POST DALLAS – CREATING HIS OWN LEGACY
After the loss of his brother, Robert Kennedy was a broken man. For about a year he appeared lost. Up until 1963 a large proportion of his life had been serving his elder brothers’ interests. Photographs reveal just how much the loss affected him. Whilst the nation mourned the loss of a President, he mourned the loss of his brother and closest confidant. It is through this commonality of loss and notion of family that the untouchable Kennedy’s became touchable. The world shared in the grief of the widow, the children losing a father, siblings losing a sibling and parents losing a son. Although Robert never separated himself from his brothers’ legacy, guilt ridden at the thought of moving on, the American public did, it had to. JFK was gone and the hopes of many fell upon Robert. It is commonly acknowledged that the most venerate believer in promulgating the John F. Kennedy mythology was Robert Kennedy. When it came to creating his legacy, it was a disenchanted American public that believed and propagated it the most. From 1964 until 1968, Robert Kennedy came to symbolize hope. People genuinely thought that under his leadership political violence would end, as would racial segregation and the war in Vietnam. Evidently, with his assassination, a powerful mythology was unquestionably going to emerge.