In 1960 the U.S. elected John F. Kennedy as President. He was younger than what we were used to, had a glamorous wife and two small children. My family; my Republican father and Democratic mother (yes, hard to believe, but that kind of thing was possible back then) and two older brothers embraced this little touch of optimism amid the hovering apocalypse of the Cold War. I was too young to know about any kind of Camelot references, but I knew the new President had a daughter about my age (she was actually a bit younger but I identified with her as a child among adults).

            By all accounts I was a rather annoyingly precocious child. My cousin has described me as two-foot-tall with the vocabulary of a college professor. I don’t recall that exactly, but I’ve always had a tendency towards explanation and I do hear the sound of my own voice prominently in my memory. I was especially fond of animals and dinosaurs and would often enlist the assistance of older relatives in “specimen hunts.” I guess you could say I was similar to stereotypical movie child who gathered frogs, snakes, turtles, etc. for temporary “pets.” These were usually accepted by my parents as the cost for something to deter my relentless questioning for a while.

            Two “specimens” stand out in my memory. I had managed to capture a praying mantis and had badgered my father into construction a screened cage for it. I would ruthlessly obtain live food for my fearsome predator and delighted in its efficient food preparation habits. Although they were rather less common than many of my captives, I managed to get another mantis when it landed in my hair. I was very excited and the family gathered to see how it went with two in the cage (as years went by, I came to realize just why my brothers wanted to observe this event). As chance would have it, I had captured a pair. You may be aware of the rather unpleasant post-coitus habits of the praying mantis. I had no idea what was going on, but the two seemed to be getting along well at first. Then, one quite unceremoniously grabbed her new friend and chewed his head off. No one had a ready explanation for me at the time but I can still remember that combination of repulsion and fascination.

            Another time I snagged a big spider. So big it could be kept in my screened cage (no longer occupied by Mrs. Mantis). It made a nice big web and we gleefully fed flies to the ravenous arachnid. This was fine until it turned out to be female. Apparently, I had captured her shortly after an arthropodic assignation. The extremely numerous progeny were too small to be restrained by their cage and went everywhere. This was too much for my mother and pet spiders were no longer welcome in our house.

            A veritable Ark of species came and went under my watch. Various turtles, garter snakes, an alligator, a horned toad, anoles, many types of frogs, toads and salamanders represented the cold-blooded category. Parakeets and canaries were recruited for the avians and in addition to the standard dog and cat, I had several hamsters and mice.

            But to get to the actual point of my story. After a trip to the Bronx Zoo (a major undertaking for us, we were from Central NY and my father was a notorious city-hater) I decided that what I really needed was a baby elephant. I had no illusions about the practicality of an adult pachyderm, but a toddler seemed do-able. My parents, both schoolteachers, wanted to avoid the cheap out “because I said so” type of explanation. They explained that the village had rules about the harboring of exotic herd animals. After a first stage of acceptance of defeat, I realized I might have an ace in the hole. I was certain this President, whose children must have similar needs would be able to help.

            I crafted a brief letter explaining the circumstances and asking if he could somehow give me some kind of exclusion from these unreasonable regulations. A couple weeks passed and one day an official looking letter with the return address of The White House arrived. It wasn’t from the President himself, but the writer, a staff assistant thanked me for writing to the President. He was sorry to inform me, that, alas, the President would be unable to comply with my request. Although it didn’t net me the baby elephant, that letter has, nonetheless, remained a cherished bit of family memorabilia. Our close relationship made it that much harder when one day in second grade I found out he had been shot. In those halcyon days I didn’t know a single person without both Mom and Dad, I wondered how Caroline would get by. I still do.