My photographer and his wife had been in Sandwich, Massachusetts for over a day and not once did they eat a sandwich, unless a hamburger is considered a sandwich. It was Monday July 17, 2017 and we pulled out of the parking lot of the Sandwich Lodge and Resort at 7:45am headed for Newport, Rhode Island. I knew that Newport was the home of the Tennis Hall of Fame; and I also knew that there was no chance in hell that my photographer planned on going there; much to my relief. We had two Presidential sites on our radar – St. Mary’s Church and the Hammersmith Farm; both of which played a huge role in the lives of John F. Kennedy and his wife Jacqueline.
We were lucky and found a parking place along William Street about a block from St. Mary’s Church. From the car, I was carried downhill along the narrow street until we reached the historic Roman Catholic church that was built in 1848. My photographer noticed that a side door into the rectory was open; which meant the three of us invited ourselves inside. While Vicki sat in a rear pew, Tom carried me up to the altar where Senator John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier on September 12, 1953. As I posed for photos near the historic altar, I envisioned JFK as he recited his vows to Jackie – it was the beginning of Camelot.
When we finished our photos at the altar, I was carried down the same aisle that JFK and Jackie walked during their first few minutes as man and wife. It would’ve been cool if we could’ve walked out of the same doors that they had emerged in 1953, but a chain blocked that exit. When we finally made it around to the front of the church, the exterior looked amazing. The spire was extremely high and was somewhat difficult for my photographer to get into the entire frame. I posed for a few photos with the historic church as a backdrop. The highlight for me was when I stood just outside of the same double wooden battened doors that the Kennedy’s walked through as they greeted the throngs of onlookers who had gathered near the entrance following the wedding.
It was great seeing the church where JFK and Jackie were married. In my four years of traveling to Presidential sites, I’ve just about come full-circle with sites associated with Kennedy. I’ve visited his birthplace, the JFK Presidential Library, and the assassination sites in Dallas. I’ve also seen the limo he was riding in when he was killed, and I’ve been on Air Force One that he used for the Dallas trip. Oh, I almost forgot, I also stood on JFK’s grave in Arlington Cemetery.
There was one more place that I wanted to visit in Newport. After my photographer and his wife spent about an hour wandering in and out of a handful of shops in town, we were off to the Hammersmith Farm that was located about three miles from the church. Not only was that 28-room house, which was built in 1887, the childhood home of Jacqueline Bouvier; it was the site of the Kennedy wedding reception and was also used as the Summer White House during JFK’s administration.
In the 1991 Declaration of Independence tour that my photographer experienced with Bob Moldenhauer, the two of them were able to wander onto the Hammersmith Farm property where they had a great view of the house. Not only did they see the house, but they also saw the grounds near the water where some of the Kennedy’s wedding reception photos were taken. But after the farm was sold in 1999, it was restored and returned to a private residence, which meant there was no way for the three of us to get a great look at the historic house. As a matter of fact, from our position along Harrison Avenue, we were only able to see a small portion of the building through the trees. The view was far from great, but it was better than no view at all.
Our time in Newport was finished and my photographer wanted to visit a couple of sites in New Haven, Connecticut before we called it a day. After we drove over Rhode Island’s most scenic bridge, which was the Claiborne Pell/Newport Bridge, we headed west for almost two hours until we arrived at a large house located on the campus of Yale University in New Haven. While Vicki stayed in the Avenger, my cameraman carried me to the front of the Graves-Gillman House, which was built in 1866, and was currently used by the Yale Department of Economics.
As I posed in front of the two-and-a-half-story mansion, I found out that George H.W. Bush had moved into the building in 1946 with his wife Barbara. It turned out that Yale had turned the building into apartments for married students. When their son George W. Bush was born at nearby Yale-New Haven Hospital in July of ’46, he was taken home to that house; which made it George 43’s first boyhood home. I was in luck; I hit two birds with one stone as two Presidents had once lived in that house. As a matter of fact, George W. learned to walk and talk there; and he was also potty trained inside the building as well. When the elder Bush graduated from Yale in 1948, he packed up his young family and moved them to Midland, Texas. After my photographer had snapped a handful of photos of me at different angles with the building, he carried me onto the porch for a closeup with the front door. While there, a male economics student walked up onto the porch. As the guy was about to open the door, my friendly cameraman said to him: “Good morning, this is really a cool and historic house.” The pompous, nerdy dude gave Tom a quick glance and without speaking a word, he opened the door and walked inside. I felt bad for my photographer after being snubbed by the “Yale Man”. Then I thought to myself: “To heck with that nerd. He probably owns a Steve Urkel bobble head that he carries around to different banks in New Haven.”
We spent roughly 20 minutes at the former Bush apartment, and it was time to make the mile-and-a-half drive south to George W’s birthplace – Yale-New Haven Hospital. When we arrived at the large complex at 3:15pm, Vicki had to park the car two blocks from the hospital, and I was carried to the entrance. After my photographer captured a small handful of images of me with the hospital, the three of us went inside the building to do a little “Exploring for George W.” Tom made an effort to find the section of the hospital where the President was born, but no one seemed to know; or maybe they didn’t want to take the time to have a conversation with us. During our stay in New Haven, we found the people there were not overly friendly. As a matter of fact, the ones we encountered were the rudest people we’ve ever crossed paths with during any of our adventures. When our hunt for the exact birth site proved futile, we headed back to the car and left New Haven. In my opinion, we couldn’t get out of that city fast enough.
Even though our next Presidential site was in Greenwich, Connecticut, my cameraman decided to spend the night at Springhill Suites in Milford; which was only 34 miles from the George H.W. Bush boyhood home. Once we were in our room, I spent the night alongside the television set; and throughout the entire night I thought about New York City. I had never been there before, but that would change the following day. My body was flooded with emotions; from nervousness to excitement about visiting The Big Apple. It’s the largest city in the United States and I’m a small bobble head ready to take it on!
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For some reason, we got a later start than normal on the morning of Tuesday July 18, 2017. By the time we made the 34-mile drive to Greenwich, Connecticut, it was 8:45am as we arrived in front of the boyhood home of George H.W. Bush. The future President’s father, Prescott Bush, moved his family to Greenwich in 1925 when George was six months old, and he spent most of his childhood there. The two-and-one-half-story house sat back from the road and a small creek ran through the front yard. Because of that creek, which had an extremely rocky bank, my photographer didn’t attempt to wander closer to the historic house.
I could tell that my photographer was antsy as he hurriedly snapped the photos of the former Bush residence. Normally he takes his time and absorbs the history at each site, which is the same thing that I try to do as well. For me, it’s never about just standing on a site and having my picture taken; then rushing off to another location. We both try to visualize the historical event or person at each site we visit. For the two of us, it brings history to life. But on that morning, I could understand my photographer’s uneasiness. After all, we were about to head for New York City and it’s not a great place to visit for anyone diagnosed with COBS (Crabby Old Bastard Syndrome).
For the most part, we got lucky and the 30-mile drive to the Jamaica Estates section of Queens, New York went as planned. Traffic was heavy, but it moved along at the posted speed limit. When I was removed from my camera case, I was standing in front of Donald Trump’s first boyhood home; a modest two-story home in a very quiet and peaceful neighborhood. The house was built by Fred Trump, who was Donald’s father, in 1940 and the future President lived there until the age of four. Although the house appeared to be in great shape, the lawn hadn’t been mowed in a while and the landscaping looked very unkempt. I overheard my photographer tell his wife that “the house was sold for $2.14 million dollars shortly after Trump became President. I heard a foreign guy bought the house and I bet there was speculation that someday in the future this property will be the sight of Trump’s Presidential Library.”
I was excited as we stood in front of Donald Trump’s first home; after all, it was where he learned to walk; learned to talk; and likely learned to say, “You’re fired!” I had also wondered if Trump learned to Tweet there as well, but Twitter didn’t have its first post until March 21, 2006. It was also cool that we could walk right up to the house as it sat very close to the sidewalk; plus, it appeared that no one was there.
After ten minutes of admiring ‘The Donald’s’ first boyhood home, we got back in the car and went around to the opposite side of the same block to visit his second boyhood home. Not only was that second house on the same block, the two Trump boyhood homes were situated back-to-back. Trump’s father moved his family to the 23-room Jamaica Estates mansion in 1950 to accommodate their growing family. Compared to the first house, the second Trump home, and the landscaping, appeared to be immaculate. Since the house sat a bit further away from the public sidewalk, it took a little more effort to capture quality images of me with the historic mansion. At one point, as Tom was getting in position to hold me above the brick walkway, the owner of the house arrived and she immediately stopped her car in the driveway to see what the two of us were doing. The woman didn’t say a word; likely because she noticed that I was a very handsome bobble head and posed no threat to her or her property. In my mind I had hoped that she would invite us onto the property for a closer look, but that didn’t happen.
I laughed to myself when I heard the story about the young Donald Trump and the trouble that he caused his parents when he lived at that house. It’s been reported the youngster would constantly sneak into Manhattan without permission, which ultimately caused his parents to send him to military school at the age of 13. In my mind I thought “even as a teenager, Donald Trump didn’t care what other people thought, not even his parents Fred and Mary. He marched to the beat of his own drum; even in the early days.”
We had one final Trump site to visit while we were in Queens – the Jamaica Hospital Medical Center where Donald Trump was born on June 14, 1946. The hospital was technically located in the Richmond Hills section of Queens, but it was situated less than three miles from his two boyhood homes in Jamaica Estates. The biggest problem we faced upon our arrival at the hospital was the inability to find a place to park the Avenger. Vicki finally parked in a ‘No Parking’ zone across the street from the large complex while my photographer carried me into position to get our desired images. There was a lot of traffic on the street near the hospital; both vehicular and pedestrian; and Tom didn’t dilly-dally with the photoshoot. Unlike most of the other hospitals that we had visited in the past, the Jamaica Hospital seemed to be an extremely busy place; which convinced my photographer not to venture inside the building to find the room where the President was born.
I was relieved when my photographer had placed me safely back in my case that was situated on the back seat of the car. Even though it was only 10:30am, it was time to head for our home-away-from-home in the Carroll Gardens section of Brooklyn. The place Tom had reserved was a very nice 1880’s brownstone studio apartment owned by Cassie Diehm that my photographer and his wife had stayed in 2008. It felt to me like it took forever to make the 16-mile drive to the Sackett Street apartment; and it took even longer to find a place to park the Avenger. In that neighborhood of Carroll Gardens, and perhaps everywhere else in Brooklyn, street signs were posted that disclosed the street cleaning schedule. The cleaning days changed, depending on the street, and the time was posted when parking was prohibited. While my photographer and his wife did their best to keep that cleaning schedule in mind so that we didn’t have to move the car twice during our stay, it was inevitable that the Avenger would have to be moved at least once. Vicki navigated the Avenger down the narrow one-way streets for over a half-hour; and she did her best to keep us within a five-block hike of the apartment. When my cameraman’s wife finally found an open parking spot that was only three blocks from our place, I could hear her let loose with a sigh of relief. The Carroll Gardens apartment was a safe and beautiful place to stay; but parking (or lack of parking) made the area less desirable. In 2008, the street cleaning rules were not in place and I heard my photographer mention that they had parked the car down the street from Cassie’s apartment and they never moved it during their entire four-day stay.
I was surprised that it took my photographer and his wife only two trips to lug all our belongings to the apartment. By the time the two of them had caught their breath, Tom wanted to take the subway into Manhattan. He didn’t want to waste any sightseeing time and that was okay with me. I was excited to experience New York City and I was even more excited to ride the subway. Big Apple – here I come!
