On November 29, 1962, President and Mrs. Kennedy spoke at a fundraising dinner for a National Cultural Center that would become known as “The Kennedy Center.” The event, called “An American Pageant of the Arts,” was broadcast live across the U.S. via closed-circuit hookup.

Leonard Bernstein served as master of ceremonies for an evening that included appearances by Marian Anderson, Van Cliburn, Robert Frost, Danny Kaye, Bob Newhart, Harry Belafonte, and a young Yo-Yo Ma.

Watch the full pageant:    • “An American Pageant of the Arts” wit…  

“Art is political in the most profound sense,” the president stated, “not as a weapon in the struggle, but as an instrument of understanding of the futility of struggle between those who share man’s faith.”

Two months after President Kennedy’s assassination in November 1963, Congress passed and President Johnson signed into law legislation renaming the National Cultural Center as a “living memorial” to John F. Kennedy.

Learn more about the Kennedy Center’s history:
https://www.kennedy-center.org/our-st…