Jack and Lem John F. Kennedy and Lem Billings: The Untold Story of an Extraordinary Friendship

by Pitts, David

• ISBN13: 9780306816239
• ISBN10: 0306816237
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-03-25
• Publisher: Da Capo Press

Summary

I'm not that kind of boy," Jack angrily wrote to Lem after his friend made a sexual advance. But Jack didn't end the relationship. From the time John F. Kennedy and Kirk LeMoyne "Lem" Billings met at Choate, until the President's assassination thirty years later, Jack and Lem remained best friends. Lem was a virtual fixture in the Kennedy family who even had his own room at the White House. Drawing on hundreds of letters and telegrams between the two, plus Lem Billings's oral history and interviews with family and friends like Ben Bradlee, Gore Vidal, and Ted Sorensen, award-winning Kennedy scholar David Pitts tells the story of an unusual friendship that endured despite an era of rampant homophobia.

Author Biography

David Pitts has been senior writer at the U.S. Information Agency/Voice of America, and has written for publications including the Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Christian Science Monitor. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. IX
Introduction	p. XIII
The Earlier Period
The Ties That Bind (Choate, 1933-35)	p. 3
Rebels with a Cause (College, 1935-37)	p. 39
Trip of a Lifetime (1937)	p. 52
The Restless Years (1938-41)	p. 68
Courage Under Fire (War, 1941-45)	p. 83
Turning Point (1945)	p. 105
Seeking the Torch (1946-59)	p. 118
Room at the Top (The 1960 Election)	p. 155
The White House Years
One Fine Day (The Inauguration, 1961)	p. 175
First Friend (1961-63)	p. 185
A Touch of Class (1961-63)	p. 225
Blood and Tears (November 22-25, 1963)	p. 239
Lem after Dallas
The Sea Change (1933 v. 1973)	p. 253
His Final Years (1963-81)	p. 270
Acknowledgments	p. 309
Appendices
The Kennedys and the Billingses	p. 316
Timeline	p. 321
Source Notes	p. 325
Bibliography	p. 341
Index	p. 345
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.