Kennedy was also a member of the Utah State Legislature, the Rich County Commission, and a justice of the peace.
In the 1860s, he joined the LDS Church along with the rest of his family and in 1870 sailed to America on the ship Colorado with his brother James.
The Kennedy brothers worked as coal miners in Pennsylvania and then in Almy, Wyoming.
Soon after arriving in Almy, Kennedy married Hannah Simpson.
Kennedy later moved to Argyle, Utah, where he worked as a farmer and rancher.