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For example, Ted Sorensen whom I interviewed for the book, perhaps the closest aide to JFK, saw Lem around the White House all the time, but he told me he didn’t know that he’d had his own room there and was staying there so much of the time.
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And actually some of the people who were working in the White House very close to JFK didn’t know it. KH: One of the very surprising facts that comes out in this book is that Lem had his own room at the White House?ĭP: Yes, that’s one of the revelations in the book that’s really surprising. He wasn’t just “a gay friend” on the side. This was the closest person in all the world to him outside of his family for 30 years. There was one reviewer who wrote, “What’s the big deal here? This guy’s writing that JFK was comfortable with gay men, so big deal, we all knew that.” But of course it’s not the fact that he had a friend named Lem Billings who was gay. He liked the stimulation of those relationships, there was nothing sexual about it, but there was something about that male-male dynamic that fed him.ĭP: I think that’s exactly right. I guess “man’s man” used to sort of mean that, but JFK took it so much further in a way because he loved being around men, he knew some men were attracted to him and even seemed to enjoy it. KH: We don’t really have a word for that.
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We don’t have a word for that, right? Somebody who prefers the opposite gender for sexuality, and the same gender for deep, emotional attachments. But his strongest emotional attachments were to men - and principally, to Lem.
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We don’t need much evidence of that, the evidence is all over the place. And then fourthly, there was the two month trip to Europe that they took, just before WWII in 1937, just the two Americans at that pivotal time, I think that was obviously a very strong bonding event.Īnd then over and above these issues, I would say this - and this is kind of a complicated thought because we really don’t have language to express these kinds of relationships - and that is, I’m firmly convinced after working on this book that John Kennedy’s sexual interests were in women. Lem was the person who was always there for him and took care of him. Thirdly, and I think this is really important, John Kennedy was so sick most of his life, far earlier than when most people think, including when he was at Choate, and Lem was the person at boarding school - his mother and father did not come to the school when he was ill Lem was there. Secondly, they roomed together for part of the time at the school. And were engaged in all kinds of pranks which almost got them expelled twice. One was the fact that they both hated that school in which they met.
KENNEDY GAY BAR TAMPA SERIES
First of all, there were a series of bonding events early on. I think there were a number of elements to it. The fact that it started when they were very young and, from what I read in the book, they were basically inseparable for the rest of their lives except when circumstances had them in distant cities.ĭP: Yes, indeed. KH: You said that this was the story of a friendship that crossed sexual orientation lines, which I think is really an interesting element of it, but talk a little bit about the depth of this friendship. Kenneth Hill: How would you characterize the friendship between JFK and Lem Billings?ĭavid Pitts: The way I would characterize it is that is was a very close, deep, friendship across sexual orientation lines. Kenneth Hill of WoolfAndWilde, conducted a fascinating interview with David Pitts, the author of ‘Jack and Lem’, to uncover some more details about the extraordinary relationship between the two unlikely friends: