From his boyhood years sailing his boat Victura in Nantucket Sound to his final summer as president, John Fitzgerald Kennedy loved the Cape and often called it home. His bronze replica marks the entrance to the John F. Kennedy Hyannis Museum on Main Street, which is gearing up to celebrate the 100th anniversary of JFK’s birth.

Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, the nation’s first Catholic president and, at age 43, the youngest person ever elected to the nation’s highest office, was born May 29, 1917. The centennial of his birth falls this year on Memorial Day.

The museum will celebrate the centenary with a special exhibition: “JFK at 100: Life & Legacy.” Museum Foundation Executive Director John Allen said the exhibit is designed to give visitors fresh insight into Kennedy as a son, brother, husband, father and lifetime devotee of Hyannis Port.

The May 22 exhibit opening coincides with the beginning of Allen’s fourth year as executive director of the JFK Museum Foundation, which runs the Hyannis museum.