It was almost the two-hundredth anniversary of America's founding. Running as the Republican candidate, Richard Nixon had won the election and become the thirty-eighth president of the United States.
During the campaign, his team had even floated a certain kind of "dirty trick" to probe the opposition's strategy, but Nixon had laughed it off and rejected the idea.
He knew very well that if Robert Kennedy hadn't insisted on stepping aside, he could have served four terms as president, just like Roosevelt.
After all, the constitutional limit of two consecutive presidential terms had been pushed through by Republicans in the 1950s, after President Roosevelt died in office.
With the unprecedented support of the people for the younger Kennedy, and the Howlett Family working behind the scenes, the system had been changed and the rule broken. Kennedy had been elected to three consecutive terms.
So unless the gentleman who looked down upon the White House gave his approval, all those little tricks in the campaign would be useless.
Only a few days had passed since the new president's inauguration and the formal handover. Instead of riding in the conspicuous presidential limousine, he came in person to the Howlett estate on Long Island, New York, escorted by a White House Secret Service motorcade disguised as ordinary vehicles.
Howard Stark, who lived in the same exclusive estate community, was arguing over the phone with his company's second-in-command, Obadiah Stane.
His six-year-old son, Anthony Edward Stark, was tinkering in the yard with a nearly finished V8 internal combustion engine.
"Dad! Dad! I did it! I did it, Dad!"
Young Stark glanced at the black Cadillac motorcade passing the estate entrance, then excitedly ran into the house. He wanted to share the news with his father.
".I know, Obadiah. We just haven't found a profitable