The day politics and TV changed forever

Editor’s Note: Explore America’s most dramatic presidential elections on CNN’s Original Series “Race for the White House,” narrated by Kevin Spacey, Sundays at 9 p.m. ET. The article below first published in 2004.

On radio, most pundits and polls scored the September 26, 1960, debate between presidential candidates Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy a draw, with some giving the Republican contender the edge.

But on television, it was no contest.

Throughout the 60-minute program set in a Chicago TV studio, the 43-year-old Kennedy “looked to be radiating health,” said presidential historian Robert Gilbert. Kennedy wore a dark suit and had a wide smile and vivid tan.

Nixon, on the other hand, appeared pale and a bit listless. He had just gotten out of the hospital, where he had lost weight after a knee injury. In a gray, ill-fitting suit and hastily added pancake makeup, Nixon looked – even if he did not necessarily sound – a pale shadow of the aggressive, composed senator from Massachusetts.

“I was listening to it on the radio coming into Lincoln, Kansas, and I thought Nixon was doing a great job,” former Sen. Bob Dole, the GOP’s 1996 presidential nominee, recalled in a PBS interview. “Then I saw the TV clips the next morning, and he … didn’t look well. Kennedy was young and articulate and … wiped him out.”

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About 40% of the nation’s 180 million people tuned into the “Great Debates” of 1960, a series of four televised matchups between Kennedy and Nixon. Many political experts, like the New York Herald-Tribune’s Washington bureau chief Earl Mazzo, credited Kennedy’s debate performances for lifting him over the top in a tight election.

The forums’ wide exposure and impact on the election made them perhaps the most renowned political debates since 1858, when U.S. Senate candidates Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas faced off in Illinois towns.

The Nixon-Kennedy debates’ significance extended well beyond 1960. The use of television to transmit an image or idea instantly to millions soon made presidential campaigns more of a spectator sport.

“I don’t think it’s overstating the fact that, on that date, politics and television changed forever,” said Bruce DuMont, a nationally syndicated radio talk show host and president of the Museum of Broadcast Communications. “After that debate, it was not just what you said in a campaign that was important, but how you looked saying it.”

Cosmetic politics

Not everyone was impressed with the first debate or excited about the prospect that TV could change the face of politics.

One day after the Chicago encounter, CBS-TV newsman Edward R. Murrow said, “After last night’s debate, the reputation of Messieurs Lincoln and Douglas is secure.”

Historian Henry Steele Commager, in a subsequent New York Times piece, said he hoped “TV debates will be eliminated from future presidential campaigns” after the 1960 affairs.

“The present formula of TV debate is designed to corrupt the public judgment and, eventually, the whole political process,” he wrote. “The American presidency is too great an office to be subjected to the indignity of this technique.”

John Fitzgerald Kennedy and his fiancée, Jacqueline Lee Bouvier, playing tennis in 1953. They were one of history's power couples, a dashing Democrat and an elegant wife. They were both from influential families and became superstars before he entered the White House. Take a look back at the couple that embodied the image of a perfect family.

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John Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier met in 1951 and after a brief engagement, they married in Rhode Island in the century-old church of St. Mary's on September 12, 1953.

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John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy at the U.S. Capitol on May 6, 1954.

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The couple strolling in the Georgetown area of Washington on May 8, 1954.

Jackie looking over John's shoulder as he reads the May 7 issue of the Christian Science Monitor on May 9, 1954, Mother's Day.

The Kennedy's cuddle daughter Caroline while relaxing on a bed at home on March 25, 1958.

John and Jackie at Eleanor Roosevelt's 75th birthday celebration in 1959.

The then-senator engages in his favorite pastime of sailing at Hyannisport, Massachusetts, with Jackie in July 1960.

Shortly after his acceptance of the Democratic Party nomination for president, Kennedy and his wife smile and wave from the back of an open-top car in Massachusetts in July 1960.

Jacqueline greets her husband in 1960.

Jackie watches her husband during a presidential debate in September 1960.

Kennedy lends an ear to his wife as they sit together at a table during cocktail hour before dining at a society gala at the Walford Astoria Hotel in 1960.

Kennedy, campaigning for president, listens to the whispers of his wife in 1960.

Jackie shares a moment with her husband before he became president, in January 20, 1961, in the rotunda of the Capitol. She became the youngest first lady in nearly 80 years.

President Kennedy and Jackie greet guests at a party for Nobel Prize winners at the White House on April 29, 1961.

The Kennedys stand at attention during the playing of the national anthem at the start of a reception during their state visit to Mexico City on June 30, 1962.

John and Jackie at Union Station after the departure of King Hassan of Morocco on March 27, 1963.

President Kennedy, John F. Kennedy Jr., Jackie and Caroline with puppies Blackie and White Tips, and family dogs Shannon, Clipper, Wolfie and Charlie on August 14, 1963.

Jackie stands with her two children and her brothers-in law Ted Kennedy and Robert Kennedy at the funeral of her husband on November 26, 1963.

John and Jackie: A love story

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While the debate’s “cosmetic aspect” dominated the postmortem commentary, according to DuMont, Kennedy and Nixon did touch on weighty issues, including civil rights and the threats posed by communist China and the Soviet Union.

“The question now is: Can freedom be maintained under the most severe attack it has ever known? I think it can be,” Kennedy said.

Before the debates, Nixon had the higher public profile as vice president to the popular President Dwight D. Eisenhower. So – much like his challenge to veteran Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge in debates during a 1952 senatorial race – Kennedy gained in stature simply by sharing the stage with his Republican opponent.

“The fact that a person can stand next to a famous person and go toe to toe with them, it elevates them in the public eye,” said DuMont.

The first televised presidential debate took place on September 26, 1960, when U.S. Sen. John F. Kennedy, left, faced off against Vice President Richard Nixon, right. The debate was one of the most-watched broadcasts in U.S. history.

The candidates shake hands as moderator Howard K. Smith looks on. The one-hour debate took place in Chicago at the studios of CBS affiliate WBBM.

CBS President Frank Stanton fixes the debate stage.

Stanton, right, and producer Don Hewitt check a television monitor before the debate.

Kennedy's wife, Jacqueline, watches the debate from the wings of the studio.

Much has been made about the two men's appearance and how that affected the perception of those who watched the debate on television. Nixon declined CBS' offer of makeup, instead choosing to wear a product called LazyShave to hide his five o'clock shadow. He was also still recovering from the flu and a knee injury. The telegenic Kennedy, meanwhile, did wear makeup, and he appeared rested and relaxed.

A CBS camera flashes a 30-second warning to those on stage.

Kennedy, 43, was a Democratic senator from Massachusetts. He would become the youngest president elected to office.

Nixon, 47, wa