Mention the initials JFK to anyone with even a cursory knowledge of American history, and the images that spring to mind will likely have little to do with his political achievements.
Instead, the modern imagination springs right to John Fitzgerald Kennedy's grisly assassination in 1963 and the many infidelities that he reportedly engaged in throughout his marriage to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.
The stories are the stuff of legend. Just last year an alleged Marilyn Monroe-JFK sex tape was shopped around by a former Hollywood bodyguard.
The public reacted with disgust, and reps for the Kennedys expressed their hope that that would be the last time that the 35th President's romantic life would be the subject of public scrutiny.
Unfortunately, for the esteemed family, a new set of claims made by author and historian Jerry Oppenheimer is likely to generate renewed interest in JFK's scandalous lifestyle.
Oppenheimer claims that in 1947 - a full six years before he married Jackie - Kennedy got hitched to Palm Beach socialite Durie Malcolm.
The decision to wed was made while both were drunk at a rowdy party that reportedly raged well into the morning.
Oppenheimer says Kennedy and Malcolm wasted no time making good on their drunken boast and headed straight to a justice of the peace to make it official.
Rumors about Malcolm and Kennedy have circulated for decades, but Oppenheimer - a longtime Kennedy family historian - says he now believes that JFK's father covered the affair up, but that the young couple never bothered to get divorced or have their union annulled.
"There is evidence that suggests the records of JFK's alleged secret marriage were destroyed at the behest of his father, the powerful Kennedy patriarch Joseph," Oppenheimer writes.
In his article for the Mail, Oppenheimer even presents legal documents that seem to prove that Malcolm and Kennedy were married, including a page from Durie's family tree that states she was married to "John F. Kennedy, son of Joseph P. Kennedy."
Of course, if the marriage was never legally dissolved, then JFK's marriage to Jackie O. may have never been legitimate.
That's of little consequence now, as all parties involved are long-deceased, but it goes to show that some political scandals never truly die. Who knows what we'll find out about Bill Clinton in 50 years!
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