mildly retarded young woman her family knew.

As Rose Kennedy would describe later, her daughter had been reduced to a "childlike level" which left her completely incapable of caring for herself. Not only was she unable to speak more than a few words, but she had to learn to walk all over again. While she had formerly led a semi-autonomous life at the convent school where she had been living, this was no longer possible for her. Acting on the advice of Cardinal Richard Cushing, a trusted advisor of the Kennedy family, Rosemary's parents sent her to St. Coletta's convent in Wisconsin where she would spend the rest of her life. And it was there that she was reportedly abandoned by her family. Not only did her mother notvisit her for many years afterward, but she become virtually forgotten as far as the rest of the world was concerned. Her father scarcely mentioned her at all in his private correspondence once she went to the convent.

Not until her brother John became President in 1960 would anyone in the family publicly acknowledge Rosemary's disability. Up to that time, her disappearance was put down to her being a recluse or even working as a teacher for the disabled. When Rosemary's disability was finally revealed, she was referred to as mentally retarded with no mention of the lobotomy. Still, her brother John visited her secretly as he was running for President and it was during his term in office that the first Presidential Panel on Mental Retardation was established.