01:00 AM EDT on Thursday, June 3, 2004

BOSTON -- When he was running for president, Sen. John F. Kennedy was at a dinner, poised to give a speech. Wanting to quote from Tennyson's Ulysses, he scratched a note to his wife, Jacqueline, asking for the poem's passage that starts, "Come my friends."

On the same sheet, she supplied, with near-perfect recall, more than a dozen lines. " 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. . . . To strive, to seek, to find, & not to yield."

It's hard to imagine any other presidential candidate and prospective first lady engaging in such an impromptu exchange. This one is a highlight of a Kennedy Library exhibit that runs though Jan. 20.

Entitled "Campaign!" it chronicles the ultra-close 1960 race between Democrat Kennedy and Republican Vice President Richard M. Nixon.

It is an expanded version of a permanent display. There are riveting films and artifacts -- say, a TV camera from the first debate -- that capture the election and the era. Here's a framed piece of the teleprompter script Kennedy used in his convention acceptance speech. You'll love the campaign commercials -- there's JFK talking with Harry Belafonte -- on a black and white TV. Your kids may be puzzled by a phonograph and a cluster of 45 rpm tunes by Frankie Avalon and Fabian. For many young visitors to the library, according to Jim Wagner, assistant curator, "This is the first time they've ever seen a record player or a record."

But the best thing is the Ulysses note and other documents in a gallery a few steps from the bulk of the exhibit.

Curator Frank Rigg says, "It's a very, very good thing for people to realize that history just doesn't come out of a book and that it just doesn't come off a TV screen, but it comes from somewhere, and this is the sort of material that it comes from."

Here's the original text of Kennedy's announcement that he wanted Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson for vice president. It's adorned with handwritten Kennedy comments. You might find the statement quoted somewhere, but Rigg says it's special to see the real thing. "John F. Kennedy actually handled this piece of paper and he actually wrote these notes, and so it takes me to that moment in quite a dramatic way."

Attention, John F. Kerry. As you mull your pick for VP, consider that any materials you have lying around may find their way into a library one day. Here's a memo to Kennedy from aide Ted Sorensen about VP possibilities. LBJ would be "easier to work with in this position than as Majority Leader." Two governors are "extreme conservatives, inarticulate and sometimes ill-tempered."

Here's a memo detailing an Oct. 28, 1959 strategy meeting in Hyannisport whose participants included former Rhode Island Gov. Dennis J. Roberts.

It's sobering to glance at anti-Catholic pamphlets, a reminder of the battle Kennedy had to wage to ease fears about a Catholic in the White House. He gave eloquent voice to the principle of separation of church and state. That's something to contemplate at a time when some bishops talk of denying communion to politicians who support abortion rights.

Kennedy, at 43, also had to overcome skepticism about his youth. Here's a July, 18, 1960 letter to his brother, Robert, from historian/ally Arthur Schlesinger Jr., grousing that on CBS a supporter had referred to the candidate as "Jack." Schlesinger said this played into GOP hands. Also, "On the same principle, people should stop calling you 'Bobby.' "

Tell that to Time magazine. Here's the Oct. 10 cover featuring the campaign manager: you know, "Bobby Kennedy."

For more, see www.jfklibrary.org

M. Charles Bakst, The Journal's political columnist, can be reached by e-mail at mbakst [at] projo.com