All language subtitles for jfk.the.making.of.a.president.2017.1080p.web.h264-cbfm

(ethereal music)

(crowd cheering)

- [John] In your hands, my
fellow citizens, more than mine

will rest the final success
or failure of our course.

- [Narrator] John Fitzgerald Kennedy

was the 35th president
of the United States.

He was the young, handsome
leader who promised a new hope.

- [John] The torch has been passed

to a new generation of
Americans born in this century.

- [Narrator] A modern
politician for a modern America.

- Ask not what your
country can do for you,

ask what you can do for your country.

(crowd cheering)

(rising tense music)

- [Reporter] We know it
is the president's car.

Another car directly behind
the presidential car-

Another Secret Service man
spread-eagle over them.

We don't know-

- [Narrator] However, the life of JFK

is so often defined by his death.

- [Reporter] The president
of the United States is dead.

- [Narrator] His
assassination in November 1963

came to be seen as a
turning point for the US,

a shift from an age of innocence

to one of violence and change.

JFK himself was transformed
from man into legend.

- This young, handsome, intelligent,

terrifically photogenic
but honest political leader

was a breath of fresh air
on the political scene.

- I can't think of any other leader

in a Western democratic context

who developed such a fantastic image.

- For a college boy to
give his brand label

to invent a new way of being a politician

and a new kind of marketed
politics, this was revolutionary.

- [Narrator] This reading
of history can disguise

the fascinating and contradictory
man behind the myth.

- [Nigel] Jack Kennedy never
performed very well at school.

He was clearly gifted,

but he really scraped
by in his final grades.

- He was the walking
textbook of illnesses.

It's astonishing he survived childhood.

- People sometimes assume
that it was almost accidental

that JFK happened to have
been in Berlin in 1939,

a few days before the declaration of war,

that he'd been to Palestine,
that he'd been to Indochina.

But it's clear from the diaries he kept

that was what excited him
about the study of politics.

- There's this quality
of hope and admiration

and optimism that he projected
that really inspired people

and something about his personality

that continues to interest
and engage people.

- [Narrator] JFK was
recognized by millions,

but known by few.

This program will explore
the making of a president.

(pensive music)

Born in Massachusetts on
the 29th of May, 1917,

John Fitzgerald Kennedy,
known familiarly as Jack,

was the second son of
multimillionaire investor

and politician Joe Kennedy.

- Jack Kennedy was born
into a Boston Irish family.

It was a middle-class family

without any particular
political pretensions,

the father working in banking

and a mother who actually
came from a political family,

a Democratic family.

Her father had been the mayor of Boston.

- Rose Kennedy's father,
John "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald,

was a real force in
Massachusetts politics.

He was elected to Congress three times.

He was elected mayor of Boston.

And Edward Kennedy
would say in later years

one of the reasons the Kennedys

were always so strong in
Massachusetts politically

was because of Honey Fitzgerald,
the maternal grandfather.

They had a grand home in
Hyannis Port on Cape Cod.

They had a home in Palm Beach, Florida.

- It was a life of prep schools,

of luxury, of tennis courts,

of really living in a kind of bubble,

very, very far removed from the
mass of the American people.

It was kind of like being
a European aristocrat,

which is essentially what he was.

- [Narrator] Having attended various

local elementary schools,

Jack Kennedy's secondary education

formally started at a Catholic school,

but it soon became apparent
he was unhappy there.

It was decided that he switch

and follow his brother
to Choate Rosemary Hall,

a private prep school in Connecticut.

Although the school is thought to be

the inspiration for the famous

"ask not what your country
can do for you" speech,

Jack was no happier here than
he was at his previous school.

One thing Choate did have, though,

was his brother, Joe Kennedy, Jr.

But where his brother seemingly
excelled, Jack did not.

- His older brother is
already there at Choate

and he's kind of the golden boy.

He's doing fantastically well.

He's on all the sports teams.

He's a very diligent student.

Jack Kennedy isn't really a
diligent student at this point.

He's a little bit badly behaved.

- [Nigel] He was clearly
very smart and very lazy,

and not only lazy, he didn't
seem to want to excel.

- He was bright, he was charming.

He had some interest in
history and in biography

and he did read, but he was
a rather indolent student.

And at his prep school,

he ended up graduating 65th out of 110,

so that's about midway, in fact,
below halfway in the class.

If you look at his academic
record, for example,

it's far less impressive
than say Richard Nixon's.

- He chafes at the discipline
of the Choate School

and he organizes a club among his friends

called the Muckers Club,

sort of essentially designed
to break school rules.

- He was, in fact, expelled to begin with,

but his father pleaded he
should be kept at school.

But he was required to sit
down with a psychologist

and the psychologist said,

"Jack, you seem to do
very well in your classes,

"but you don't try very hard.

"What is going on?"

And he came up with a
brilliant answer and he said,

"Well, my brother does very well.

"Why should I be doing the same?

"He does it all for me." (laughing)

(gentle music)

- Jack's childhood was in
many ways a fortunate one,

but he was plagued by illness.

Long stretches of bedrest

and prolonged courses of heavy medication

began in childhood.

This would set the blueprint
for the rest of his life.

- As a young child,

he'd had a very bad case of scarlet fever

and there was a huge outbreak
in Boston at the time.

His father and his
grandfather, Honey Fitz,

had to pull strings

to get him into the
best hospital in Boston.

- [Nigel] He was continually ill

either in the school
sanatorium or in hospital.

And worse still was the
fact that very rarely

were they able to diagnose
what was wrong with him.

- It meant that he had
long periods off school.

There was not only the scarlet fever,

there was the pneumonia,
there was the asthma.

- He had major spinal problems.

He was born with one leg
slightly short than the other,

and this created a long-term
problem with his back.

And it never leaves him, that problem.

It's always there.

- [Nigel] I think what's remarkable

is that he wanted to enjoy
the health that others had.

He developed a jokey sort
of heroism, if you like,

that he was coping with
what for normal people

would be considered
life-threatening diseases,

but just wouldn't take them seriously.

- It's interesting to
speculate on the impact

of his very severe health
problems on his mentality.

And I think what it left him with

was a live-for-the-moment mentality.

I think there was part
of Kennedy that thought,

"I'm not gonna be around for long,

"so I may as well enjoy myself

"as much as I can while I can."

- [Narrator] There were
underappreciated depths

to the younger Kennedy
boy which many overlooked.

He used his frequent
bouts of illness to read,

developing his mind and imagination

through the works of
Robert Louis Stevenson,

Winston Churchill, and others.

Although academically
he was just getting by,

his self-education was invaluable.

As both Jack and his brother matured,

their father would instill
a rivalry within them both,

which the businessman Joe
Sr. evidently thrived off.

- The Kennedys had to excel at everything.

They had to excel at sport, at academe,

in debating, in writing, in literature.

This family, in other words,

were being turned into a
brand, groomed for success.

- [Nigel] The father had such
high expectations of them

and he put them under so much pressure.

But also, there was a certain degree

of sexual competition going on.

Both of the two older boys
were extremely handsome.

They brought home lots of girlfriends.

And the father openly not only
flirted with the girlfriends

but propositioned them.

- It wasn't just that he was a philander

of spectacular proportions,

but that he was completely open about it.

His sons knew about it.

And the advice which he
apparently gave his sons was,

"You need to get laid
as often as possible."

But also with his affairs,
he was open about it.

They knew about it.

And so, obviously, that's
something he passed on

to the sons, including John Kennedy.

- The good side is that Joe Kennedy

took an acute interest
in all his children.

In that sense, he was a good
father because, remember,

in that generation among the elite,

both American and British,

fathers would often
neglect their children.

They'd maroon them in
boarding schools for years.

They'd take no interest in them,

whereas, of course, Joe Kennedy
took an aggressive interest

in the lives of his children.

(brooding music)

- [Narrator] Jack would
complete his studies at Choate.

And although his grades
were nothing special,

he still managed to
gain entry into Harvard.

But it would be that summer

where the real education
of Jack Kennedy began.

Coinciding with his father's appointment

to the ambassadorship to Britain,

Jack would begin a number
of trips to 1930s Europe.

The political tensions
and shifting of power

fascinated this young American.

He would witness some
of the 20th century's

most historic events firsthand.

These visits would inform his future

in ways he could never imagine.

The first trip to Europe that
Jack Kennedy took was in 1937.

He and a school friend, Lem Billings,

sailed from the US, taking
Jack's sports car with them,

and spent 10 weeks driving around Europe.

The following year, in 1938,
Joe Kennedy Sr. was appointed

US ambassador to the United
Kingdom by President Roosevelt.

Jack again made a trip to Europe,

but this time it wasn't
explicitly for pleasure.

He traveled to England
to work in the embassy,

where he would get his first taste

of the inner workings of politics.

- This showed him the international scene

of global high politics and
what could follow from them.

It was an extraordinary kind of education

because his father, you see,
had not only a front-row seat

but his father had a unique position

in relation to the government

of British Prime Minister
Neville Chamberlain.

So, we're not just talking
about any ambassador's son.

Joe Kennedy was at the
vortex of European events

in the late-1930s and he was
a major actor on that scene.

- It was while Jack was there

that he became fascinated
by the rearmament

that was going on in England

and the growing rise of
fascism on the continent.

- This gave him extraordinary insight

into the nature of Hitler, of Hitlerism,

the nature of charisma.

It was an extraordinary kind
of tutelage, if you like,

into the power of
propaganda because he saw,

unlike historians,

that this whole regime
was about propaganda.

The whole thing was driven

by the most brilliant levels of propaganda

history had ever seen.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] The year after,

he would travel to
Europe for a third time.

This time, however, he
did not stay in London.

He traveled to the Middle
East, the Soviet Union,

and the Balkans to research
for his final-year thesis.

He then went to
Czechoslovakia and Germany.

What he witnessed was
Europe on the brink of war.

He left Berlin on September the 1st, 1939,

the day Germany invaded Poland.

(soldiers yelling)

- I think this trip had a
lasting influence on him

in the sense that he was someone

who truly believed in being there.

- He was very interested
in political history.

That's what he wanted to study

and he wanted to see it firsthand.

- He realized that Europe
was on the verge of meltdown.

He wanted to educate himself
onto the global scene,

and this was the best and most
practical way of doing it.

- Kennedy has a faith in his own judgment

and his own perception, and
being there on the ground,

traveling around, becomes a
motif of his political career.

- Here was an opportunity

where he could actually
visit these countries

simply with his passport

and a letter from his father (laughing)

as the United States
Ambassador to Britain.

(solemn music)

- [Narrator] Jack returned home

and started to write his dissertation.

Thanks to his father, it would be a work

which would live beyond the
realms of his Harvard studies.

- The idea was to see
how slow Britain had been

to recognize the threat of Germany.

His professors were
very laudatory, really,

because, after all, it
was unusual for a student

to be able to have such
firsthand information.

It was shown to a friend of Jack's father

who worked at the "New
York Times," Arthur Krock,

and he said, "This is an
awfully good dissertation.

"This would make a book."

- In the summer of 1940,
John Kennedy's first book,

"Why England Slept," is published.

By the spring of '41,

it sold something like 80,000
copies in America and Britain,

although there is the rumor

that his father bought up 30,000 copies

and stored them at his
home in Hyannis Port.

- [Nigel] For the United States,

which was still a neutral country

but looking at what was
happening in Europe,

this seemed almost like a wake-up call.

- It establishes a key
component of his image,

which is that he is a man of letters.

This is someone who is
an authentic intellectual

who publishes books.

It's also important because it furnishes

the cornerstone of his
foreign policy ideology.

You want to understand
what John Kennedy is saying

about foreign policy during the Cold War,

if you wanna understand his foreign policy

during his presidency, you
can still learn a lot about it

by reading "Why England Slept."

- [Narrator] For Jack,
the book seemed to be

a turning point in his life.

Up until now, he had lived in the shadow

of his more able older brother.

The attack on Pearl Harbor
made the war a global concern.

And like many families,

the Kennedys were not
immune to its effect.

The political life of Joe Sr.
would be the first casualty.

(tense music)

- As ambassador, he began to see himself

more and more as the peacemaker of Europe,

that he could do a deal.

He could get the British prime minister

and the fuhrer together around a table,

and that somehow he would be
able to make it all come right.

When it turned out that he
had misunderstood Hitler,

when it was obvious that
Britain was standing alone,

Joseph Kennedy lost faith in Britain.

- [Nicholas] He had very
much the businessman's

fix-it mentality.

He really didn't understand

all this blood and soil mystical stuff.

He thought you could do deals.

He thought you could pay them.

- That becomes a deeply
controversial position

and unpopular with the British people

and he becomes an embarrassment.

It's why often in JFK's later campaigns,

although Joseph Kennedy
is pulling the strings

behind the scenes, he's often
not out there in public.

So, by 1941, his political career is over.

- The president of the United States

wasn't even using his ambassador to London

because he didn't think
Joseph Kennedy was right

and he didn't think the
prime minister of Britain,

Neville Chamberlain, was right.

The president believed
that Winston Churchill

had the makings of the one person

who could stand up to Hitler,

and that left Joseph
Kennedy out in the cold.

- [Narrator] Despite
his ongoing ill health,

Jack was eager to sign
up for the US forces.

Securing a doctor's certificate,

he managed to enroll in the Navy

just before the Pearl Harbor attack.

Jack was thirsty for action,

but his health meant he was stationed

at a desk in Washington,
working in naval intelligence.

It would be during this time
that he would meet the first

and arguably the greatest
love of his life, Inga Arvad.

(gentle music)

- He met this beautiful Danish woman

who was seven years older
than him, Inga Arvad.

- This is one of the few times in his life

where he's very emotionally involved.

I think it's partly physical attraction.

She's very beautiful and she's worldly.

- [Nigel] She was a
journalist in Washington

and pretty much everybody she interviewed

fell in love with her,
including Jack Kennedy.

But she was drawn to him.

He'd been to Europe,

so he had a feeling for her as a European.

He was fascinated by politics.

And the fact that she had
interviewed Hitler and Goring

before she left Europe,

that made her very special in his eyes.

- The trouble is that
Adolf Hitler adored her.

The fuhrer had said that she
was the ideal Aryan woman.

She was really seen in
Washington as a kind of Mata Hari

and she was feared.

- [Narrator] Her ties to
Hitler and the Nazi elite

meant the FBI were observing her.

Private conversations and liaisons

between her and Jack were recorded.

No one, it seemed, approved of the affair.

- His family, she's not exactly
wife material in their view.

She's not Catholic, she's twice divorced.

But also, his superiors
in naval intelligence

are concerned about this young
naval intelligence officer

caught up in a passionate relationship

with this beautiful woman

who we're not sure if she maybe is a spy.

- He was crazily in love with this woman,

told his father he was gonna marry her.

The father said, "No, you can't."

And finally, the father
spoke to Inga and said,

"Listen, you are never gonna marry my son.

"Get that out of your mind.

"This cannot be.

"You will get locked up, so back off."

That put an end to the relationship.

He admitted to somebody I interviewed

that she was the love of his
life, but it was not to be.

- [Narrator] Although his father

was against him entering naval combat,

Joe Sr. did end up eventually
facilitating his son's wish.

Jack became the pilot of
a patrol torpedo boat.

These boats were small
and ready for combat.

It's unclear if the guilt of
ending the affair with Inga

caused Joe Sr. to change his mind,

but he made sure Jack's boat

was always out of hostile waters.

However, an unexpected show of
aggression from the Japanese

around the Solomon Islands

meant Jack would eventually
come under attack.

The war would have
bittersweet consequences

for the Kennedy family.

Although tragedy would strike in Europe,

honors would flow at home.

(tense music)

On the night of August the 1st, 1943,

while performing routine
patrols with two other PT boats,

Jack spotted an enemy ship.

Before he could react and attack,

his boat was rammed and sliced in two

by the Japanese destroyer.

(water sloshing)

- It's in the middle of the night.

They don't have proper radar.

They don't have good physical
sighting at that point,

and ultimately his boat
is actually stove in two.

Some of his crew members
are killed instantly,

but some of them survive
and they're in the waters,

and Jack Kennedy is able
to rescue some of them.

(water sloshing)

- He performs heroically.

Using a belt in his mouth,

he tows a crew member
three-and-a-half miles to an island.

- This is a man who has
extensive health problems,

has extreme back problems.

He swims for five hours to
get those men to safety.

- Nine of the men survived.

They managed to swim to
this literally desert island

to stay there until Jack Kennedy arranged

through a local native to
get out a coconut (laughing)

with a message saying
they were still alive,

and they were finally rescued.

- His older brother has always been

better than him at school.

There was a competitive dynamic
between these two brothers,

and Joe Jr. maybe feels

that he needs to prove himself even more.

He's already gone above and beyond.

And then, maybe because of the heroics

of his younger brother,

maybe out of his own
sense of duty and service,

he actually volunteers for
a very dangerous mission

to bomb a German airbase in Belgium.

(airplane rumbling)

- [Nicholas] No one is ever
compelled to go on a mission

where the probability is
that he will lose his life.

Essentially, he became
an American kamikaze.

They were wiring up bombers,
filling them with explosives

to attack the V rocket and
placements in occupied Europe.

- [Narrator] The mission failed.

The bombs exploded onboard the plane

before it reached its target.

Joe Kennedy Jr. was still
on board and died instantly.

For the whole Kennedy family,
this was a tragic loss.

Whilst Jack was still coming to terms

with the death of his brother,
word was beginning to spread

about his heroic actions in the Pacific.

- There's a writer for "Life"
magazine called John Hersey,

and he approaches Kennedy and says,

"I'd like to write an article

"on what you've done for
the "New Yorker" magazine."

Now, Joseph Kennedy,
working behind the scenes,

gets it republished
with "Reader's Digest."

A large number of people in
1944 read this vivid account

of John Kennedy's bravery in World War II.

So, 1940 was "Why England Slept."

The idea of him as an
intellectual, a man of letters,

of cultural sophistication,
that idea is established.

With his service in World War II,

a second element in his
image is established,

which is that he's a war hero.

So, what you have is the idea
that he has brains and brawn.

- People have speculated
that it was just the death

of the older brother that
pushed JFK into politics.

That is nonsense.

The fact is, from the FBI records,

JFK was talking about going into politics

and even going as far as the presidency

way back at the time of Pearl Harbor

in his conversations with Inga Arvad

to the extent that the brother
might have been in the way.

But the fact that he had been
killed opened the way for JFK

to accept the family mantle, if you like,

and the father was willing to fund it.

- [Narrator] After the PT boat incident,

Jack was left with chronic back issues

and he was honorably
discharged from the Navy.

His brother was dead and his
father's political career over.

He found employment as a journalist,

but the question about what
he should do next lingered.

It was then decided

that Jack would run for Congress in 1946.

Again, Joe Sr. would be
instrumental in making this happen.

- He will run for Congress,

and his father helps make that happen

by inducing local Democratic
congressman to vacate his seat

and run for mayor of Boston instead.

It's not a shoo-in for
Jack Kennedy, though.

He doesn't necessarily have
strong ties in the community,

so they have to start really
building connections in Boston.

- Behind the scenes,

Joseph Sr. is spending
huge amounts of money.

A typical amount of money

for a congressional candidate in 1946

would have been something like $25,000.

Estimates are that Joe Kennedy spent

at least 10 times that amount,

at least a quarter of a
million, maybe half a million.

- [Nigel] What JFK understood
was the imagery of politics

would transform the business.

His father was an expert in that field.

So, between the two of
them, were able to change

the course of American
politicking and campaigning.

- Joseph Kennedy hired
two advertising agencies

to promote Kennedy's campaign.

So, these advertising agencies
would contact the media,

they would polish his speeches.

He even hired a billboard specialist

who put up 90 billboards
around the city in Boston.

And so, it's an incredibly slick campaign.

- The fact that he was
facing such ill health

did make him aware

that he could project an image
that could cover that up.

He had a certain shyness,
a certain modesty,

which allowed him on camera to come across

as youthful, handsome,
thoughtful, compassionate,

and all those things were genuine.

- [Narrator] The campaigning paid off.

And in November 1946, John
F. Kennedy won the seat

of the 11th District of Massachusetts.

But he soon realized that
the life of a congressman

might not be all that he'd expected.

- Now, the truth was,

as a congressman, he wasn't impressive.

He was quite lazy.

He used to party a lot.

He was also ill a lot and
he often wasn't there.

But he didn't have an
outstanding reputation

when he's in the House of Representatives.

- Actually, he found it very
boring to pursue the interests

of working-class Bostonians.

To defend their rights
was an honorable activity,

but ultimately it's the world
stage which interests him.

It was the great questions
of war and peace.

It was the macro struggle
between communism and democracy

because he saw things
on a global template,

not just the little workings
of the internal parish.

(gentle music)

- [Narrator] Jack serves
six years as a congressman

before turning his sights on the Senate.

- [Nigel] His intent, I think,

always was to go for a Senate seat,

but of course he was very young.

In a state like Massachusetts,

it was going to be a huge battle

and many people said, "Don't try."

- They decide that this is the
time to run for the US Senate

and he'll be running
against Henry Cabot Lodge.

- That campaign was run in
a kind of modern, slick way.

And what's also important to note

is that in the campaign against Lodge,

Kennedy's views on foreign
policy, on the Cold War,

were probably more hard-line than Lodge's.

And probably a good many people,

including some Republicans,
voted for Kennedy in '52

'cause they thought he
would be more hard-line

on the Cold War than Henry Cabot Lodge.

- [Nigel] The family
recognized that they had a star

and that actually people
would like to meet the star

and shake hands.

It was very effective.

- Like the '46 campaign, the
1952 campaign for the Senate

highlighted Kennedy's
appeal as a sex symbol.

Again, there's a lot of talk
of his physical attractiveness

and also his appeal as
a symbol of the family.

The 1952 Senate campaign is most famous

for the teas held by his mother
and his sisters for women.

I think it's estimated
something like 70,000 women

attended those teas,

which coincidentally
was his winning margin.

He defeated lodge by 70,000 votes.

And this might seem an
extravagant statement,

but I think it's entirely defensible

that more than any other
politician in American history,

Kennedy symbolized family life

because he's seen as a
representative of a dynasty.

(uneasy music)

- [Narrator] The image of John F. Kennedy

was something that had
been worked on and honed.

He was the academic, the
war hero, the family man.

And thanks to the tea parties,

older women wanted to mother him

and younger women wanted to marry him.

Before his Senate victory, though,

his reputation as a playboy
was becoming problematic.

His father agreed that what
Jack needed was a wife.

- When John F. Kennedy
runs for the US Senate,

he's a bachelor.

He's obviously had a lot of relationships

with women over the years,
but he's never gotten married.

And he enters the US Senate
in 1953 as a single man.

There's a article in the
"Saturday Evening Post" headlined,

"The Senate's Gay Young Bachelor,"

and there's a lot made
of his marital status.

Now, at that time, he'd actually
already met Jackie Bouvier.

They had been introduced at a dinner party

in Georgetown by a mutual friend.

- There was certainly a strong
element of mutual attraction.

There's an article in "Life" magazine

in the summer of 1953 with the headline,

"Senator Kennedy Goes A-Courting"

and a picture of him and
Jackie Kennedy on a sailboat,

and it's a very glamorous image.

So, it's a private matter, but
it also affects JFK's image.

- Jackie Kennedy had unique gifts.

She was a remarkable woman,

highly intelligent, highly insightful,

a very, very good foil to him.

Similarly, they'd both come
from very troubled backgrounds.

Her father had been a chronic alcoholic.

Her parents divorced when she was 12.

So, there's a kind of mutual sympathy,

a mutual understanding.

- It's unclear if Jack
really wanted to get married,

if he really saw himself
as a marrying man.

Certainly, he appreciated
freedom in his romantic life.

But it's his father that basically,

with a little bit of
political calculation, says,

"Being the Senate's gay young bachelor

"isn't gonna cut it for very long.

"And if you want to be president,

"you have to have a family
and you have to have a wife

"and the political image is important."

And Jackie Bouvier fits
all of those criteria

for being a political wife

and a political wife to a
prominent Catholic politician.

- He had always built up
the family as a brand.

Remember, in those days,
most men were married at 22.

To be unmarried at 35
raised certain questions.

Were you were a serial philander?

In this case, true.

So, it kind of, if you like,

embourgeoisifized the Kennedy label.

They were anything but bourgeois.

They were very wealthy bohemians.

But this turned it into
something much more palatable,

much more acceptable.

You can't have a king without a queen.

You can't have a prince
without a princess.

And here she came.

- [Narrator] Jack and Jackie married

on September the 12th, 1953,

at St. Mary's Church,
Newport, Rhode Island.

The young senator was
no longer a bachelor.

From the outset, the
marriage was troubled,

both parties conducting illicit affairs,

but the thing they both worked towards

and understood was the image.

Projecting the notion

of a happily married couple was paramount.

- She was pretty perfect in
terms of the senator's wife

and the prospective
presidential nominee's wife.

But as to their actual relationship,

I think the honest truth

from all the people who
were very close to them

was that this was not a love relationship.

- One of the interesting
things about that relationship

is that she was aware of his womanizing.

- [Nicholas] It was common
knowledge within his close circle

and increasingly known more widely.

What really happened is that people

turned a blind eye to it.

They didn't want to know.

- [Nigel] In terms of the marital drama,

it was always on a knife edge,

and there is no doubt that Jackie

was on the point of divorcing.

- There's stories that she
even approached Joe Kennedy

and said that she was
contemplating a divorce.

And it's Joe that patches
that over and says,

"Do what you need to do,

"spend what you need
to do," to some extent,

"to make you happy and to
stay in this marriage,"

because the symbolism and the qualities

that Jackie Kennedy
brought to her public life

were so valuable and he saw that value.

And he knows that without her,

Jack's political career is ruined.

- Prior to his marriage, his sexual appeal

was seen as an exciting
attribute of his bachelorhood.

After his marriage, it's
seen as an attribute

of this marriage to this
glamorous, beautiful woman.

There are a lot of magazines
in the mid- and late-'50s

that have them on the cover

long before he reaches the White House.

So, she adds to his sexual appeal.

- The Kennedy brand was set,

and it was the 1956 Democratic Convention

that threw it into the
national consciousness.

(crowd cheering)

- I give you the next Democratic nominee

and our next president
of the United States,

Adlai E. Stevenson!

- [Narrator] Jack's televised speech

gained so many supporters
that he nearly found himself

as the running mate of Adlai Stevenson.

Had he won, his future presidential hopes

would most certainly have been dashed.

The Democrats lost heavily
in the '56 elections

and Kennedy would continue
working in the Senate.

The convention proved one thing, however:

John F. Kennedy connected.

Who he was, his image, all
resonated with an audience

who eagerly consumed what was fed to them

via televisual broadcast.

On January the 2nd, 1960,

Jack began his campaign for
the Democratic nomination.

That November, he would face
Vice President Richard Nixon

for the White House in what was shaping up

to be one of the tightest
races in history,

but Kennedy's religion
remained a potential issue

for the American electorate.

- In a way, the biggest issue

that Kennedy has to deal with in 1960

is the religious issue of
his own Catholic faith.

No Catholic had ever
been elected president.

What some Americans felt was
that a Catholic president

might owe their allegiance
to Rome, to the Pope,

to the Catholic faith, rather
than to the United States

and the American constitution.

So, this is a major issue
that Kennedy has to deal with,

and I think initially he'd
rather not talk about it.

By the time they get to
the West Virginia Primary

in the spring of 1960, he
decides to tackle it head-on.

- He gives a speech

before the Ministerial
Association of Greater Houston.

So, this is an organization
of Protestant ministers.

And he gives a speech to say,

"I'm not a Catholic
candidate for president.

"I am the Democratic
candidate for president

"who happens to be Catholic."

So, he essentially challenges
this longstanding concern

that Catholics have dual
loyalties in the political sphere,

and it's a watershed moment

in terms of religious discussions

in American political campaigns.

- It adds another element
to this multifaceted image

that he'd been developing,

and that is the idea of
Kennedy as a man of faith.

The whole debate over
Kennedy's religion in 1960

is based on the idea

that his Catholic faith
was important to him.

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] Still, no
one in the Kennedy camp

was certain his assurances
were enough to defeat Nixon.

The decisive moment
would come in late-1960

with a series of televised debates

between the two candidates.

- They have a televised
presidential debate.

And John F. Kennedy behind the scenes

is not the healthiest
of men at this point,

projects health and vigor and vitality.

- The candidates need no introduction.

The Republican candidate, Vice
President Richard M. Nixon,

and the Democratic candidate,
Senator John F. Kennedy.

- He's tanned, he's wearing makeup.

His father's work in Hollywood

means that he knows the
best television men,

and so they've all done
everything they can

to present him perfectly
for the television age.

And Nixon, he's not been very well.

He's had a bit of a temperature.

He looks sort of older and crumpled,

even though they're similar ages.

So, just the images that are
projected are so different,

and that association of Kennedy

with youth modernity in
the future stays with him

and Nixon can never
really identify with that.

(reverent music)

- Because they felt that
the American society

was moving again.

I want us to recapture that image.

- That first television debate

showed the importance of image.

The overwhelming majority of people

who watched that debate
on their television sets

thought that Kennedy
had won comprehensively.

People who listened on radio
thought that it had been a tie,

which says everything about the importance

of the visual image.

Before that first debate,

Kennedy was behind in the polls narrowly,

but he was behind in the polls.

After the first television
debate with Nixon,

Kennedy moved ahead in the
polls and he stayed ahead.

(reverent music continuing)

(ethereal music)

- Jubilant parades and celebration

marked the day JFK won the
race to the White House.

(moving into grim music)

But for the man they were cheering,

this signaled the beginning of the end.

For many, he was the perfect leader

for a forward-thinking America,

yet his policies and political dogma

were taken from his
experience of the past.

His political maneuvering
and independent manner

seemed astute for such a young man,

but behind him was a father

pulling the strings and making decisions.

What made this sickly prep
schoolboy from New England

stand out, however, was his image.

He was everything to everyone

and became the blueprint
for a new form of politics.

All these factors were
carefully crafted together

in the making of a truly modern president.

(pensive music)