Michael LeMoyne Kennedy was born on February 27, 1958, in Washington, D.C. He was named after an Irish priest and a long-standing family friend, Michael Kennedy of Dungarvan in County Waterford, and Kirk LeMoyne Billings, the prep school roommate of his paternal uncle, John F. Kennedy, and a close Kennedy family friend. He was five years old when his uncle was assassinated and ten years old when his father was assassinated.