page_title: USS Sequoia (presidential yacht)
section_title: Kennedy Administration
hierarchical_section_title: USS Sequoia (presidential yacht) / U.S. Government service / Presidential service / Kennedy Administration
caption_attribution_description: English: The Sequoia was used to transport guests to a State Dinner at Mount Vernon in honor of Muhammad Ayub Khan, President of Pakistan,
context_page_description: USS Sequoia is the former presidential yacht used during the administrations of Herbert Hoover through Gerald Ford and then sold by Jimmy Carter.
  Often called the “floating White House”, the Sequoia offered presidents, first families and high-ranking government officials a place to escape the complexities of official life while also serving as the backdrop for significant moments of 20th-century American history.
  A Congressional Resolution passed December 1985 stated, “Sequoia was the setting for Presidential meetings, negotiations and decisions of extraordinary significance for and effect on the history of the United States and the course of world events” and “recognized the unique significance of the former Presidential yacht Sequoia which has made her a symbol of American political heritage and the Office of the President”.
  Sequoia was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1987 and according to a statement made by the President of The Mystic Seaport Museum to the New York Times, "The Sequoia is probably the most significant artifact of presidential importance that is in private hands".
context_section_description: President Kennedy's use of Sequoia is not as well documented as that of other presidents. Government photographers did not accompany him on the yacht, and curiously, immediately after his assassination, an order was given to destroy all personal logs associated with Sequoia's use during Kennedy's Administration. At the time, Paul “Red” Fay, one of Kennedy's closest friends and confidants, served as Acting Secretary of the Navy. 
  During October 1962, President Kennedy held strategy meetings on Sequoia to discuss the Cuban Missile Crisis. On May 29, 1963, the Kennedys hosted a cruise to celebrate the President's 46th and final birthday. At 8 pm, the couple boarded Sequoia to the music of two orchestras. With 25 friends and family, the President and his guests danced after a meal of roast filet and Dom Perignon. In the words of Clement Norton, a close Kennedy family friend who was aboard that night, “You never can imagine anything happier or more normal or nice.” The iconic photographs documenting the President's last birthday were not taken by an official White House photographer, but by the navy officer in charge of Sequoia using his own Kodak Instamatic camera. Mary Pinchot Meyer's presence at the intimate celebration and her murder the following year have been topics of much speculation.
  At the time President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963 he and the First Lady were scheduled to host friends for a Sunday cruise aboard Sequoia, two days later, on November 24, 1963. In April 1964, the widowed Mrs. Kennedy spent an evening aboard Sequoia with a group of President Kennedy's closest friends. Frank Gannon, the piano player aboard that day, recounts a poignantly sad story of Mrs. Kennedy requesting him to play “Me and My Shadow” a song about being alone. On May 27, 1964, two days before what would have been Kennedy's 47th birthday, his closest family and some friends once again gathered aboard Sequoia for a dinner cruise documented by Kennedy speechwriter and presidential historian, Arthur Schlesinger Jr.
caption: Secretary of the Navy John Connally welcoming President Kennedy Aboard Sequoia July 11, 1961
exif: {}