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Jacqueline "Jackie" Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was the wife of the 35th president of the United States, John F. Kennedy, and served as First Lady during his presidency from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. She was later married to Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis from 1968 until his death in 1975. In later years she had a successful career as a book editor. She is remembered for her style and elegance.
Jacqueline Lee Bouvier in Southampton, New York, she was the daughter of John Vernou Bouvier III, a Wall Street stockbroker, and his wife Janet Norton Lee.
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Quotations
A camel makes an elephant feel like a jet plane.
On a 1962 visit to India quoted in A Hero for Our Time (1983) by Ralph G Martin
Dear God, please take care of your servant John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
Inscription for cards at her husband’s funeral (25 November 1963)
His head was so beautiful. I tried to hold the top of his head down, maybe I could keep it in... but I knew he was dead.
I held his hand all the time the priest was saying extreme unction.
It looks like its been furnished by discount stores.
On the White House; Quoted in A Hero for Our Time (1983) by Ralph G Martin
One must not let oneself be overwhelmed by sadness.
Quoted in The Unknown Wisdom of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (1994) edited by Bill Adler
Encyclopedia
Jacqueline "Jackie" Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was the wife of the 35th president of the United States, John F. Kennedy, and served as First Lady during his presidency from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. She was later married to Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis from 1968 until his death in 1975. In later years she had a successful career as a book editor. She is remembered for her style and elegance.
Early life
Born Jacqueline Lee Bouvier in Southampton, New York, she was the daughter of John Vernou Bouvier III, a Wall Street stockbroker, and his wife Janet Norton Lee. She had a younger sister, Caroline Lee Bouvier, born in 1933, and later known as Lee Radziwill.
Jacqueline Bouvier was of mostly Irish, Scottish, and English descent; her French paternal ancestry is distant, with her last French ancestor being Michel Bouvier, a Philadelphia-based cabinetmaker, merchant and real estate speculator who was her great-great–grandfather and a contemporary of Joseph Bonaparte and Stephen Girard. Both sides of her family made exaggerations about their heritage, with the Bouviers claiming descent from French nobility and the Lees declaring they were part of the "Virginia Lees."
She spent her early years between New York City and Easthampton, New York at the Bouvier family estate "Lasata". At a very early age she became an accomplished equestrienne, a sport that would remain a lifelong passion. As a child, she also enjoyed drawing, reading and lacrosse. This idyllic childhood came to an end when her parents divorced in 1940.
Her father never remarried. In 1942 her mother married second husband Standard Oil heir Hugh D. Auchincloss, Jr., and they had two children, Janet and James Auchincloss. Jacqueline and her sister Lee then lived with their mother's new family, dividing their time at their stepfather's two vast estates, "Merrywood", in McLean, Virginia, and "Hammersmith Farm", in Newport, Rhode Island. They remained close to their father, and visited him often in New York City, where he lived.
Education, introduction to society, and first job
She was educated at selective schools such as the Holton-Arms School in Washington (1942–1944) and Miss Porter's School in Farmington, Connecticut (1944–1947). When she made her society debut in 1947, a Hearst columnist dubbed Jacqueline "Debutante of the Year".
She spent her first two years of college at Vassar in Poughkeepsie, New York, and spent her junior year (1949–1950) in France at the University of Grenoble and The Sorbonne in a program through Smith College. Upon returning home to the United States, she transferred to The George Washington University in Washington, D.C., graduating in 1951 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in French Literature. Her college graduation coincided with younger sister Lee's graduation from high school, and the two sisters spent the summer of 1951 on a trip through Europe. This trip was the subject of Kennedy's only autobiographical book, One Special Summer, which is also the only one of her publications to feature her drawings.
On parole from college, she was hired as the "Inquiring Camera Girl" for The Washington Times-Herald. Her job was to ask witty questions of people she met in Washington, D.C. The questions and amusing responses would then appear alongside the interviewee's photograph in the newspaper. She was hired at a weekly salary of $42.50.
During that period she was briefly engaged to a young stockbroker, John Husted, but the engagement was called off after three months.
Kennedy marriage and family
Jacqueline Bouvier and then-congressman John Kennedy were in the same social circle and often attended the same functions. It was at a dinner party organized by mutual friends, journalist Charles Bartlett and his wife Martha Buck Bartlett, that they were formally introduced in May 1952. Kennedy was then busy running for a seat at the U.S. Senate. They began dating sporadically and after he was elected senator in November of the same year, the relationship grew more serious and eventually led to a proposal. Their engagement was officially announced on June 25, 1953.
They were married on September 12, 1953, at St. Mary's Church in Newport, Rhode Island. The wedding was performed by Archbishop Richard Cushing. The wedding was considered the social event of the season with an estimated 700 guests at the ceremony and 900 at the lavish reception that followed at Hammersmith Farm.
Her wedding dress was created by designer Ann Lowe of New York City. The dress is now housed in the Kennedy Library in Boston, Massachusetts.
Following a honeymoon in Acapulco, Mexico, the couple settled in McLean, Virginia. Behind all the glamour, however, not all was easy. Jacqueline found it hard to adjust to the demands of political life and the pressure put on her by the Kennedy family. Her husband had serious health issues, suffering from Addison's Disease, and from chronic and debilitating back pain from a wartime injury. He underwent two spinal surgeries which proved almost fatal due to complications. While he was recovering from the surgeries, Jacqueline encouraged him to write a book, Profiles in Courage, which is about several U.S. senators who risked their careers to fight for the things in which they believed. The book was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for biography in 1957.
Jacqueline suffered a miscarriage in 1955 and gave birth to a stillborn baby girl in 1956. All these events put considerable strain on the marriage and led to a brief separation. However, the couple reconciled and made a fresh start.
They sold their estate, Hickory Hill in Virginia, and moved to a townhouse on N Street in Georgetown. Jacqueline successfully gave birth to a second daughter, Caroline, in 1957, and a son, John, in 1960, both via Caesarian section.
| Name | Birth | Death | Notes |
|---|
| Arabella Kennedy | August 23, 1956 | August 23, 1956 | Stillborn daughter | | Caroline Bouvier Kennedy | November 27, 1957 | | Married to Edwin Schlossberg; has two daughters and a son. She is the last surviving child of Jacqueline and John F. Kennedy. | | John Fitzgerald Kennedy Jr. | November 25, 1960 | July 16, 1999 | Married to Carolyn Bessette. Both Kennedy and his wife died in a plane crash, as did Lauren Bessette, Carolyn's sister, on July 16, 1999, off Martha's Vineyard in a Piper Saratoga II HP piloted by Kennedy. | | Patrick Bouvier Kennedy | August 7, 1963 | August 9, 1963 | Died from hyaline membrane disease, which is now more commonly called infant respiratory distress syndrome. |
Candidate's wife
On January 2, 1960, Kennedy announced his candidacy for President of the United States, and began campaigning around the country. Mrs. Kennedy took an active role in the campaign, even speaking to grocery store shoppers over the PA system in one town. In Appleton, Wisconsin, she signed autographs for junior high school students, commenting that her signature would be more legible than John's. Campaigning in West Virginia hit her the hardest, as she had not witnessed that degree of poverty before. Later, in the White House, when the need for new glassware came up, Jackie suggested that Morgantown Glassware from the impoverished state supply it.
Shortly after Kennedy announced his presidential run, Jacqueline learned that she was pregnant and, due to previous problem pregnancies, her doctor instructed her to stay at home. From Georgetown, Jacqueline helped her husband by answering thousands of campaign letters, taping TV commercials, giving interviews both televised and printed and by writing a weekly newspaper column, Campaign Wife, which was distributed across the country. She was assisted by her personal secretary, Mary Barelli Gallagher.
First Lady of the United States
Celebrity status
In the general election on November 8, 1960, Kennedy narrowly beat Republican Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election. Two weeks later, Jacqueline gave birth to son John Jr. by Caesarean delivery. When Kennedy was sworn in as president on January 20, 1961, Jacqueline became, at age 31, one of the youngest First Ladies in history, just behind Frances Folsom Cleveland and Julia Tyler.
Mrs. Kennedy ranks among the most popular of First Ladies. She was a stark contrast from her recent predecessors, who were all much older. She was not only young and attractive, but intelligent and cultivated, and possessed an innate sense of style and elegance. Though she was sometimes criticized for her aloofness, expensive tastes, and European ways, the American public quickly took to her, and made her its idol.
Like any First Lady, she was forced into the public spotlight, with everything in her life under scrutiny. While she did not mind giving interviews or being photographed, she was worried about the effect such treatment might have on her children. Mrs. Kennedy was determined to protect them from the press and give them a normal childhood.
Social success
Mrs. Kennedy planned numerous social events that brought the First Couple into the nation's cultural spotlight. She invited artists, writers, scientists, poets, and musicians to mingle with politicians, diplomats, and statesmen. She spoke fluent French. Her appreciation for art, music, and culture marked a new chapter in American history. Jackie's skill at entertaining gave White House events the reputation of being magical.
For instance, when she orchestrated a dinner at Mount Vernon in honor of Pakistan's President Ayub Khan, whom President Kennedy wanted to honor for his role in supporting the U.S. in a recent crisis, she banished large U-shaped dining tables, replacing them with smaller round tables that seated eight. Her social graces were legendary, as can be noted from the way she communicated with Charles De Gaulle in Paris and Nikita Khruschev in Vienna. The President's summit in Vienna turned out to be a disaster, but the Premier's enjoyment of Mrs. Kennedy's company was subsequently deemed one of the few positive outcomes. When Soviet Premier Khrushchev was asked to shake President Kennedy's hand for a photo, the Communist leader said, "I'd like to shake her hand first."
Due in part to her French ancestry and her educational background, Jacqueline had always felt a bond with France. This was a love that would later be reflected in many aspects of her life, such as the menus she chose for White House state dinners and her taste in clothing and love of ballet. She chose French interior designer Stéphane Boudin of Maison Jansen to consult on the White House Restoration and decoration of the private family quarters on the second and third floors of the Executive Mansion. Mrs. Kennedy recruited a Vietnamese-born French chef to become White House chef.
White House restoration
The restoration of the White House was Jacqueline Kennedy's first major project. She was dismayed during her pre-inauguration tour of the White House to find little of historic significance in the house. The rooms were furnished with undistinguished pieces that she felt lacked a sense of history. Her first efforts, begun her first day in residence (with the help of society decorator Sister Parish), were to make the family quarters attractive and suitable for family life and included the addition of a kitchen on the family floor and rooms for her children. Upon almost immediately exhausting the funds appropriated for this effort, she established a fine arts committee to oversee and fund the restoration process; she also asked early American furniture expert Henry du Pont to consult.
Her skillful management of this project was hardly noted at the time, except in terms of gossipy shock at repeated repainting of a room, or the high cost of the antique Zuber wallpaper panels installed in the family dining room ($12,000 in donated funds), but later accounts have noted that she managed the conflicting agendas of Parish, du Pont, and Boudin with seamless success; she initiated publication of the first White House guidebook, whose sales further funded the restoration; she initiated a Congressional bill establishing that White House furnishings would be the property of the Smithsonian Institution, rather than available to departing ex-presidents to claim as their own; and she wrote personal requests to those who owned pieces of historical interest that might be donated to the White House.
On February 14, 1962, Mrs. Kennedy took American television viewers on a tour of the White House with Charles Collingwood of CBS. In the tour she said, "I just feel that everything in the White House should be the best—the entertainment that's given here. If it's an American company you can help, I like to do that. If not—just as long as it's the best." Working with Rachel Lambert Mellon, Mrs. Kennedy oversaw redesign and replanting of the White House Rose Garden and the East Garden, which was renamed the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden after her husband's assassination. Her efforts on behalf of restoration and preservation at the White House left a lasting legacy in the form of the White House Historical Association, the Committee for the Preservation of the White House which was based upon her White House Furnishings Committee, a permanent Curator of the White House, the White House Endowment Trust, and the White House Acquisition Trust.
Broadcasting of the White House restoration greatly helped the Kennedy administration. The United States sought international support during the Cold War, which it achieved by affecting public opinion. Mrs. Kennedy’s celebrity and high profile status made viewing the tour of the White house very desirable. The tour was taped and distributed to 106 countries since there was a great demand from the elite as well as people in power to see the film. Focus and admiration for Jacqueline Kennedy took negative attention away from her husband. By attracting worldwide public attention, the First Lady gained allies for the White House and international support for the Kennedy administration and its Cold War policies.
Foreign trips
Before the Kennedys visited France, a television special was shot in French with Mrs. Kennedy on the White House lawn. When the Kennedys visited France, she'd already won the hearts of the French people, impressing the French public with her ability to speak French. At the conclusion of the visit, Time magazine seemed delighted with the First Lady and noted, "There was also that fellow who came with her." Even President Kennedy joked, "I am the man who accompanied Jacqueline Kennedy to Paris — and I have enjoyed it!"
At the urging of John Kenneth Galbraith, President Kennedy's ambassador to India, Mrs. Kennedy undertook a tour of India and Pakistan, taking her sister Lee Radziwill along with her, which was amply documented in photojournalism of the time as well as in Galbraith's journals and memoirs. At the time, Ambassador Galbraith noted a considerable disjunction between Mrs Kennedy's widely-noted concern with clothes and other frivolity and, on personal acquaintance, her considerable intellect.
While in Karachi she found some time to take a ride on a camel with her sister. In Lahore, Pakistani President Ayub Khan presented Mrs. Kennedy with a much-photographed horse, Sardar (the Urdu term meaning ‘leader’). Subsequently this gift was widely misattributed to the king of Saudi Arabia, including in the various recollections of the Kennedy White House years by President Kennedy's friend, journalist and editor Benjamin Bradlee. It has never become clear whether this general misattribution of the gift was carelessness or a deliberate effort to deflect attention from the USA's preference for Pakistan over India. While at a reception for herself at Shalimar Gardens, Mrs. Kennedy told guests "all my life I've dreamed of coming to the Shalimar Gardens. It's even lovelier than I'd dreamed. I only wish my husband could be with me." While in Lahore, she had a friendly chat with Iranian Empress Farah Pahlavi, whom many compared to Mrs. Kennedy.
Death of an infant son
Early in 1963, Jacqueline became pregnant again and curtailed her official duties. She spent most of the summer in the Kennedy family's Cape Cod compound at Hyannis Port, where she went into premature labor on August 7, 1963. She gave birth to a baby boy, named Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, via emergency Caesarian section at Otis Air Force Base, five and a half weeks early. Because his lungs were not fully developed, Patrick could not breathe and he was air-lifted to Boston Children's Hospital where he was placed in an oxygen-rich, pressurized room. He died of Hyaline Membrane disease (now known as Respiratory Distress Syndrome) on August 9, 1963. The couple was devastated by the loss of their infant son, and that tragedy brought them closer together than ever before.
Shortly after, Mrs. Kennedy received an invitation from her sister Lee to go on a Mediterranean cruise aboard Aristotle Onassis's luxury yacht. Despite concerns of the President's entourage over possible bad publicity it might bring, Jacqueline and her sister went on the cruise along with Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. and his wife. Upon her return, feeling reinvigorated, she made her first public appearance at the White House in the middle of November 1963 and decided to accompany her husband on an official pre re-election campaign visit to Texas.
Assassination and funeral of John F. Kennedy
On November 21, 1963, the First Couple left the White House for a political trip to Texas, stopping in San Antonio, Houston, and Fort Worth that day. After a breakfast on November 22, President and Mrs. Kennedy flew from Carswell Air Force Base to Dallas's Love Field on Air Force One, accompanied by Texas Governor John Connally and his wife Nellie. A 9 ½-mile motorcade was to take them to the Trademart where the President was scheduled to speak at a lunch. Jackie was seated next to her husband in the limousine, with the Governor and his wife seated in front of them, while Vice President Johnson and his wife followed in another car in the motorcade.
After the motorcade turned the corner onto Elm Street in Dealey Plaza, Jackie heard what she thought to be a motorcycle backfiring, and did not realize that it was a gunshot until she heard Governor Connally scream. Within 8.4 seconds, two more shots had rung out, and Jackie had leaned in toward her husband. The final shot struck the President in the head, and she screamed out, "They've killed my husband; Jack Jack!" Jackie then climbed out of the back seat and crawled over the trunk of the car for reasons that are debated. Her Secret Service agent, Clint Hill, ran to the car and leapt onto it, directing Mrs. Kennedy back to her seat. The car rushed to Dallas's Parkland Hospital, Jackie talking to her husband and cradling his head in her arms along the way. When the limousine reached the hospital, Jackie initially refused to leave her husband, telling her Secret Service agent, who urged her to release the President from her arms, "you know he is dead". Only after his head was covered by an agent's suit jacket did she relent and allow them to take her husband from her. Jackie ran alongside the stretcher that was transporting her husband into the hospital.
A few minutes into the President's treatment, Jackie, accompanied by the President's doctor, Admiral George Burkley, left her folding chair outside Trauma Room One and attempted to enter the operating room. Nurse Doris Nelson stopped her and attempted to bar the door to prevent Mrs. Kennedy from entering. Jackie persisted, and the President's doctor suggested that she take a sedative, which she refused. "I want to be there when he dies," she told Burkley. He eventually persuaded Nelson to grant her access to Trauma Room One, saying "It's her right, it's her prerogative".
Later, when the casket arrived, Jackie took her wedding ring off and slipped it onto the President's finger. She told aide Ken O'Donnell, "Now I have nothing left."
After his death she refused to remove her blood-stained clothing, and regretted having washed the blood off her face and hands. She continued to wear the infamous blood-stained pink Chanel suit as she stood next to Johnson on board the plane when he took the oath of office as President. She told Lady Bird Johnson, "I want them to see what they have done to Jack."
Jacqueline took an active role in planning the details of the state funeral for her husband, based on Lincoln's state funeral, including the riderless horse and Lincoln catafalque on which his coffin rested in the Capitol rotunda. She led the nation in mourning as the President lay in repose at the White House and then lay in state in the Capitol. The funeral service was held for the President at St. Matthew's Cathedral. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery and Jackie was the first to light the eternal flame at the grave site, which had been created at her request. Lady Jean Campbell reported back to The London Evening Standard: "Jacqueline Kennedy has given the American people… one thing they have always lacked: Majesty."
Following the assassination, she stepped back from official public view. She did, however, make a brief appearance in Washington to honor the Secret Service agent, Clint Hill, who had climbed aboard the limousine in Dallas to try to shield her and the President.
Life following the assassination
A week after the assassination, Mrs. Kennedy was interviewed in Hyannisport on November 29 by Theodore H. White of Life magazine. In that session, she compared the Kennedy years in the White House to King Arthur's mythical Camelot, commenting that the President often played the title song of Lerner and Loewe's musical recording before retiring to bed. She also quoted Queen Guinevere from the musical, trying to express how the loss felt. "Now he is a legend when he would have preferred to be a man."
The steadiness and courage of Jacqueline Kennedy during the assassination and funeral won her admiration around the world. Following his death, Jackie and her children remained in their quarters in the White House for two weeks, preparing to vacate. Johnson made several phone calls that were recorded via Dictabelt from the Oval Office to Jackie in the residence; the two also shared several letters and notes back and forth through messengers after the assassination. A letter from Jackie to Johnson is displayed in the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum where she thanks him for his kindness in allowing her and the children to remain in the White House with the promise to vacate soon. In the first call on December 2, 1963, she told him that she knew how rare it was to have something in a President's handwriting and that she now had more in his handwriting than she did in Jack's. The President encouraged her to come and visit with him to spend time talking.
After spending the winter of 1964 in Averell Harriman's home in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C., Jackie decided to purchase an apartment at 1040 Fifth Avenue in New York in the hope of having more privacy for her children. She sold the home that had been built in Atoka, Virginia, where she and President Kennedy had intended to retire. She spent a year in mourning, making no public appearances, zealously guarding her privacy. During this time, her daughter Caroline told her school teacher that her mother cried frequently.
She perpetuated her husband's memory by visiting his grave site on important anniversaries and attending selected memorial dedications. These included the 1967 christening of the Navy aircraft carrier named USS John F. Kennedy (decommissioned in 2007), in Newport News, Virginia, and a memorial in Hyannisport, Massachusetts. In May 1965, Mrs. Kennedy and Queen Elizabeth II jointly dedicated the United Kingdom's official memorial to President Kennedy at Runnymede, England. This memorial included several acres of soil given in perpetuity from the United Kingdom to the United States of America on the meadow where the Magna Carta had been signed by King John in 1215. She also visited Ireland in 1967 to officially open a special park, dedicated to the late President, located near New Ross, where her husband's ancestors came from.
She oversaw plans for the establishment of the John F. Kennedy Library, which is the repository for official papers of the Kennedy Administration. Original plans to have the library situated in Cambridge, Massachusetts, near Harvard University, proved problematic for various reasons, so it is situated in Boston. The finished library, designed by I.M. Pei, includes a museum and was dedicated in Boston in 1979 by President Jimmy Carter, nearly 16 years after the assassination. The governments of many nations donated money to erect the library, in addition to corporate and private donations.
Onassis marriage
During her widowhood, Jacqueline was romantically linked by the press to a few men, notably David Ormsby-Gore and Roswell Gilpatric, but nothing came out of it. So when the news of her marriage to Aristotle Onassis broke out, it came as a total shock to the world. Her motives for the marriage are open for debate, but beyond financial security, it is reasonable to believe that at that point in her life she desperately needed an escape from the Kennedys and the United States, as she came to fear for her life and that of her children after the assassination of her brother-in-law Robert F. Kennedy in June 1968.
The wedding took place on October 20, 1968, on Skorpios, Onassis's private island in the Ionian Sea, Greece. Jacqueline gave up Secret Service protection and her Franking Privilege, to which a widow of a president of the United States is entitled, after her marriage to Onassis.
For a time, the marriage brought her much adverse publicity and seemed to tarnish the image of the grieving presidential widow, and she became the target of paparazzi who were following her everywhere much to her displeasure and dismay. Despite it all, the marriage initially seemed successful enough, the couple dividing their time between New York City, Paris and Skorpios.
Then tragedy struck again, Onassis's only son Alexander died in a plane crash in January 1973. The once invincible Onassis was left a broken and disillusioned man and the marriage turned sour. His health began deteriorating rapidly and only his death in Paris, on March 15, 1975, saved Jacqueline from the embarrassment of a divorce. Her legacy was severely limited under Greek law, which limited how much a non-Greek surviving spouse could inherit. After two years of legal battle, Jacqueline eventually accepted from Christina Onassis, Onassis's daughter and sole heir, a settlement of $26,000,000, waiving all other claims to the Onassis estate.
Later years
Life in New York
Onassis's death in 1975 made Mrs. Onassis, then 46, a widow for the second time. Now that her children were older, she decided to find work that would be fulfilling to her. Since she had always enjoyed writing and literature, in 1975 Jacqueline accepted a job offer as an editor at Viking Press. However, in 1978, the President of Viking Press, Thomas H. Guinzburg, authorized the purchase of the Jeffrey Archer novel "Shall We Tell the President?", which was set in a fictional future presidency of Edward M. Kennedy and described an assassination plot against him. Although Guinzburg cleared the book purchase and publication with Mrs. Onassis, upon the publication of a negative Sunday New York Times review which asserted that Mrs. Onassis held some blame for its publication, she abruptly resigned from Viking Press the next day. She then moved to Doubleday as an associate editor under an old friend, John Sargent, living in New York City, Martha's Vineyard and the Kennedy Compound in Hyannis, Massachusetts. From the mid 1970s until her death, her companion was Maurice Tempelsman, a Belgian-born industrialist and diamond merchant who was long separated from his wife.
She also continued to be the subject of much press attention, most notoriously involving the photographer Ron Galella. He followed her around and photographed her as she went about her day-to-day activities, obtaining candid, iconic photos of her. She ultimately obtained a restraining order against him and the situation brought attention to paparazzi-style photography.
Among the many books she edited was Larry Gonick's The Cartoon History of the Universe. He expressed his gratitude in the acknowledgments in Volume 2. Mrs. Onassis's continuing charisma is indicated by the delight the Canadian author Robertson Davies took in discovering that at a commencement exercise at an American university at which he was being honored, Jacqueline Kennedy was on hand, circulating among the honorees. On the other hand, her efforts on behalf of Doubleday to enlist Frank Sinatra, the Duchess of Windsor and Queen Elizabeth II as Doubleday authors were firmly rebuffed.
Jacqueline Onassis also appreciated the contributions of African-American writers to the American literary canon and encouraged Dorothy West, her neighbor on Martha's Vineyard and the last surviving member of the Harlem Renaissance, to complete The Wedding: a multi-generational story about race, class, wealth, and power in the United States. The novel received great literary acclaim when it was published by Doubleday in 1995 and Oprah Winfrey introduced the story in 1998 to millions of Americans via a television film of the same name starring Halle Berry. Dorothy West acknowledged Jacqueline Onassis's kind encouragement in the foreword.
She also worked to preserve and protect America’s cultural heritage. The notable results of her hard work include Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C, and Grand Central Terminal, New York's beloved historic railroad station. While she was First Lady, she helped to stop the destruction of historic homes in Lafayette Square, because she knew that these buildings were an important part of the nation’s capital and played an essential role in its history. Later, in New York City, she led a historic preservation campaign to save and renovate Grand Central Terminal from demolition. A plaque inside the terminal acknowledges her prominent role in its preservation. In the 1980s, she was a major figure in protests against a planned skyscraper at Columbus Circle which would have cast large shadows on Central Park, the project was cancelled, but a large twin towered skyscraper would later fill in that spot in 2003, the Time Warner Center.
From her apartment windows in New York City she had a splendid view of a glass enclosed wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art which displays the Temple of Dendur. This was a gift from Egypt to the United States in gratitude for the generosity of the Kennedy administration, who had been instrumental in saving several temples and objects of Egyptian antiquity that would otherwise have been flooded after the construction of the Aswan Dam.
Death
In January 1994, Onassis was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a form of cancer. Her diagnosis was announced to the public in February. The family was initially optimistic, and she stopped smoking at the insistence of her daughter. Onassis continued her work with Doubleday, but curtailed her schedule. By April 1994, the cancer had spread, and she made her last trip home from New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center on May 18, 1994. A large crowd of well-wishers, tourists, and reporters gathered on the street outside her penthouse apartment at 1040 Fifth Avenue, and she died in her sleep at 10:15 pm on Thursday, May 19, at the age of 64. Her son said, in announcing her death to the world, "My mother died surrounded by her friends and her family and her books, and the people and the things that she loved. She did it in her own way, and on her own terms, and we all feel lucky for that."
Jacqueline Onassis's funeral was held on May 23 at Saint Ignatius Loyola Roman Catholic Church at Park Avenue and East 84th Street in Manhattan, which was the same church where she was baptized in 1929. At her funeral, her son, John, described three of her attributes as the love of words, the bonds of home and family, and her spirit of adventure. She was then buried next to President John F. Kennedy, and near their son Patrick and daughter Arabella at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia. The New York Daily News ran an issue the next day saying, "Missing Her."
In her will, Onassis left her children an estate valued at $43.7 million by its executors.
Fashion icon
During her husband's presidency, Jacqueline Kennedy became a symbol of fashion for women all over the world. She set the style for the early sixties with her clean suits, sleeveless A-line dresses and the pillbox hat that she often wore. In the years after the White House, her style changed dramatically. Gone were the modest "campaign wife" clothes. The styles were changing and she certainly did not want to be stuck in the past. She set styles just as she did as the president's wife, but this time the clothes were different. Wide-leg pantsuits, blue jeans, large lapel jackets, silk Hermes head scarves and of course those large, round, dark sunglasses were her new look. She also experimented with different styles, sometimes wearing lots of jewelry, gypsy skirts, and hoop earrings with her hair pulled back. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis has been called one of the most influential women in fashion.
Legacy, memorials, and honors
The companion book for a series of interviews between mythologist Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers, The Power of Myth, was created under the direction of Onassis, prior to her death. The book's editor, Betty Sue Flowers, writes in the Editor's Note to The Power of Myth: "I am grateful… to Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, the Doubleday editor, whose interest in the books of Joseph Campbell was the prime mover in the publication of this book." A year after her death in 1994, Moyers dedicated the companion book for his PBS series, The Language of Life to Onassis. The dedication read: "To Jacqueline Onassis. As you sail on to Ithaka." Ithaka was a reference to the C.P. Cavafy poem that Maurice Tempelsman read at her funeral.
In December 1999, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis was among 18 included in Gallup's List of Widely Admired People of the 20th Century, from a poll conducted of the American people.
Like her assassinated husband, Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis's legacy has been memorialized in various aspects of American and, to a later extent, non-American culture. They include:
- A high school named Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School for International Careers, was dedicated by New York City in 1995, the first high school named in her honor. It is located at 120 West 46th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, and was formerly the High School for the Performing Arts.
- Central Park's main reservoir was renamed in her honor as the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir.
- On the campus of her alma mater, The George Washington University, a residence hall located on the southeast corner of I and 23rd streets NW in Washington, D.C. was renamed Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Hall.
- Near the White House, a garden was renamed the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden in her honor, shortly after the assassination of her husband.
- In 2007, her name, along with her assassinated husband's, is being included on the list onboard the Japanese Kaguya mission to the moon launched on September 14, as part of The Planetary Society's "Wish Upon The Moon" campaign. In addition, they are included on the list onboard NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission.
- There is an award and a school at American Ballet Theatre named after her, in honor of her childhood study of ballet.
Cultural depictions
An American icon from the 1960s and beyond, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis is frequently alluded to and depicted in various forms of popular culture, including films, television series, cartoon series, computer and video games and music. Numerous books and plays have been written about her, as she remains symbolic of 20th century America.
Films
- Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy (1981, TV)
- Kennedy (1983, TV)
- LBJ: The Early Years (1987, TV)
- A Woman Named Jackie (1991, TV)
- Love Field (1992)
- Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (2000, TV)
- Thirteen Days (2000)
- Jackie, Ethel, Joan: The Women of Camelot (2001) (TV)
- Timequest (2002)
- America's Prince: The John F. Kennedy, Jr. Story (2003, TV)
Books
- A Woman Named Jackie: An Intimate Biography of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, by C. David Heymann, A Lyle Stuart Book first published by Carol Communications, 1989.
- Jacqueline Bouvier: An Intimate Memoir, by John H. Davis, John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1996.
- Farewell, Jackie: A Portrait of Her Final Days, Edward Klein, Viking Books, 2004.
- All Too Human: The Love Story of Jack and Jackie Kennedy, St. Martin's Press, 1997.
- Just Jackie: Her Private Years, Ballatine Books, 1999.
- The Kennedy Curse: Why Tragedy Has Haunted America's First Family for 150 Years, Pocket Books, 1996.
- Diana & Jackie, Maidens, Mothers, Myths, by Jay Mulvaney, St. Martin's Press, 2002.
- The Death of a President, by William Manchester, New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1967.
- "What Would Jackie Do? An Inspired Guide to Distinctive Living," by Shelly Branch and Sue Callaway, Gotham Books, 2006.
- What Jackie Taught Us: Lessons from the Remarkable Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Tina Santi Flaherty, 2005
- As We Remember Her: Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in the Words of Her Family and Friends, Perigee Trade, 1997
- Jackie Oh!, Kitty Kelley, Lyle Stuart, 1978.
- Jackie, the Clothes of Camelot, by Jay Mulvaney, St. Martin's Press, 2001.
- Jackie by Naomi West & Catherine Wilson Editions de la Martiniere 2006
- America's Queen The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. By Sarah Bradford. Illustrated. 500 pp. Viking, New York 2000.
- Jackie After Jack, Christopher Andersen, William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1998.
- Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years, Hamish Bowles, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Rachel Lambert Mellon, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and Bulfinch Press/Little, Brown and Company, 2001.
The Threads of Time, the Fabric of History, 38 Profiles of Afro-American Designers from 1850 to the Present, by Rosemary E. Reed Miller, T & S Press, 2007, 288 pps. $24.95, ISBN 0-970-9713-0-3
Plays and theatre works
- Jackie O an opera by Michael Daugherty — Houston Opera Studio, Houston, TX.
- JACKS by Lys Anzia — Fremont Centre Theatre, South Pasadena, CA.
- Cirque Jacqueline by Andrea Reese — Triad Theater, NY, NY.
- Jackie, An American Life by Gip Hoppe — Wilber Theatre, Boston, MA.
- Jackie Undressed by Andree Stolte — Eagles Dare Theater, NY, NY.
- The Secret Letters of Jackie & Marilyn by Mark Hampton and Michael Sharp, O'Reilly Theatre, Pittsburgh, PA.
- Jackie" by Naomi West & Catherine Wilson Editions de la Martiniere
- The First Lady by Herman van Veen and Lori Spee
- Die Prinzessindramen: Der Tod und das Maedchen IV - Jackie by Elfriede Jelinek
- "Grey Gardens (musical)" - Walter Kerr Theatre, New York City, NY. The character of Jacqueline Bouvier appears in Act I.
Songs
- "dead on the dancefloor" by ultraviolet sound "expensive like Jackie O"
- "Jackie O" by John Mellencamp
- "One's on the Way" by Loretta Lynn - "And Jackie's seen in a discotheque doing a brand new dance."
- "Jackie Will Save Me" by American rock band Shiny Toy Guns
- "Jackie's Strength" by Tori Amos
- "Jackie Onassis" by Boston protopunk band Human Sexual Response.
- "Tire Me" by Rage Against the Machine includes the lines "I wanna be Jackie Onassis/I wanna wear a pair of dark sunglasses" from the Human Sexual Response song.
- "Jacqueline/Jackie-O" by Strung Out
- "Mrs. O" by The Dresden Dolls
- "Don't Let Me Explode" by The Hold Steady
- "Touched by the Sun" by Carly Simon
- "Bullet" by The Misfits
- "The Trouble With Lovers" by Vegas
- "The Lady is a Vamp" by The Spice Girls includes the lines "Jackie-O. We loved her so."
- "You Wear it Well" by Rod Stewart — "Madame Onassis got nothin' on you."
- "Posthuman" by Marilyn Manson (Reference includes the lines "In all of her dreams/She's a saint like Jackie O.")
- "Anything" by Third Eye Blind - "Jackie O with the top down open/All the words to what's unspoken."
- "52 Girls" by The B-52s - The last girl named of the 25 girls' names listed in the song.
- "Romeo and Juliet" by Mickey Avalon - Includes the line "Jackie O had Johnny F; I just wanna smoke your last cigarette."
- "Burn like Brilliant Trash (at Jackie's funeral) by Machines of Loving Grace - Includes the line "I survived, while Ruby died."
- "Tire Me" by Rage Against the Machine - Album: Evil Empire - "I wanna be Jackie Onassis/I wanna wear a pair of dark sunglasses/I wanna be Jackie O, O, O please don't die!!..."
- "Cruel" by Bryan Ferry - "And James Bond, Jackie O, Johnnie Ray and Garbo/Who got an answer here?"
- "Tomorrow Wendy" by Concrete Blonde - ("Underneath the chilly grey November sky/We can make believe that Kennedy is still alive and/We're shooting for the moon/And smiling Jackie's driving by")
- "Fever for the Flava" by Hot Action Cop - ("You gotta be my First Lady, Jackie")
- "La, La, La" (Excuse me Miss Again)" by Jay-Z You wanna pass for my Jacqueline Onassis, then hop ya ass out that S-Class
Further reading
- Abbott, James A. A Frenchman in Camelot: The Decoration of the Kennedy White House by Stéphane Boudin. Boscobel Restoration Inc.: 1995. ISBN 0-9646659-0-5.
- Abbott James A., and Elaine M. Rice. Designing Camelot: The Kennedy White House Restoration. Van Nostrand Reinhold: 1998. ISBN 0-442-02532-7.
- Abbott, James A. Jansen. Acanthus Press: 2006. ISBN 0-926494-33-3.
- Baldrige, Letitia. In the Kennedy Style: Magical evenings in the Kennedy White House. Doubleday: 1998. ISBN 0-385-48964-1.
- Bowles, Hamish, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., and Rachel Lambert Mellon. "Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years." The Metropolitan Museum of Art. bulfinch Press/Little, Brown and Company: 2001. ISBN 0-8212-2745-9.
- Cassini, Oleg. A Thousand Days of Magic: Dressing the First Lady for the White House. Rizzoli International Publications: 1995. ISBN 0-8478-1900-0.
- Taraborrelli, J. Randy. Jackie, Ethel, Joan: Women of Camelot. Warner Books: 2000. ISBN 0-446-52426-3
- West, J.B. with Mary Lynn Kotz. Upstairs at the White House: My Life with the First Ladies. Coward, McCann & Geoghegan: 1973. SBN 698-10546-X.
- Wolff, Perry. A Tour of the White House with Mrs. John F. Kennedy. Doubleday & Company: 1962.
- Exhibition Catalogue, Sale 6834: The Estate of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis April 23–26, 1996. Sothebys, Inc.: 1996.
- The White House: An Historic Guide. White House Historical Association and the National Geographic Society: 2001. ISBN 0-912308-79-6.
External links
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- Exclusive television coverage -- most from the KRLD -TV/KDFW Collection at the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza
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