IS THIS THE DAFTEST JFK BOOK QUOTE YET? I only married Jackie so

0 Comments | Sunday Mirror, Nov 6, 2005 | by EXCLUSIVE By JULIAN BROUWER

MURDERED president John F Kennedy never really wanted to marry glamorous girlfriend Jackie Onassis - but went through with the wedding because he didn't want people to think he was "queer".

And the womanising world leader spent most of their marriage cheating on her with a string of sexy employees, acquaintances and high-class hookers.

The revelations are made in bombshell new book, Forty Ways To Look At JFK, by Gretchen Rubin.

In the book, Kennedy is quoted as telling friends: "I only got married because I was 37-years-old, and in politics, people would think I was queer."

According to author Rubin, there was very little danger of anyone thinking that - because President Kennedy openly flaunted his girlfriends, often right under Jackie's nose.

In the book Kennedy's friend Jim Reed claims Jackie was well aware of what he was up to. Jim said: "Jack kept assuring us that she didn't suspect, but it was obvious that she knew exactly what was happening."

A female journalist was once taken aback when Jackie pointed out two young female aides to her during a White House tour and said: "Those two are my husband's lovers."

When another woman went to greet her, Jackie muttered to JFK's military aide Dave Powers: "Isn't it bad enough that you solicit this woman for my husband? Now you insult me by asking me to shake her hand!"

She should have been used to that kind of humiliation. Kennedy even insisted on making his 23-year-old lover, Pamela Turnure, Jackie's Press secretary, despite the fact she had no experience whatsoever.

Despite the danger of Kennedy being assassinated, his secret service agents were usually more worried about him being caught with his pants down.

As Larry Newman, a secret service agent assigned to Kennedy's detail, explains: "You were on the most elite assignment and you were there watching an elevator or door because the president was inside with two hookers."

Prostitutes would regularly walk into JFK's workplace to satisfy his lusty desires.

New York hooker Leslie Devereux recalls: "I visited him twice at the White House, the first time for only fifteen minutes in a small room off the Oval Office. His secretaries didn't so much as blink when they saw me."

Having a bad back had its advantages too - Kennedy spent fortunes worth of tax payers' money, employing gorgeous girls to massage him.

A stewardess on JFK's private plane, The Caroline, explained: "One of my functions as a stewardess, which couldn't have pleased Jackie very much, were the neck and shoulder massages I gave him every day."

And Kennedy also had a succession of secretaries specially trained to give him daily massages.

Despite her revelations, Rubin is confident that Kennedy will remain America's most popular president. She wrote: "Some commentators marvel that, despite the explosive information about JFK that has emerged, he remains one of the most popular figures in American history. But they misunderstand that these revelations don't diminish interest in Kennedy - they feed it.

"It's ironic, but true, that facts that would have destroyed Kennedy's presidency - his assignations with Marilyn Monroe, the secretly taped conversations, the affair with his White House intern - now help keep him and his legacy in public sight.

"Somehow, for most people, these details don't tarnish Kennedy's brilliant reputation but merely make him more interesting."

TIME UP FOR MONROE GIFT

A ROLEX watch given to JFK by his secret lover, actress Marilyn Monroe, has been sold at auction for $120,000.

Though he was usually brazen about his many affairs, JFK was startled to receive the expensive gift - which contained an incriminating inscribed message and came with a love poem.

He even ordered trusted White House aide, Kenneth O'Donnell, to: "Get rid of it now!"

However, it has taken the O'Donnell family over four decades to get rid of the gold timepiece because the aide couldn't bear to part with it. Instead he allowed it to be kept in the family.

When the O'Donnells finally did sell the Rolex recently, at Connecticut's Alexander Autographs auction house, a US collector snapped it up.

The watch, inscribed with the words: "Jack with love as always, Marilyn, May 29th, 1962", came accompanied with a poem the Some Like it Hot star wrote for the US leader, entitled A Heartfelt Plea On Your Birthday. Her poem reads:

Let lovers breathe their sighs

And roses bloom and music sound

Let passion burn on lips and eyes And pleasure's merry world go round

Let golden sunshine flood the sky

AND LET ME LOVE, OR LET ME DIE!"

... Monroe did die only three months later of a drug overdose and Kennedy was assassinated the following year.

Marilyn is said to have given Kennedy the watch on his 45th birthday. Ten days earlier, she had sexily serenaded JFK and her breathless rendition of Happy Birthday had triggered talk the pair were having an affair.