date published:
May 26, 2003
 We can't be sure wedded bliss always existed between Jacqueline
Bouvier Kennedy and her presidential husband, John Fitzgerald
Kennedy. Suspicions about what went on behind the shroud of their
private home life continues to be fodder for countless tabloids and
tell-all books. But all the tales of extra-marital affairs seem to
do nothing to tarnish the glimmer of romance that surrounds
America's iconic first couple.
It seemed to take just one day in
September of 1953 to cement Jack and Jackie as an idyllic pairing in the
public eye. Newspapers across the country ran their wedding announcement
alongside photos of a young but already poised and elegant Jackie, dressed
in an off-the-shoulder white wedding gown. And from that day forward, the
pairing of a well-educated Connecticut debutante and Washington's most
eligible bachelor would grip the interest of the American public like
nothing short of Britain's Royal Family. To celebrate the country's love affair with Jack and Jackie Kennedy
and the 50th anniversary of their wedding, Boston's John F. Kennedy
Library and Museum has unveiled the new exhibit The Wedding of
Jacqueline Bouvier and John Fitzgerald Kennedy, which is on display
through October.
The exhibit showcases items such as Mrs.
Kennedy's ivory silk and taffeta wedding dress created by African-American
designer Ann Lowe, as well as her diamond and emerald engagement ring,
which was reset with additional smaller diamonds in 1962. Also on view are
screenings of rarely seen color film footage from the wedding reception,
depicting the young couple's first dance to "I Married an Angel," as well
as countless photographs of the 28-member wedding party including John's
best man, brother Robert F. Kennedy. These images offer an in-depth peek
at what it was like to have witnessed this historic gathering.
FIRST DATES
May, 1951: Jacqueline is first
introduced to John at a Georgetown dinner party. June 24, 1953:
Jacqueline accepts John's proposal of marriage and an emerald
and diamond engagement ring. September 12, 1953: The couple is
married at St. Mary's Church in Newport, Rhode Island in front
of 750 guests with 3,000 well-wishers waiting to catch a glimpse
of the newlyweds outside. A two-week honeymoon in Acapulco,
Mexico follows. November 27, 1957: Jacqueline gives birth to the
couple's first child, a baby girl named Caroline Bouvier
Kennedy. November 25, 1960: John F. Kennedy, Jr. is born only
two weeks after his father is elected president. November 22,
1963: President John F. Kennedy is shot and killed in Dallas,
Texas. His wife Jacqueline is by his side. November 25, 1963:
President Kennedy is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Jacqueline, praised for her strength during the aftermath of her
husband's assassination, makes the funeral arrangements and
ignites an eternal flame at his grave. May 19, 1994: Jacqueline
Bouvier Kennedy Onassis is laid to rest beside President Kennedy
in Arlington National Cemetery. |
Visitors can also glimpse more intimate
items from the Kennedy wedding, including the never-before-seen personal
scrapbook kept by Jacqueline during the days of her engagement and a poem,
"Meanwhile in Massachusetts," that Jackie wrote for her husband and gave
to him on their first anniversary. It's enclosed in a leather-bound
collection of the major speeches he made as a young senator and inscribed
"To J.F.K from J.B.K," followed by the Napoleon quote "Great men are
meteors; consuming themselves to light the world." All in all the exhibit paints a picture of the birth of what would
long be referred to as Camelot, a term Jackie herself coined, and an
idyllic time in the early '60s when private lives remained private
and divorce wasn't commonplace. Reports may tell us that the reality of the relationship between
President and Mrs. Kennedy-like any modern-day romance-wasn't always
ideal. But what emerges from the Kennedy Library's exhibit is what
still feels like a very real romance between the couple-evidenced by
the eloquent poems Jacqueline wrote for her husband and the pure joy
apparent on their faces in the wedding photos. Sure, countless
rumors of infidelity would emerge in the years that followed their
September 12, 1953 wedding, but some 50 years later, the public
still comes out in droves to see what to them is a real fairytale
romance-warts and all.

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