David A. Kennedy
| David A. Kennedy | |
|---|---|
Kennedy in 1983
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| Born |
David Anthony Kennedy June 15, 1955 Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Died | April 25, 1984 (aged 28) Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Drug overdose |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Parent(s) |
Robert F. Kennedy Ethel Skakel |
David Anthony Kennedy (June 15, 1955 – April 25, 1984) was the fourth of eleven children of Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel.
David Anthony Kennedy, born on June 15, 1955 in Washington, D.C., was the fourth child of Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy. As a child, David was shy, introverted and sensitive, and shared a particularly strong bond with his father.
On June 4, 1968, 11 days before his 13th birthday, Kennedy nearly drowned while he and his siblings were swimming in the Pacific Ocean near the Malibu, California beach house of Hollywood film director John Frankenheimer, a Kennedy family friend. Kennedy had been knocked over by a wave and was trapped on the bottom by the undertow. His father dived under the water and rescued him, scraping and bruising his own forehead in the process. Frankenheimer gave Senator Kennedy theatrical makeup to hide the bruise, as he would be appearing on television hours later.
At just after midnight on June 5, David watched on TV as his father claimed victory in the California presidential primary election; the 12-year-old then watched as the same broadcast reported his father's assassination moments later. The event left an emotional scar on David and he began recreational drug use shortly thereafter.
A 1973 Jeep accident left Kennedy's then girlfriend, Pamela Kelley, paralyzed. His oldest brother, Joseph Kennedy II, had been driving the Jeep and was charged with reckless driving. Kennedy sustained a fractured vertebra and became addicted to the painkillers he was given in the hospital. He began using heroin intravenously that autumn in his final year at Middlesex School in Concord, Massachusetts. Kennedy spent two years as a student at Harvard College, pursuing a major in American history before dropping out in 1976. He had ambitions of becoming a journalist and spent several months as an intern for a Tennessee newspaper in 1974. Some staff there were impressed with his aptitude. In 1974 Kennedy and his siblings were the target of kidnap threats, and were given Secret Service protection.
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