A Final Update To My Kennedy Collection (For Now)

Today is the 60th Anniversary of when a renowned Two-time Pulitzer Prize winning author, poet, and historian Carl Sandburg met with President John F. Kennedy at the White House on October 25, 1961. 

In my opinion, Carl Sandburg was one of the great contributors to American art, music and literature, especially with his six-volume biography of Abraham Lincoln. In my book collection, I have a one volume abridged edition of “Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years & the War Years (Library of the Presidents),” which I purchased at the Brattle Book Shop in Boston several years ago. My admiration for Mr. Sandburg deepened when I saw a PBS documentary about him called “The Day Carl Sandburg Died,” which really isn’t about his death at all, but rather tells the story of his interesting and unique life.

Apart from this, it has also been one month and seven days since I last updated this blog and also three months and one day since I gave an update on my Kennedy Book Collection. Since today was the anniversary Mr. Sandberg’s meeting with President Kennedy, I decided that tonight would be an appropriate time to update my blog and share with the reader on what books on the Kennedys I have acquired since then. To be honest, I cannot recall in detail on my inventory of Kennedy books that I acquired because I did not make time to document it. Because of it, I will do my best to recount from memory.

Since the end of July, I ordered and received hardcover copies of:

• “Jack: A Life Like No Other” by Geoffrey Perret
• “Kennedy and Roosevelt: The Uneasy Alliance” by Michael R. Beschloss
• “One Hell of a Gamble: Khrushchev, Castro and Kennedy, 1958–1964” by Aleksandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali (not pictured)
• “One Minute to Midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro on the Brink of Nuclear War” by Michael Dobbs.
• “The Kennedy Tapes: Inside the White House During the Cuban Missile Crisis” Edited by Ernest R. May and Philip D. Zelikow
• “JFK and the Masculine Mystique: Sex and Power on the New Frontier" by Steven Watts (not pictured)
• “JFK's Forgotten Crisis: Tibet, the CIA, and the Sino-Indian War” by Bruce Riedel
• “John F. Kennedy (The American Presidents #35)” by Alan Brinkley
• “Mrs. Kennedy: The Missing History of the Kennedy Years” by Barbara Leaming
• “Jacqueline Kennedy: First Lady of the New Frontier” by Barbara A. Perry
• “Mutual Contempt: Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, and the Feud that Defined a Decade” by Jeff Shesol

While I did not make an update for this blog, I did post an update on August 7 in a Facebook group of Kennedy Devotees called “The History of the Kennedys.” When I rediscovered my post from that time (which I had forgotten I had posted), I was finally able to recount my inventory with some accuracy.

Those were intended to be my final books for now. However, I received a surprise comment to my August 7th post from an author by the name of Thomas Maier, who wrote a book called “The Kennedys: America's Emerald Kings: A Five-Generation History of the Ultimate Irish-Catholic Family” which was originally published on September 22, 2003. He suggested that I buy a copy of his other book “When Lions Roar: The Churchills and the Kennedys,” which was published on October 28, 2014. Since I felt honored that he reached out to me, I replied that I would order the book, looked forward to reading it, and adding it to my collection. Upon ordering the book, it became the last book I would ever order online of the Kennedy Family as my book shelf was already become full.

However, since the end of August, only four more books were unintentionally added to my collection. One night when I was cleaning out my room, I found my hardcover copy of “Kennedy & Nixon: The Rivalry That Shaped Postwar America” by Christopher Matthews. I felt relieved that I didn’t have to order it. 

About a month later, I traveled to the Framingham Public Library and I discovered bought a copy of “A Lady, First: My Life in the Kennedy White House and the American Embassies of Paris and Rome” by Letitia Baldrige and “A History of the Kennedy Space Center” by Kenneth Lipartito and Orville R. Butler for $2.00 each.

The final book I purchased was “Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero” by Chris Matthews, which I purchased this morning for only three dollars on my final visit to the Framingham Public Library for this year. I had purchased another copy of the book years ago from the same library for the same price, but I had misplaced it. When I found the book today, I knew I had to bring it to my apartment near Boston and have it become the final book to add to my Kennedy bookshelf… for now.

As I mentioned in another blog entry, I am going to put a hold on buying Kennedy books to add to my Kennedy book collection as I don’t want to have too many books and need to save money. I know that there are more books out on the Kennedys that I have yet to discover, but there are only two more books I wish to purchase upon their future publication. The books are the second volume of Frederik Logevall’s biography of President John F. Kennedy and the second volume of Neal Gabler’s biography of Edward M. Kennedy. It will be some time before they are published because the authors are still working on them, but I will wait until them. Besides, I think I have more than enough books on the Kennedys that I can use as a reference and need to make time to read. 

In addition to putting a hold on buying Kennedy books, I have also placed myself on a book buying ban. As a bibliophile, I have a bad habit of impulsively overspending on books even though I bought most of my books for under ten dollars each and at bargain prices. Despite this, I’ve realized that I have too many books that I have not read, but many more that I want to buy. I have been piling up book and many are untouched. I’ve decided that I need to make time to read that books that I own and to glean knowledge from their pages. Another reason is that I need to save money for other important things like bills, food, rent, and so on and my saving may be needed in case of a financial emergency. I will have to avoid going to bookstores and libraries as well. By spending time reading the books that I already own and in saving money, I believe this will be of better benefit as a whole. Gleaning knowledge from my books and sharing what I have learned with others who might be interested will be its own reward. After all if JFK took the time to read, I should too.

With nothing more to say, I want to end this blog entry with a quote. I have debated if I should use the words of John F. Kennedy or some other historical figure to somehow wrap up this blog entry. However, this isn’t really a blog entry about him, but about my journey collecting books about him and his family that is coming to an end… for now. After some searching, I came upon these words from a homeowner named Thea Beasley (with no connection to the Kennedy family): “All these things we find are pieces of ourselves. I’ve built a future by rummaging through the past.”