An Intimate Look at Ethel and Jackie Kennedy’s Special Bond

After Daddy started working on Capitol Hill, my parents moved the family into a cozy house on S Street in Georgetown. Life there was unpretentious, hectic, and fun. “S Street was the smallest house you’ve ever seen in your whole life, teeny tiny,” Mum recalled, probably exaggerating a teeny tiny bit. “But we were happy there.” She made their home a cheerful refuge from Daddy’s increasingly stressful job as assistant counsel for the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Uncle Jack [John F. Kennedy, a U.S. senator at the time] lived with them on weekdays and flew back to Massachusetts to campaign and work with constituents on weekends.

When Mum announced she was throwing a party on St. Patrick’s Day in 1953, Uncle Jack asked to bring Jackie Bouvier, the woman he was dating. Aunt Jackie was a sophisticated and lovely young photographer from another wealthy East Coast family. Mum called Aunt Jackie to invite her and informed her that all women were to dress in black—an odd request for the most Irish of holidays. It soon became clear why: As the guests gathered in the living room, Mum flounced down the stairs in a dazzling green chiffon dress. To add to the joke, she used enormous live bullfrogs in her green centerpieces.

Mum and Aunt Jackie went out to lunch a week later. Aunt Jackie, revealing her own sense of humor and generosity, gave Mum a green four-leaf clover-pin with a small diamond on each leaf. The two women hit it off right away. They were nearly the same age, shared a deep Catholic faith, and were both mad about horses, interior design, and two Kennedy brothers. During their courtship, Uncle Jack would often bring Aunt Jackie over for dinner and a movie. “I liked Jackie a lot,” Mum recalled. “She was fun, and really funny—a wonderful wit.” Mum felt they had a natural rapport.

Two months later, Uncle Jack and Aunt Jackie were engaged. One of many pre-wedding celebrations was an engagement party held at a friend’s house in Hyannis Port. Part of the fun was a scavenger hunt with a tantalizing list of items to collect. “Longest object” was a perfect challenge. Mum and my aunt Pat Kennedy Lawford won the night when they pulled into the driveway with a bus Pat had “borrowed” from a local parking lot while the driver had stepped away. Another guest swiped a policeman’s hat—off his head—as a “show of courage.” Needless to say, the police were not amused. Before long there were three squad cars with lights flashing parked in the drive, with a furious Grandpa Joe trying to sort out the trouble. (As Mum would later quip: “It isn’t a party unless the police are called.”)

Daddy served as best man and Mum was a bridesmaid when Uncle Jack and Aunt Jackie were married in Newport, Rhode Island, on September 12, 1953.

Their friendship endured through the best and the worst of times. When Aunt Jackie was dying of cancer in 1994, Mum was there to give her comfort. The two sisters-in-law had such different personalities: Jackie was understated and reserved; Mum was the opposite, outgoing and exuberant. But they had a special bond from their shared history, and they often sent each other sweet notes and gifts over the years. (In the spring of 1967 Jackie sent Mum a lingerie case after Mum’s tenth child was born with the note: “A baby present for you, not Douglas. It is absolutely useless, but it comes with much, much love, Jackie.”) They had been pillars of strength for each other when they’d had to bury their husbands in the prime of life. Jackie and Coretta Scott King accompanied Mum on that dreaded flight back from Los Angeles carrying Daddy’s body in 1968. They knew they could depend on one another in times of need.