Jackie, Ethel, Joan: Women of Camelot (12 page)

Jackie’s First Meeting with Ethel

B
y the time Jackie Kennedy got into the White House in January 1961, she and Ethel Kennedy had known each other for about six years “for better or worse,” as Jackie once re- ferred to their often contentious relationship. Sweetness and light weren’t always possible in a family like the Kennedys,

whose members had widely differing temperaments, and probably no two of them were more at odds over the years than Jackie and Ethel. Once she became First Lady, Jackie was the embodiment of everything Ethel wanted to be: a powerful, intelligent, and attractive woman who com- manded the world’s attention and respect just for being her- self. Ethel felt that, if her life worked out as she planned, Bobby would one day be President and she would have the status she so craved. Meanwhile, she just had to tolerate the fact that Jackie had it and she didn’t—at least for the time being.

From the first time they met, though, Jackie presented herself as a princess, even on Ethel’s own, royal, home turf. In March 1953, when Ethel Kennedy settled into her new Georgetown home, she longed to meet Bobby’s new friends in government. She hoped to demonstrate her ability as a hostess to the Kennedy family, especially after Jean had told her, “You can’t be in this family unless you know how to en- tertain.” Ethel had certainly come from a clan who knew how to throw a good party, and she was anxious to show Bobby’s side of the family that she was worthy of her dis- tinction as the only Kennedy wife so far (other than the ma- triarch, Rose). So she decided to host a get-together at her home in honor of St. Patrick’s Day—an affair of about thirty people, mostly family but with some important business as- sociates of Bobby’s as well. When Bobby’s brother Jack heard about Ethel’s plans, he called to ask if she could invite his new girlfriend, Jacqueline Bouvier. Ethel readily agreed.

She liked the senator a great deal and would do anything to please him.

Two days later, Ethel telephoned Jackie to invite her to the party and inform her of the unusual theme: All of the

guests were to wear black, which seemed particularly strange for a St. Patrick’s Day party.

On the night of the party, Jack showed up first, on crutches and slippers, his chronic back troubles causing him great discomfort. “I’m dying here,” he said. “This damn back is killing me.” Jim Buckley, brother of magazine pub- lisher William F. Buckley and who would go on to become a New York senator and one day marry Ethel’s college friend Ann Cooley, asked Jack about his date. “Oh, she’s a looker,” Jack said. “Wait until you get a load of her. She’s my new dance partner,” he added with a grin.

Anxious to make an entrance befitting a Bouvier—and perhaps hoping to impress her new beau and his friends— Jackie was the last to arrive. Whereas everyone else had ei- ther driven his or her own car or took a cab to Bobby and Ethel’s, Jackie showed up in a chauffeur-driven black Rolls Royce. She did wear black, though, as did all of the guests. Jackie wore an elegant dark cocktail dress embroidered with silver threads in medallion shapes, along with white pearls and matching earrings. A black fur coat was the perfect win- try touch.

As if on cue, shortly after Jackie’s arrival, Ethel came swooping down the staircase from the second floor. “Here I am, everybody.
How are you all
?” Her smile was dazzling as she walked about the room, meeting and greeting her guests, all of whom looked at her with expressions of aston- ishment. Ethel was wearing a stunning green diaphanous gown—and not just one shade, but layer upon layer of dif- ferent hues of green. The center of attention, Ethel gra- ciously spent time with each guest and began to acquit herself well as the ideal hostess.

Jackie stood in a corner and watched Ethel with an in-

scrutable expression. Lem Billings, who attended the party, remembered, “About an hour into the party, she came over to me and said, ‘Interesting woman, that Ethel.’ I told her, ‘Once you get to know her, I think you’ll like her.’ ”

Billings asked Jackie, “Now, does it upset you, the way she set this up?”

“Oh, no. Not in the least,” Jackie said with a chuckle. “After all, it
is
her party. As hostess, she can do whatever she likes, don’t you agree? Now, personally, I would never do anything like that. But how utterly clever of her.”

To another guest, Jackie said, “How refreshing it will be to know someone who has no interest whatsoever in im- pressing anyone with her fashion taste.”

When Jackie and Ethel finally met for the first time, their exchange was unmemorable, chilly and brief. Jackie stayed to herself for the rest of the evening, not mingling but rather seeming to pose regally in front of the roaring fireplace—a perfect picture. The way she had positioned herself she had everyone’s attention, and so for the next hour Jack fetched his senatorial friends and brought them over to make her ac- quaintance. All the while, Ethel eyed Jackie, muttering to Bobby that the Bouvier interloper was trying to pull the room’s focus to her. “It’s
not
my imagination,” she was overheard saying angrily. Finally, long before any of the other invitees, Jackie walked over to Ethel and Bobby and told them that she had to go.

“Before dinner?” Ethel was flabbergasted. “But we have a wonderful meal prepared.”

Jack was already helping Jackie with her fur as she apol- ogized and said that she had “the most dreadful headache ever.” As much as she wanted to stay, she said, she couldn’t. Jackie then walked through the small crowd, shaking

hands and kissing cheeks as if she were royalty. After she had bid adieu to everyone, Jack escorted her to the front door and to her waiting Rolls. Some of Ethel’s guests peered through the front windows to watch with mesmerized ex- pressions as the uniformed chauffeur popped out of the dri- ver’s side of the car, whipped around to the other side, and opened the door for Jackie. After she had gotten into the au- tomobile, he closed the door and ran back to the driver’s seat. As the car started to pull away, Jackie rolled down the window and grandly waved farewell to her fans in Ethel’s living room.

“Well, I never . . .” Ethel said, not bothering to hide her fury.

“Clearly,” Bobby said, his eye twinkling. He was taken with Jack’s new girlfriend and liked her from the start.

Later, over dinner, Ethel still couldn’t get over what had occurred with Jackie. “Jack-leen,” she observed as she and her guests discussed Jack’s new girlfriend. “Rhymes with ‘queen,’ doesn’t it?” It was a stolen quip, actually; Eunice had already said it after meeting Jackie for the first time.

Still, Jack was amused by the observation. “Seems rather appropriate, doesn’t it?” he said.

The next day, Jackie sent Ethel a letter. “I had such a won- derful time,” she wrote in her difficult-to-read backhand. “So many fascinating people, so much wonderful conversa- tion. And you, Ethel, were the most perfect hostess, so lov- ley [
sic
], and so beautiful in your greenery. I thank you so much for inviting me, and I feel absolutely dreadful that I had to leave in such a completely inappropriate rush.”

Upon receipt of the note, Ethel found herself confused about “Jack-leen.” Anyone who complimented her on one of her parties was definitely a person Ethel appreciated and

wanted in her circle. However, because Jackie had also proved herself to be a scene-stealer, Ethel didn’t know whether to love her or loathe her. Of course, in years to come, Ethel’s predicament would be one in which many people would find themselves when it came to Jackie.

Despite the letter Ethel had received—which, because it was so confounding to her, she shared with anyone—most of her friends were appalled by Jackie’s behavior at the gathering. However Ethel, never one to conform, decided to take an opposing point of view. “You know what? I like her,” she said approvingly. “I really do. I like her nerve. My mother would get a kick out of her, too.”

A week later, as Ethel and Jackie enjoyed lunch together in a Washington restaurant, Jackie gifted her with a pin: a delicate green four-leaf clover with a small diamond in the center of each leaf. Jackie further ingratiated herself by shar- ing a confidence with Ethel: The reason she had to leave the party in such a rush was that she was suffering from pre- menstrual cramps. According to what Ethel would later re- call, Jackie said that her illness made it unbearable for her to have to meet all of the people Jack kept bringing over to her. Also, she said she was “absolutely freezing,” which was the reason she was standing in front of the fireplace during most of the party.

Ethel explained that the reason the temperature was so frigid in her home was that Rose Kennedy was angry at her and Bobby for their spending habits, “and Bobby said I could only have the party if I didn’t use any heat. He said, ‘It’s either heat or a party. You choose.’ So, naturally, I chose the party.”

“Well, naturally,” Jackie agreed.

After the two women shared a hearty laugh, Jackie asked

Ethel to keep sacred the secret of her premenstrual cramps. Ethel promised to tell “not a soul.”

But how could she resist? In weeks to come, Ethel would tell just about everyone she knew all of the details of her lunch with Jackie, including her little secret. Ethel also proved herself to be a perceptive woman because, after just one luncheon with Jackie, she seemed to understand some- thing about her that it usually took others much longer to discern. “She asks a lot of questions, on and on and on with the questions,” Ethel said. “And I’m sitting there answering all of these questions when it suddenly hit me: As long as she keeps me busy talking, she doesn’t have to give me any information about herself.”

Jack Proposes Marriage

I
n the months after their first meeting, Ethel Kennedy and Jackie Bouvier got to know each other on weekend Kennedy outings. Football games at the Georgetown Recreation Cen- ter were particularly amusing. Ethel fit right in with the Kennedy brothers—and even their sisters, who played a rau- cous and sometimes even violent game. Jackie, of course, hated these kinds of sports. The first time she got out on the field, she somehow managed to catch a ball hurled at her by Jack. Stunned at her good luck, she stood in the middle of the field, dazed, and said, “Now, which way do I run, ex- actly?”

“Aw, get that debutante off the field,” Ethel said, an-

noyed. “You gotta be kidding me!” (Ethel had never gotten over her astonishment when Bobby told her that Jackie had once been given the title “Queen Deb of the Year” by New York society reporter Cholly Knickerbocker—a.k.a. Igor Cassini, brother of designer Oleg. “And she was actually proud of that?” Ethel wanted to know.)

Trying to fit in, Jackie continued to play football every time a game was organized, until one weekend she sprained her ankle. (Some say she broke it.) As she sat in the middle of the field, sobbing and holding her foot, Jack, Bobby, and the other Kennedys stared at her in disbelief. Kennedys don’t cry, after all—or at least that had always been the fam- ily myth. It was Ethel who ran over to the “debutante,” her mothering instincts surfacing. “Oh, you poor dear,” she said as she helped Jackie hobble to the sidelines. “Now, you have to go straight home and get some ice and put it in a towel, then use it on your ankle. Otherwise it will swell.” Then she turned to the others, who were by now laughing, and screamed at them, “Don’t laugh at her. Don’t be so mean. She’s getting better at the game.”

After that incident, however, Jackie decided that she would never play football with the Kennedys again.

For years, it has been said that Jackie and Ethel were not, and could never be, friends. That was not the case. In fact, Jackie and Ethel treaded warily into a friendship and devel- oped a deep, profound understanding that would last for decades. At the beginning they set certain boundaries.

For instance, Jackie loved to talk about her father’s sex- ual exploits, shocking Ethel with her frank discussions. Because Ethel, who never liked talking about sex, was clearly uncomfortable hearing about Black Jack’s private

life, he soon became a subject the two women rarely dis- cussed. Jackie’s parents were divorced, and Jackie had no problem with divorce at all. Ethel didn’t believe in divorce, however, and was vocal about her disapproval. Once, at a family picnic, the two women engaged in a heated discus- sion about whether or not Jackie was a true Catholic be- cause, as Ethel put it, “If you were, you wouldn’t approve of divorce.”

“Well, if you were, you wouldn’t be so judgmental about what I do and do not approve of,” Jackie shot back.

“Oh yeah? Well, I . . . I . . . I don’t even know what you’re talkin’ about,” Ethel said.

In time, the two women learned not to broach the subject of divorce, though they did have many more discussions about the pros and cons of Roman Catholicism. (Jackie was fairly religious, actually, but few could match Ethel’s devo- tion.)

Nevertheless, Ethel did continue to give Jackie a hard time for many years to come. “Ethel was more Kennedy than the Kennedys,” says John Davis. “She made Jackie prove herself, yes. She could try a saint’s patience, and even though my cousin [Jackie] was not a saint, she was pretty close just by virtue of the fact that she never went to blows with Ethel, at least not to my knowledge.”