John F. Kennedy Official Presidential Matchbook.

The 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination in 1963, John F. Kennedy, or JFK as he is often referred to, was the youngest person to assume the presidency by election and the youngest president at the end of his tenure. Kennedy served at the height of the Cold War, and the majority of his foreign policy concerned communist states such as the Soviet Union and Cuba. Kennedy's administration included high tensions with communist states in the Cold War. He increased the number of American military advisers in South Vietnam. He authorized numerous operations to overthrow the Cuban government of Fidel Castro, including the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion in April 1961. The following October, U.S. spy planes discovered Soviet missile bases in Cuba; the resulting period of tensions, termed the Cuban Missile Crisis, nearly resulted in the breakout of a global thermonuclear conflict. He also signed the first nuclear weapons treaty in October 1963. As a presidential couple, the Kennedys differed from the Eisenhowers by their relative youth and their relationship with the media. Historian Gil Troy has noted that in particular, they "emphasized vague appearances rather than specific accomplishments or passionate commitments" and therefore fit in well in the early 1960s' "cool, TV-oriented culture". The Kennedys were great entertainers in both the White House and "Winter White House" in Palm Beach Florida, hosting many social events that brought together the most elite figures from politics and the arts. A fashion icon of the era, Jacqueline was courted by the best fashion designers in the world, often at private parties held at the Everglades Club on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach.