Before Dallas there was Dublin…and New Ross…and Galway.

Historian Myles Dungan shares his memories of John F. Kennedy’s June 1963 visit to the Irish capitol in a post that sets the stage for next month’s 50th anniversary of the historic trip.

America’s first (and only) Irish-Catholic president “lapped up the blatant adulation,” Dungan writes, as he shared the motorcade with Eamon De Valera.

The U.S. Embassy, the JFK Presidential Library and Museum in Boston, the National Library of Ireland and other organizations are marking the anniversary with a number of special events on both sides of the Atlantic.

We will post more about this anniversary over the coming month. It will be good to enjoy these happy memories before having to recall the dark anniversary of November 1963.

JFK in Dublin, June 1963. Image from thegatheringireland.com