# About Kennedy Prediction **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [May 28, 2006, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560 "2006-05-28T19:35:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Alex\_Dubinsky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dbc845/32.png) [@Alex\_Dubinsky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alex_Dubinsky)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/21 "2006-06-02T08:20:06Z")
nah, nah, nah, let’s not get into a debate about conspiracy theories. this was all settled nicely without going into anything on which we might disagree. Kennedy might’ve won on fraud, but that doesn’t excuse her error. She said he wouldn’t win the presidency. Don’t tell me the astral plane only detects things as they would happen ideally (or else what is its use?). Lastly, her claim to fame of predicting his assasination is totally dubious since there were tons of people at the time who would’ve expected the presidents-elected-in-year-zero trend to continue. That’s also why she said “not necessarily in his first term” as had happened with the victims before him. (and, of course, she had endless other predictions that didn’t come true at all). alcondragon, if you honestly expect yourself to be a rational person, you’re going to have to give up ground on some things. I think this might be a good place to start. Mind you, i’m not one of those who has a knee-jerk reaction to the phrase conspiracy theory. There’s obviously plenty of corruption and wrong-doing that goes on in the world (although we can’t usually be so sure that we’ve found exactly what it is). And I mean don’t even get me started on Sept 11. (Building 7, anyone?) Anyway, remember, it is just as ridiculous to think that everyone is lying to you as it is to think that no one is. Also, stop believing in psychics. That’s just silly. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/22 "2006-06-02T09:48:25Z")
Alex\_Dubinsky writes: \> Lastly, her claim to fame of predicting his assasination is totally dubious since \> there were tons of people at the time who would’ve expected the presidents- \> elected-in-year-zero trend to continue. Was the year-ending-in-a-0 curse ever mentioned by anyone before 1963? I have the distinct impression that no one ever thought about it until Kennedy died. Who’s the first person to mention the curse? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/23 "2006-06-02T13:14:40Z")
> [@Wendell Wagner](#): > > Alex\_Dubinsky writes: > > \> Lastly, her claim to fame of predicting his assasination is totally dubious since > \> there were tons of people at the time who would’ve expected the presidents- > \> elected-in-year-zero trend to continue. > > Was the year-ending-in-a-0 curse ever mentioned by anyone before 1963? I have the distinct impression that no one ever thought about it until Kennedy died. Who’s the first person to mention the curse? As posted by **dougie\_monty** in a similar thread last month, the original source of this 20-year phenomenon was _Ripley’s Believe It or Not_ published in 1934. [http://www.snopes.com/history/american/curse.asp](http://www.snopes.com/history/american/curse.asp) says in their article about this whole matter > [@](#): > > A Ripley’s Believe It or Not book published in 1934 noted the coincidental twenty-year pattern of presidential deaths between 1840 and 1920, with question marks in place of a name for the upcoming 1940 entry indicating the presumption of a continuing pattern. The pattern did, of course, hold true again when Franklin Roosevelt, who had been re-elected in 1940, filled in that blank by dying in office in 1945. And the phenomenon was used as column filler in newspapers in the late 30’s, early 40’s. So unless a very young Jeane Dixon supplied Ripley with the suggestion, she was just another person who could have read this and played upon it. ---
**Author:** ![Mycroft\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/898d66/32.png) [@Mycroft\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mycroft_H)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/24 "2006-06-02T13:55:49Z")
I was going to come in and mention _Ripley’s Believe It of Not_ as well. I had not known about the previous thread and **dougie\_monty** ’s reference. Ripley was as good a psychic/predictor as Dixon. In the late 60s I remember seeing in a library an older edition (1950s? definitely not the 1934) of _Ripley’s_ that had the blank line for the 1960 election. Someone had written in Kennedy’s name. When 1980 came around I was firmly convinced that whoever was elected would die in office. I guess death in office can’t get much closer than the situation of being shot and recovering as Reagan did. I now look at it all as one more of those many interesting cosmic coincidences. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/25 "2006-06-02T14:25:35Z")
> [@Mycroft H.](#): > > I guess death in office can’t get much closer than the situation of being shot and recovering as Reagan did. Yup, except for the not dying part, it fit the pattern perfectly. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2006, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/26 "2006-06-02T17:48:07Z")
And after looking in newspapers from the time, there was an even earlier source than _Ripley_. A newspaper article concerning _numerology_ by Walter B. Gibson, written to start off the new year of 1927. The 20-year sequence was included as only part of a longer article but this was the first incidence I could find in print. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/27 "2006-06-03T07:59:14Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > And after looking in newspapers from the time, there was an even earlier source than _Ripley_. > > A newspaper article concerning _numerology_ by Walter B. Gibson, written to start off the new year of 1927. The 20-year sequence was included as only part of a longer article but this was the first incidence I could find in print. Be that as it may, I had heard–as I mentioned in another thread–about the “Indian curse” on the Presidency, from a theme written about November 1962 in my Freshman English teacher’s class the year before. The teacher read us that theme on the afternoon of November 22, 1963, a few hours after the news of Kennedy’s assassination hit the West Coast. (The writer mentioned Tecumseh’s tribe, and William Henry Harrison. He had defeated the tribe, so the writer said, and when he became President in 1841 the “curse” was made. Harrison died after one month in office.) FWIW, I heard about this _ten years_ before I even knew about the Ripley article–which I saw in a Ripley hardbound volume that had been published in 1946. ---
**Author:** ![agnostic2009](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d9b06d/32.png) [@agnostic2009](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/agnostic2009)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2011, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/28 "2011-10-10T17:31:53Z")
Dixon was right, Nixon won the election. Nixon knew he had won, but the election was stolen by fake votes in Texas and chicago. Dead people voted in Illinois and Texas. Lyndon Johnson later had Kennedy killed, when Kennedy planned to drop Johnson as VP. Johnson said Kennedy was ungrateful, as Johnson had won the election for Kennedy. Dixon correctly predicted the Democrat who assumed office from the 1960 electionn would be assasinated, and that Nixon won that election. The contradictory predictions were both true. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2011, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560/29 "2011-10-10T20:14:40Z")
AS MODERATOR: Just noting that this thread was from 2006, so don’t expect responses from any of the prior posters. AS A POSTER: It’s so unfair. Nixon won the 1960 election, Gore won the 2000 and 2004 elections, and Thomas Dewey won the 1948 election. Meanwhile, I can predict elections MUCH better than Jean Dixon. For instance, I predict that Barak Obama won the 2008 election, both electoral votes and popular votes. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/about-kennedy-prediction/358560.md?page=1)