In January 1967, the German news magazine Stern (Star) wrote that deceased U.S. president John F. Kennedy had suffered from a potentially fatal disease. The above cover of National Enquirer from today in 1967 echoes that famous Stern story. The illness JFK had is known as Addison’s disease, and is a withering of the adrenal glands. Rumors about the sickness sprang up early in Kennedy’s political career, but he denied having any health problems, thinking (correctly, we can assume) that Americans would not elect a sick man to the presidency.

In the end, Kennedy managed the disease by taking cortisone, though one side effect was puffiness in his face. The disease had historical side effects, as well. After JFK’s death, his family requested that the autopsy report be kept secret, and to confuse matters even more, the coroner destroyed the examination notes. This created yet another layer of mystery around Kennedy's death. Both Jackie Kennedy and Robert Kennedy documentably believed JFK had been murdered as the result of a conspiracy, which means that in their desire for privacy they perhaps rashly made a decision that hampered their later search for the truth.

But perhaps not. It's very possible the autopsy notes would not have settled any issues around the assassination. We say this because, though a majority of Americans have always doubted the lone gunman theory (the first survey taken just weeks after the assassination showed that 52% believed there was a conspiracy), the Kennedy narrative has always favored a minority of backers of the official story. That favoritism is not deliberate, in our opinion. It's more a matter of journalistic laziness. We discussed that a while back, so click over that post to see an example of what we mean. We'll have more from National Enquirer and much more on JFK later.