Sargent Shriver's life has been driven by a desire to serve others
Sargent Shriver's life has been driven by a desire to serve others
EDWIN O. GUTHMAN
Baltimore Sun
SARGE: The Life and Times of Sargent Shriver
By Scott Stossel. Smithsonian.
704 pages. $32.50.
Fate groomed Sargent Shriver for leadership. His forebears had participated in Maryland politics since Colonial days. Shriver, born in 1915, grew to manhood in a family keenly involved in Democratic Party politics and devoutly Roman Catholic.
He attended Yale University, where he became chairman of the Yale Daily News. He went on to Yale Law School and, after finishing his bar exam in September 1941, reported for duty as a Navy ensign and saw extensive combat in World War II.
The other hand of fate ensnared him in 1946, when he was an assistant editor at Newsweek magazine and Joseph P. Kennedy asked him to read the letters and diaries of Joe Jr., who had been killed in a plane crash during World War II.
Then Shriver agreed to be Kennedy's representative at the massive Merchandise Mart in Chicago. That led to marriage to Kennedy's daughter, Eunice; involvement in Illinois politics and presidencies of the Chicago School Board and the Catholic Interracial Council; and a part in the political agendas of John, Robert and Edward Kennedy.
He would go on to direct the Peace Corps, run for the vice presidency and join Eunice in deep involvement with the Special Olympics.
Shriver's admirable life is thoroughly and insightfully reported by Scott Stossel.
