Back to the Launching Pad

If I am elected, West Virginia will have done it, and I'll do everything I can for the interests of this state.

So said Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy, one of several Democratic candidates for the presidency, on April 29, 1960 at Cabin Creek, W. Va. Less than two weeks later, Kennedy swamped Minnesota's Senator Hubert Humphrey in West Virginia's turning-point presidential primary--and was on his way to the White House. Last week, 2 1/2 years later, President Kennedy returned to the state that had given him his biggest push.

At the Wheeling airport, Sonny Day's six-piece combo--the same outfit that had blatted out High Hopes and Happy Days for Kennedy in 1960--struggled manfully on electric accordion, tuba, cornet, saxophone, trumpet and trombone to render Hail to the Chief. Rain was falling steadily when Kennedy arrived at the high school football stadium for the political rally. But 7,500 persons were nonetheless on hand to hear and cheer him. Coatless, Kennedy strode through the rain to the covered platform. "When I come back to West Virginia," he declared. "I feel as if I was coming home."

Quenched Oratory. Then the President poured it on the Republicans. "In January of 1961 a government of veto and obstruction and do-nothingism was thrown out of office, and a government here in this state of West Virginia, under your Governor, and a government in Washington committed to progress began to work together for the state of West Virginia, and the result in that brief period has been a marked improvement in the economic climate of this state."

Only a step-up in the downpour cooled off the President and brought him to a quick close. "I have too high regard for this state to have the rain fall upon all of you, but I want you to know how much I appreciate your coming here tonight in a cold, rainy night. I come to West Virginia tonight for the purpose of asking your help in giving us the men and women who, joining together in Washington, can help West Virginia and the country move forward."

Despite the miserable weather, West Virginians greeted Kennedy with warmth and gratitude. For most of them seemed satisfied that he has lived up to his promise of trying to help one of the most economically depressed of all the states.

Kennedy's first executive order as President was to double the amount of federally held surplus food available for West Virginia (as well as for other depressed areas). More than 230,000 West Virginians now get such provisions. This year the Kennedy Administration has placed $144 million worth of defense contracts in the state, quadrupling the amount awarded by the Eisenhower Administration in its last year. Kennedy has approved a 172-mile highway from the Pennsylvania border to Charleston, W.Va. An increased federal relief program has put some 15,000 men to work at $1 an hour cleaning up the state's littered roadsides and shabby towns. Three thousand displaced miners and other unemployed workers have been retrained and placed in new jobs. In last week's Wheeling speech, Kennedy could justly point with pride to the fact that West Virginia's unemployment has dropped from 90,000 in 1960 to 61,200--still depressingly high.

Not Much Doubt. But more pulled Kennedy back to West Virginia last week than economics and nostalgia. The President was specifically on hand to speak for veteran Democratic Representative Cleveland Bailey, 76, whose main claim to fame during nearly 20 years on the Hill is having once thrown a punch at Harlem's Representative Adam Clayton Powell (too soft to inflict permanent damage). Bailey is engaged in a desperate fight in a newly created district against popular Arch Alfred Moore, 39, the state's lone Republican in Congress. Few people thought that Kennedy's speech would affect the outcome. But there was little doubt about one thing: if West Virginians had it all to do over again, they would send Jack Kennedy on his way to the White House.

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