Inga Arvad

Inga Marie Arvad Petersen (6 October 1913 – 12 December 1973) was a Danish-American journalist who was a guest of Adolf Hitler at the 1936 Summer Olympics and also had a romantic relationship with John F. Kennedy in 1941 and 1942. The juxtaposition of these facts led to suspicions during World War II that she was a Nazi spy. Secret U.S. investigations uncovered no such evidence, and her past did not harm her professional life or social standing in the United States. She was a motion picture writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1945 She attended the Columbia School of Journalism in New York and then moved to Washington D.C., where she worked as a columnist at the Washington Times-Herald. She met John F. Kennedy in Washington through his sister Kathleen, who was a reporter at the same newspaper. Arvad was said to have a good "intuitive style of writing" by her editor.

In 1935, as a freelance reporter, she interviewed Hitler, and this connection would color the rest of her life. She is thought to be among the few Scandinavians who interviewed Hitler. He granted her two Arvad had scooped her colleagues earlier by reporting that Hermann Göring was soon to marry German actress Emmy Sonnemann. In her article, a description of Hitler was later translated into English: "You immediately like him. He seems lonely. The eyes, showing a kind heart, stare right at you. They sparkle with force."

Kennedy's superior officer, Captain Seymour A. D. Hunter, said that the U.S. Navy viewed Arvad as similar to Mata Hari. They thought she was using Kennedy to find out all she could about what was happening in the Navy Department. Captain Howard Klingman, then assistant director of the Office of Naval Intelligence, called Hunter into his office. Hunter was told that Kennedy needed to be put out of the Navy. Hunter pointed out that the situation was delicate because of Kennedy's father, Joseph P. Kennedy, having been United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom. However, he believed the young naval intelligence officer was not privy to information that would be "more than a bit embarrassing". Hunter advised that Kennedy be transferred to a seagoing unit. Arvad later reflected on her time with Kennedy as a "passing affair".

Personal life Arvad's first husband was Kamal Abdel Nabi, whom she married in 1931 when she was 17. Her second marriage was to Hungarian film director Paul Fejos, whom she married on 28 January 1936 in Copenhagen, Denmark. She appeared in two Danish films, Storm Varsel and a Fejos-directed 1934 film Flight from the Millions. She was still married to Fejos when she traveled to the United States and during her affair with Kennedy. She obtained a divorce from Fejos in June 1942.

Arvad became a naturalized citizen of the United States on 5 March 1945.

She became engaged to Robert Boothby, a British member of Parliament, in May 1945. He met Arvad in Los Angeles while he was with a British delegation to a conference in San Francisco, California. Arvad was suspected of being the mistress of Axel Wenner-Gren, a Swedish industrialist on the U.S. State Department blocklist. No proof of such a relationship has surfaced. They met when McCoy was making a film short shot on a Native American reservation. McCoy and Arvad resided on a estate in Bucks County, Pennsylvania named Dolington Manor, also known as the Benjamin Taylor Homestead. where he had lived for 37 years. Arvad and McCoy had two sons, Ronald and Terence. When their first child was born in August 1947, McCoy was 56. He had three children from his previous marriage to Agnes Miller, daughter of actress Bijou Heron.

In January 1946, David O. Selznick sent Arvad on a tour of 25 to 30 American cities to promote Duel in the Sun. She was accompanied by Anita Colby, Florence Pritchett, and Laura Wells.

Death Inga Arvad died of cancer on a ranch near Nogales, Arizona, in 1973. Her husband and their two sons survived her. She was buried in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Saginaw, Michigan.