Saturday, September 2, 1944
Friends Gather
Over the Labor Day weekend of 1944, less than three weeks after learning of the death of his older brother, JFK had friends gather for a house party in Hyannis Port, where his family was spending the holiday weekend. JFK invited Lennie and Kate Thom, Jim and Jewel Reed, Red Fay, and Barney Ross. Many years later, Jewel Reed recounted the days of that weekend:
That famous weekend, Barney came up and spent the night with us. The next day the three of us drove down to Hyannis Port. The others came over from Newport. Red Fay, a bachelor then, didn’t care for Lennie’s wife and made it quite clear. Just the way he did later in Washington about Barney Ross’s wife.
We were organized from the moment we arrived. The Kennedys organized everybody. I hated playing tennis, so Eunice invited me to play golf. The next day we played touch football, which was hideous. But, we had to play and it was relentless. At the dinner table at night, Mr. Kennedy went around the table checking on what you’d done that day. His approval was almost automatic if you’d scored first or second. If somebody came in fifth there was a lot of ribbing and disapproval. Rose was in mourning for Joe Junior. Kathleen was home from England. She was very much of a live wire. Red and Kathleen got along famously. The Kennedys played the word game Categories endlessly, and they were terribly sharp at it. The whole weekend we were always competing with somebody over something.
[41, p. 392]