The Founding Father

Originally published in 1964, THE FOUNDING FATHER is the first biography of Joseph P. Kennedy to review the history of the father of one of the most powerful political families in America. This comprehensive biography of Kennedy patriarch follows his genius business career, his relationship with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, becoming the first SEC Chairman, and watching his children become powerful politicians each in their own right. This eBook edition includes a new foreword from the author.


About the Author

Richard J. Whalen is a best-selling author, a path-breaking investigative journalist, and the founder of an international news service, consulting and public affairs company.

Whalen, the author of seven books, wrote The Founding Father: The Story of Joseph P. Kennedy as a twenty-nine year-old editor of Fortune. His critically acclaimed book was on the New York Times' bestseller list for more than a year and was the runner-up for both the 1964 Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. This important book is the foundation of two generations of Kennedy scholarship.

A native of New York City, Whalen graduated with honors from Queens College in 1957, joined the Richmond (VA) News Leader and rose to the associate editorship in two years. He returned to New York as a contributing editor of Time, was later an editorial writer at the Wall Street Journal and ultimately a senior writer and member of the board of editors at Fortune.

In 1967-69, he was writer-in-residence at Georgetown University's Center for Strategic and International studies. In 1967-68, he served as a special assistant in Richard M. Nixon's successful campaign and later (1972) wrote a prophetic study of the Nixon presidency, Catch the Falling Flag: A Republican's Challenge to His Party which the New Republic described as "masterfully written." His book, published a month before the Watergate break-in, predicted Nixon's single term and the upheaval that flowed from the Watergate affair.

He was a consultant to Secretary of State William Rogers in 1969-71, and left to launch his own political and economic intelligence and consulting firm, WIRES, Ltd. He ran Wires, Ltd.  successfully for more than two decades. From 1975 to 1981, he was a senior policy adviser to Ronald Reagan, and was a private White House adviser thereafter. He was a campaign adviser to George H. W. Bush from 1970 through 1992. He has edited the reports of three presidential commissions, and has contributed to several of America's leading magazines, including The Nation.