MASSACHUSETTS: A Good Kennedy Year

If the Irish of Massachusetts are heard to speak of Presidential Nominee Jack Kennedy as "John Fitzgerald," they have not turned stiffly formal toward one of their own. With the state's Democratic primary looming Sept. 13, such formality is the essence of clarity. Not that anybody wants too much clarity, for no fewer than eleven Kennedys—including seven Johns—hope to hitchhike into office this year on Jack Kennedy's bandwagon.

At the top of the emerald green ticket is doughty John Francis Kennedy, 55, a onetime stock clerk and WPA ditch digger whose name did him no harm in winning the maximum three terms as state treasurer (salary: $11,000). Now he wants to be Governor, and has at least a nominally clear field since the withdrawal of a Belmont fisherman named, of course, Kennedy (James M.). A pair of Kennedys are out to succeed incumbent Treasurer John Francis Kennedy: John Michael, 63, a Boston commercial painter, and John Boyle, 59, town manager of Saugus (pop. 20,000), who was an usher at the funeral of Jack Kennedy's grandfather. "We all came from Ireland," says John B., "and there probably was something there, but we don't want to trade on it in any way."

John Philip Kennedy, 42, an ex-hod carrier who put himself through a Boston night-school accountancy course, is a one-term state representative who wants to be reelected. Father of seven, he got into politics (as town councilman in Everett) in 1948, and proudly asserts: "Put me down as one of the original Kennedys." Bidding half-heartedly for a state senate seat is I. (for Irving) John Kennedy, 47, manager of Boston's Zebra cocktail lounge. John Joseph Kennedy, 36, a salesman for "Roost-No-Mor" bird repellent, is running for commissioner of Norfolk County, thinks he may be related to Senator Kennedy but "I'm not using the name." John A. (for Andrew) Kennedy, 62, tree warden of Plymouth for 22 years, is trying for a state representative's seat, says a friend suggested he run because "we thought it would be a good Kennedy year; besides, the pay is better."

Other Kennedys are clutching at four-leaf clovers in the wind. William F. is a candidate for registrar of probate of Suffolk County; Joseph W. wants to be representative from the eleventh Bristol district; Thomas E. Jr. is running for a commissioner's seat in Essex County, and Miss Mary Kennedy will try to break the Republican stranglehold on the Sixth Congressional District. Obviously, the Kennedys of Massachusetts cannot lose—except to each other.