Robert F. Kennedy: Ripple of Hope • Opened July 2,  2018

The John F. Kennedy Hyannis Museum is pleased to announce the opening of a special exhibit to commemorate the life and legacy of Robert F. Kennedy.

The “RFK: Ripple of Hope” exhibit, assembled in collaboration with RFK Human Rights Foundation, will open on July 2, 2018 at the Hyannis museum and will be on display through 2019.

“The theme ‘Ripple of Hope’ comes from his most famous and powerful speech delivered in Cape Town, South Africa,” said JFK Hyannis Museum curator Rebecca Pierce-Merrick. “It’s a fitting title for our exhibit as well because that’s exactly what his life of public service created – a ripple of hope that continues to reverberate through the generations since his passing.”

One particularly poignant part of the exhibit highlights an impromptu speech he gave before a large group of distraught onlookers the night Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in April 1968 just weeks after Kennedy announced his bid for the presidency.

A powerful part of the exhibit is an eight-minute video, produced by Andrew Fone and narrated by Kathleen Kennedy and Congressman Joseph P. Kennedy III.
“Our 2018 Special Exhibit – ‘Creating Camelot’ – has been extremely well received to visitors ever since it opened in May. We are pleased that this year we will have an additional new exhibit which was created in collaboration with the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Foundation that focuses on Robert F. Kennedy, President Kennedy’s brother. It captures his own unique contributions to our country and to the world as well as his Presidential Campaign in 1968,” said JFK Hyannis Museum Executive Director John Allen.

“We are not only bringing to life the Kennedy family’s place in history and their intimate connection to Cape Cod, but really aim to inspire a renewed sense of civic commitment among today’s generation,” Allen said. “I believe anyone who comes to visit will be enthralled and educated by the exhibits we have at the museum this year.”