Jack Kennedy: The Making of a President

by Barbara Leaming

Although John F Kennedy is perhaps the best-known American president of the 20th century, surprisingly he lacks a major, full-length, all-embracing biography. Barbara Leaming realised the omission as she wrote her most recent book, MRS KENNEDY, an account of Jackie Kennedy as First Lady. Whereas some see JFK as noble idealist, others as self-serving deceiver, to Leaming he is ‘Time and time again,’ she writes, ‘I have been astonished to discover a man in crisis, a leader desperately and profoundly at odds with himself.’ She sees the formative years starting on the eve of the Munich crisis in 1938 in London where his father had just become US ambassador. Leaming spotlight the friendship between the Kennedy and Cavendish families made formal when Billy, heir to the Devonshire dukedom, married Kenndy’s sister ‘Kick’, the person to whom he was closest. But Kick died in a plane crash in 1948. Twelve years later Kennedy, now the 35th US president, found himself dealing with a friend from those formative years, the British PM, Harold Macmillan, whose wife was a Cavendish. In Leaming’s view – and she is the only writer to have seen the full Macmillan-JFK-Jacky letters – Macmillan, and others from the pre-war period, played a far more important role in his presidency than have hitherto been given credit for.

456 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Barbara Leaming is the author of “Kick Kennedy: The Charmed Life and Tragic Death of the Favorite Kennedy Daughter” (Thomas Dunne Books, April 12, 2016). She has written three New York Times bestsellers, including her recent book “Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis”. Leaming’s book “Churchill Defiant” received The Emery Reves Award from the International Churchill Centre. Her groundbreaking biography of America's 35th President, “Jack Kennedy: The Education of a Statesman” was the first to detail the lifelong influence of British history and culture and especially of Winston Churchill on JFK. Her articles have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, the Times of London and other periodicals. She lives in Connecticut.

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