New Folks at Home

In the second week the pace was more than fast; it was almost frantic. Usually the new President was up by 8 o'clock. Usually there were breakfast conferences, followed by long sessions with assorted aides and task forces. There was the first meeting with the National Security

Council and Democratic legislative leaders, the second with the Cabinet and the second televised press conference,* plus a constant stream of phone calls and official visitors. Lights glowed in the President's oval office up to 8 or 9 p.m. as he worked over messages and reports to Congress. A staff member took a sheaf of papers to the White House living quarters at 11 p.m. and found the President impatiently waiting for the material. After a while, even Jack Kennedy seemed to sag momentarily. "Nixon should have won the election," said he with a weary smile.

Life on the White House social front was just as active. At the first Kennedy reception (for 300 executive appointees and their families), there was a well-stocked bar in the presidential mansion for the first time in Washington's memory--bourbon, Scotch, vodka, champagne, martinis, and Cokes for the kids. Washington Star Reporter Betty Beale was so startled that she wrote a story next day listing all the shattered precedents. Among them: newsmen were allowed to mingle with guests, hors d'oeuvres were fancier than ever, guests were welcomed as soon as they arrived instead of waiting in a corridor, four abreast, for a formal presidential handshake. Even routine ceremony had a new style. Jacqueline Kennedy opened the Heart Fund drive by posing with twin beneficiaries of heart surgery, Donna and Debbie Horst, 6. When the pictures were over, she gave each one a tiny gold heart charm with the girl's name and Jackie's "J.B.K." initials on it.

Inside Out. Both Kennedys seemed determined to remake their new home to their own tastes. By the time the two children, Caroline and John Jr., got home from their Palm Beach vacations, Jackie had their rooms ready. Caroline found most of her white bedroom furniture from the Georgetown N Street house in a pale pink room with white woodwork and old-fashioned chintz curtains. Little John, now 9 1/2 Ibs. and smiling broadly, was bedded down next door in a white room with white woodwork. He slept in the same white wicker bassinette that was used by his mother and his sister.

In the President's office, the pale green walls were newly painted minutes after Ike moved out, but Kennedy ordered them repainted--in white. The two red couches were sent out to be re-covered in tan. Ike's gold-eagle bookends stayed on the presidential desk, but between them now are a Bible, The World Almanac, and two of Author Jack Kennedy's own books: The Strategy of Peace and Profiles in Courage. Some of the President's recent reading--Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung and New York Herald Trib-man Bob Donovan's Inside Story of the Eisenhower Administration--cluttered the big presidential desk. Beside them was the coconut shell on which Navy Lieut. Jack Kennedy had scratched a message asking for rescue after his PT boat was rammed and sunk by a Japanese destroyer during World War II.

Outside In. Even with a brisk business and social schedule, the President sandwiched in a little outdoor activity in the Kennedy tradition. One morning he put on a plaid sports jacket, some old shoes and an old hat, picked up a snappy walking cane, and hiked through the snow-covered streets of Washington with his Choate roommate, New York Adman K. Le Moyne Billings. Later in the day he stretched his legs again. Hiding behind dark glasses and a grey fedora, he walked almost unrecognized among the skiers and sleigh riders of Battery Kemble Park. This week the White House physician, Dr. Janet Travell, hopes to get him to relax by swimming for the first time in the indoor pool that was built for Franklin Roosevelt.

Kennedy may need a dip now and then, for by the end of the second week something new had been added to the boyish Kennedy look: a brow that wore deep furrows oftener than not.

* Apparently the last live press conference telecast for at least two weeks. Without explanation, Press Secretary Pierre Salinger announced that for a while the conferences would be taped for rebroadcast.

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