Kennedy talks history with Naperville fifth-graders

An interest in U.S. history may seem to be a given for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., but his passion for the past goes far beyond his family name.

His childhood, he recalls, included dinnertime chats in which his father would talk about famous battles that shaped history and his extended family still takes annual trips to historic battlefields.

But in today's computer generation, he has struggled to get his own children interested in the history books he grew up reading.

"So I decided to write history books that were filled with blood and gore and excitement so that kids would love to read them and they could compete with the stories and things they see on the computer," Kennedy said Wednesday.

He certainly had the attention of hundreds of Naperville Unit District 203 fifth-graders as he talked to them about his latest book, "Robert Smalls: The Boat Thief."

Nina Menis, director of community relations for the district, said fifth-grade curriculum includes the Civil War, so Kennedy's book was a good tie-in as well as a chance for students to learn about history from someone straight out of the history books himself.

Kennedy, an environmental attorney, is the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy. His father was a former U.S. attorney general who was assassinated while running for president.

The younger Kennedy's latest book, the second in the series, tells the true story of Robert Smalls, who grew up as a slave in South Carolina in the mid-1800s but earned his freedom when he stole a Confederate gunship and turned it over to the Union Navy. A skilled sailor, he went on to become the first black Navy captain.

After the Civil War, Smalls spent much of his career fighting for equal rights for black people. He helped draft South Carolina's constitution and served as both a state legislator and U.S. Congressman.

But Smalls and other blacks faced many hardships and prejudice after the Civil War, Kennedy told students, including segregation under Jim Crow laws and violence from groups like the Ku Klux Klan.

Even in Kennedy's own childhood in the 1950s and 1960s prejudices remained, he said. But he told students they are witnessing history with Sen. Barack Obama's candidacy for president.

"We're in a very historical time and a lot of groundwork for that was laid because of people like Robert Smalls who fought courageously during the Civil War," Kennedy said.

He hopes his book about heroes like Smalls will give children noble examples to aspire to.

"They (heroes) make some sacrifices for the good of other people rather than just doing things for themselves," Kennedy said. "That's an important thing for all of us to do."

Afterward, students were in a frenzy over getting to meet Kennedy.

"Inspirational," "Awesome," "We loved it," Ellsworth fifth-graders Cate Humbert, Sasha Keenan and Abby Rader effused all at once.

"It was exciting because he's so famous," said Maplebrook fifth-grader Kaylyn Brothers.

Kennedy's visit was brought to District 203 through a partnership with Anderson's Bookshop.