Ted Kennedy's "True Compass" Memoir To Be Published In September

Originally scheduled for release in 2010, and then advanced to October, the publisher said last week that it had moved the release to September. A spokesman said “the production process moved faster than expected, so we were able to shave off some time.”

Mr. Kennedy reportedly received an $8 million advance for the memoir, which he wrote in collaboration with Ron Powers, an author of “Flags of Our Fathers” and other biographies.

Mary Jo Kopechne, which the Senator will not do, but I will. Her 69th birthday would have been July 18th, had the Senator pulled her out of the car that he drove into the Chappaquiddick, or even had he expediently brought help for her rescue to the scene. Her death occurred on July 20th 1969. She was 28 at the time. Two days later her funeral was held in Pennsylvania and she was buried there. Ms. Kopechne's body was whisked off the island and out of Massachusetts for a very quick burial.

Mary Jo Kopechne had known Robert Kennedy well, once staying up all night at his Virginia home to type a landmark speech on Vietnam. After he was killed, Kopechne told a former teacher she felt unable to return to Capitol Hill "because it will never be the same again."

He would recall being swept away by the tide, calling out Kopechne's name as he drifted. He said he recovered his footing and waded back to the car through waist-deep water, guided by the glow of the headlights underwater.

He dove below the surface, trying to get to Kopechne. He failed, and tried again, seven or eight times in all. By then he was exhausted, barely able to hold his breath.

Finally, he let himself float away. He crawled onto shore and lay there, coughing and gasping. Then he staggered up the bank and started back up Dike Road, "walking, trotting, jogging, stumbling, as fast as I possibly could."