To help celebrate the 60th anniversary of the UNC Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute (FPG), we will be looking back at stories that highlight FPG’s history, its people, and some of the incredible work accomplished within the Institute over the past six decades. This piece, from FPG’s publication, “The Promise of the Premise: The First 50 Years of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute,” recounts FPG's early growth from the seeds John F. Kennedy planted the month before he was assassinated.

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John F. Kennedy planted the seeds for the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute in key federal legislation he had signed into law the month before he was assassinated. Kennedy’s sister Rosemary had intellectual disabilities, which in large part—along with his sister Eunice’s encouragement—compelled him early in 1963 to challenge Congress to significantly address mental illness and mental health by establishing interdisciplinary research centers that could profit from “the talents of our best minds.” 

Not only did the subsequent Mental Retardation Facilities and Community Mental Health Centers Construction Act authorize funding for developmental research centers in university-affiliated facilities, the law also specifically included provisions that supported universities in the construction of research centers. With Kennedy’s assassination the following month, the Act marked the end of his planning for America’s “New Frontier”—but the legislation’s crucial, germinating effects would long outlive its biggest advocate.

Read the full story, JFK, LBJ, and FPG: Soil and Seeds for a New Center for Children.