If I Cannot Live, Let Me Be Brave in the Attempt

(Kudos to Don)
Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the white sheep of the Kennedy clan, has died at the age of 88 after knocking on death’s door more times than Emily Dickinson (and looking about as lively). A chance phone call in 1962 at her Maryland home led to her life’s calling, and what may be the most lasting legacy for any member of the Kennedy family. Some crank probably looking for a hand-out called the house to whine about the lack of camps for the handicapped, and Eunice told her if she could get her kid to the house, she’d start her own. Later that year, she wrote an article in The Saturday Evening Post about her own mentally retarded sister Rosemary, which had been a closely held family secret – ironically the least objectionable of the family secrets that have been aired over the years. Camp Shriver grew, with Eunice doing everything from organizing the event to jumping in the pool to give swimming lessons. Thankfully, her efforts at swimming lessons were more successful than her brother Teddy’s. The camp sowed the seeds for the Special Olympics, which debuted in 1968 with 1,000 athletes on Chicago’s Soldier Field, and now totals 3 million in more than 180 countries. The games were unique in calling attention to mentally retarded children, then still largely kept out of sight, and in encouraging physical activity, when the prevailing wisdom was to keep them from hurting themselves.