Boston Brahmin

and the Kennedy legacy

Again, I left my last posting with a remark about not being a member of the uppercrust ruling elite and that, along with some other events, is responsible for what I'm afraid will be a somewhat rambling posting today.
Being in the midst of the "Dog Days" of summer may have something to do with my apethetic feeling but I am beginning to believe that part of it is due to my getting older. I know my memory is not as sharp as it once was and I remember things from the past more often than I once did. I think I remember someone telling me that would happen but I'm not sure. Oh well, time keeps marching on - and on.
A few days ago a short jingle came to mind that I had heard either during the 1952 Massachusetts Senate race between Henry Cabot Lodge, the incumbent, and the upstart John F. Kennedy or the 1960 presidental race when the same Henry Cabot Lodge was running as Richard M. Nixon's vice presidential candidate against the same John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. By the way, Kennedy won both races. That jingle was written by John Collins Bossidy as a toast given at the Holy Cross College alumni dinner in 1910 and was: "Here's to good old Boston / the land of Beans and Cod / where Lowells talk only to Cabots / and Cabots talk only to God. For these races the wording was changed from Lowells to Lodges.
The Lodge family along with the Adams family (not the one on TV, the one with two presidents), the Lowells, the Cabots and many other prominent families of that time were the uppercrust ruling elite of the northeastern United States which led to the coining of the name "Boston Brahmins" by Oliver Wendell Holmes, sr. in a January 1860article titled "The Professor's Story" The word Brahmin comes from San Scrit, the writing of the Hindu Religion of India and loosely translated means the Upper Caste which was/is the ruling class of India, thus uppercrust ruling elite in America.
The Irish "Potato Famine" was from 1845 til 1852 and during this period millions died while other millions immigrated to other countries, including America. In 1849, in the midst of those terrible days, Patrick Kennedy and Bridget Murphy sailed on the same ship (may have been the "Washington Irving") from "New Ross, County Wexford" in southeastern Ireland for Massachusetts where they married later that year and settled in East Boston. They had one son "Patrick Joseph (P.J.)" who was the father of "Joseph Patrick" who was the father of John F. Kennedy.
From that lowly beginning the Kennedy Dynnasty was built but since they were relative newcomers, they were never accepted into that rather exclusive Boston Brahmin Society. What irony, that John F Kennedy would win, not one but two, elections when running against one of the more prominent members of that society. I am not a particularly enthusiastic supporter of the latest members of the Kennedy Clan, beginning with Teddy, and not having a crystal ball I can't see any big political successes in their future. No more uppercrust ruling elite but if you are like me you probably wonder what would have happened but for Lee Harvey Oswald or whoever. Would we have had that long unwinnable (?) war in Viet Nam? What about Watergate? We'll never know because time keeps marching on. Thanks, stay tuned - William