Richard J. Kerry
| Richard John Kerry | |
|---|---|
| Born |
July 28, 1915 Brookline, Massachusetts |
| Died |
July 29, 2000 (aged 85) Boston, Massachusetts |
Cause of death | Metastatic prostate cancer |
| Education |
Phillips Academy Yale University Harvard Law School |
| Religion | Roman Catholicism |
| Spouse(s) |
Rosemary Isabel Forbes (m. 1941–2000; his death) |
| Children |
|
| Parents |
Frederick Kerry Ida Lowe |
| Relatives |
Alexandra Forbes Kerry (granddaughter) Vanessa Bradford Kerry (granddaughter) |
Richard John Kerry (July 28, 1915 — July 29, 2000) was an Austrian-American Foreign Service officer and lawyer. He was the father of U.S. Senator, 2004 Democratic Presidential candidate and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
Life and career
Richard John Kerry was born in Brookline, Massachusetts to Austrian immigrants Frederick "Fred" Kerry (born Fritz Kohn) and Ida Lowe.[1] Fred and Ida had been born Jewish and changed their names to "Frederick and Ida Kerry" from "Kohn" in 1900 and converted from Judaism to Roman Catholicism in 1901[2][3] or 1902.[4] Fritz' elder brother Otto had earlier, in 1887[3] or 1896,[1] also embraced Catholicism. The "Kerry" name, widely misinterpreted as indicative of Irish heritage, was reputedly selected arbitrarily: "According to family legend, Fritz and another family member opened an atlas at random and dropped a pencil on a map. It fell on County Kerry in Ireland, and thus a name was chosen."[2][4] Leaving their hometown Mödling, a suburb of Vienna where they had lived since 1896, Fred and Ida, together with their son Eric, emigrated to the United States in 1905, living at first in Chicago and eventually moving to Brookline, Massachusetts, by 1915.
The village where Fritz Kohn was born in 1873 was at that time known as Bennisch and was a part of Silesia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. For a time, Fred Kerry was a prosperous and successful shoe merchant. He and Ida along with their children Richard and Mildred were able to afford to travel to Europe in the autumn of 1921, returning on October 21. A few weeks later, on November 15, Fred Kerry filed a will leaving everything to Ida and then, on November 23, walked into a washroom of the Copley Plaza Hotel in Boston and committed suicide by shooting himself in the head with a handgun. The suicide was front-page news in all of the Boston newspapers, reporting at the time that the motive was severe asthma and related health problems, but modern reports cite family sources saying that the motive was financial trouble: "He had made three fortunes and when he had lost the third fortune, he couldn't face it anymore", according to granddaughter Nancy Stockslager.[2]
John Kerry has said that although he knew his paternal grandfather had come from Austria, he did not know until informed by The Boston Globe on the basis of their genealogical research that Fred Kerry had changed his name from "Fritz Kohn" and had been born Jewish,[4] nor that Ida's brother Otto and sister Jenni had died in Nazi concentration camps.[1]
Richard Kerry attended Phillips Academy, graduated from Yale University in 1937, and received his law degree from Harvard Law School in 1940.[5]Kerry met Rosemary Isabel Forbes in 1938 in Saint Briac, France, where he was taking a course in the sculpture of ship models and she was training as a nurse. They married on February 8, 1941, in Montgomery, Alabama, while he was a Cadet in the Army Air Corps. They had four children: Margaret (born 1941); John (born 1943); Diana (born 1947); and Cameron (born 1950).[6][7]
Kerry joined the United States Army Air Corps in World War II and volunteered to become a test pilot. He flew DC-3s and B-29s until contracting tuberculosis, after which he was discharged. Upon returning to Massachusetts after convalescing in Colorado, he became an Assistant United States Attorney. He moved to Washington, D.C. in 1949, where he worked in the office of the General Counsel for the Navy Department.[8]
Kerry entered the American foreign service and served as a diplomat in positions both in the United States and at embassies in other nations, including Germany and Norway. He also served as a lawyer in the Bureau of United Nations Affairs.[9]
Kerry authored The Star Spangled Mirror: America's Image of Itself and the World in 1990.[10]
In retirement Kerry engaged in his passion for sailing, making several Atlantic crossings, sailing the New England and Nova Scotia coasts solo, and racing sloops.[11]
Kerry died in at Massachusetts General Hospital on July 29, 2000, of complications from prostate cancer.[12] He was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Berger, Joseph (May 16, 2004). "Kerry's Grandfather Left Judaism Behind in Europe". The New York Times. Retrieved January 8, 2008.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Kranish, Michael; Mooney, Brian C.; Easton, Nina J. (April 27, 2004). "John Kerry: The Complete Biography by The Boston Globe Reporters Who Know Him Best". The Boston Globe. Retrieved January 8, 2008.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Whitmore, Brian (February 22, 2004). "Hearing of roots, Czech village roots Kerry on". The Boston Globe. Retrieved January 8, 2008.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Kranish, Michael (June 15, 2003). "A privileged youth, a taste for risk". The Boston Globe. Retrieved January 8, 2008.
- ↑ Kranish, Michael; Mooney, Brian C.; Easton, Nina J. (2004). John F. Kerry: The Complete Biography By The Boston Globe Reporters Who Know Him Best. The Boston Globe. p. 13.
- ↑ Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Miss Forbes, Lieut. Kerry Are Married, February 16, 1941
- ↑ Boston Herald, Obituary: Richard J. Kerry, July 31, 2000
- ↑ Purdum, Todd S. (May 16, 2004). "Prep School Peers Found Kerry Talented, Ambitious and Apart". New York Times. Retrieved January 25, 2013.
- ↑ Bruce Harrison, The Family Forest: Descendants of Lady Joan Beaufort, 1998, page 3117
- ↑ Richard J. Kerry, The Star Spangled Mirror: America's Image of Itself and the World, 1990 and 2004, title page
- ↑ Evan Thomas, Newsweek magazine, The Solitary Soldier, August 2, 2004
- ↑ Associated Press, Richard Kerry, Father of Sen. John Kerry, Dies, Lewiston Sun-Journal, July 31, 2000
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