McCALL'S/AUGUST 19 74 WHAT HAPPENED AT CHAPPAQUIDDICK Five years later, after an exhaustive new study of the original investigation and recent interviews with many of the participants, a clearer picture emerges of how Mary Jo Kopechne died and what Senator Edward Kennedy did —and did not do—that tragic weekend BY VIVIAN CADDEN

The weekend of July 18,1969, should a storm of criticism, has departed have been one of great rejoicing for Edgartown, following a dispute about Senator Edward Kennedy. Apollo 11 salary, for a job in Essex Junction, had been racing to the moon and on Vermont. Sunday night Neil Armstrong took E. Howard Hunt, who in his capac- the "one small step for man" that was ity as White House "plumber" went "one giant leap for mankind." It to Chappaquiddick and nosed marked the realization of John F. around, still believes that Mary Jo Kennedy's dream and promise. For was asleep in the back of the car, un- the same reason it should also have beknownst to Kennedy—and that been a time of rejoicing for Mary Kennedy was in the front seat with Jo Kopechne, whose loyalty and de- another of the girls, Cricket Keough. votion to the Kennedys, starting with At this late date it is doubtful that JFK, had been the central fact of an investigator will turn up many her adult life. new hard facts about that incredible It was, instead, the weekend of night, but time and reflection, a re- grief and death on Chappaquiddick. turn to Chappaquiddick and talks It is now five years since the Sen- with many of these people who were ator's car ran off the narrow wooden involved lend perspective to the bridge, landing upside down in seven facts that were always there. Sud- feet of water. The details of that night denly some of the pieces fall into have faded from most people's mem- place. We know what went on at the ories but there remains the instan- was due to his condition of shock. party, why Kennedy and Mary Jo taneous, flash summary that the "When he called that morning to left together and where they were word "Chappaquiddick" evokes: a tell us what happened he was so going. We know the time of the acci- party in a cottage on a tiny island, obviously distraught. His voice was dent. We have a good idea of what Kennedy driving to the beach with a breaking and then he was crying and the Senator did and, more important, girl, the drowning, Kennedy's failure he could hardly get the words out," what his thoughts were during those to notify the police until the next Mr. Kopechne says. hours of nightmare until he walked morning and a vague recollection of In Edgartown, the chief village on into the Edgartown police station at loose ends, contradictions, things the island of Martha's Vineyard, 9:30 the next morning. unexplained. The matter might rest . John Farrar, the div- there, always just below the surface er who recovered Mary Jo's body The occasion for the gathering on of our consciousness when we think and who runs the Turf and Tackle Martha's Vineyard was the 46th about Teddy Kennedy, were it not shop on Main Street, is still obsessed Edgartown Regatta. Edgartown's for one fact: If he does decide to run with the details of time and tide on Vineyard Gazette for the Presidency, it is inevitable of July 19th re- that weekend, and Deputy Sheriff ported that "Senator Edward Ken- that we will once more relive the Christopher Look, Jr., now running nedy will sail story in its every detail. Victura, the Wianno for sheriff, is as certain as ever that Senior in which he and his famous Five years after the tragedy Mary he saw Kennedy's car minutes be- brothers raced years ago in these Jo's parents, living now in their re- fore the accident. same waters." tirement home in a wooded section Two of the young women who at- It was Joe Gargan's idea to use the of the Pocono Mountains in Pennsyl- tended the party have since become occasion for another reunion of the vania, are convinced that Kennedy's lawyers and the others hold impor- "boiler-room girls," as they called version of it is substantially the true tant political posts. , themselves, the six young women one and that the Senator's failure to Police Chief Dominick (Jim) Arena, who had worked so hard in Rob- summon help or report the accident whose handling of the case evoked ert Kennedy's Presidential primary

79 campaign that had ended abruptly a the Katama Shores. Paul Markham. widow's walks from the old whaling year before with RFK's assassination. a former U.S. District Attorney from Gargan, a first cousin of the Sena- days and many of them dating back Boston, 38 years old, hard working, to the 1700s, runs down on its east tor's (it was his unmarried sister, Ann, successful, father of seven children, who was faithfully tending the strick- end to a 500-foot channel that forms had been reluctantly enlisted by a harbor for the Edgartown Yacht en old Joe Kennedy), is a practicing Gargan to crew, and the two men lawyer, but for years he had always Club. Across this channel is the sailed the Victura from Hyannis Port island of Chappaquiddick. It is a been tirelessly and immediately to Edgartown on Thursday after- available to the Kennedys in any place of magnificent beaches pro- noon, together with a boy named tected by acres of nature conser- capacity in which they needed him. Howie Hall. Ray LaRosa, a one-time vancy, sparsely settled by a few local He is sometimes referred to as one fireman and sailing buddy of Ken- of the Kennedy "tub drawers,'' from residents, by one or two large es- nedy's with a patronage-type job in tates but mostly by some summer the fact that John Kennedy and Ted, Boston, came down from Boston on cottages. It is a three-minute run both plagued by bad backs, were al- Thursday. ways surrounded by people who in from the Edgartown dock, on an old- The possibility that addition to their other duties might these women fashioned two-car ferry that operates and these men were being paired be called upon at any moment to from 7:30 A. M. until midnight. off for some type of swinging week- produce a hot tub bath, "a soak." Crimmins drove the Senator to a But Gargan is more versatile than that. He would make an ideal social director for a summer vacation spot or "leisure village," he is an advance man par excellence and he had an instinctive gift for making Kennedy campaign workers feel noticed and appreciated. All during the spring of 1968 when they were lining up and keeping track of Robert Ken- nedy's delegates, Gargan would drop in on the girls to see if they were happy and had everything they needed. And it is not at all unlikely that in arranging this reunion, the I The Lawrence cottage where the cookout was held fourth for the "boiler-room girls" 2. Foster and Dodie Silva s since they had scattered to other house. jobs after Bobby's death, he was 3. The Chappaquiddick looking to 1972 when firehouse. 4. The turn in the road—lell on might need to reassemble them for the hardtop to the ferry, right his own primary campaign. on the dirt road to Dike Bridge The young women themselves— and the beach. 5. The Smith house Mary Jo, the two Lyons sisters, 6 'Dike House," occupied by Nance and Maryellen, Esther New- Mrs. Maim berg. "Cricket" Keough and Susan 7. Dike Bridge. Tannenbaum—can best be described 8. Where Kennedy's car landed. The ferry shack-acid dock on as impressive. College-educated, e Chappaquiddick side. frighteningly intelligent, politically 0. The'lerry landing in astute, capable as all get-out, a little Edgartown,..gartha's Vineyard... tough, perhaps. The men who assembled in Edgar- KIT HINRICHS town, with the exception of Charles end is not only remote, it is incon- cottage on Chappaquiddick that Gar- Tretter who had worked in the Wash- ceivable. Joseph Kopechne, Mary ington office of Bobby's campaign gan had rented, where he changed Jo's father, says emphatically, "With into his bathing trunks, and from and who knew the boiler-room girls, those girls? Forget it!" were sailing buddies of Kennedy's there over Dike Road to Poucha On Friday Kennedy shuttled up Pond, crossing over Dike Bridge to or part of his usual Massachusetts from Washington to Boston and took entourage. John Crimmins, age 63, the ocean beach where he had a a charter plane to the Vineyard, swim. Back in the cottage Kennedy unmarried and on the surly side, who where Crimmins met him at about describes himself as a "legal aide changed once more—to dry shorts— 1:30. Driving to Edgartown they and Crimmins took him back to the and investigator,- drives for the Sen- stopped off to get some fried clams ator when he is in the state. He came ferry landing where the Senator for lunch and then went on to Chap- waded into the channel to his boat. on down from Boston on Wednesday, paquiddick to have a swim. bringing a supply of liquor, and en- The girls, most of whom had arrived The beautiful town of Edgartown, from Washington or Boston on Thurs- gaged three rooms for the girls a with its spanking white- or gray- mile out of town at a motel called day, followed the race from a boat shingled houses, some of them with that Gargan had arranged for. The 80 MCCALL'S. AUGUST 1974 Senator finished a disappointing week's vacation with the children— few minutes on the deck of the win- ninth; his nephew Joseph Kennedy and pray that it doesn't rain. ning sailboat congratulating the win- III, in another boat, finished 19th. Mrs. Dodie Silva, a pleasant, ample ner, Ross Richards. Afterward he The cottage on Chappaquiddick woman whose youthful face belies checked into his room at the Shire- where Kennedy changed his clothes, her grandmotherhood, is the rental town, and then Crimmins drove him known locally as the Lawrence cot- agent for the cottage. She and her over to the Lawrence cottage where tage, is a little more than two miles husband, Foster Silva, and her family he had a "soak"—a facility that the from the ferry landing. Small, pretty live next door to it. The.cottage rents. extremely modest Shiretown Inn from the outside. with its weather- Mrs. Silva says, for $200 a week and does not provide. beaten shingles and yellow shutters, at the height of the summer season, We are indebted to Joe Gargan for it is surely best described as a "sum- when guest houses in Edgartown the one unintentional bit of comic mer cottage" of the kind one finds are renting rooms for 535 or $40 a relief in that weekend of tragedy in in beach areas the world over. Its day, it certainly is a good buy. his doggedly detailed description of "big" room, about 12 feet by 20 feet, That summer Joe Gargan rented the onset of the cookout at the cot- is kitchen, dining room and living it, sometime in June, for eight days. tage on Chappaquiddick. room all in one. An ample refrigera- He was going to bring Mrs. Gargan "I would say that I arrived at the tor and a pint-size stove and cup- and their children down for the week house somewhere between eight-

"It is virtually impossible to turn off the only hardtop road on Chappaquiddick onto unpaved Dike Road without being immediately aware of the mistake..."

boards make up one end of the that would include the regatta week- fifteen—eight-thirty, probably close room; a built-in counter with four end. But Mrs. Gargan's mother, suf- to eight-thirty. At that time I immed- high stools divides the kitchen area fering from cancer, was taken to the iately went outside, took what is from the living-room space. Oppo- hospital that weekend for what known as a cookout and moved it site the kitchen there is a fireplace proved to be unsuccessful surgery, away from the house. It was close to and, at right angles to it, a daybed and Mrs. Gargan and the children the house. I moved it approximately, covered with faded cretonne. By the had stayed close to home. Since the oh, I will say twenty to twenty-five front-window wall there is a dinette group had been unable to get more feet from the house and placed it in table covered with a long cloth, with than two rooms for the men at the front of the window that faced the a couple of dinette chairs tucked in. Shiretown Inn, Gargan decided to kitchen so that while I was in the The cottage has two minuscule put up Crimmins and Markham at the kitchen area I could see it outside. bedrooms, each with twin beds, and cottage and to use it as a kind of I then put charcoal into the cookout an adequate bathroom. All in all, it is bathhouse for the weekend and site and poured a substantial amount of a perfect vacation spot for a family for a Friday-night cookout. charcoal lighter onto the charcoal. of moderate means to rent for a After the races Kennedy spent a It flamed up, then/turn to page 120

81 WHAT HAPPENED AT and could only do a few steaks at a CHAPPAQU IDDICK the mistake, the "wrong turn" was a time. matter of unanimous disbelief. It was continued I rom page 81 On the basis of what any of the par- began—at least the stuff I poured on evident that they were not on their way ticipants said five months later at the to the ferry. And the time, therefore, the charcoal began to burn. inquest, it is impossible to tell what "I turned on the oven. At that time did not need to be before midnight. time it was that the group more or less We know for a fact that it was I took out of the refrigerator what you finished eating. Time is altogether not would call frozen hors d'oeuvres, some before midnight, because of Deputy fuzzy in the accounts of that evening Sheriff Christopher ("Huck") Look, of those cheese-type things, some which except for Kennedy's statement that he have sausage and some which have Jr. A lifelong resident of Chappaquid- and Mary Jo left the party at about dick, whose ancestors there go back cheese, I turned the oven to about 11:15, a statement that all other par- four hundred fifty degrees. They take about 300 years, Look operates a small ticipants fell in with, although many of oil business, will run for sheriff this about twelve minutes to cook and I put the rest of their statements of time are in some of these hors d'oeuvres at that fall, is a lay reader in the Episcopal wildly divergent. Church, a highly respected man in Ed- time. After they were ready, I took But the time of 11:15 was not so them out and started to pass them gartown and, be says, "always a Ken- much an answer to the question, "What nedy fan." around to some of the people. Some I time did the Senator and Mary Jo leave passed to some of the girls and sug- That Friday night Look was on duty the party?," as it was to the implied at the yacht club, which is on the Ed- gested they pass them." question, "What was the Senator doing The cookout was late and slow in gartown side of the channel, until about in the car with Mary Jo?" With the half past 12. Then, thankful that re- getting started. After the races the inevitability of innuendo on that latter girls bad gone back to their motel to gatta weekend had so far been relative- question, Kennedy chose to say that ly benign—it has on occasions got shower and nap and change, and didn't they were on the way to catch the ferry arrive until close to nine o'clock. The pretty wild—he remarked on the fact when he made a wrong turn. Every- to the manager of the club, said good- pesky charcoal wouldn't catch on. body knew that the ferry closed down When Tretter and Cricket Keough night and was taken by the yacht- at midnight and so the time had to be club launch to the Chappaquiddick went back to the Shiretown Inn to see before side if they could borrow a radio for some midnight. where he had left his car. It was an unfortunate explanation of It was about 15 minutes before one music, nobody had had anything but their being in the car together. It did those "cheese-type things" to eat. when he came to the sharp turn on the nothing at all to prevent the innuendos. hardtop where Main Street becomes There were potatoes to bake, the salad And since it is virtually impossible to to be fixed, and it was discovered, once Schoolhouse Road. A black car was turn off the only hardtop road on Chap- coming out of Schoolhouse Road but, the fire did get going, that the "cook- paquiddick onto unpaved Dike Road out" (barbecue grill) was too small instead of making the turn, it went without being immediately aware of straight for a few feet onto a dirt lane 120 and then stopped. Huck Look, believ- ing that the people—a man driving and Doctors' Tests Show How You Can a woman beside him, Look thought, and possibly someone or something Actually Help Shrink Painful making a shadow on the rear window —might need some help, stopped too and began to get out of his car. At that Swelling of Hemorrhoidal Tissues point the black car backed up and then shot down Dike Road toward the ... Due to Infection. Also Get Prompt, Temporary Relief beach. Huck Look thought momen- in Many Cases from Pain, Itch in Such Tissues. tarily of following it but since they ob- viously were doing no wrong and didn't Doctors have found a most effective Tests by doctors on hundreds upon seem to want to talk to him, he got back medication that actually helps shrink hundreds of patients showed this to be painful swelling of hemorrhoidal tis- true in many cases. The medication the into his car. He did note that the car HO—the had Massachusetts plates and a license sues caused by infection. In many doctors used was Preparation with an L and a 7 at the beginning cases, the first applications give same Preparation H you can get with- and a 7 at the end. prompt relief for hours from such pain out a prescription. Ointment or sup- Minutes later, just before reaching and burning itching. positories. the Lawrence cottage, he came upon two girls and a man (it was LaRosa and the Lyons sisters) walking single file much talk of Bobby, too much pressure down the white line of the road toward and he wanted out, fast. the bend in the road and he stopped Mary Jo's parents still cling to the again, to ask if they needed a ride. One belief that Kennedy and Mary Jo were on their way to the ferry though they CAN'T of the women said, "Shove off, buddy. We're not pickups," or something to don't understand why, if Mary Jo was that effect, and then the man, seeing going back to the motel, she left her Huck's uniform, apologized and said pocketbook under the table in the cot- they were fine and right close to where tage. "That upset us terribly," Mr. SLEEP? they were going. Look, a bit crestfallen Kopechne says. "We don't know the at being twice rebuffed, continued past answer." It would not be like Mary Try This Different the cottage to his own house, where he Jo, they feel, to forget her purse. arrived at five minutes before one— "But it would be just like the Sena- Sleeping Method That probably almost exactly the time at tor," Mrs. Kopechne says, "to say sud- Lets You Fall Asleep which Senator Kennedy and Mary Jo denly, 'I'm leaving.' Bingo! And for were going off the bridge. Mary Jo to say, 'Me, too. Can I have More Naturally. There is no reason to doubt Huck a ride? I don't feel well and I can't Does it work? Judge for yourself. Look's word. "What did I have to keep my eyes open any more!' " Try the simple Compoz method. gain?" he asks. He had been sum- It would have been very much like Take two Compoz tablets one moned to the bridge the next morning them both. But given the fact that it was already past midnight, it is highly hour before you get ready for with other police officers, had been bed. Then let Compoz help you there when John Farrar brought up probable that what Kennedy said was, Mary Jo's body. When shortly there- "I'm beat and I have to race tomorrow. unwind—quiet you down. By the after the black Olds sedan with the I'm going down to the beach and try to time you climb into bed Compoz license plate L78-207 was hauled out grab a couple of hours' sleep," and that is working at its peak to help you of Poucha Pond, he went immediately what Mary Jo said was, "Me, too. I relax to sleep more naturally. to another of the officers and said, don't feel very well and I can't keep my Compoz is not a sleeping pill. "Gee, that is the same car I saw last eyes open any more." Not a barbiturate. Not habit form- night." Was there something else in the Sen- ator's bead beyond getting out of that ing. Compoz is so gentle we think of it as throwing the sleep switch. t seems clear, then, that the cookout close, crowded room and catching a I had gone on much longer than had breath of fresh air, a few hours' sleep? been expected and that nobody was Probably not even the Senator knows going to make the midnight ferry back that. Seductions are rarely explicitly to Edgartown. There had been some planned and Mary Jo would seem an talk, encouraged by Crimmins who unlikely candidate for a premeditated surely wished that the whole lot of seduction. Pretty. in a kind of conven- Compot them would leave and let him get some tional way, unflirtatious to a fault, she GENTLY THROWS sleep, about sending someone down to was described by one of her friends as THE SLEEP SWITCH the ferry to see if a $20 bill might not "almost prim." Be that as it may, induce the operator to make a later what is seldom noted is the fact that trip, but since nobody was ready yet to Mary Jo was not an innocent little girl set a time for the end of the party, straight out of a convent but a 28-year- could only have thought that for a Sen- nothing came of that idea. Midnight old woman who had, ever since her ator from Massachusetts to be caught passed with coffee drinking and more graduation, been living away from in a car with a young woman, late at talk and some cleaning up and some home and working in the midst of a night on a lonely island, could be taken dancing. People went in and out, stood fast-moving, high-pressure, sophisti- as nothing but scandal. His instinct in the yard and then came back in to cated political atmosphere dominated was to get away, rattling down that escape the mosquitoes. by men. The question is not what was bumpy dirt road at, he says, 20 miles It must have been somewhere around in the Senator's head about Mary Jo. an hour. 12:45 that the Senator, who had been The fact is that Mary Jo was a grown It's easy enough to run off Dike talking with Mary Jo, stood up abrupt- woman who could take care of herself. Bridge. It's always been said that some- ly, asked Crimmins for the key to his But no matter what the Senator's day somebody would do it. And you car and went out the front door, with conscious or subconscious intentions don't have to be drunk or as poor a Mary Jo following. were, when he reached the turn to the driver as Kennedy is reputed to be in All that year after Bobby's death beach, overshot it by a few feet and order to do it—although either or both newsmen had noticed these abrupt de- saw, in his rear-view window, an officer of those factors would make it easier. partures of Kennedy's. It was as if sud- who would surely recognize him get- If you're barreling down that road at denly there were too many people, too ting out of his car and approaching, he continued

121 continued farther from the road, there was a windows and trying to see her walking night and see the bridge a split second night-light of some kind in the chil- down that road. . . . I just wondered too late, failing to note that it goes off dren's room facing the road. Around how all of this could possibly have at an oblique angle from the road, you the bend on the hardtop road, the Fos- happened. I also had sort of a thought will do just what Kennedy did. Local ter Silvas had gone to bed at about 1:30 and the wish and desire and the hope people, if they are going over it, come but a small light burned night and day that suddenly this whole accident to a dead halt in front of it, then turn at the fire station almost directly across would disappear. . . ." their wheels to the left and negotiate it. from their house. It seems very probable—it would Not very many people go over it any- Kennedy was not seeking help. be highly in character—that Gargan way except for fishermen who want to Stunned, incredulous, certain that un- wouiu have offered to say that he was take their jeeps down to another part of less by some miracle Mary Jo had got the driver of the car. Kennedy's ac- the beach or Foster Silva who guards out of the car, too, and was somewhere tions—or inactions the rest of the night the reservation area. You can park in out in that darkness, help would be and extending as late as 9:30 the next the sand just before the bridge and you unavailing; he was heading back to his morning—can be seen as consistent must park in the sand just after it un- friends. with tne theory that he intended to let less you have a four-wheel drive—be- At two o'clock, LaRosa, having re- Gargan take the rap—a theory ad- cause then there are the dunes and the turned from one of the innumerable vanced by columnist Jack Anderson. ocean. walks by which everybody was trying Much as they dislike Gargan, the Ko- to keep awake after the party wound pechnes believe his loyalty to Kennedy ennedy has always said that he down, was leaning against the tree out- would have prompted him to make K doesn't know how he got out of side the cottage, reluctant still to stake such an offer. And a week later, at the tne car. He says he can "remember out an uncomfortable berth on the liv- hearing betore Judge Boyle on charges the last sensation of being completely ing-room floor, when he heard the Sen- of "leaving the scene or an accident," out of air and inhaling what must have ator's voice saying, "Get me Joe," and the Judge raised the suspicious ques- been a half a lung of water and assum- then, "Better get Paul, too." tion, "Was there a deliberate effort to ing that I was going to drown and the Gargan and Markham found Ken- conceal the identity of the defendant?" full realization that no one was going nedy slumped in the backseat of the But it Kennedy's actions that night and to be looking for us that night until the rented white Valiant that was parked early the next morning could be inter- next morning and that I wasn't going in front of the house and Kennedy's preted as an effort to deny that he was to get out of that car alive, and then the driver of the car, Gargan's surely somehow I can remember coming up were not consistent with such a plan. to the last energy of just pushing, press- PROCRASTINATION For if indeed that had been agreed ing and coming up to the surface." SAVES TIME upon, there was nothing that needed to Kennedy says he was swept by the be done but get Kennedy back to tide that was rushing through the nar- Edgartown and see to it that he was row cut that is spanned by the bridge Each mother's faced with noticed there bone-dry and to have and landed on the far bank some 30 Gargan plunge into the channel and feet, he estimates, down from the car. A basket of mending— then make for a phone to report the The car headlights were on and he A tedious, tiresome task accident. could make out the position of the car. That's unending. It was more than likely that Gargan's For a period of about 15 or 20 min- offer was one of a host of possibilities utes, he said at the inquest, he dove and fantasies that swirled through the down to the car, clung to the under- So follow my system: Senator's head in his "sort of a hope carriage and tried to get to a window Before I have sewn them, that suddenly this whole accident or door. He would come up for air, I'm free of the bother, would disappear." Certainly, when the be swept down again by the current Because they've outgrown three men parted, there was no agree- and try again. He was to repeat this, ment about what to do other than not he says, seven or eight times, each time them! to tell the people in the cottage about more weakly until the last time, he says, —ANN& KOMORNY the accident. "I just couldn't hold my breath any Gargan and Markham returned to longer. I didn't have the strength even the cottage and eked out a place to to come down even close to the win- first words were, "The car's gone over stretch out among the eight sleeping or dow or the door." After the last dive the bridge and Mary Jo is in it." His half-sleeping occupants of the cottage. he let himself float over to the near next words were, "Get me back to Of this Mr. Kopechne says, eyes shore and lay spent and exhausted on Edgartown." blazing, "I will never excuse those two the grass. What else was said on that ride to the men." And his wife adds, "I can for- It would be about 20 minutes before ferry landing we will probably never give a lot but I can never forgive them two now, when Kennedy started back know. Kennedy described his feelings for leaving Mary Jo in the water for down the dirt road, "walking, trotting, in his television address a week later as nine hours. And Gargan was supposed jogging, stumbling" as fast as he could. "a jumble of emotions—grief, fear, to be her friend!" It was extremely dark. The crescent doubt, exhaustion, panic, confusion Whether Kennedy swam the 500- moon of that evening had dropped and shock." foot channel to Edgartown or found a shortly after ten o'clock, and Kennedy He revealed them more vividly at boat to paddle over in is still uncertain. says he could make out no shapes and the inquest, without a script. Driving His first statement to the police the next that the only way he could stick to the toward the ferry with Gargan and morning makes no mention of a swim road was to follow the silhouettes of Markham, he says, "A lot of different —it is an addition in his later television the trees. Eyes glued on the road, it thoughts came into my mind—about statement, which tends to make it sus- was possible, as he claims, that he saw how I was going to really be able to John Farrar, the diver, says that no lights on the way back. call Mrs. Kopechne at some time in he can swim it in five minutes but he Yet there were some lights. The the middle of the night to tell her that believes it was "virtually impossible" Maim cottage sits about 500 feet her daughter was drowned, to be able for Kennedy with his back brace and from the near side of the bridge and to call my own mother and my own weakened state to do it. An aide of although Mrs. Mahn and her college- father, relate to them, my wife, and Kennedy's believes that he did do it be- age daughter are extremely vague I even—even though I knew that Mary cause the Senator told him about it be- about time, they say they had left a Jo Kopechne was dead and believed fore the television speech was drafted. night-light on—of what strength or in firmly that she was in the back of that It would have been a foolhardy what direction was not clear. A few car—I willed that she remain alive. thing to do—and even more foolhardy feet farther on, on the other side of the As we drove down that road I was al- for Gargan and Markham to stand road, at the Smith cottage set back most looking out the front window and continued on page 128

122 McCALLS, AUGUST 1974 continued from page .122 At that point, Gargan and Markham the ferry back to Edgartown. I was un- there and watch the Senator disappear arrived and close,ted themselves with familiar with the road and turned right into the dark waters as they said they Kennedy in his room. Shortly there- onto „Dike Road instead of bearing did. On regatta weekend the harbor is after, Tretter arrived with Cricket and hard left on Main Street. full of dinghies, and it would have been Susan, rumpled, exhausted and still un- "After proceeding for approximate- easy enough to "borrow" one and have aware of what had happened. Tretter ly one-half mile on Dike Road I de- Gargan or Markham row him across asked them whether they wanted to go scended a hill and came upon a narrow and then return the dinghy to the Chap- right to their motel or use his room at bridge. The car went of the side of paquiddick side. the Shiretown. The women said they the bridge. There was one passenger would like to wash up and plunk down with me, one Mary Jo [there was a y whatever means, then, Kennedy on a bed. Tretter poked his nose into blank here because the Senator did not B was in Edgartown shortly after Kennedy's room and got waved out by know how to spell her last name], a for- two that morning and probably made the three consultants. mer secretary of my brother Robert his way up Daggett Street to the Shire- At about nine o'clock Kennedy and Kennedy. town Inn and his upstairs room un- Gargan and Markham walked the "The car turned over and sank into noticed. Although at that hour there block to the ferry and crossed to the the water and landed with the roof rest- were still some festivities going on at Chappaquiddick side. Dick Hewitt, ing on the bottom. 1 attempted to open the Harborside Inn on Main Street who was operating the ferry that morn- the door and window of the car but down by the yacht club, the back street ing, says they kind of hung around have no recollection of how 1 got out of near the Shiretown must have been the landing and the little house there the car. I was unsuccessful in the at- relatively deserted. that is filled with tackle and gear. tempt. I came to the surface and then Kennedy got out of his wet clothes There is a pay telephone inside the repeatedly dove down to the car in and into a dry pair of pants and a suit shack and apparently the men were an attempt to see if the passenger was jacket (apparently he had no dry pull- using it. They were in and out of the still in the car. I was exhausted and in a over), and at 2:25 came out on the shack—during which time Kennedy state of shock. I recall walking back to deck outside his room and started down changed his shirt. (Was it still damp where my friends were eating. There the outside stairway that leads to a from the night before? Was there some was a car parked in front of the cot- court formed by the assortment of thought of the three men's "discover- tage and I climbed into the backseat. I frame buildings that comprise the inn. ing" the accident? Were they still cling- then asked for someone to bring me Russell Peachey, co-owner of the Shire- ing to the faint hope that Mary Jo back to Edgartown. I remember walk- town, was, at that moment, giving the would turn up?) ing around for a period of time and place a last-minute inspection when They were still there standing then going back to my hotel room. Kennedy (Peachey was not sure it was around the ferry slip at 9:30 when When I fully realized what happened he) asked him what time it was and Hewitt again docked the ferry and this morning, I immediately contacted complained of noise from a party in walked over to the group, saying, the police." one of the other buildings that he said "There's been an accident, have you ■■. had awakened him. heard?" Markham said, "We just he statement remains a closer ap- It was a strange thing to do. Ken- heard about it." I proximation of what happened than nedy spoke of it in his television ad- Kennedy and Markham returned anything said subsequently. It is sketchy dress in the context of his general daze to Edgartown with Hewitt and went to to say the least. And if "when I fully and confusion that night: "1 remember the police station, which lies behind the realized what happened . ." would going out at one point and saying some- pillared Dukes County Court House, have been more accurately put by, thing to the room clerk." Still, it had while Gargan went back to the Law- "When 1 fully realized it had happened all the appearance of wishing to estab- rence cottage to bring the remaining and I must take the responsibility for lish an alibi and it may have been a girls back to Edgartown. He met the it . . ." the statement still yields the part of his groping for a way to make bedraggled group walking toward the basic outlines of the tragedy. If some the whole thing go away. ferry, having decided that was the only details had been filled in quickly and There may have been still another way to get there, and brought them some steps taken to verify the account element in his appearance on the stairs. back to the cottage to tell them about immediately, the damage to Kennedy's There are no phones in any of the the accident. But even at that late mo- reputation would have been much less rooms in the Shiretown. Two pay tele- ment he apparently was not sure of grave. But at the police station and phones hang nakedly on the wall of one what Kennedy was going to say. For then with the gathering of the Kennedy of the frame buildings around the all he told them was, "There's been a family and top-level advisers there be- courtyard to which Kennedy was de- terrible accident and Mary Jo is miss- gan a chain of events that simply com- scending. If Russell Peachey had not ing." pounded his predicament. appeared when he did—he was not in One can only sum up that night of Edgartown's Police Chief Jim Arena evidence, after all, when the Senator Kennedy's as one of horrendous inde- had been summoned to the scene of the slipped unnoticed into his room— cision. Surely there were, as he said accident at 8:30 that morning by Mrs. would Kennedy have sought out some- later, "grief, fear, doubt, exhaustion, Maim. Two fishermen out fishing off body else to make his presence in Ed- panic, confusion and shock." There is the bridge had spotted the wheel of the gartown known? Or would he have no reason not to believe Kennedy had car sticking up in the pond and reported summoned the courage to make one of suffered a "slight concussion," as his it to her. After the body had been re- the phone calls he needed to make—at doctor testified. It is very likely, too, covered and the Senator's registration least the phone call to Burke Marshall, that in times of lucidity there were rea- found in the glove compartment, Arena the trusted friend and lawyer of the soned explorations about how it might sent out an alarm for Kennedy, only to ? In any event, having all "go away"—wild scenarios with be told that Kennedy had just arrived been told it was 2:25 he returned to Gargan driving or Mary Jo driving at the police station and wished to talk his room. herself. with him there. Still in the bathing The next morning Kennedy emerged The fact is that when he walked into trunks that he had borrowed from the at 7:30 and was walking out toward the police station he had finally sum- Maims in order to try to see if anyone the street when he ran into Ross Rich- moned up his resolve and except for was in the car before Farrar arrived ards, the winner of Friday's race, whose the "wrong-turn" excuse, which dic- and took over with his diving equip- room shared the porch with Kennedy's. tated the false time, he told it pretty ment, Arena had been stunned to learn They chatted for a few minutes and straight: from Kennedy that he himself had been then strolled back to the Shiretown. "On July eighteenth, nineteen hun- the driver of the car. One can appreci- At eight o'clock, when the breakfast dred sixty-nine, at approximately elev- ate the dilemma of a small-town police bell rang, Richards invited Kennedy to en fifteen P.M., in Chappaquiddick, chief faced with a case involving the breakfast and Kennedy said, "Thanks, Martha's Vineyard, I was driving my best-known name in the state of Mas- maybe later." car on Main Street on my way to get sachusetts. Arena was speechless.

128 MCCALL S. AUGUST 1074

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Kennedy said: "What would you like me to do? We must SUMPALK SPLUIAL do what is right or we will both be criticized for it." Indeed they were. Kennedy, clearly in the leadership here as he would be Baby's First Shoes in most situations, proposed that he write a statement, which he did, and gave it to Arena, who typed it. Kennedy asked that it not be released until Arena heard from him—pre- Bronze-Plated sumably because he wished to consult his lawyers about it. With this, Kennedy departed. in Solid Metal . • • Arena never questioned Markham about the accident— or Gargan, who showed up at the police station after hav- ing delivered the women to their rooms at the Katama Inn. He never thought to or summoned the courage to ask the $3.99 Senator if he would be willing to have a test to determine whether he had been drinking. Only He never asked where Kennedy's friends "were eating" or who they were or whether he might question them. A PAIR Arena says, "My gosh—you had to accord the Senator some credibility. . . ." Limited time only! Baby's precious shoes gorgeously bronze- Dr. Donald Mills, a gentle, unassuming general practi- plated in SOLID METAL for only $3.99 a pair. Don't con- tioner who is the Associate Medical Examiner of Dukes fuse this offer of genuine life-time BRONZE-PLATING County, was similarly bowled over by the fact that the body with painted imitations. 100% Money-Back Guarantee. Also he was expected to examine and issue a death certificate Portrait Stands (shown above) , ashtrays, bookends, TV for was in some way connected to the Kennedys. Frankly awed and out of his depth, certain that it was a Lamps at great savings. Perfect gift for Dad or Grandparents. simple case of death by drowning but aware that when Send No Money! Rush the coupon with your name and ad- Kennedys are involved things are not so simple, he called dress today for full details, money-saving certificate and han- the office of District Attorney Dinis in New Bedford to see dy mailing sack. Mail the coupon today! if they wanted him to do an autopsy. Dinis' office passed r the buck directly back, relaying the message that if Mills AMERICAN BRONZING CO. was satisfied that it was death by drowning there was no Box 6533-H1, Bexley, Ohio 43 2 09 need for an autopsy. FREE and without obligation—rush complete details of your Meanwhile, the kind of smooth, incredible staff work that genuine bronzing of baby shoes, money-saving certificate, and most successful politicians have—presumably engineered in handy mailing sack. this instance by Gargan—saw to it that cars and planes showed up instantaneously at the right places and times (as Name continued Address 107 GLOBAL STAMPS only 1011 U.S. STAMPS! L City Stile Zip

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It was a fuller they had the day before), and within not the only wild rumor that was given hours the entire party had departed explanation and it did give us some credence by Kennedy's silence during glimpse of Kennedy's state of mind the island—the Senator to the family that first week. during that night—but by including compound at Hyannis Port (the line The quick departure of the group— the channel swim and Gargan's and boy at the Hyannis airport where Ken- the existence of which only gradually Markham's return to the scene of the nedy arrived in a small chartered plane was pieced together by reporters during accident, unmentioned in the first state- says, "His face was sweating . . . he that week—and the fact of its gath- ment, it raised as many new questions looked in a semi-state of shock"), the ering at Lawrence Cottage, "six mar- as it answered. girls and most of the men back to their ried men and six unmarried women" as The aura of rumor and gossip gener- homes and Mary Jo's body to Plym- some of the stories put it, served to heat ated during that first week survives outh, , to be buried. up rumors of an "orgy." today in the widely held impression In the very short run, it may have The failure of Dinis to order and Dr. been extremely helpful to Kennedy to that the Kopechnes built what is usually Mills to perform an autopsy gave rise described as a $75,000 house with have the entire entourage whisked off to ugly hints of foul play that still per- money given to them by the Kennedys the island, no questions asked. By the sist in some John Birch-type circles and to insure their support or at least their end of the week it was dear that it was that led to the whole hassle about an benign acceptance of the story as Ken- a grave mistake. autopsy three months later when Dis- nedy told it. trict Attorney Dinis, stung by criticism, The Kopechnes, through their law- ews spreads fast. By three o'clock fought to have the body exhumed and yer, Joseph Flannagan, did present a Nthe pressure on Police Chief Arena belatedly autopsied against the Ko- claim to the insurance company for trom the ever-increasing assemblage of pechnes' wishes. "wrongful death and survival" and reporters was so great that he reieased Among the flock of advisers who negotiated a settlement, Mr. Flannagan the statement—minutes before a call flew to the im- says, for a "substantial amount." The from Hyannis Port, presumably to mediately following the accident— amount would be based, among other make some changes. , the Stephen Smiths, things, on the fact that Mary Jo was The dispatch with which everything the Sargent Shrivers, former Defense making $15,000 a year at the time of was done—and Kennedys retirement Secretary McNamara, Theodore Soren- her death and could be expected to to Hyannis Port, where he was to re- sen, Burke Marshall, the whole familiar make more and that since she was only main unavailable to the press, only group that had been close to JFK and 28, she had many years of life expec- emerging at Mary Jo's funeral, but in tancy. Any good negligence lawyer absolute silence for more than a week will tell you that the settlement in such —served to further a host of rumors, FIVE O'CLOCK a case might be as high as a million dol- theories, speculations and revelations. lars (of which the lawyer might get The fact that Cricket Keough's one third). lunch-box-type pocketbook was found Talking to the Kopechnes, looking in the black sedan led everybody to be- Heartwarming as a blessing is at Mary Jo's memorabilia—a wedding lieve, initially, that it was she who was A summer afternoon, picture of JFK and Jacqueline Ken- the victim, and it formed, too, the basis of the thesis of "Plumber" E. Howard A pile of clothes, fresh-ironed nedy in the small bedroom that holds and her books and childhood stuffed ani- Hunt, among others, that it was Cricket mals, a picture of John F. Kennedy in- and the Senator who were on their way A husband coming soon, scribed to Mary Jo and one of Robert to a tryst at the ocean and that Mary Jo And a small girl singing in Kennedy given to her one Christmas by had been asleep in the backseat of the Ethel, in the den of the ranch-style car. Even the Kopechnes believed this The very next room Just a little out of tune. house—one knows that the Kennedys at first, again because it was "so like would never need to buy their support. Mary Jo." Her mother recalls that "we —MAUREEN CANNON For to be anything less than enthusias- always had letters from her saying how tic about the Senator and, if it comes, tired she was, that she was always need- his candidacy for President, would be ing to go to bed early." Since no one then Bobby—there were some, appar- to renounce the entire meaning of their was talking, it was not known then that ently including Kennedy himself, who daughter's life. Cricket had left her pocketbook in the felt that there must be a fuller state- Olds after she and Tretter had gone to ment immediately—and early reports ' years after Chappaquiddick Edgartown earlier in the evening to from the compound, around which the there are no longer any doubts fetch the radio for some music. press stood vigil, had it that Kennedy Fabout the basic facts of the tragedy. Cricket, who has since become a was indeed drafting such a statement. Most people believe, as Judge Boyle lawyer and is married to Paul Red- But there developed a struggle between did, that the Senator and Mary Jo were mond, one of the attorneys who repre- the public-relations types, led by Mc- on their way to the beach, and many sented the young women at the inquest, Namara, who were aware of the dam- persons close to Kennedy no longer says today that she is "notoriously de- age that each passing day of silence was even try to deny it. The question is if, linquent" about her pocketbook. "I doing, and the lawyers whose sole con- and when, and under what circum- don't smoke and hardly use any make- cern was the hearing, set for the follow- stances, the Senator himself may wish up and I'm just apt to leave it around." ing week. Judge James A. Boyle, Jus- to acknowledge it. Whether or not he She left it, she says, on the front seat. tice of the District Court for Dukes seeks the Presidency in 1976, a public If any more evidence were needed County, was to preside at the hearing and a press that have always doubted the to prove that Mary Jo was not on her on the charge that Chief Arena had way back to her motel, it "wrong turn" would welcome his can- is this. For if, filed: "leaving the scene of an acci- dor if even at this late date he affirms contrary to all characteristic behavior, dent." Judge Boyle, the lawyers felt, she had forgotten her pocketbook, that, yes, it was after midnight and he was a tough judge and, since he was and Mary Jo were headed for the beach; when Kennedy opened the car door for shortly to retire, in no need of Kennedy her and she saw Cricket's pocketbook that their going there was entirely inno- favors. Never mind public relations. cent, but that the appearance there, she would have immediately The main thing was to keep Kennedy of immor- been reminded that she had forgotten ality was so inevitable that, in his grief out of jail. and remorse about the accident itself, her own. Instead, what undoubtedly And so it was not until after Ken- happened was that Kennedy, coming he despaired of answering that ques- nedy pleaded guilty to the charge and tion straightforwardly at the time with around to the other side of the car, put received the usual sentence for that Cricket's pocketbook on the backseat any chance of being believed. offense—a two-month suspended sen- If that were to happen, then perhaps shelf—where it became the shadow tence—that he went on television with that Huck Look saw. the subject of Chappaquiddick could a fuller statement, drafted apparently finally be closed. ■

130 MCCALL'S. AUGUST 1974