Gearing-class destroyers like USS Kennedy were constructed with the same propulsion plant that powered earlier Fletcher-class tin cans: Four Babcock & Wilcox (or, alternatively, Foster Wheeler) boilers generated steam for two sets of geared turbines.

Originally a pair of three-bladed 11'6' propellers provided thrust for Kennedy and her sister ships, but as persistent vibration problems cracked the shaft struts and peripheral shell plating, the vessels were modified with 12' four-bladed props, which they carried for the rest of their careers.

Robert F. Kennedy
1925-1968

RFK: Carrying on with a tradition begun by his brothers Joe and Jack, Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy enlisted in the Navy for WWII. Although he missed the war altogether, Seaman Kennedy served as a radarman on board DD-850, the only vessel aboard which he was to serve during his brief naval career.

In 1948 he graduated from Harvard, and earned his law degree from the University of Virginia in 1951. After managing brother John's Senate campaign in 1952, and then his presidential campaign eight years later, RFK accepted the Office of the Attorney General in 1961.

Kennedy resigned his cabinet position for a successful Senate bid in 1964. One June 4, 1968, merely four months after announcing his candidacy for President, he was assassinated in a Los Angeles hotel.

Click here to visit the Robert F. Kennedy Assassination Archives at nearby UMass Dartmouth.