybody from Jackie Kennedy to Nikita Krushchev. After Kennedy’s death, Governor Pat Brown appointed him as a senator to fill a vacancy, but RFK’s death in 1968, for which he was present, being one of the managers of the campaign, soured him on both politics and the U.S., and he moved to France, where he would become a bureau chief for ABC.
Frank Sinatra loving on Kennedy, before the 1962 snubbing.
Sidenote about Bing Crosby, at the time JFK was visiting:
In 1962, Bing Crosby was 59 years old. He’d just wrapped up shooting in England, along with his old pal Bob Hope, on a new movie, called The Road to Hong Kong. It would be the very last of their Road movies, a series of movies they’d done together beginning back in 1940, when they’d also had Dorothy Lamour in the mix. By 1962, however, 47-year-old Dorothy had been dubbed too old, and was replaced by a 29-year-old Joan Collins. The movie is pretty bad – it came about ten years after the previous installment, and the humor had not aged so well. And the two stars, both 59, come off more like leches than romantic interests to the young Collins. Before Kennedy’s visit, the relationship between Bing and Frank Sinatra had been good – so much so that Sinatra and his best buddy Dean Martin had flown all the way to England back in August just to do a tiny two minute cameo in the movie, which incidentally revolves around a Russian/American space race, and culminates in a no-return trip to another planet, Plutonius, where Crosby and Hope find the Italians, aka Sinatra and Martin, have already beat them there. It’s a hot mess. In the final scene the two elderly leches arrange to share the romantic attentions of poor Joan Collins, with each claiming alternate days, only to spy Sinatra and Martin shaking cocktails ten feet away. Of course, Dino immediately grabs Joan and starts kissing her, only to then hand her off to Frank. It’s hilarious, and not creepy at all. That’s a lie. It’s very creepy. Anyway, these were the guys the president hung out with in his free time, and the exact kind of guys that would be hanging out with the president of the United States that weekend. Although, for the record, it appears that Bing himself may not even have been there –though he was in town – just a few days before he’d recorded a radio program with Rosemary Clooney, but it seems that he had simply let his friend borrow his house to throw an extended party. Now that’s a pal.
Jackie and Lee looking very natural on a camel. 25
March 1962.
Cecil Stoughton. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston (Public domain).
Kennedy says “thank you” to Bing, but it is unknown the extent of what he was thanking him for.
Papers of John F. Kennedy. Presidential Papers. President's Office Files. Subjects. Trips: California, March 1962: 23-25
Sidenote about Bing’s House:
Bing Crosby would own a number of houses in Palm Springs over the years, and this would not be the only time JFK would retreat to Bing’s house, and so the Marilyn Monroe night is sometimes – mistakenly - linked to a house in Rancho Mirage, a mistake only enhanced by the fact that the guest suite there is called the JFK wing. But – in case you were looking to buy the $5 million Rancho Mirage house because of its history – be forewarned that the history of that particular house does not include a tryst between JFK and Marilyn. Which is not to say it’s not a beautiful house. I think it’s actually more beautiful than the real tryst house in Palm Desert. So go ahead and buy it. Why not.
The after-party at the home of movie executive Arthur Krim: Monroe stands between Robert and John Kennedy. The party followed a democratic fundraiser at Madison Square Garden honoring John F. Kennedy’s birthday where Marilyn famously sang “Happy Birthday.” New York, NY. 19 May 1962
Cecil Stoughton. The LIFE Images Collection. Getty Images.
Marilyn Monroe leaving Columbia Hospital after her breakdown.
