WASHINGTON (AP) – Trivia question: Where is the memorial to President John F. Kennedy in Washington?
If you said the Kennedy Center – not just the bronze bust of Kennedy inside but the entire building and all that happens there – you’d be correct. You’d also be better-informed than most Washingtonians.
This year, in honor of the 100th anniversary of JFK’s birth, leaders of the performing arts behemoth are trying to put the Kennedy back into the Kennedy Center. They are reemphasizing its role as a “living memorial” to the slain 35th president.
“Most people, even the people who’ve lived in this city all their lives, not all of that group understand that it’s a memorial,” Kennedy Center president Deborah Rutter said in an interview. “It doesn’t necessarily click for people that a performing arts center would be a memorial to a president.”
After Kennedy’s 1963 assassination, turning the center into a memorial made perfect sense. Kennedy, who served at the height of the Cold War and pushed the U.S. space program forward with his bold pledge to put a man on the moon, was also a strong advocate for the arts. He actively raised money for the center, which initially was to have been called the National Cultural Center.