John F Kennedy's Accomplishments

1213 Words5 Pages

John F. Kennedy never knew what his Presidency would look like or if he would have one at all in 1960, but that fateful November night would change everything. From his home in Massachusetts, Kennedy experienced a good prosperous childhood until Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbor and Kennedy went into the Navy; when he retired, he went into politics where he was a very young but fierce force, and this fighting spirit led him to the highest office in the land, the oval office. John F. Kennedy selflessly served his country not only as a sailor but as President; without his leadership, the US would not be where we are today, and revolutionized the world with diplomacy. The decision to run for the presidency happened a long time before he had …show more content…

In response, Kennedy, knowing he had to do something to let America reclaim the spot as the most powerful country in the world, announced, with the Cold War burning hotter than ever, that the US would send a man to the moon by the end of the 1960’s decade. In one of his most famous speeches titled, “We Choose to Go to the Moon,” Kennedy publicly said that the US is the best country in the world. “We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.” This quote gives the Soviet Union a clear message about the US’s intentions; we are the hardest working, most resilient people on the face of this Earth but above all else; we can do anything we set our minds to. This mission was a hard one, and the US would be starting from a blank canvas, so in 1961, Kennedy created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to be responsible for the mission to the moon. As a result, and with racial unrest at one of the highest levels it has been, a civil rights icon was born. Katherine Johnson, a black woman, was made responsible for the flight plans for the first mission to the moon, the Apollo Mission. Thanks to President Kennedy’s plan for America and Johson’s skills in geometry, NASA sent …show more content…

The man behind the assassination, Lee Harvey Oswald, would later be apprehended at 1:50 P.M. on a different charge; the murder of Dallas police officer J.D. Tippit, and would later be charged with the murder of the President. Two days later, Oswald was being transported in the basement of the Dallas Police station where Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby would slip a gun into the basement and fatally shoot and kill Oswald and Kennedy’s casket would also lie in state in the US Capitol Rotunda where over 250,000 people and countless leaders across the world would show up to pay their respects. However, Ruby’s actions would receive him a first-degree murder charge and a death sentence, however, when he was awaiting a new trial, he died of lung cancer in 1967. Today, an eternal flame is lit at his gravesite in Arlington National Cemetery in his memory and as a symbol of his spirit for this

Open Document