First director of the jfk library. He was a member of the Kennedy Administration. It is a special pride that he would share it would glow in him, in his advocacy for the importance of the Kennedy Administration and the many treasures we had inside our building. I love this photograph of the building, it is a nighttime vision. For those who have not yet come to see us, i believe the library is inspirational in and of itself and fitting for the life and times and ideas of an inspirational president , the 35th president , president kennedy. If you are able to come to visit us, you will see this building. We are right on Columbia Point facing towards Boston Harbor and it is a sight that will elevate your thoughts, and as you think about what the nation is all about and your role in it and whether you would answer president kennedys call to service, which he issued in his inaugural address, ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. All of those words reverberate throughout the building and i think everyone who comes through is changed by it. If we go to the next slide, you see what was in the background on the first slide, a flag. You would come through the museum and experience a lot of president kennedys origin story, his campaign, his debates against the other candidate, richard nixon. You get the opportunity to really experience who he was through the magic of video and audio clips and props, in terms of things that were part of the administration and achievements therein. You would experience all of that and then come out into this atrium. President kennedy himself did not want to have the focus be on busts or portraits of himself. It was felt that the flag of the United States would simply represent the presidency. You would enter this atrium, which is also a memorial space for a fallen president , and reflect upon his life and perhaps ask yourself, what if . What if he had lived out his life and served certainly the duration of his term . What could have been . You could reflect on whether you would answer his call to service. How might you, either locally or nationally, serve the greater interest to create a more just and Peaceful World . All of that, i think, is part of the experience of our library and i look forward to reopening and welcoming people from around the nation and around the world to enter with us. It is exciting that we are now reflecting on the 19th amendment and the historic milestones that led up to it and the reverberations of that amendment beyond that. President kennedys administration and their role in advancing womens rights in the nation. It is an exciting thing. Thank you for having me here to speak on that. As you can see from this slide, jfk and womens rights, it was a truly major part of president kennedys platform as a candidate. He spoke eloquently about the importance of womens rights and all human rights. He got bogged down in a lot of issues. I think all presidencies involve a learning curve and the National Issues that pop up are traditionally unpredictable. We can move onto the next slide. In 1960, this is the historic context, women make up a third of the countrys work force. They earn only . 60 on every dollar earned by men. Unlike some of his predecessors, president kennedy did not appoint that many positions in the Kennedy Administration to women and did not have any women in the cabinet itself. You can flip to the next slide. I think there is a great clip, and many of us have watched it many times, where one of the reporters, may craig, on november 8, 1961, asks president kennedy, the democratic platform on which you ran promises to work for equal rights for women, including equal pay, and to wipe out job opportunity discriminations. Now you have made efforts on behalf of others, but what have you done for the women, according to the promises of the platform . I will say that president kennedys answer, while witty in the moment and is wellregarded in the moment, i think there is a play within a play here because his answer is, well, i am sure we have not done enough , and there is laughter in the audience. I am a strong supporter of equal pay for equal work and we should do better, and im glad you have reminded me of that, mrs. Craig. I think if it had been left by itself, it could have been interpreted as a dismissive answer, but i think what we see on the record as the followthrough following that brief question and answer, kennedys response does rise to the occasion and he does take it seriously. We can flip to the next slide. Youve got it there, kennedys response. Historians consider three Kennedy Administration initiatives to have been significant in furthering womens rights. Number one, the creation of the president s commission on the status of women. Number two, the order of prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender in hiring federal employees, and the signing of the equal pay act. The equal pay act was the First Federal legislation that sought to put women on an equal footing with men. We can go on to the next slide. This commission on the status of women is extremely important. At the urging of Esther Peterson, head of the womens bureau of the department of labor, kennedy creates the commission with executive order 10980 in 1961. As an interesting side note, if anyone is looking for a Research Project or wants to write a hollywood script, i think the womens bureau is a film worth making at some point. He appoints Eleanor Roosevelt as chairwoman of the commission and she served in this capacity until her death in 1962. Esther peterson was the vice chair and took over upon Eleanor Roosevelts passing. I would say that his relationship with Eleanor Roosevelt is one of the defining relationships of president kennedys presidency. Certainly, she is a major factor in his becoming president in the first place. He works very hard to get her support for him as a candidate. She is enamored with and very supportive of Adlai Stevenson earlier on, going into the democratic convention, and it is by the power of meeting with her in person at her residence in new york, coming out of that conversation, she comes around and sees the real kennedy, not just his social side, but the depth of his conviction and ideas, and i think it is wonderful that he appoints her as chairwoman of this commission. We can flip to the next slide. We have a picture here of Esther Peterson with president kennedy, the secretary of labor, arthur goldberg, and the chairman of the Civil Service commission, john macy, in december, 1961. We can flip to the next slide where he is meeting with the president s commission on the status of women, now underway here in february of 1962. We can flip to the next slide. I will pause here and say a few things. In april of 1962, Eleanor Roosevelt interviews him about the status of women. It starts out with some softball questions about what prompts president kennedy to form the commission, and he answers, clearly, we need to do better and the government needs to lead the way. Eleanor roosevelt then starts to dig a little deeper. Well, do better how . What exactly are we going to do about this . President kennedy, in some ways, says, i was looking forward to seeing the output from the commission to get guidance on where we should focus our efforts. I know that eleanor is not fully satisfied by that, but then she begins to answer his inquiries about where should we focus. She says one of the things we should focus on is childcare. If we cannot do better in terms of childcare, it will be difficult to have women more fully enter the labor force. Certainly, where other countries may have had more success in women fully entering the labor force, america, she felt, was behind some other countries. I should also add in terms of context, though this may seem like an obvious idea by todays standards, there are Many Political opponents during this time who felt women should be removed from the labor force altogether because it created a greater scarcity of jobs that might be available to men who wanted jobs in the labor force. I think an argument that a similar to some of the antiimmigration efforts going on today. These are not new arguments, they were not invented then, and will not go away anytime soon. I think president kennedys that if wehat is need to do better on the economy and grow the markets and the labor force overall, then let us focus on making a better and healthier, stronger economy for all such that while welcoming others into the labor force, we will grow the nation ever stronger. We can go on to the next slide. Ultimately, in response to the commission and its report, president kennedy does open more federal jobs and promotions for women. You can see here, a memorandum dated july 23, 1962. It is a memorandum to the heads of executive departments and agencies on equal opportunity for women. Quote from that. Consideration for any career position must be made solely on the basis of merit and fitness. So, as we have seen from many other efforts to move our nation towards justice, making things legal or illegal is not the end of the road. A lot of work needs to happen beyond that to eliminate discrimination. But at least some of the legal groundwork is laid in that moment. We can move on to the next slide. Namely, the equal pay act signed in june of 1963. The act makes it illegal to discriminate based on gender in deciding employees wages. By the way, we have used the term here, discriminate based on gender. The actual historic term of the era was discrimination based on sex. Just for those interested in the historic language. In his remarks, kennedy noted that the act represents many years of effort to call attention to the unconscionable practice of paying female employees less wages than male employees for the same job. This measure adds to our laws another structure basic to democracy while much remains to be done to achieve full equality of economic opportunity, for the average woman worker earns only 60 of the average wage for men, this legislation is a significant first step forward. As we know today, more steps need to be taken. But i think it is an interesting and exciting moment in time. We go to the next slide. We have the signing of the equal pay act on june 10, 1963. It is an interesting photograph and some might note, just by the window on the left side, it is clearly an africanamerican woman there and that is dorothy height, who was president of the National Council of negro women and served in that role from 1957 to 1997 and there for that historic moment. I think again, these are struggles that do not end on that moment and i think it is quite a shame and shocking for those who remember those moments. It is only a few months after the signing that president kennedy is assassinated and unable to Carry Forward the legacy even further. Lyndon johnson assumes the presidency and advances many elements of kennedys legacy from that point on. I just wanted to make sure people knew some of those historic facts. I encourage you to come to the library and learn more about it. As i said before, the womens bureau, i think, would make a terrific movie. All right. Patrick are we ready to jump into some questions . Alan yes. Would love to hear them. What do we have . Patrick i want to remind everyone that if you would like to ask a question on this or about the library, please put those on the chat box on youtube and we will put them in and try to get them in the queue for alan. Lets start with a couple of basic ones. One that im curious about, i will take moderators discretion and ask the first question. Alan feel free. Patrick in that United States over the last couple months. We have really been looking at legacy. Legacy of historic figures, president s, the founding and forward. What can you tell us about , whether it is historians or the public, that you are finding at the Kennedy Library people thinking about john f. Kennedys legacy . Has it been shifting . I think folks would be interested in hearing about that. Alan sure. I think many people point to some pretty concrete measures in terms of his legacy. The establishment of the peace corps as an agency, certainly an inspiring legacy for the thousands who have served as peace corps volunteers and returned with an even greater sense of Civic Responsibility to lead this nation. I think that the signing of the Nuclear Test Ban treaty and i would connect that to the peaceful resolution of the cuban missile crisis from which we have learned a tremendous amount and the subsequent putting into place things like a hot line between the white house and the kremlin to reduce the risk of Nuclear Escalation and other peacemaking efforts. I think that his rhetoric, in so many ways, has inspired generations, not only in america, but around the world. He was a beloved president. I would say that the entire Kennedy Family, ms. Kennedy is an inspiration, his brother bobby, his brother ted kennedy and their public service. The sisters, as well, did so many things from the Special Olympics to fighting injustice and pushing in the Civil Rights Era to senator kennedys longstanding championing of universal healthcare. S believe carry on the legacy of president kennedy and the Kennedy Family in incredibly powerful ways. Patrick thank you. Segue toctually a good one of our questions. Are there any members of the Kennedy Family involved with the library . Alan we have Caroline Kennedy and her husband, ed schlossberg, are very involved in the library foundation, which is very helpful in supporting the programming and efforts and outreach of the library. I would say caroline and eds daughter has recently joined the board of the Jfk Library Foundation and we are excited that a new generation is picking up the cause of how can we make sure that our repository is truly available to enrich citizens for another 40 years. Patrick are there any members of jfks cabinet still alive . Alan yes. With the passing of dan finn, very recently, there is at least one other and another prior serving member, that is chuck daly who was appointed to the Kennedy Administration in the summer of 1963. Obviously the administration did , not last much longer than that. But he is a living witness to those times. Patrick i think i saw him in that picture that you showed earlier. How many people i know you do a lot with School Groups. How many visitors does the museum have and researchers in a regular year . Alan in a regular year, we get about 250,000 visitors a year and about 15 of those are international visitors. The remaining 85 come from all over the nation. People are smart to make president ial libraries part of their family road trip and destinations. Some come by cruise ship. Many just come from many different countries, oftentimes with stories of their direct personal connection to why president kennedy was important to them. One of my favorite things to do is to stand in the lobby on different days and ask people, how did you come to choose this place and what did you think of it, and they tell me their stories of personal connection to president kennedy and it is marvelous. I should add, we have so many School Groups who come by the busload who are not even counted in that number. Now that we have had the pandemic disruption, weve had thousands participate in our programs virtually. Everything from education about the 35th president to Civic Education in general. We take great pride in fulfilling the mission that future generations should be inspired by the words and deeds of this president. Patrick we are very encouraged by the fact that the president ial library and archives in washington have quite a bit of demand for educational materials and resources, folks are turning to these trusted institutions to ground their teaching whether you are a new parent who has become a teacher or an actual certified teacher in the classroom. Quite a demand. Alan we put out a blast every tuesday to teachers, many of the middle school teachers, with care are with here are primary source materials and lesson plans to introduce many of these concepts to your classroom. We try to make it easy for teachers to incorporate these sections of history into their lesson plans. Patrick perfect. Let me see if i can make my way through a couple more questions. A couple researchrelated questions. I will bundle them and let you answer. Are there any more papers about the assassination that will be coming out, and secondary to that, what are researchers studying when they come to the library and the archives, if you can share general topics . Alan research is always happening with us. Though it is more challenging to do it in this pandemic, telework environment, we still respond to hundreds of researcher requests constantly. When researchers are with us and we are, i believe, the library that attracts the greatest number of researchers and researcher requests of the president ial libraries, we take great pride. Their Research Subjects are so varied. Last summer, we had a researcher with us for almost the entire summer who had come from italy and who was doing research on Bobby Kennedy because when bobby was doing investigations into the rackets, the organized crime, and as attorney general reorganized the department of justice in an interdisciplinary way to be able to anticipate and better respond the criminal activities of organized crime and he was the first to publicly name the