Young JFK at Choate: Bullied but unbowed
When we think of John F. Kennedy, we recall images of a confident, poised and self-assured president. Yet, it is instructive to know that young JFK had to contend with a number of people who bullied and tormented him, especially around the time he entered or attended prep school. The nature of the bullying and the strategies he used to deal with them are not only illuminating, but might provide a model for many who are bullied today.
During the research for my book “JFK & the Muckers of Choate,” which deals with Kennedy’s troubled years at the boarding school Choate in Wallingford, I learned of several instances where JFK was browbeaten, harassed or worse.
For starters, both he and his mother opposed his father’s idea of enrolling at Choate, preferring to remain in a parochial school in the Boston area where he felt happy and comfortable. His father insisted that it would do him good to leave an all-catholic world because he would have to later in life. His father’s opinion carried the day.
When he first came to Choate as a skinny, sickly child and a Catholic in a predominantly Protestant school, Jack dealt with bullies by successfully using his wit. Never a brawler, he established a rapport with some oppressors and used jokes to escape other difficult situations.
Perhaps more significantly, Jack was tormented by the school’s headmaster and his own housemaster. The latter would often barge in unannounced to inspect his room. He’d intercept his mail. He’d frequently tell young Jack, to his face, that he’d likely never succeed if he continued his slovenly ways.
Worse, the headmaster called out Choate students he called “muckers,” which Jack interpreted as an anti-irish epithet. In retaliation, Jack formed a club he dubbed the Muckers, despite the school rule that forming such an organization on school premises was impermissible. Jack brought a Victrola and jazz records to school and, forming friendships around music, entertained club members every evening before chapel.
He also found companionship, club members and personal acceptance, despite his Catholicism and Irish roots, by participating in team sports, when he was well enough to do so, and by playing social golf.
After several club-related problems cropped up (mainly tepid pranks launched by club members), the headmaster got wind of one idea only jokingly mentioned at a club discussion — spreading manure on the dance floor at an upcoming school event. Deciding enough was enough, the school head sought to expel both Jack and the other Muckers, though many were close to graduation. Eventually, he was talked out of following through, and Jack and his friends were allowed to stay on and to graduate. No doubt having 12 compatriots — instead of Jack on his own — was a key reason. Perhaps more important, Jack sought help from teachers and lesser administrators, who had convinced the headmaster to rescind the order.
Jack had a difficult relationship with Joe, his older brother, whom his domineering father was grooming to become president. Joe frequently bullied Jack, both verbally and physically. In truth, Jack initially had few avenues for dealing with the harassment. He long believed he couldn’t measure up to his brother, who had won the Harvard Trophy at Choate, which was awarded to the student who best combines athletic skills and scholarship. “I am the boy that doesn’t get things done,” he lamented. “If my brother were not so efficient, it would be easier for me to be efficient. He does it so much better than I do.”
But after nearly being expelled, Jack agreed to see a world-famous therapist at Columbia University, Prescott Lecky, who concluded that Jack was opting out of competition with his brother, and that “a good deal of his trouble is due to comparison with an older brother.” After two therapy sessions, Jack decided he wasn’t so inferior after all. He took on his brother in several competitions, finished strong in his final few months at school, and was voted “Most Likely to Succeed” by his Choate classmates, which was a triumph of a smart and well-executed plan given Jack’s mediocre school performance.
That he won this coveted school award indicates that one tool Jack used well was his ability to make friends. Had he not found a lifelong friendship in Lem Billings at Choate, I doubt that Jack would have even graduated. As loyal a friend as anyone could ever hope for, Billings provided him the encouragement and unconditional friendship Jack needed to see him through difficulties that included frequent stays in the school infirmary.
It might not be too much to say that lessons Jack learned at Choate might have saved the country and even the planet 30 years hence. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, JFK coolly dismissed the “bullies” in the military who demanded he bomb Cuba into submission. Unwilling to risk a nuclear Armageddon with the then-soviet Union, which had provided nuclear missiles to Cuba, Jack and brother Bobby cleverly devised a diplomatic solution that allowed a face-saving way for the USSR to back down, agreeing to remove the threats from an island nation just 90 miles from U.S. shores.