Cut Down

"It's right that we all be reminded of what it meant for our elected leader to be cut down
during his term and what it still means today."

An official eight-by-ten photo portrait of him rested on the family bookshelf in our living room for many years: A young, but serious man --tan, with thick hair, suit and tie. In the background was the American flag hanging furled from the pole-stand directly behind his high-backed upholstered office chair. I would grow older to learn that this was President Kennedy who had died from an assassin's bullet when I was too young to remember the tragedy.

After my father passed away many years later, I learned that he had campaigned for Kennedy in 1960, the year I was born, in Peoria, Illinois. Dad had become a Precinct Committeeman for the Democratic Party. He was featured in a Caterpillar Corporation company magazine article that showed photos of him meeting with members of his precinct during the election year. It was one of those employee profiles that companies sometimes run in their "Getting-to-know" so and so sections of their internal publications. Dad looked so young and earnest in those photos in his Mad-Men-Era shirt and slacks carrying a dark professional-looking folder to his appointments. The following year he would resign from his position in the photography department of Caterpillar and move our family to Florida with the prospect of helping my grand father run a motel in Daytona Beach. 

We were just in time to witness the Cuban Missile Crisis and watch the showdown between Kennedy and Russian President Kruschev that brought the human race closer to the brink of nuclear destruction than any time in the history of the world up to that time and since. My mom, who was a school teacher then, told me parents were instructed to send canned goods to school with their children in case they needed to bunker down in the building during a missile attack. This reminded me of the ridiculously futile "duck and cover" safety drills that were practiced around the county and parodied in such movies as the animated film "Iron Giant".

My dad's support and trust in Kennedy was not misplaced. It turns out that the Missile Crisis of the same week in October that I turned two years old was to be our young President's shining moment. He averted nuclear war by standing up not only to the Russian leader but to hawkish advisors who were urging him to nuke Cuba. The post-apocalyptic scenarios that are popular in Science Fiction came all too close to being reality.

I wish I could ask my dad how he felt when that same President who had inspired him to grass-roots political involvement had been cut down in the prime of life and at the height of his popularity. By the time of Kennedy's assassination, our family had returned to Illinois. The motel management gig didn't pan out. We moved back in the September of 1963 and had become pretty much settled again when Kennedy's motorcade came under fire that day in late November. As a three-year-old at that time, I have no memories of the event. My earliest awareness of the fallen hero is of that eight-by-ten photo collecting dust on the top of our family bookshelf. 

As a middle-aged man on the fifty-year anniversary of Kennedy's brutal death, I viewed the film footage and photos of a man who was then several years younger than I am now. I have strong emotions when I see this young father, husband, son and brother being taken from not only his family but from the rest of us. He was our President and I feel outrage that he was cut down. I am reminded of the bitterly understated words of Clint Eastwood's character in the movie "Unforgiven": "It's a hell of a thing to kill a man --to take away all he has and all he's ever gonna have." Kennedy's killer did that to us. To me. Not only took away my President but all he ever might have done for the good of my country. It's right for me to understand that. It's right for me to feel the travesty of it. It's right that we all be reminded of what it meant for our elected leader to be cut down during his term and what it still means today.

A framed copy of this Official Photo Portrait of President Kennedy had a prominent place on our home library book shelf all the years of my childhood.

JFK aboard "Honey Fitz" with cigar and New York Times sports section on final Labor Day weekend of his life: #JFKL pic.twitter.com/3hdHBko0ts

— Michael Beschloss (@BeschlossDC) September 5, 2022

 I recommend this movie set in the 7 days after Kennedy's assassination
from the POV of his widow Jackie.

The Twitter Thread below is worth reading:

On this day in 1963, my uncle was killed by an assassin’s bullet. I was in 3rd grade at the time. I was taken out of class and sent home. This day is forever seared into my heart and mind. pic.twitter.com/zCP4c3Df0n

— Maria Shriver (@mariashriver) November 22, 2022