In July 1962, John F. Kennedy installed a hidden recording system in the Oval Office and Cabinet Room and taped more than 265 hours of private conversation – from tense briefings about the emerging Cuban Missile Crisis to a cheery interlude with his 3-year-old son.
On Wednesday, March 20, historian Ted Widmer will return to Washington College to talk about the new book he has produced in conjunction with the John F. Kennedy Library — Listening In: The Secret White House Recordings of John F. Kennedy. With a foreword by Caroline Kennedy, Listening In includes 150 minutes of the most compelling of those recordings on CD, as well as transcripts accompanied by historic photographs and Widmer’s extensive annotations. The talk will begin at 6:00 p.m. in Hynson Lounge at Hodson Hall, and will be followed by a book signing.
A former speechwriter and senior advisor to President Bill Clinton, Widmer is assistant for special projects to the president of Brown University and has been a senior advisor to former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. From 2001 to 2006, he was the inaugural director of the C. V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience at Washington College. His previous books include Martin Van Buren (2005), Campaigns: A Century of Presidential Races (with Alan Brinkley, 2001), and Ark of the Liberties: Why American Freedom Matters to the World. Widmer is a frequent contributor to The New York Times, The New York Observer and The American Scholar.
Update: The time of the lecture has been changed to 6:00 PM
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