ASB officers Jane Choi, from left, Ibrahim Bharmal, Pia Salcedo, Andrew Yu, and Janelle Lee sport John F. Kennedy T-shirts and hold up the symbolic rocking chair that is kept in the principal's office at John F. Kennedy High School in La Palma.


ASB officers Pia Salcedo, from left, Jane Choi, Janelle Lee, Andrew Yu and Ibrahim Bharmal along with the ASB student body wear T-shirts honoring the school's namesake, John F. Kennedy.



John F. Kenney ASB officers Pia Salcedo, from left, Ibrahim Bharmal, Andrew Yu, Jane Choi and Janelle Lee carry John F. Kennedy High School's symbolic rocking chair back to the principal's office. The Spirit Chair, a nod to President Kennedy's love for rocking chairs, is taken out on special occasions to invoke school spirit.


John F. Kennedy's most famous quote is splashed across the entrance to the high school named after him in La Palma.



Russ Earnest, principal at John F. Kennedy High in La Palma, holds a shillelagh, or walking stick, given to the school's marching band during a visit to Ireland. The chair at right symbolizes the rocking chairs John F. Kennedy liked to sit in to ease his back pain. The school's chair is taken out on rare occasions to invoke school spirit.



Russ Earnest, principal at John F. Kennedy High in La Palma, holds the school's first yearbook dated 1965, which shows a photo of the rocking chair he has in his office at right. The chair is symbolic of the rocking chairs John F. Kennedy liked to sit in to ease his back pain. It is taken out on rare occasions to invoke school spirit. Unaware of the chair's significance to the campus, Earnest said he wanted to put it in storage when he first arrived in 2010 to check out his office. A custodian told him, "That chair never leaves here."


An aeriel photo shows John F. Kennedy High in La Palma during its early years when the area still had farmland and dairies.


Local newspapers from the day after President John F. Kennedy's assassination are kept in the high school's safe along with other material evoking the history of the school's name and legacy.


A bronze sculpture of John F. Kennedy is kept in the main office at John F. Kennedy High in La Palma.


The first yearbook, called the Eternal Flame, opens with a picture of John F. Kennedy and was published in 1965.



A copy of a photograph and personal letter by former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy was sent from the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum to the school and is kept in the school vault.



These students who attended John F. Kennedy High in La Palma back in the 1960s were instrumental in getting the school's name changed to honor the slain president.