JFK...A Hero?

In the song "He Was Born to Live" on the JFK 50: A Memorial Album,there's this verse:

He asked our help while on his way

To let the sun shine in,

We thought of him as a hero back then,

Didn’t mind his feet of clay.

(Click here to see the video post of the complete song.)

Is JFK a hero? In my opinion...yes. A good many people regarded him as a hero in the late '50s. And after he was killed in office, many more felt the same way. He died serving his country as its Commander in Chief. 

The Oxford dictionary defines a hero as

• a person, typically a man, who is admired or idealized for courage, outstanding achievements, or noble qualities:a war hero

By now, most people have heard the story of JFK's heroism as Commander of PT 109 in the Pacific in WWII. The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library site says that later when asked how he became a hero, Kennedy said, "It was involuntary. They sank my boat."

That's Kennedy on the far right, bare chested and in shades. On a night mission, his patrol boat was rammed and cut in half by a Japanese destroyer. Two of JFK's men were killed. He and his remaining crew members gathered in the dark water and decided to swim to an island over three miles away.

JFK, a strong swimmer, towed one of the injured men by clamping his life jacket strap between his teeth. Over the next several days, the men moved to other nearby islands looking for food and water. They encountered a couple of natives who took a message on a coconut shell to a nearby US base. Kennedy and his men were eventually rescued. You can read the whole story in more detail at the JFK Library site.  

For his bravery during the incident, Kennedy was awarded the Navy and Marine Corps Medal and for his injuries was given a Purple Heart.

So he meets the "courage" and "war hero" parts of the standard.

But what about the "outstanding achievements and noble qualities" part? As president, I think he accomplished at least two "outstanding" things: he started and inspired others to follow through on the program to reach the moon, and he did more than any president up to that time to champion civil rights.

But what about the "nobility" standard?

Many point to the revelations about his treatment of women and many sexual affairs as proof of his poor character. It has been reported that he had various one day or one night stands while president. And in my JFK 50 drama (see column on right) a feminist character says that's not all.

Kennedy apparently had several longer affairs. Frank Sinatra introduced him to Judith Campbell Exner who also had mafia connections. It is also reported that he had a liaison with suspected spy, Ellen Rometsch, as well as a relationship with promiscuous Mariella Novotny, the notorious woman who also slept with British war minister John Profumo and a soviet military attaché. More recently, Mimi Alford, a White House intern during JFK’s tenure, has described her long sexual relationship with him. And finally this catalogue of promiscuity wouldn’t be complete without celebrities he was rumored to have bedded, stars such as Angie Dickinson, Kim Novak, and Marilyn Monroe.

Everything that's been said about Kennedy’s sexual indiscretions may be true, but heroes are human beings, and that means they are flawed just like us. 


As far as I know, no mythological or historical heroes were absolutely perfect from a moral, especially sexual perspective. But they came through in a time of desperation and fear, and their leadership and courage inspired people to elevate them above their human shortcomings.