# Don't you have a better reason for disliking Kerry? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 1, 2004, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404 "2004-11-01T21:17:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404/41 "2004-11-02T17:20:29Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Which isn’t surprising, since one of his grand fathers was french. > > He’s the first cousin of a minor french politician. 😕 Ok? So? ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404/42 "2004-11-02T17:54:22Z")
> [@Elenia28](#): > > 😕 Ok? So? So, nothing. I just felt like posting this anecdotal tidbit upon reading the comment about him looking french. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404/43 "2004-11-02T18:06:42Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Which isn’t surprising, since one of his grand fathers was french. Um, where did you get that? [His ancestry](http://www.wordiq.com/definition/John_Kerry): > [@](#): > > Kerry’s paternal grandfather, Frederick A. Kerry (born Fritz Kohn), was born in the town of Horni Benesov, Austria-Hungary (in what is now the Moravian-Silesian Region of the Czech Republic), and grew up in Mödling (a small town near Vienna, Austria). His wife Ida (née Loewe) was born in Budapest, Hungary. They were both German-speaking Jews. But in 1901, Fritz Kohn converted from Judaism to Catholicism and changed his name to Frederick Kerry. His wife Ida also converted at the same time. They then immigrated to the United States, arriving at Ellis Island in 1905. They raised their three children, including John’s father, as Catholics. A Czech historian believes that Ida was a descendant of Sinai Loew, one of three older brothers of Rabbi Judah Loew (1525-August 22, 1609), a famous Kabbalist, philosopher and talmudist known as the Maharal of Prague. Two of Ida’s siblings, Otto Loewe and Jenni Loewe, died in the Nazi extermination camps (Theresienstadt and Treblinka, respectively), after being deported from Vienna in 1942. > > Richard John Kerry, John’s father, was born (c. 1916) in Massachusetts. After a stint in the U.S. Army Air Corps, he worked for the Foreign Service and served as an attorney for the Bureau of United Nations Affairs in the U.S. Department of State. In 1937, he met Rosemary Forbes, a member of the wealthy Forbes family. One of eleven children, she studied to be a nurse, and served in the Red Cross in Paris during World War II (she also was a Girl Scout leader for 50 years). The couple married in Montgomery, Alabama in January 1941. > > John Kerry’s maternal grandfather, James Grant Forbes, was born in Shanghai, China, where the Forbes family of China and Boston accumulated a fortune in the opium and China trade. Forbes married Margaret Tyndal Winthrop, who came from a family with deep roots in New England history. Through her, John Kerry is related to four Presidents, including, ironically, George W. Bush (9th cousin, twice removed). [1] ([http://www.familyforest.com/Kerry\_Bush\_Cousins.html](http://www.familyforest.com/Kerry_Bush_Cousins.html)) [2] ([Search](http://msn.ancestry.com/landing/strange/bush4/tree.htm)) ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404/44 "2004-11-02T22:23:54Z")
> [@MEBuckner](#): > > **Co-worker 2:** “Oh, I never discuss politics at work.” This is me. It’s made a _huge_ difference in my workplace mental health. > [@Elenia28](#): > > Really, **danceswithcats**? I thought you were better than that. Now you know. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-you-have-a-better-reason-for-disliking-kerry/272404.md?page=2)