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But an understanding of the political Kennedys of 1960 begins with an understanding of Patrick's boy Joe, whose shrewd Irish instincts were first and foremost focused on making a name and a fortune. Pat Kennedy did so well with a string of saloons and a flyer in banking that he could afford to send young Joe off in style to the Boston Latin School and Harvard. After graduation, Joe went to work as a $1,500-a-year bank inspector, but such small-bore jobs were not for him. When he heard that Columbia Trust Co.—in which his father owned an interest—was about to be absorbed by a larger bank, Joe borrowed $45,000 from sentimental depositors and rich cousins, bought a controlling interest in the bank and shook the city's Brahmin banking circles by making himself, at 25, the youngest bank president in the U.S. and the first Irish-American ever to achieve such eminence in the city of Boston.
Several months later Joe married Rose Fitzgerald, the eldest of Honey Fitz's six children, and the belle of Boston. The dynasties were linked at a nuptial Mass performed by William Cardinal O'Connell. The following year, when his first son, Joe Jr., was born, Joe vowed to give each child he sired a million-dollar trust fund at the age of 21. It was a promise that would have staggered greater millionaires, as Jack, Rosemary, Kathleen, Eunice, Patricia, Bobby, Jean and Teddy relentlessly and regularly followed Joe Jr. into the world. But old Joe could have begotten as many children as an Oriental potentate with 50 wives and still have enough left over to make his grandchildren and great-grandchildren millionaires.
Bulging Warehouses. As his tribe and fortune increased, Joe Kennedy moved out of Boston into the big time of Wall Street, then on to other bold ventures in Hollywood, Florida, Texas, Britain and Chicago and the far corners of the world. His bankroll today is estimated at more than $200 million. As a Wall Street plunger, he specialized in damming up huge stock pools (in partnership with such fellow beavers as Harry Sinclair and "Sell 'Em Ben" Smith), inflating the stock through rumors and erratic—but well publicized—selling and buying, then selling short for big profits. Later, as the first chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Joe helped write the stern Government regulations that stopped the very stock market practices that had made him rich.
A tough and tightfisted operator, Joe made some bitter enemies as he acquired his millions (many of his embittered ex-associates refuse to speak of their ventures with Joe Kennedy, or to him). He was a foresighted speculator: anticipating the end of Prohibition, Joe made a quick trip to England in 1933, cornered the import franchise for British Scotch (Haig & Haig, Dewar's) and gin (Gordon's) for $118,000. Then he wangled a Government permit to import thousands of cases of his whisky and gin for medicinal purposes, and when repeal came, the Kennedy warehouses were bulging and ready to flow. After 13 years of giddy profits, Joe sold his British franchise for $8,500,000—and paid off the two top officials who had run his distribution company for him with a niggardly $25,000 each.