Nov. 17, 1962 - JFK Dedicates Dulles Airport

Nov. 17, 1962 - President Kennedy dedicated the Dulles International Airport today in Chantilly, Va. Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower also was a speaker in the ceremonies at the airport, the first in the nation to have been designed from the start for the age of jet travel. The field, twice the size of New York’s Idlewild Airport, is 27 miles from downtown Washington in the rolling Virginia countryside. President Kennedy, standing before the terminal, praised its designer, the late Eero Saarinen, for this “distinguished ornament of a great country.” “I also want to say how appropriate it is,” he continued, “that this airport should be named after Secretary [John Foster] Dulles. He was a member of an extraordinary family.” Mr. Kennedy then cited “Allen Dulles, who served in a great many administrations, stretching back, I believe, to President Hoover, all the way to this one.” Allen Dulles, who resigned as Director of the CIA in the wake of failed Cuban invasion in April 1961, was present at the ceremony as well.