(Photo credit: Simon & Schuster)
Twenty-five years after the death of JFK Jr. in a plane he was piloting, a new book released last week includes a story about a mystery Rolex the former president John F. Kennedy’s son owned.
In “JFK Jr: An Intimate Oral Biography by Liz McNeil and RoseMarie Terenzio,” one friend, David Clarke, told the authors how John once traded his Rolex Daytona, exotic dial, for a Nikon photo lens Clarke owned.
Clarke had also told that story to Jake Ehrlich of RolexMagazine.com who was first to publish it.
“It was a stainless steel Rolex Daytona wristwatch. On the back it says, ‘To John, from Ari and Alex, 10/20/68.’ Alex is Aristotle Onassis’ son. Ari gave it to John when [his mother] Jackie married Aristotle Onassis,” Clarke said.
A few years later John told Clarke his mom wanted him to get the watch back, and they swapped again. “My mom says I have to get it back, only because it was a gift from my stepfather,” John told Clarke.
Clarke later wrote to John’s sister Caroline Kennedy, telling her the story, and asking her if she knew where the Rolex was. “She wrote back, ‘I didn’t know about it or ever see it. He probably lost it. He lost everything.' ”