OBSERVANCES
A new book by historian Doris Kearns Goodwin is about her husband, Richard Goodwin, who was a speech writer and advisor to both John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson in their campaigns and in the White House. Although he lived until age 85 this is about his 20’s and early 30’s encompassing that turbulent decade of the 60’s when the world turned on its axis with The New Frontier, Great Society, Vietnam, Civil Rights and three assassinations marched across the stage.
I was in the sixth grade in the climatic 1960 election and watching the returns come across our old dim black and white TV with my father. We were Nixon supporters, but I remember how the first televised debate between Kennedy and Nixon was watched by almost 80% of voters and changed perceptions.
