A peek into the llfe and many challenges of one of America's most beloved and elegant first ladies.
Famous First Ladies
Early Years
Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis was born on July 28, 1929, in Southampton, New York. The eldest of two daughters of "Black Jack" Vernou Bouvier III, and Janet Lee, her ancestry was mostly Irish with some French. Black Jack Bouvier was a playboy stockbroker whose incessant womanizing led to divorce when Jacqueline and Caroline were still young children. As a child, Jacqueline Bouvier became a well-trained equestrienne, and she won several medals and trophies for her skill.
Vassar College and John F. Kennedy
Jacqueline Bouvier studied at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. During her junior year, she studied abroad at the Sorbonne in Paris, France. She completed her senior year at George Washington University in Washington, DC, where she graduated with a degree in French Literature. It was in 1951, where at a dinner party, she met a young, handsome Senator from Massachusetts named John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
Marriage and the Presidency
Jacqueline Bouvier and John Kennedy were married on September 12, 1953, in Newport, Rhode, Island. Their first child, a daughter named Arabella, was stillborn in 1956. Caroline and John Fitzgerald Kennedy Jr. followed in 1957 and 1960 respectively. Another child, a son named Patrick, was born and died in August of 1963. Their marriage was severely strained from the outset by John Kennedy's numerous affairs and debilitating illness.
When John Kennedy became the 35th president of The United States, Jacqueline Kennedy became one of the youngest First Ladies in American history. In such capacity, Jacqueline Kennedy brought a French "flair" to the White House which was reflected in both her personal and public life. Her first major project as First Lady was the restoration of the White House, the final outcome of which was viewed by the American public on a televised CBS tour on February 14, 1962.
Throughout her too short life, Jacqueline Kennedy was the epitome of social grace, beauty and fashion. After her husband's assassination, she went on to marry shipping magnate, Aristotle Onassis in 1968. After his death in 1975, Jacqueline Kennedy spent her remaining years in New York and Martha's Vineyard. She was an editor for Doubleday and an activist who led the preservation campaign to save Grand Central Station.
On May 19, 1994, Jacqueline Kennedy died of lymphoma, leaving an enormous gap in the American psyche. She remains a symbol of the turbulent past; a brave lady whose life and death touched many, and who cared much about the world, which is lacking now because she is not in it.
Jacqueline Kennedy is buried next to her husband at Arlington National Cemetery.
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