Bussey holds a master's degree in interdisciplinary studies and a bachelor's degree in English literature. She is an independent writer specializing in literature. In the following essay, she offers a possible explanation for John F. Kennedy's inclusion of the men he wrote about in Profiles in Courage. By reviewing the historical and cultural context, she identifies qualities in some of the nine stories that may have had relevance for the time of the book's publication.

Although most readers associate John F. Kennedy with the 1960s, Profiles in Courage was written while he was recovering from spinal operations in 1954. At the time, Kennedy was a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, not yet aware of the political future that awaited him. While most readers can readily identify the dominant social and political forces of the latter part of Kennedy's career, many Americans have a distorted view of what life...