Ask not : the inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the speech that changed America / Thurston Clarke.

Ask not : the inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the speech that changed America / Thurston Clarke.

First Owl Books edition.

080507936X (pbk.)

New York : Henry Holt and Co., 2005.

English

xvi, 264 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 21 cm

9780805079364

J82.D91 C53 2005

"Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." On the January morning when John F. Kennedy assumed the presidency and stood to speak those words, America was divided, its citizens torn by fears of war. Kennedy's speech--called the finest since Lincoln at Gettysburg and the most memorable of any twentieth-century American politician--did more than reassure: it changed lives, marking the start of a brief, optimistic era of struggle against "tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself." This book is a detailed account of the week leading up to that moment, Kennedy's quest to create a speech that would distill American dreams and empower a new generation. Clarke's portrait of JFK during what intimates called his happiest days reveals the President at his most charismatic--and cunningly pragmatic.

"An Owl book."

Includes bibliographical references (p. [245]-249) and index.

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