John F. Kennedy

In October 1960, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy came to Indianapolis, Indiana. The state was a Republican strong hold so his visit was special.



At that time, I was a junior at Shortridge High School. My parents were active in the Indiana Democratic Party. There would be a parade from the Wier Cook Airport to the Claypool Hotel in downtown Indianapolis. Later, Kennedy would give a speech at the Indiana State Fair Coliseum.



As one of the few students at Shortridge identified as a Democrat, I was asked to be in the motorcade. We wore white blouses, blue skirts and sat on the back of some one's convertible. We were given those silly white hats to wear and Kennedy posters to wave. Also, this is big, we sang "Happy Days are Here Again".



The cars were lined up on the tarmac and as Kennedy left the plane we cheered. The route of the motorcade had been published in the papers, so there were crowds from the airport to down town.



I can close my eyes and see the whole day replay in my mind. It was such an innocent time compared to political campaigns today.



Back at home, my parents were getting ready to stand on 38th Street near the entrance to the fairgrounds to watch Kennedy drive by. Then we entered the coliseum and watched the speech.



We sat in the sixth row on the left side of the stage. There are old films of this event that I have seen quite a while ago. The speech was pure Kennedy. The reception huge. I think all 30,000 of the state's Democrats were there.


These events seem such a long time ago and yet just yesterday.