Why did/do the Kennedys remain silent?

[Terry Mauro]

Len,

I don't know the guy. This is so much fun answering your questions.

I found Brady Schofield partying with Alexander von Auspberg. When I googled that name it turned out he was the son of Sonny Von Bulow, step son to Claus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Count_Anton_Alexander_von_Auersperg

I found Brady connected to the Von Hapsburgs through these same Newport/Naples blue blood circles. This section of the Von Hapsburgs family have control of the Faberge Egg.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faberg%C3%A9_egg

http://www.antiquesatoz.com/habsburg/habsburg-family.htm

Brady is no "moving van" blue collar guy from Rhode Island.

We are going in circles you keep claiming to have linked Schofield to various rich people but don’t provide any citations and normally come up blank in Google searches the only link I can find between him and von Auersperg even when using your misspelling is that they were among hundreds of people who donated to the Preservation Society of Newport County. But even if he recently hung out with these people that is scant indication he was a friend of John-Johh’s years ago. Who said he was blue collar?

Maybe you can check with your family the Oppenheimers and see what they can turn up for you? This seems to be their kind of group.

Are you sure they are “equity holders in the trust”? Were they/was he before 1999 (when John Jr. crashed) or 1994 (when he broke up with Daryl Hannah)? Even if he was, that would at best indicate he MIGHT have known John-John’s mother’s ex-stepbrother

There's that classic "say nothing" jibberish again. Let's see if I can translate

" They are not equity owners and even if they are equity owners that indicates he MIGHT have known John-John's mother's ex step brother". HUH?

I’m not responsible for your intellectual limitations. I was asking you to document your claim they were “equity holders in the trust”. Even if he and his wife were that would only POSSIBLLY link them to Auchincloss. Auchincloss was “John-John’s mother’s ex-stepbrother”

"How does any of this jibberish preclude him knowing John Kennedy Jr. ? None of this gobbly gook precludes him from knowing the Obama family, the Schriver family, the Astor family the Cushing family, the Forbes family or the Vanderbilt family. In fact it is more likely than not that he knows all the families listed above. Just as it is very likely to a certainty that all the families above know each other."

I never indicated it precluded him from knowing John-John or the others but you have failed to produce any evidence he did.

"I don't know the circumstances of JFK Jr's. decision to fly to Martha Vineyards. I suppose he didnt consider it a big deal. And I don't know that he turned down flight instructors."

This was documented in the various threads about the crash you can find the links upthread. Can you think of a reason why he would ask a less experienced pilot to fly him? Or why there is no sign of this on the Net or why Schofield who come down to Essex County to fly him? Since you are so convinced by this unlikely tale you might want to ask the FAA for more details about Schofeild’s license it would boost your case if he was actually licensed before the crash and it would be interesting to know how many flight hours he had at the time. I can PM the address.

And back to your source’s credibility as Tom pointed out there is no sign the Schofeilds were Great Dane breeders let alone renowned ones.

"Joe Kennedy Sr.- who would have to document it to satisfy you?"

Anything with a reasonable citation.

"I have not read a single Joe Kennedy Sr. bio.

What's wrong with the article? Does it stand out as awful; compared to what, your contributions?"

I doubt the author actually spent much time trying to find out were Joe Kennedy Sr’s money came from.

Talk about intellectual limitations. Whether or not they're equity holders in the trust doesnt preclude them from being friends with the Kennedy family and John Jr. in particular. Ownership in the trust doesnt limit their relationship with anyone the Kennedy family included.

It's just another of your consciousness-ramblings.

Check this out.

I never indicated it precluded him from knowing John-John or the others but you have failed to produce any evidence he did.

Or this winner

I doubt the author actually spent much time trying to find out were Joe Kennedy Sr’s money came from.

Researching the origin of the Kennedy wealth was not the purpose of his article. He is right when he says the origin of their wealth is still a mystery.

Jibberish, that's all we get from you.

[Terry Mauro]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

[Len Colby]

Talk about intellectual limitations. Whether or not they're equity holders in the trust doesnt preclude them from being friends with the Kennedy family and John Jr. in particular. Ownership in the trust doesnt limit their relationship with anyone the Kennedy family included.

You’re the one who indicated it suggested they knew each other but failed to show that this was the case or that they were equity holders. Neither Tom or I said this precluded anything but you need to resort to strawmen to maintain your position.

You seem to want us to prove a negative which is near impossible. Could he have been friends with Kennedy? Anything is possible but none of Trouser’s story can be confirmed there is no evidence Schofeild:

• knew the rich and famous let alone the Kennedys, let alone John-John, let alone back in 1994
  
• knew Daryl Hannah
  
• was a pilot in 1999
  
• came from a family of dog breeders
  

Nor is there any evidence his wife Hannah or the Kennedy’s or that his ancestors portrait hung in the Kennedy residence.

It's just another of your consciousness-ramblings.

Check this out.

I never indicated it precluded him from knowing John-John or the others but you have failed to produce any evidence he did.

Or this winner

I doubt the author actually spent much time trying to find out were Joe Kennedy Sr’s money came from.

Researching the origin of the Kennedy wealth was not the purpose of his article. He is right when he says the origin of their wealth is still a mystery.

Jibberish, that's all we get from you.

I have no idea what your objection to the 1st sentence was the second was reasonable since we have no idea how much research went into his statement we have no idea of its value. Get back to us when you’ve found someone who we know researched Joe Sr.’s life who says the origin of his fortune is a mystery.

[Len Colby]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

[Guest Tom Scully]

Gore Vidal, weighed in on this controversy, just 53 weeks ago. Joe Kennedy, though, did not have nine living and or competent children to call together in 1960.

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article6854221.ece

September 30, 2009

Gore Vidal: ‘We’ll have a dictatorship soon in the US’

...Obama believes the Republican Party is a party when in fact it’s a mindset, like Hitler Youth, based on hatred — religious hatred, racial hatred. When you foreigners hear the word ‘conservative’ you think of kindly old men hunting foxes. They’re not, they’re fascists.” ...

...He observes presidential office-holders balefully. “The only one I knew well was Kennedy, but he didn’t impress me as a good president. It’s like asking, ‘What do I think of my brother?’ It’s complicated. I’d known him all my life and I liked him to the end, but he wrecked his chances with the Bay of Pigs and Suez crises, and because everyone was so keen to elect Bobby once Jack had gone, lies started to be told about him — that he was the greatest and the King of Camelot.”

Today religious mania has infected the political bloodstream and America has become corrosively isolationist, he says. “Ask an American what they know about Sweden and they’d say ‘They live well but they’re all alcoholics’. In fact a Scandinavian system could have benefited us many times over.” Instead, America has “no intellectual class” and is “rotting away at a funereal pace. We’ll have a military dictatorship fairly soon, on the basis that nobody else can hold everything together. Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being over-educated. He doesn’t realise how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is. Benjamin Franklin said that the system would fail because of the corruption of the people and that happened under Bush.”

Vidal adds menacingly: “Don’t ever make the mistake with people like me thinking we are looking for heroes. There aren’t any and if there were, they would be killed immediately. I’m never surprised by bad behaviour. I expect it.”...

...There is a trace of thwarted ambition about him. “I would have liked to have been president, but I never had the money. I was a friend of the throne. The only time I envied Jack was when Joe [Kennedy, JFK’s father] was buying him his Senate seat, then the presidency. He didn’t know how lucky he was. Here’s a story I’ve never told. In 1960, after he had spent so much on the presidential campaign, Joe took all nine children to Palm Beach to lecture them. He was really angry. He said, ‘All you read about the Kennedy fortune is untrue. It’s non-existent. We’ve spent so much getting Jack elected and not one of you is living within your income’. They all sat there, shame-faced. Jack was whistling. He used to tap his teeth: they were big teeth, like a xylophone. Joe turned to Jack and he says, ‘Mr President, what’s the solution?’ Jack said, ‘The solution is simple. You all gotta work harder’.” Vidal guffaws heartily...

[Terry Mauro]

Talk about intellectual limitations. Whether or not they're equity holders in the trust doesnt preclude them from being friends with the Kennedy family and John Jr. in particular. Ownership in the trust doesnt limit their relationship with anyone the Kennedy family included.

Youre the one who indicated it suggested they knew each other but failed to show that this was the case or that they were equity holders. Neither Tom or I said this precluded anything but you need to resort to strawmen to maintain your position.

You seem to want us to prove a negative which is near impossible. Could he have been friends with Kennedy? Anything is possible but none of Trousers story can be confirmed there is no evidence Schofeild:

• knew the rich and famous let alone the Kennedys, let alone John-John, let alone back in 1994
  
• knew Daryl Hannah
  
• was a pilot in 1999
  
• came from a family of dog breeders
  

Nor is there any evidence his wife Hannah or the Kennedys or that his ancestors portrait hung in the Kennedy residence.

It's just another of your consciousness-ramblings.

Check this out.

I never indicated it precluded him from knowing John-John or the others but you have failed to produce any evidence he did.

Or this winner

I doubt the author actually spent much time trying to find out were Joe Kennedy Srs money came from.

Researching the origin of the Kennedy wealth was not the purpose of his article. He is right when he says the origin of their wealth is still a mystery.

Jibberish, that's all we get from you.

I have no idea what your objection to the 1st sentence was the second was reasonable since we have no idea how much research went into his statement we have no idea of its value. Get back to us when youve found someone who we know researched Joe Sr.s life who says the origin of his fortune is a mystery.

Here is what you wrote:

Are you sure they are equity holders in the trust? Were they/was he before 1999 (when John Jr. crashed) or 1994 (when he broke up with Daryl Hannah)? Even if he was, that would at best indicate he MIGHT have known John-Johns mothers ex-stepbrother

I responded by pointing out your ridiculous "reasoning". There are no conditions regarding Sara Bullock and Brady Schofield, as it relates to Aqudineck Trust, which would preclude them from knowing John F. Kennedy Jr., or anyone else for that matter.

You and Tom seem to insist that Brady does not move in the same social circles as the Kennedy's and nothing could be further from the truth. Acquidneck Trust, Newport Art Museum, Carnegie Abbey resort, all suggest he travels in the same circles.

Edited October 10, 2010 by Terry Mauro

[Terry Mauro]

Gore Vidal, weighed in on this controversy, just 53 weeks ago. Joe Kennedy, though, did not have nine living and or competent children to call together in 1960.

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article6854221.ece

September 30, 2009

Gore Vidal: ‘We’ll have a dictatorship soon in the US’

...Obama believes the Republican Party is a party when in fact it’s a mindset, like Hitler Youth, based on hatred — religious hatred, racial hatred. When you foreigners hear the word ‘conservative’ you think of kindly old men hunting foxes. They’re not, they’re fascists.” ...

...He observes presidential office-holders balefully. “The only one I knew well was Kennedy, but he didn’t impress me as a good president. It’s like asking, ‘What do I think of my brother?’ It’s complicated. I’d known him all my life and I liked him to the end, but he wrecked his chances with the Bay of Pigs and Suez crises, and because everyone was so keen to elect Bobby once Jack had gone, lies started to be told about him — that he was the greatest and the King of Camelot.”

Today religious mania has infected the political bloodstream and America has become corrosively isolationist, he says. “Ask an American what they know about Sweden and they’d say ‘They live well but they’re all alcoholics’. In fact a Scandinavian system could have benefited us many times over.” Instead, America has “no intellectual class” and is “rotting away at a funereal pace. We’ll have a military dictatorship fairly soon, on the basis that nobody else can hold everything together. Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being over-educated. He doesn’t realise how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is. Benjamin Franklin said that the system would fail because of the corruption of the people and that happened under Bush.”

Vidal adds menacingly: “Don’t ever make the mistake with people like me thinking we are looking for heroes. There aren’t any and if there were, they would be killed immediately. I’m never surprised by bad behaviour. I expect it.”...

...There is a trace of thwarted ambition about him. “I would have liked to have been president, but I never had the money. I was a friend of the throne. The only time I envied Jack was when Joe [Kennedy, JFK’s father] was buying him his Senate seat, then the presidency. He didn’t know how lucky he was. Here’s a story I’ve never told. In 1960, after he had spent so much on the presidential campaign, Joe took all nine children to Palm Beach to lecture them. He was really angry. He said, ‘All you read about the Kennedy fortune is untrue. It’s non-existent. We’ve spent so much getting Jack elected and not one of you is living within your income’. They all sat there, shame-faced. Jack was whistling. He used to tap his teeth: they were big teeth, like a xylophone. Joe turned to Jack and he says, ‘Mr President, what’s the solution?’ Jack said, ‘The solution is simple. You all gotta work harder’.” Vidal guffaws heartily...

Tom , what is the point?

[Terry Mauro]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

He was also part of the Kennedy extended family. Whether he is a novelist or essayist has no bearing on the matter.

So we will give Gore Vidal a thumbs down. We'll put him with Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Diamond Joe Esposito, Henry Reifel and the records of the Canadian Royal Commission on Customs. We'll also sit and wonder how the old Irishman financed a Presidential campaign and also left $500 million behind when he died in 1969.

Edited October 10, 2010 by Terry Mauro

[Bernice Moore]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

He was also part of the Kennedy extended family. Whether he is a novelist or essayist has no bearing on the matter.

So we will give Gore Vidal a thumbs down. We'll put him with Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Diamond Joe Esposito, Henry Reifel and the records of the Canadian Royal Commission on Customs. We'll also sit and wonder how the old Irishman financed a Presidential campaign and also left $500 million behind when he died in 1969.

HI TER, may i ask the documentation of old joe leaving 500 million behind when he died in 69...thanks much take care...b

[Guest Tom Scully]

Terry, you mentioned Gore Vidal, and I posted his recent comments about Joe Kennedy's fortune, along with some of Vidal's consistent criticism of the right wing state of siege many mistake for a rival party American political system.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&tbs=nws%3A1%2Ccdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A1957%2Ccd_max%3A1957&q=%22list+of+76%22+joseph+p+kennedy+million&btnG=Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

Oilman Getty Heads List Of Nation's Richest Men

‎ - Hartford Courant - Oct 28, 1957

In the 200 to 400 million class were Howard Hughes, Los Angeles tool manufacturer, aircraft maker and movie producer; Joseph P. Kennedy, ...

Kennedy Holdings Valued Nov. 19, 1970

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=5qUtAAAAIBAJ&sjid=w54FAAAAIBAJ&pg=6761,6443721&dq=estate+joseph+p+kennedy+million&hl=en

http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/1998/02/01/1998-02-01_glimpse_inside_the_kennedy_f.html

GLIMPSE INSIDE THE KENNEDY FORTUNE

BY MICHAEL O. ALLEN, WILLIAM GOLDSCHLAG and RICHARD T. PIENCIAK, With research assistance by Peter Edelman

Sunday, February 1th 1998, 2:04AM

THE FRONT ENTRANCE to Suite 1710 at 500 Fifth Ave. is adorned very simply. In addition to four brass-coated numerals, a single piece of 81/2-by-11-inch paper is taped to the laminated door panel. The message in black lettering "J.P.K. Enterprises" is more concealing than revealing.

The door shields the public from the headquarters of Joseph P. Kennedy Enter-prises Inc., a holding company for a far-reaching financial empire started more than 50 years ago by the patriarch of one of America's most famous families.

Kennedy's fortune has allowed his children and their heirs to live in comfort and style while choosing less-driven careers of their own making.

Although the Kennedys haven't been on the Forbes 400 list of richest families since 1994, Joe Ken-nedy's children and grandchildren have achieved prominence in politics, media, public service, diplomacy and business.

While the Kennedy family was back in the news last week with an announcement about their plans to sell the historic Mer-chandise Mart in Chi-cago and several other commercial real estate properties for $625 million, management of the family fortune remains shrouded in secrecy.

Joseph Kennedy made certain that would be the case.

Papa Joe's Legacy

With an almost ruthless sense of history, the family patriarch amassed a fortune in liquor, B-grade Hollywood movies, oil and gas, insider trading and real estate.

Over the decades, Joseph P. Kennedy Enterprises Inc. and its subsidiaries have been headquartered at a number of Manhattan addresses. Until last summer, the company was housed on the 47th floor of 500 Fifth Ave. on the northwestern corner of 42nd and Fifth. Before that, the firm was located at 100 E. 42nd St., and at 230 Park Ave. (under the name The Park Agency.)

From behind closed doors, accountants and attorneys have managed and supervised the fortune, checking on investments and dispensing profit checks to the heirs.....

[Terry Mauro]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

He was also part of the Kennedy extended family. Whether he is a novelist or essayist has no bearing on the matter.

So we will give Gore Vidal a thumbs down. We'll put him with Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Diamond Joe Esposito, Henry Reifel and the records of the Canadian Royal Commission on Customs. We'll also sit and wonder how the old Irishman financed a Presidential campaign and also left $500 million behind when he died in 1969.

HI TER, may i ask the documentation of old joe leaving 500 million behind when he died in 69...thanks much take care...b

From an 1969 article that covered his death. Of course it's an estimate.

From Forbes 1957.

In 1957 Fortune declared Kennedy one of the richest men in America, with assets of 200 to 400 million bucks.

[David Andrews]

Caveat lector because Vidal's personal animosity toward the Kennedys has never left him. He's excepted Jack personally, whom he regarded as a friend and one-time political ally. Politics is somewhat mechanical for Vidal, though political differences and ideals, where they exist, are not - so it's both surprising and not surprising that he's rarely said a positive or negative word about Kennedy as Chief Executive,* though plenty negative about the family.

The trouble with finding bootlegging references is that Vidal is asked about the Kennedys in many interviews above a certain length, he's written about them in reviewing historical works for the press, and his several volumes of memoirs are not sequentially nor topically arranged - so it's hard to locate that "A-ha!" reference, and if one did, it would be a quick description or epithet rather than an investigative finding.

I'll poke about in what I have at hand and see what I can quote, but it would only be Vidal's insider status that would give it weight. Remember, too, that the Vidal-Auchincloss-Bouvier families would have shared a certain anecdotal knowledge with their growing children (Jackie, Gore), so this may be the origin of any "bootlegger" reputation for Old Joe in this circle.**

So that's what caveat lector meant. I sometimes overestimate the extent to which Vidal is read among those interested in the assassinations, so I thought it would be self-explanatory within the terms of the Vidal-Bouvier relationship. People could do worse than start with his memoir Palimpsest, and might generally do worse by reading political non-fiction other than Vidal's.

Taking a quick morning-coffee flip through Vidal's essay collection, United States, I'll note that you're more likely to find a reference to the sources of the Kennedy fortune in writings and interviews after 1980.

* Rarely after 1970. In my memory, Vidal is kinder on Jack in his later interview comments. I forgot the many incisive and useful observations in the late-1960s articles that finally parted him from the family, "The Manchester Book" and "The Holy Family," both in United States, and which readers here would appreciate. (Also in that volume is "The Art and Arts of E. Howard Hunt," surely of interest regarding other topics on this forum.)

** Vidal's mother married first Gore's father, airline pioneer Eugene Vidal, and then Bouvier relative-by-marriage Hugh D. Auchincloss.

Edited October 12, 2010 by David Andrews

[Terry Mauro]

Caveat lector because Vidal's personal animosity toward the Kennedys has never left him. He's excepted Jack personally, whom he regarded as a friend and one-time political ally. He's never really said a positive or negative word about Kennedy as Chief Executive, though plenty negative about the family.

The trouble with finding bootlegging references is that Vidal is asked about the Kennedys in many interviews above a certain length, he's written about them in reviewing historical works for the press, and his several volumes of memoirs are not sequentially nor topically arranged - so it's hard to locate that "A-ha!" reference, and if one did, it would be a quick description or epithet rather than an investigative finding.

I'll poke about in what I have at hand and see what I can quote, but it would only be Vidal's insider status that would give it weight. Remember, too, that the Vidal-Auchincloss-Bouvier families would have shared a certain anecdotal knowledge with their growing children (Jackie, Gore), so this may be the origin of any "bootlegger" reputation for Old Joe in this circle.

So that's what caveat lector meant. I sometimes overestimate the extent to which Vidal is read among those interested in the assassinations, so I thought it would be self-explanatory within the terms of the Vidal-Bouvier relationship.

Try "Joseph Kennedy Ltd., a holding company that operated export houses in British Columbia.

Or

The "Kennedy Silk Hat Cocktail Co."

Edited October 10, 2010 by Terry Mauro

[Len Colby]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

He was also part of the Kennedy extended family. Whether he is a novelist or essayist has no bearing on the matter.

That’s absurd he wasn’t even part of Jackie’s “extended family”. To make a long story short he was born in 1925, in 1935 his parents got divorced and his mother married Hugh D. Auchincloss, and had 2 children with him. She divorced Auchincloss 1941 and he remarried Jackie’s mother the next year. They probably did not know each other at best they might have met at some parties. The notion that he has some sort of special insight in to how the father-in-law of his ex-stepfather’s step-daughter made his fortune in the 1920’s is absurd. And since he has made inaccurate statements about Joe Sr. in the past even if we accepted your bizarre premise his claims would have to be met with skepticism.

So we will give Gore Vidal a thumbs down. We'll put him with Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Diamond Joe Esposito, Henry Reifel

Of the above I only know of Costello saying this just before his death in the 1970’s, do you have cites for the others.

...and the records of the Canadian Royal Commission on Customs.

LOL you finally seem to have discovered a fairly legitimate source Iced: The Story of Organized Crime in Canada by Stephen Schneider a professor from Nova Scotia. Even he only said that Kennedy “…is also reported to have made millions smuggling booze into America”. He cited Costello and Ted Schwarz a biographer. Publisher’s Weekly whose reviews are almost positive said the following about the latter’s book:

…Schwarz appears to base his book heavily on very loosely referenced secondary sources (he mentions interviews with "invisible" Kennedy staff members, but this is vague). The star witness Schwarz breathlessly announces in his intro-Barbara Gibson, onetime personal secretary to Rose Kennedy-is hardly referenced at all, but then neither is anyone else. Schwarz's 22 chapters have a total of only 92 endnotes. Even more problematic is the fact that Schwarz repeats a number of myths about Kennedy-the majority of them long ago debunked by other researchers and writers. Example: As more than one recent scholar has deduced, Joseph Kennedy did not buy 40,000 copies of John Kennedy's Why England Slept in order to make the book a bestseller. Other small errors compound to make Schwarz's tome annoying for any reader familiar with the Kennedy saga-and there are many. For instance: Joe did not cooperate, as Schwarz implies he did, in arranging for Jack to get posted to the South Pacific theater during WWII. Quite the contrary. Jack (as has been documented in several recent books) had to go around his father's back and over his head to get the assignment he craved. In sum, readers interested in JPK would do better to consult Ronald Kessler's The Sins of the Father, granddaughter Amanda Smith's Hostage to Fortune or Michael Beschloss's excellent Kennedy and Roosevelt.

Schwarz’s credibility is further undermined by his claim, as paraphrased by Schneider, that “…Joe Jr. obtained Canadian whiskey through his father for the tenth reunion of his Harvard graduating class.” The problem is that Joe Jr. graduated in 1938 almost 5 years after the end of Prohibition and died long before 1948. One could argue he meant the 10th anniversary of Joe Sr.’s graduation but his son was a couple months shy of his 7th birthday at the time. Schneider, also wrote:

The most concrete evidence of Kennedy's involvementin bootlegging Canadian liquor comes from the Royal Commission on Customs and Excise , which linked Kennedy and British Columbia brewmaster Henry Reifel. Along with their breweries, the Reifel family ran Joseph Kennedy Ltd., a holding company that operated several bonded export houses in British Columbia… Another associated company accused of being used by the Reifel family for smuggling purposes was the KennedySilk Hat Cocktail Co., which shared its offices with Joseph Kennedy Ltd. on Homer Street in Vancouver

What Schneider failed to explain is how he established that the owner of the companies in Vancouver was the Joseph Kennedy in question. It’s a very common name hundreds are listed in the US White Pages*. Schwarz and Costello said he brought the booze in through Boston so why would he use companies on the west coast of Canada? I have never heard of him having business interests in British Colombia, silk or hats. There are no other references on the Net to “Kennedy Silk Hat” and only one to “Joseph Kennedy Ltd”, that was to an index of Henry Morgenthau’s diaries. There was a single result, page 54 of diary 5 (Spring {April?} 1935), the closest result for the president’s father was on pages 106 – 118 of diary 7 (Summer {June?} 1935). The only other hits to page 54 are for Canada, Columbia Distillery, Ltd. and Customs Bureau. So it seems that the Canadian company probably was involved in bootlegging and perhaps legal exports in 1935 but the evidence that it was run by Joe Sr. is scant

We'll also sit and wonder how the old Irishman financed a Presidential campaign and also left $500 million behind when he died in 1969.

You’re right the only way an ambitious Harvard educated Irish-American could have become wealthy in the ‘20s was rum running

Sources:

Jackie’s, Vidal’s, Joe Sr’s, Joe Jr’s and Auchincloss’ Wikipedia bios

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_D._Auchincloss

Iced: The Story of Organized Crime in Canada by Stephen Schneider

http://books.google.com/books?id=ZO8jKSn25DAC&pg=PA207&dq=%22silk+hat%22+intitle:Iced+intitle:The+intitle:Story+intitle:of+intitle:Organized+intitle:Crime+intitle:in+intitle:Canada&hl=en&ei=-9yxTMfcL8GC8gaLh_ChCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22silk%20hat%22%20intitle%3AIced%20intitle%3AThe%20intitle%3AStory%20intitle%3Aof%20intitle%3AOrganized%20intitle%3ACrime%20intitle%3Ain%20intitle%3ACanada&f=false

Amazon Page for Joseph P. Kennedy: The Mogul, the Mob, the Statesman, and the Making of an American Myth by Ted Schwarz including PW review

http://www.amazon.com/Joseph-P-Kennedy-Statesman-American/dp/0471176818

White Pages results for Joseph Kennedy -

http://www.whitepages.com/dir/a-z/kennedy/joseph

* It lists them alphabetically by middle name or initial then by location (state, city), it found 90 with no middle name or initial and 10 with the initial A or B before it reached the 100 result max. It also found over 100 Joes and J’s. Though some of the numbers are duplicates and work phones obviously it does included unlisted or cell phone only Joseph Kennedys

Index of Henry Morgenthau’s diaries 1933 - 9

http://www.lexisnexis.com/documents/academic/upa_cis/9691_MorgDiariesDepression.pdf pgs 4,120

Edited October 10, 2010 by Len Colby

[Terry Mauro]

I believe Gore Vidal, Bouvier relative-by-marriage and Hollywood insider, has alluded to the bootlegging component of the Kennedy fortune in interviews over the years, and perhaps in his volumes of memoirs, Caveat lector

Len,

Gore Vidal, yes or no?

How absurd can you get? If Vidal said this I would like to see what evidence he cited, he was a novelist and essayist not a historian or journalist. But David only said that he “believes” Vidal “alluded” to this and used the disclaimer "Caveat lector".

He was also part of the Kennedy extended family. Whether he is a novelist or essayist has no bearing on the matter.

That’s absurd he wasn’t even part of Jackie’s “extended family”. To make a long story short he was born in 1925, in 1935 his parents got divorced and his mother married Hugh D. Auchincloss, and had 2 children with him. She divorced Auchincloss 1941 and he remarried Jackie’s mother the next year. They probably did not know each other at best they might have met at some parties. The notion that he has some sort of special insight in to how the father-in-law of his ex-stepfather’s step-daughter made his fortune in the 1920’s is absurd. And since he has made inaccurate statements about Joe Sr. in the past even if we accepted your bizarre premise his claims would have to be met with skepticism.

So we will give Gore Vidal a thumbs down. We'll put him with Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Diamond Joe Esposito, Henry Reifel

Of the above I only know of Costello saying this just before his death in the 1970’s, do you have cites for the others.

...and the records of the Canadian Royal Commission on Customs.

LOL you finally seem to have discovered a fairly legitimate source Iced: The Story of Organized Crime in Canada by Stephen Schneider a professor from Nova Scotia. Even he only said that Kennedy “…is also reported to have made millions smuggling booze into America”. He cited Costello and Ted Schwarz a biographer. Publisher’s Weekly whose reviews are almost positive said the following about the latter’s book:

…Schwarz appears to base his book heavily on very loosely referenced secondary sources (he mentions interviews with "invisible" Kennedy staff members, but this is vague). The star witness Schwarz breathlessly announces in his intro-Barbara Gibson, onetime personal secretary to Rose Kennedy-is hardly referenced at all, but then neither is anyone else. Schwarz's 22 chapters have a total of only 92 endnotes. Even more problematic is the fact that Schwarz repeats a number of myths about Kennedy-the majority of them long ago debunked by other researchers and writers. Example: As more than one recent scholar has deduced, Joseph Kennedy did not buy 40,000 copies of John Kennedy's Why England Slept in order to make the book a bestseller. Other small errors compound to make Schwarz's tome annoying for any reader familiar with the Kennedy saga-and there are many. For instance: Joe did not cooperate, as Schwarz implies he did, in arranging for Jack to get posted to the South Pacific theater during WWII. Quite the contrary. Jack (as has been documented in several recent books) had to go around his father's back and over his head to get the assignment he craved. In sum, readers interested in JPK would do better to consult Ronald Kessler's The Sins of the Father, granddaughter Amanda Smith's Hostage to Fortune or Michael Beschloss's excellent Kennedy and Roosevelt.

Schwarz’s credibility is further undermined by his claim, as paraphrased by Schneider, that “…Joe Jr. obtained Canadian whiskey through his father for the tenth reunion of his Harvard graduating class.” The problem is that Joe Jr. graduated in 1938 almost 5 years after the end of Prohibition and died long before 1948. One could argue he meant the 10th anniversary of Joe Sr.’s graduation but his son was a couple months shy of his 7th birthday at the time. Schneider, also wrote:

The most concrete evidence of Kennedy's involvementin bootlegging Canadian liquor comes from the Royal Commission on Customs and Excise , which linked Kennedy and British Columbia brewmaster Henry Reifel. Along with their breweries, the Reifel family ran Joseph Kennedy Ltd., a holding company that operated several bonded export houses in British Columbia… Another associated company accused of being used by the Reifel family for smuggling purposes was the KennedySilk Hat Cocktail Co., which shared its offices with Joseph Kennedy Ltd. on Homer Street in Vancouver

What Schneider failed to explain is how he established that the owner of the companies in Vancouver was the Joseph Kennedy in question. It’s a very common name hundreds are listed in the US White Pages*. Schwarz and Costello said he brought the booze in through Boston so why would he use companies on the west coast of Canada? I have never heard of him having business interests in British Colombia, silk or hats. There are no other references on the Net to “Kennedy Silk Hat” and only one to “Joseph Kennedy Ltd”, that was to an index of Henry Morgenthau’s diaries. There was a single result, page 54 of diary 5 (Spring {April?} 1935), the closest result for the president’s father was on pages 106 – 118 of diary 7 (Summer {June?} 1935). The only other hits to page 54 are for Canada, Columbia Distillery, Ltd. and Customs Bureau. So it seems that the Canadian company probably was involved in bootlegging and perhaps legal exports in 1935 but the evidence that it was run by Joe Sr. is scant

We'll also sit and wonder how the old Irishman financed a Presidential campaign and also left $500 million behind when he died in 1969.

You’re right the only way an ambitious Harvard educated Irish-American could have become wealthy in the ‘20s was rum running

Sources:

Jackie’s, Vidal’s, Joe Sr’s, Joe Jr’s and Auchincloss’ Wikipedia bios

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_D._Auchincloss

Iced: The Story of Organized Crime in Canada by Stephen Schneider

http://books.google.com/books?id=ZO8jKSn25DAC&pg=PA207&dq=%22silk+hat%22+intitle:Iced+intitle:The+intitle:Story+intitle:of+intitle:Organized+intitle:Crime+intitle:in+intitle:Canada&hl=en&ei=-9yxTMfcL8GC8gaLh_ChCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22silk%20hat%22%20intitle%3AIced%20intitle%3AThe%20intitle%3AStory%20intitle%3Aof%20intitle%3AOrganized%20intitle%3ACrime%20intitle%3Ain%20intitle%3ACanada&f=false

Amazon Page for Joseph P. Kennedy: The Mogul, the Mob, the Statesman, and the Making of an American Myth by Ted Schwarz including PW review

http://www.amazon.com/Joseph-P-Kennedy-Statesman-American/dp/0471176818

White Pages results for Joseph Kennedy -

http://www.whitepages.com/dir/a-z/kennedy/joseph

* It lists them alphabetically by middle name or initial then by location (state, city), it found 90 with no middle name or initial and 10 with the initial A or B before it reached the 100 result max. It also found over 100 Joes and J’s. Though some of the numbers are duplicates and work phones obviously it does included unlisted or cell phone only Joseph Kennedys

Index of Henry Morgenthau’s diaries 1933 - 9

http://www.lexisnexis.com/documents/academic/upa_cis/9691_MorgDiariesDepression.pdf pgs 4,120

Wasnt Gore Vidal Jackie Kennedy's step brother? To refer to Vidal as part of the Kennedy extended family isnt "absurd".

Otherwise I cannot read the rest of your drivel, it's just too painful. I assume this is what you had been waiting for all this time? It's always the same.

You were waiting for the moment you could dump more of your consciousness-ramblings.