JFK mistress reveals details of affair in ‘Once Upon a Secret’
US: Mimi Beardsley, now Mimi Alford, a 69-year-old grandmother and
retired church administrator, has broken her silence about her 18-month
affair with John F. Kennedy in her memoir, Once Upon a Secret: My Affair
With President John F. Kennedy and its Aftermath. The book, out
Wednesday, was bought by the New York Post at a Manhattan bookstore.
Candid details about how her relationship began with Kennedy are
revealed in the explosive memoir.
It was the summer of 1962 and a sandy-haired, slender teenager had
landed an internship in the White House press office.
Mimi Beardsley, the polite 19-year-old intern from New Jersey who
would return to an all-girls college in Massachusetts when the summer
heat subsided, left her job as much more than an intern.
She was John. F. Kennedy’s mistress, and continued an intimate affair
with him that was cut short by his assassination in 1963.
According to the Post, it started in the White House pool, four days
into her new job. Kennedy, who swam regularly to relieve back pain,
floated up to her and said, “It’s Mimi, isn’t it?” he asked. “Yes, sir,”
she said. “And you’re in the press office this summer, right?” “Yes,
sir, I am,” she replied.
A match had been struck that would set the summer on fire. Soon
after, she was invited to a party where the president offered her a
private tour. He took her to Mrs. Kennedy’s room, she writes in the
memoir. He paused when he noticed her resisting, she said.
0That was the beginning of the affair that was made possible by the
absences of his wife, Jackie Kennedy, the Post states. Alford writes
that she never ran into Jackie afterward and didn’t feel guilty.
New York Post
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