Dinner in Camelot:

A Conversation with Historian, Author, and Educator Joseph Esposito

Almost sixty years ago to the day, President John F Kennedy and his wife Jacqueline hosted the largest state dinner of the Kennedy Administration. Invited to the White House for a special "brains dinner" in April 1962 were 49 Nobel laureates, along with Pulitzer Prize winners, noted actors, and Poet Laureates. What happened the night Robert Frost dined with J. Robert Oppenheimer? How did James Baldwin get on with Mary Welsh Hemingway? On this episode, we speak with Joseph A. Esposito, author of "Dinner in Camelot: The Night America’s Greatest Scientists, Writers, and Scholars Partied at the Kennedy White House” to discuss the dinner and its impressive guest list.

Host and Producer: Laura Carlson

Digital Director: Mike Portt

Special Guest: Joseph A. Esposito, author of Dinner in Camelot: The Night America’s Greatest Scientists, Writers, and Scholars Partied at the Kennedy White House

Joseph A. Esposito is a historian, writer, and educator.  He served in three presidential administrations. He met Senator John F. Kennedy in 1960 and has long been interested in the Nobel dinner.

Images of the table settings for the 1962 “Brains Dinner” at the White House. Photos courtesy of Joseph Esposito.

Jackie Kennedy’s 1962 Tour of the White House

In this extended tour, Jackie Kennedy showed the American public the inside of the Kennedy White House. The program was organized after the completion of a $2 million renovation, which sought to bring back the glory of the White House’s earlier years. The program debuted on February 14, 1962 and was watched by approximately 80 million people worldwide. Jackie Kennedy went on to win a special Emmy Award for her involvement in the program.