Victura

To truly understand the dynamics and magic of the Kennedy family, one must understand their passion for sailing and the sea. Many families sail together, but the Kennedys' relationship with Victura, the 25-foot sloop purchased in 1932, stands apart. Throughout their brief lives, Joe Jr., Jack, and Bobby spent many hours racing Victura. Lack of effort in a race by one of his sons could infuriate Joseph P. Kennedy, and Joe Jr. and Jack ranked among the best collegiate sailors in New England. Likewise, Eunice emerged as a gifted sailor and fierce competitor, the equal of any of her brothers. The Kennedys believed that Jack's experience sailing Victura helped him survive the sinking of his PT boat during World War II. In the 1950s, glossy Life magazine photos of Jack and Jackie on Victura's bow helped define the winning Kennedy brand. Jack doodled sketches of Victura during Oval Office meetings, and it's probable that his love of seafaring played a role in his 1961 decision to put a man on the moon, an enterprise he referred to as "spacefaring." Ted loved Victura as much as any of his siblings did and, with his own children and the children of his lost brothers as crew, he sailed into his old age: past the shoals of an ebbing career, and into his eventual role as the "Lion of the Senate." In Victura, James W. Graham charts the progress of America's signature twentieth-century family dynasty in a narrative both stunningly original and deeply gripping. This true tale of one small sailboat is an invaluable contribution to our understanding of the great story of the Kennedys.

When Jim gordon set out to build a wind farm off the coast of Cape Cod, he knew some people might object. But never in his wildest dreams did he expect what happened next.... Cape Wind is the story of how - and why - people of privilege and power used their high-level connections to stop America's coming energy revolution.

What would you say if I told you that President Kennedy’s death was completely made up to look like an assassination; that he was dying of an incurable disease called Addison’s disease, had accepted his fate, and was determined to go out on his shield rather than have the world see him wither away to nothing? He was shot; that we know for sure. But by whom and why? What if I told you it was done by a close-knit group of his best friends at his own request? Would you consider the possibility or think it's nuts? Taken directly from the pages of a recently discovered, personal diary that’s been kept hidden for almost 60 years, Fallen Angel takes us on an international journey of discovery revealing the true, untold emotional and spiritual journey of a man the world was never allowed to know, or forget. The idealized image of Kennedy, who seemed to be the picture of robust health, is how most remember him. Behind the scenes, however, nothing was further from the truth. He was a very sick man. In fact, he was dying. So, who stood to gain the most from his death? The mafia? The CIA? The Illuminati? No. It was Kennedy himself. Everyone knows how the story ends, but no one really knows how it began or more importantly, why. Until now. For the man who was so taken with magic as a child, this would be his greatest trick.

On May 29, 1917, John F. Kennedy was born in the Kennedy home in Brookline, Massachusetts. As a toddler, he wandered the sands of Nantasket Beach in Hull. When he was a little boy, he swam in the Atlantic waters of Sandy Beach in Cohasset, and as a teenager, he learned to sail on Nantucket Sound off the Cape Cod hamlet of Hyannis Port. He was married on the lawn of the Auchincloss Estate in Newport on the shores of Rhode Island Sound, and as president, he sailed the waters off John’s Island in Maine, while the Navy’s Blue Angels flew over in a salute to their commander in chief. John Kennedy was marked and then defined by his time sailing the seas off New England’s shores, and as his brother Ted once said, it was Hyannis Port where he enjoyed his “happiest times.”

"I'm still here, still arriving at the White House in the wee hours of the morning, reading the papers and checking the wire, still waiting for the morning briefing, still sitting down to write the first story of the day and still waiting to ask the tough questions." From the woman who has reported on every president from Kennedy to Clinton for United Press International: a unique glimpse into the White House -- and a telling record of the ever-changing relationship between the presidency and the press. From her earliest years, Helen Thomas wanted to be a reporter. Raised in Depression-era Detroit, she worked her way to Washington after college and, unlike other women reporters who gave up their jobs to returning veterans, parlayed her copy-aide job at the Washington Daily News into a twelve-year stint as a radio news writer for UPI, covering such beats as the Department of Justice and other federal agencies. Assigned to the White House press corps in 1961, Thomas was the first woman to close a press conference with "Thank you, Mr. President," and has covered every administration since Kennedy's. Along the way, she was among the pioneers who broke down barriers against women in the national media, becoming the first female president of the White House Correspondents Association, the first female officer of the National Press Club and the first woman member, later president, of the Gridiron Club. In this revealing memoir, which includes hundreds of anecdotes, insights, observations, and personal details, Thomas looks back at a career spent with presidents at home and abroad, on the ground and in the air. She evaluates the enormous changes that Watergate brought, including diminished press access to the Oval Office, and how they have affected every president since Nixon. Providing a unique view of the past four decades of presidential history, Front Row at the White House offers a seasoned study of the relationship between the chief executive officer and the press -- a relationship that is sometimes uneasy, sometimes playful, yet always integral to democracy. "Soon enough there will be another president, another first lady, another press secretary and a whole new administration to discover. I'm looking forward to it -- although I'm sure whoever ends up in the Oval Office in a new century may not be so thrilled about the prospect."