Jfk family make video for his 100th birthday 20170525 p5psom.html – Breaking News & Latest Updates 2026
Advertisement
Advertisement
This was published 9 years ago

Caroline Kennedy opens up about her dad: 'I miss him everyday'

Jessica Rapana

The family of John F. Kennedy have released a touching video to mark what would have been the former president's 100th birthday.
 
His daughter Caroline Kennedy and grandchildren opened up about their memories of their father and grandfather, who was assassinated while in office in 1963.
Advertisement
 
If he was still alive, he would have turned 100 on May 29.
 
"I've thought about him and missed him everyday of my life," said Caroline, the former president's only living daughter, in the video.
 
The 59-year-old reminisced about hiding under the Oval Office desk when she was a young girl and going out sailing with her father.
 
She revealed that growing up without her father had been made easier by all of the people who "kept him in their hearts".
Advertisement
"... [people] who told me that he inspired them to work and fight and believe in a better world, to give something back to this country that has given so much to so many," she added.

Caroline later told CNN her father was a "historical figure", but his legacy and values were "timeless" and still lived on.

She also talked about the legacy her father left behind, having championed things like human rights, health care and immigration while in office.

Advertisement
Advertisement

"President Kennedy inspired a generation that transformed America," she said.

She also talked about the need to pass on this legacy to future generations.

"As my father said in his inaugural address, 'this work will not be finished in our lifetime, it's up to us to continue to pass these values on to our children and grandchildren'."

Advertisement

Caroline's three children also featured on the video, talking about their grandfather who died before they were born.

"One of the defining relationships of my life is with someone I've never met, my grandfather, President John F. Kennedy," Tatiana Kennedy Schlossberg said.

"But while my grandfather had reverence for the past, and the lessons it could impart, he also knew that America was a country where change was possible. That we aren't bound solely by tradition if we understand the past with which we are breaking."

Advertisement
Advertisement

Rose Kennedy Schlossberg, said she was inspired by her grandfather's courage in "naming the injustices in American society, and his call for action."

"We are still faced with tremendous inequality and injustice -- from voting rights to our criminal justice system, and mass incarceration," she said.
 
But, while her grandfather would be proud of how far the country had come, he would also "be the first to tell us we have a long way to go," she said.
Advertisement
Jack Kennedy Schlossberg, JFK's only grandson, said his favorite speech of his grandfather's was in 1962 when Kennedy made a case for sending a man to the moon, saying this challenge was worthwhile, "not because [it was] easy, but because it [would be] so hard."
 
Caroline told CNN she wanted to include her children because they were perhaps the best messengers to carry her father's message forward into the 21st century.

Most viewed in Lifestyle

More to explore