While Brookline had traditionally been a wealthy enclave, the house where John F. Kennedy was born was built in 1909 during a building boom of middle-class housing, per National Park Service. “We chose this house because many of our friends lived near here,” Rose Kennedy recounted (via The Boston Globe). “The environment was much more suburban then.” Rose and Joseph Kennedy, who both came from up-and-coming Irish political families, moved into the house following their honeymoon. At the time, it was common for young married couples to live with their parents or rent. But Joseph “had a strong need for privacy, for independence, for being able to choose the people he wanted to be with in close association,” Rose recalled (via National Park Service History).

The home was well suited for the young couple with five bedrooms spread across the two top floors and a large kitchen and front porch. Rose Kennedy recalled Jack and his siblings would “stand on the porch and deliver a great hello to passersby ” (via The Boston Globe). Their eldest son, Joe Jr., was born in Hull, Massachusetts in 1915, while the Kennedys were on vacation. Besides John, two of their daughters, Rose Marie and Kathleen, were also born in the house. But they soon outgrew the residence and moved to a larger home a few blocks away.