The picture that emerges across these years is not of failure but of effort — sustained, often frustrated effort made by a young woman who was intelligent enough to know she was different and determined enough to keep trying despite it. Her letters continued to arrive at home, full of the desire to report something good. She wrote about swimming. She wrote about her classes. She wrote about missing her family and looking forward to holidays.
She also struggled with things that mattered in the Kennedy world in ways that mattered a great deal. She was sometimes described as temperamental, prone to outbursts of frustration that went beyond what those around her expected. Some observers later speculated that these episodes may have been related to seizures or some form of epileptic activity — though that remains, in the historical record, a speculation rather than a diagnosis. What is clear is that her moods were variable in ways that created management challenges for the various institutions and households that cared for her.
The Kennedy family’s response to these challenges was consistently to seek better management rather than to lower their expectations of Rosemary’s participation in family life. She was included in vacations, in social events, in the visible life of the family. This inclusiveness had a cost: it required constant supervision and planning. But it also gave Rosemary years of experience that many children with her level of disability, in that era, never had.
The Years in England
In December 1937, Franklin Roosevelt appointed Joseph Kennedy Sr. as U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s — the American ambassador to Britain. It was a prestigious posting, and the Kennedy family embraced it with characteristic energy. They moved to London in early 1938, drawing immediate attention from the British press and public.