Kennedy John



John F. Kennedy 1st Anniversary Mass Invitation to Boston's Cathedral of the Holy Cross







Invitation to November 22, 1964 commemorative mass sent to JFK's Harvard University classmate Richard R. Flood. Printed on a beveled-edged cream stock card with a pew number handwritten in the lower left corner, overall measuring 6.25" x 5". Near fine.







The invitation reads:







"First Anniversary Mass




in memory of




John Fitzgerald Kennedy




on




Sunday the twenty-second day of November




nineteen hundred and sixty-four




10 o'clock




Cathedral of the Holy Cross




Boston, Massachusetts




His Eminence Richard Cardinal Cushing




Celebrant."







Archbishop Richard Cushing delivered a funeral mass at Boston's Cathedral of the Holy Cross on Sunday, November 22, 1964 to commemorate the 1 year anniversary of the president's assassination. Just eleven months earlier, on January 19, 1964, Archbishop Cushing had delivered a Requiem High Mass at the same church. 1800 people had attended that service, among them Jackie Kennedy, Rose Kennedy, and Ted Kennedy, where the Boston Symphony Orchestra and several area choruses performed Mozart's Requiem.







Now that the 1 year anniversary was approaching, Massachusetts Governor Endicott Peabody had proclaimed November 15-November 22, 1964 as "John F. Kennedy Memorial Week." Special exhibits and concerts were offered at the State House, while Archbishop Cushing's service at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross was the capstone of the week. The 1 year anniversary was commemorated nationally and around the world: wreaths were laid at Kennedy's grave at Arlington National Cemetery, church services were held around the country, and Pope Paul VI reserved a prayer for Kennedy.







Richard Cushing (1895-1970) served as the Archbishop of Boston between 1944-1970, and was appointed a Cardinal after 1958. A Kennedy family friend who baptized many of the Kennedy children, he officiated at John and Jackie's 1953 wedding, read an invocation at the 1961 inauguration, and later conducted numerous televised funeral masses for the slain president in Washington, D.C. and Boston. Cushing is remembered for his superlative church fundraising and community engagement. The Cathedral of the Holy Cross was a Gothic Revival consecrated in 1875; it is the largest Roman Catholic church in New England.







Richard R. Flood (1914-1969) was a close friend of JFK's older brother Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. when they were both students at Harvard University. Flood graduated from Harvard a year behind Joe Jr. and a year ahead of JFK, socializing frequently with the Kennedys in Boston and Cape Cod. Flood worked on JFK's 1946 congressional and 1952 Senate campaigns. "Dick-Dick," as JFK called him, visited his old schoolmate at the White House in October 1963. Flood's oral history interview conducted in December 1964 can be accessed through the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum.







WE PROVIDE IN-HOUSE SHIPPING WORLDWIDE!