Even in the midst of her pain, however, the First Lady is practical. She makes a point to keep Kenny O’Donnell aware of the precise time she plans to leave for and return from any trip outside the White House, just to make sure she doesn’t stumble upon the president in flagrante delicto with a consort.
The First Lady has thought of taking a lover. She often dines alone with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. They flirt with each other and read poetry together. And when Jackie is in New York she visits the apartment of Adlai Stevenson, America’s ambassador to the United Nations. They always kiss when they say hello and enjoy trips to the ballet and opera together.
She is intrigued by these men and knows that there are rumors she has had a fling with actor William Holden, but it is her husband whose love she craves. Until recently their lovemaking was hardly spectacular. There was little attempt at foreplay—indeed, for all his sexual adventures, the president made love to Jackie as if it were a duty. She often wondered why he felt the need to sleep with other women and began to question whether
Then, in the spring of 1961, when Jackie twisted her ankle playing touch football at Hickory Hill, Bobby’s Virginia home, Bobby asked his neighbor, Dr. Frank Finnerty, to treat the injury. Finnerty was a thirty-seven-year- old cardiologist who taught medicine at Georgetown University. He was also extremely handsome and likeable. Jackie found him to be a good listener. A week later, her ankle healed, she asked Finnerty if she could call him from time to time, just to talk. A surprised Finnerty was more than happy to agree.
Sex was definitely on Jackie’s mind when she made the proposition, but not sex with Dr. Finnerty. Over the course of several conversations, she told Finnerty the names of the women her husband was involved with and admitted how bad JFK’s affairs made her feel about herself. The Kennedy marriage was designed, in Jackie’s words, as “a relationship between a man and a woman where a man would be the leader and a woman be his wife and look up to him as a man.” That construct extended to the bedroom, where his pleasure was paramount. She wondered why the president made love so quickly, without any concern for her pleasure. It was all about him, and she felt left out. “He just goes too fast and falls asleep,” she complained.
Dr. Finnerty came up with a solution. He scripted a discussion that Jackie might have with the president, suggesting ways that their lovemaking might be more mutual. Finnerty coached her to speak matter-of-factly and use precise descriptions of what she wanted and of how she might also be able to enhance the president’s enjoyment.
Thus fortified, Jackie nervously broached the subject to JFK over dinner one night. As the president listened in amazement, his usually shy and sexually inhibited wife told him precisely what she wanted from him in bed. Jackie lied when he asked how she had suddenly become so knowledgeable, claiming that she had gotten the answers from a priest, a gynecologist, and several very descriptive books.
The president was impressed. He “never thought she would go to that much trouble to enjoy sex,” Finnerty would later recall.
Jackie reported back to the doctor that the sex with JFK had improved, and whatever anxieties she had had about her own performance were gone for good.
Not that the president has stopped sleeping around. But at least Jackie now knows that he is getting satisfaction in the marital bed.
* * *
“Thank you, Mr. President,” concludes reporter Charles Collingwood. “And thank you, Mrs. Kennedy, for showing us this wonderful house in which you live, and all of the wonderful things you’re bringing to it.”
John Kennedy has joined his wife on camera for the last few minutes of the broadcast special, explaining the importance of Jackie’s ongoing efforts and what the White House means as a symbol of America. The First Lady says nothing as she smiles warmly and gazes into the camera. Jackie looks utterly unflappable as the special comes to an end, not a hair out of place, the strands of pearls around her neck perfectly aligned.
But looks are deceiving. The White House tour was actually recorded a month ago, and the hour-long broadcast took seven hours to film. A nervous Jackie chain-smoked her L&Ms whenever the cameras weren’t rolling and wound down afterward by combing out her bouffant so that her hair hung straight down.
She also downed one very large scotch.
* * *
Jackie’s White House tour is one of the most watched shows in the history of television. In fact, it earns the First Lady a special Emmy Award. America is now completely smitten. Jacqueline Kennedy is a superstar.
Meanwhile, the White House restoration continues. Far down on the list of items to be addressed are those gray Oval Office curtains, which will not be replaced until late in November 1963.
5
MARCH 24, 1962
PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
7:00 P.M.
John F. Kennedy is tired but alert. He is in the resort city of Palm Springs, standing on the patio of the Spanish-style home of show business legend Bing Crosby. But Crosby is not present this evening, having turned his comfortable house over to JFK and his entourage for the weekend. Kennedy watches as the party unfolds around the crowded pool on this warm spring evening. Sounds of laughter and splashing fill the night air. Beyond the pool, the president sees boulder-strewn mountains rising above the one-acre property, forming a stunning desert backdrop.
Yesterday, Kennedy gave a rousing speech to eighty-five thousand people at the University of California, Berkeley. He spoke of democracy and freedom, key themes throughout the cold war. He then flew south on Air Force One to Vandenberg Air Force Base, where he watched his first-ever missile launch. The slim white Atlas rocket blasted off without incident, proving that the United States was catching up in the space race, which was going strong, with the Soviet Union having just this week reached an agreement to share outer space research with America’s cold war adversaries.
Palm Springs, and Crosby’s secluded home, is the perfect weekend hideaway after the hectic West Coast trip. There was a brief bit of official business earlier in the day, when the president met with Dwight Eisenhower to discuss foreign policy. But now JFK can finally unwind with a cigar and a daiquiri or two.
