With Agents Sulliman, Burns, Kellerman, & Rowley

The Book "The Kennedy Detail"

I just finished “The Kennedy Detail” and it was so compelling and captivating. I felt like I was in a flashback and was there right with you during those terrible days. Your words took me right back in history.

I was 9 years old when the assassination took place and remember it very well. I had just returned to school after lunch when our principal announced over the loudspeaker that President Kennedy had been killed. We were all sent home, and my family and I were glued to our TV set over the next 3 days.

I still have the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper articles covering the killing and funeral, my mother had saved them and when she passed away I kept them.

It was a very sad time in history. I thank you so much for giving an insider’s view and the facts of those days. We need to remember.

Regards,

Peggy Stagner Jupp

Thank you for your book and the opportunity to hear you speak

Mr. Blaine

I read your book as soon as it came out and went to see you speak in Vero Beach on January 17th. You and your book have truly touched me. I was 10 years old when the assassination occurred and was very inspired by President Kennedy prior to that. From then until I was nearly 20, I wanted to be a Secret Service agent, even though no women were employed on the protective detail at the time.


Your book made me feel as if I truly understood what it was like to be an agent during that era, especially. I finally realize that even though I broke barriers as a Naval officer, I don’t think I could have ever lived the life of total commitment you and the other agents did. I truly honor your dedication and all the sacrifices you and your families made.


I never thought of the Secret Service as failing because I always understood the inability to protect against many dangers, especially a lone, mentally imbalanced person who was willing to trade his life for fame. In 2003 when the Department of Homeland Security was being formed, with the Secret Service transitioning from Treasury, I was fortunate to be in a position to act as an advisor to the Secretary of DHS to identify measures of mission effectiveness across all DHS agencies. We met with the head of every agency, including the chief of the Secret Service. It was a dream come true for me to be there. After much discussion of what could possibly be measured that would show opportunities for improvement at the mission level, including some of the things you alluded to in your book, we ended up recommending that the Secret Service be the only DHS agency where there were no measures of effectiveness tracked because their results are binary.


I just wanted to take a minute to share these things with you since you said during your talk that you enjoyed the feedback you received from your book tour. Thank you again for everything you did for the country before, during and after your time in the Secret Service. Please also give my thanks to Mr. Hill for everything he has done and endured. I’ve always known he did everything he could.


Accept the thanks of a grateful nation.


Becky Zingarelli
Melbourne, FL

John F. Kennedy Library Presidential Library and Museum ...

AnnouncingThe President's Desk an Interactive Online Module at JFKLibrary.org

The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum has unveiled The President's Desk, an interactive online module that allows students and other website visitors to sit virtually at President Kennedy's Oval Office desk and explore several multi-media presentations of historic aspects of his life and administration.

With the launch of The President's Desk, students of politics and history have the unique opportunity to learn about JFK's experience in World War II, explore the Kennedy campaign office, dial President Kennedy's Oval Office phone, press the secret button to the White House taping system, flip through his daily schedule, sail the Victura around Cape Cod, browse through family photographs, and discover what it means to hold the highest office in the land.

The module's interface is based on an archival image of President Kennedy's Oval Office desk, which was made from the timbers of the British ship, the HMS Resolute, and presented by Queen Victoria to President Rutherford Hayes in 1878. The desk disappeared from public view until Jacqueline Kennedy found it in the White House broadcast room and had it installed as the President's desk on February 4, 1961. The original desk is still being used by President Obama.

To access The President's Desk visit www.JFKLibrary.org.

For more interactive, educational experiences visit www.JFK50.org.

Website a window into John F. Kennedy's Oval Office

President Barack Obama (R) examines the ''Resolute Desk'' while visiting with Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg (L) in the Oval Office in this handout photo taken in Washington, March 3, 2009 and later released by the White House.

Credit: Reuters/Pete Souza

By Ros Krasny

BOSTON |

BOSTON (Reuters Life!) - Any history buff with a computer and Internet connection now has a chance to walk in John F. Kennedy's shoes -- or at least sit, virtually, at the 35th U.S. President's Oval Office desk.

The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston has launched "The President's Desk," an interactive website that that seats users at Kennedy's desk and displays multimedia presentations of aspects of his life and administration.

(To view the website, see: here)

The displays cover topics ranging from JFK's experiences as a torpedo boat commander in World War II to his 1960 presidential campaign, to a video in which Kennedy expounds on his love for sailing around Massachusetts' Cape Cod on his sloop Victura.

Users can dial the Oval Office phone and hear conversations between Kennedy and secretary of defense Robert McNamara, NASA astronaut Gordon Cooper and others.

In one call, Kennedy and former President Dwight Eisenhower talk frankly about how to interpret Russian actions leading up to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Another button launches an archive of once-secret recordings and transcripts on other sensitive domestic and foreign policy matters including the Vietnam War, nuclear arms testing and the civil rights movement.

Kennedy was the first president to record extensively his meetings and telephone conversations -- a practice famously ended during the Nixon administration. He selectively recorded over 12 hours of telephone conversations using a Dictaphone system, according to the library.

Kennedy's desk was an exact replica of the HMS Resolute desk, made from timbers of the British Arctic expedition ship and presented by Queen Victoria to President Rutherford Hayes in 1878.

The desk disappeared from public view until Jacqueline Kennedy found it in the White House broadcast room and had it installed in the Oval Office in 1961. The desk is still being used by President Barack Obama.

http://www.reuters.com

With Agent Ron Pontius In the Stands & JFK At Harvard Football Game

Agents of The Kennedy Detail

DAVID GRANT

David Grant was born in Chicago, Illinois, a Korean War Veteran and graduate of Iowa Wesleyan University. In 1957, the Secret Service commissioned Special Agent Grant to work the Chicago and Denver field offices, as well as the Children's Detail for President Eisenhower.

Special Agent Grant joined the Kennedy Detail shortly after the election. SA Grant assisted SA Win Lawson with the Dallas advance and was stationed at the Trade Mart at the time of the assassination. During his career, SA Grant served Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Vice Presidents, Rockefeller, and Mondale.

In 1980, David Grant retired from the Secret Service as Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Vice Presidential Division.