John Kerry in Time magazine

On Principles & Values: Grandfather committed suicide; John never told he was Jewish

Richard Kerry, John’s father, was 6 years old at the time of his father’s suicide. He would also lose a sister, to cancer, and that crush of grief seems to have hardened his personality enough that his children would have a hard time penetrating it years later. “He didn’t share emotions easily,” Kerry says. The Kerry kids never knew the full story of their grandfather until the Boston Globe published its account last year. “I knew he committed suicide, but I never knew the how or why. I never really asked. I sort of figured overdose.“ Neither did Kerry know that his grandfather was a Jewish convert to Catholicism. ”I was not aware of the name change. And obviously, I wish my mother and father were alive to ask them.“ Only in his father’s last years did Kerry talk to him a bit about the past. ”I think my dad was really upset about the loss of not only his father, but ultimately his sister, and I think it had a lot of impact on him. Just a sadness. I sensed there was a big hole.“ Source: Time Magazine, “The Making Of John Kerry” Jul 6, 2004

On Principles & Values: Spent summers on Cape Cod and hometown in Millis MA

Kerry cannot be so easily situated in the public mind. He may be the Senator from Massachusetts, but he is not from Massachusetts. He is not really from anywhere; his father’s legal and diplomatic career meant that the family moved every few years. Now he talks about deep roots nourished through summers on Cape Cod with all the various cousins, and says people have made too much of the moving around - even though he famously had to shop for a congressional district the first time he ran for public office, in 1972, because he didn’t really have a hometown. If any place comes close, it is a rural town outside Boston called Millis, where the Kerrys settled after the war. They bought a big, pretty house with six bedrooms, multiple fireplaces and a pond Source: Time Magazine, “The Making Of John Kerry” Jul 6, 2004

On Principles & Values: Attended boarding school in Europe; fluent in French

Having a mother who grew up in Europe and a father who worked to reshape it, going to school abroad and learning French, Italian and German meant that Kerry developed a comfort with other cultures and other points of view that abides to this day. He’s an affirmed multilateralist and proud regular at the yearly World Economic Forum in Davos, and he is married to a woman - Teresa - who speaks even more languages than he does. When he and his brother are on a conference call and want to talk privately, they have been known to break into French. But when he tried to flaunt his credentials as a favorite of foreign leaders and a better bet to navigate the now hostile waters of world opinion, the Republicans pounced, suggesting that he is some kind of Eurosnob - forcing Kerry, a Vietnam veteran, to remind people that he had fought for his country and has served it as a public official for most of his adult life. Source: Time Magazine, “The Making Of John Kerry” Jul 6, 2004

On Principles & Values: Despite aristocratic roots, a Catholic outsider at schools

While his pedigree was plenty aristocratic [at his boarding school in N.H.], Kerry didn’t have the money to go with it. He didn’t fly the private jet to Paris for a long weekend. In fact, he worked summers loading trucks as a Teamster at First National Stores, then one of the Northeast’s leading grocery chains. “You have to understand that atmosphere,” a [boarding school classmate] says. “These were kids who were raised to believe that they came from the ruling class. But John was Catholic. He was also not from wealth. He never had money in his pocket. I joke that he still owes me money. He never had cash, and that was a very unusual thing for a student at [the boarding school]. He also had a European kind of flair. He dressed a little differently, liked to wear French cuffs. He was a very hard worker at everything. He played sports hard. He was very competitive, and it wasn’t a cool thing to be competitive. You didn’t have to be competitive - you had a birthright.“ Source: Time Magazine, “The Making Of John Kerry” Jul 6, 2004

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