It was July, 18, 1969. Ted Kennedy was having a party with some friends in Chappaquidick, Mass. Six young, "Boiler Room Girls" and six gentlemen. It seems the wives were never invited to this party.
According to his later testimony, Ted Kennedy chose to not drink that night, and when Mary Jo Kopechne (a 28-year-old political worker) said
"that she was desirous of leaving, if I would be kind enough to drop her back at her hotel". Ted, although his driver was present at the party, took the keys from him and offered to drive her. Kopechne told no one that she was leaving with Kennedy, and left her purse and hotel key at the party.
Even though Ted Kennedy hadn't had a drop of alcohol, he became lost. Kennedy's 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88 was spotted where he pulled off on a cemetery road and a police officer approached the car to ask if needed help. But Kennedy chose to speed away from the officer in a cloud of dust.
Kennedy made a wrong turn onto Dike Road, an unlit dirt road that led to Dike Bridge. Dike Road was unpaved, but Kennedy, driving at
"approximately twenty miles an hour", took
"no particular notice" of this fact, and did not realize that he was no longer headed towards the ferry landing. -- until he plunged off the side of Dike Bridge. The car sunk in the water, and Ted swam to shore.
He was tired, so he rested about fifteen minets and walked back to the party. Kennedy denied seeing any house with a light on during his journey back to Lawrence Cottage. His route back to the cottage would have taken him past four houses from which he could have telephoned and summoned help; however, he did not do so.
He returned to the scene of the accident with his cousin and a friend that later became the Attorney General, with the hope of rescuing Mary Jo. Kennedy said he was worried for the others safety, so he didn't bother telling them about Mary Jo Kopechne. The guys tried to free her body from the car for a while, his friends drove him to the ferry where he swam to the other side and went back to his hotel room.
"I almost tossed and turned and walked around that room ... I had not given up hope all night long that, by some miracle, Mary Jo would have escaped from the car."
Kennedy complained at 2:55 am to the hotel owner that he had been awoken by a noisy party. By 7:30 am the next morning he was talking "casually" to the winner of the previous day's sailing race, with no indication that anything was amiss. At 8 a.m., Gargan and Markham joined Kennedy at his hotel where they had a "heated conversation." According to Kennedy's testimony, the two men asked why he hadn't reported the accident.
Earlier that morning, two amateur fishermen had seen the overturned car in the water and notified the inhabitants of the nearest cottage to the pond, who called the authorities at around 8:20 am. A diver was sent down and discovered Kopechne's body at around 8:45 am. The diver, John Farrar, later testified at the inquest that Kopechne's body was pressed up in the car in the spot where an air bubble would have formed. He interpreted this to mean that Kopechne had survived for a while after the initial accident in the air bubble, and concluded that
Had I received a call within five to ten minutes of the accident occurring, and was able, as I was the following morning, to be at the victim's side within twenty-five minutes of receiving the call, in such event there is a strong possibility that she would have been alive on removal from the submerged car.
When Kennedy, still at the pay phone by the ferry crossing where he was calling friends, saw that the body had been discovered, he crossed back to Edgartown and went to the police station; Gargan simultaneously went to the hotel where the Boiler Room Girls were staying to inform them about the incident.
Rest in Peace, Ted.
I may not agree with a lot of the things that Obama has been doing but I must say that he does have his endearing moments.
