John F. Kennedy was the first president to effectively use the new medium of television to speak directly to the American people. No other president had conducted live televised press conferences without delay or editing. By November 1963, President Kennedy had held 64 news conferences, an average of one every sixteen days. The first, less than a week after his inauguration, was viewed by an estimated 65 million people. A poll taken in 1961 indicated that 90% of those interviewed had watched at least one of JFK’s first three press conferences. The average audience for all the broadcast conferences was 18 million viewers.
