Iowa Barely Noticed The First Plot To Kill John F. Kennedy

 

Watercolor drawing of a public domain image from Wikipedia

A plot to kill President elect John F. Kennedy in December 1960 barely got a mention in the Des Moines papers.

 

The Des Moines Tribune reported the story on page 7 in the December 16, 1960 issue. Headline: “Plot to Kill Kennedy, Man Seized.” The December 19 issue of the Des Moines Register buried the story on page 9, lumping it in with an article titled, “Kennedy Sets Talks On Bills.”

 

The Iowa City Press-Citizen was the only paper to run the story on the front page. It was one small column wedged between an article on the plane crash in New York and Christmas for missing airmen. The tiny headline said: “Hold Man In Death Plot On Kennedy.”

 

The story that claimed the front page that week was the crash of two airliners in New York, which claimed 126 lives. The Kennedy story faded into the background.

 

And yet, what happened in Palm Beach that week could have blown the entire decade apart.

 

The man at the center of it didn’t look like a villain out of central casting. Richard Paul Pavlick, 73, was a retired postal worker from Belmont, New Hampshire. The guy you’d expect to argue about stamps, not wire a car full of dynamite.

 

But he’d convinced himself Kennedy was dangerous. Too rich. Too Catholic. Propped up by “big money.” Pavlick decided the country needed saving.

 

So he bought explosives.

 

Not one stick. Not a little bundle tucked under a coat. Authorities later said there was enough dynamite in his Buick to level a building. He rigged it with blasting caps and a detonator. The plan was simple and horrifying: park close to Kennedy, hit the switch, and die along with him.

 

This wasn’t Dallas. No rifle. No long distance.

 

It was going to be a suicide car bomb in broad daylight.

 

Kennedy was in Palm Beach in December 1960, staying at his father’s estate and easing into the role of president-elect. He hadn’t taken the oath yet. The inauguration was still weeks away. Security was present, but nothing like the wall of protection that would surround presidents after 1963.

 

Pavlick followed him.

On Sunday, December 11, he positioned his Buick near the Kennedy estate in Palm Beach. The dynamite sat in the car, wired and ready. Kennedy would come out. Pavlick would drive close. One push of a button.

 

Richard Paul Pavlick

That was the plan.

 

Then the moment came.

 

Kennedy was standing by the car. Jackie and Caroline walked out to say goodbye before he left for church.

 

Pavlick hesitated.

 

He later told authorities he didn’t want to hurt the wife and children. He’d kill Kennedy, yes. Himself too. But not the kids.

 

So he didn’t push the button.

 

Think about that. American history paused because a 73-year-old man sitting in a Buick decided, at the last second, not to press a detonator.

 

He drove away.

 

The only reason the whole thing didn’t vanish into rumor was because Pavlick had talked too much before leaving New Hampshire. He’d made comments at the local post office. Mentioned dynamite. Mentioned Kennedy. A suspicious postal supervisor alerted the Secret Service.

 

Agents were already watching for him.

 

On December 15, Palm Beach police moved in. Pavlick was sitting in his Buick near Kennedy’s estate when officers approached. Inside they found sticks of dynamite, blasting caps, wire, and the triggering device. It was all real. It was all ready.

 

The Des Moines Tribune summed it up in a handful of paragraphs. A retired postal worker. A car full of explosives. Arrest made. President-elect safe.

 

Then it pivoted back to routine politics.

 

Part of the reason may have been timing. That same week, two airliners collided over New York City. One crashed into a Brooklyn neighborhood. One hundred and twenty-six people were dead. That was the headline Iowa readers saw splashed across page one.

 

A nearly successful assassination that didn’t happen? That slid to page seven.

 

Kennedy himself reportedly didn’t want a fuss. He downplayed it. The Secret Service quietly tightened security, though nothing like the apparatus that would exist after 1963. Pavlick was charged with attempting to assassinate the president-elect. He was later found mentally incompetent and committed to a federal institution.

 

No trial spectacle. No national mourning.

 

Just a strange, dark footnote.

 

Three years later, after Dallas, every warning sign and prior threat would be dissected in painful detail. People would ask how something like that could happen.

 

But in December 1960, Iowa papers treated it as a brief oddity. An unstable old man. A failed plot. Disaster avoided.

 

History didn’t explode in Palm Beach that Sunday. It stalled. And in Iowa, it barely made the front page.