The Kennedy family has often been called the American royal family due to their dynastic role in politics, with five generations of the family having held political office of some kind. Arguably, most of this has been due to Rose Kennedy, the family’s matriarch.
Living to the ripe old age of 104, Rose Kennedy oversaw the family’s affairs from 1914 (when she married into the family) to her death in 1995, witnessing the family go from a powerhouse in the state of Massachusetts to the presidency.
Early Life
The woman history would remember as Rose Kennedy was born as Rose Elizabeth Fitzgerald on July 22 1890, as the eldest of six children born to the future Mayor of Boston, John F. Fitzgerald and his wife, Mary Josephine Hannon.
Growing up, Rose was particularly close to her father, whose political career she followed closely. Not long after she was born, her father was elected to the Boston Common Council in 1891, and later the state senate in 1892.
Serving in the state senate for two years, in 1894, John ran for, and was elected to, Congress. As the representative of Massachusetts’s 9th district, John was the only Democrat sitting in Congress to represent New England, a fact he eagerly shared with his daughter.
John served in Congress until 1901, when he took some time off. In 1906, partially with Rose’s help, he became the first Irish-American Catholic Mayor of Boston. He served there from 1906 until 1908, and again from 1910 to 1914.
Though she didn’t know it at the time, being around her father and his politics from such a young age would put her in good stead for the future.
Despite there being very few career paths for women at the time, especially those that matched Rose Kennedy’s Irish upper-class background, Rose’s father insisted that she was educated, believing that one day it would serve her and her husband well.
Although Rose didn’t fully understand why her father wanted her to have such a good education – reasoning that it would be pointless if she was going to be homemaker and raise children her entire life – she attended school to please her father.
He first sent her to the local Girls’ Latin School, an all-girls school for Boston’s Catholic elite. Later, he sent her to the convent school Kasteel Bloemendal in Vlaas, Netherlands, before returning to the US and graduating from Dorchester High School in 1906.
Desperately wanting to go to the Wellesley College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, her father refused, instead having her enroll at the Manhattan College of the Sacred Heart (now Manhattan College).
As a compromise, John took Rose on a tour of Europe which began in 1908. Whilst here, she was able to learn more about history (her favorite subject at school) as well as practice the languages she’d learned at school, including French and Latin.
That year, she and her father, even got a private audience with Pope Pius X!
Marriage to Joe Kennedy
In 1907, Rose Fitzgerald was on vacation with her family in Old Orchard Beach, Maine. Here, she met and fell in love with a fellow vacationer, Joseph P. Kennedy, the son of one of her father’s political rivals who was two years her senior.
Not long after, Rose and Joseph began courting (dating), something her father didn’t approve of due to his rivalry with Patrick Joseph “P.J.” Kennedy and the young Kennedy’s reputation for being somewhat of a womanizer.
Despite her father’s objections, the couple courted for seven years before marrying in 1914. Interestingly, this end the political rivalry between the Kennedy and Fitzgerald families, two of Boston’s leading Irish-American families.
The marriage, whilst long, was not a happy one.
Throughout his marriage, Joe Kennedy had dozens of affairs, which he made almost no attempt to hide from Rose. Most notably, he had an affair with actress Gloria Swanson that started when Rose was pregnant with Kathleen, and lasted for two years.
Understandably hurt, Rose went back to her parents and informed them of her husband’s indiscretions and her desire to divorce him. Incensed that his daughter would even suggest that, her father informed her that divorce was not an option.
Not only was it against the vows she made when she married him, and thus the religion she cherished dearly, but it would also damage both families’ standing with Boston’s Irish-American community and likely reignite the family feud.
Even in spite all this, the couple were still able to have nine children in their first 18 years of marriage, who Rose would raise herself.
Kennedy Curse
Living to the ripe old age of 104, Rose lived long enough to witness the so-called “Kennedy curse” take full effect.
Tragedy first struck the family on August 12 1944, when her eldest son, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., was killed in action over the North Sea during a top-secret mission at the height of WWII.
Posthumously awarded the Purple Heart for his bravery, the family didn’t find out the details surrounding his death until after the war had ended in 1945.
Three years later, on May 13 1948, Rose’s second daughter Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy, died in a plane crash in the south of France, whilst vacationing with her partner Peter Wentworth-Fitzwilliam, 8th Earl Fitzwilliam.
19 years later, Rose was still alive to witness tragedy strike her family once again. On November 22 1963, her second eldest son, then-President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald.
Five years after that, on June 5 1968 yet another of her sons, her third son Bobby, was assassinated outside the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, California by Palestinian nationalist Sirhan Sirhan. He died in hospital the following day.
For the third time in her life, Rose had to bury one of her sons.
Beyond the deaths of her own children, Rose also lived long enough to see the death of David A. Kennedy (Bobby Kennedy’s fourth child) on April 25 1984 due to a drug overdose.
Rose also witnessed other non-fatal examples of the Kennedy curse, such as the 1941 lobotomy of Rosemary Kennedy, the 1964 plane crash that killed two people and nearly killed her youngest son, Ted, and the famed Chappaquiddick incident in 1969, also involving Ted.
Later Life And Philanthropy
The daughter of one of Boston’s most important Irish Catholics, and the wife of another one (who was a billionaire by today’s standards) Rose Kennedy became one of the leading members of Boston’s lace curtain Irish, or the upper class of Irish-Americans.
Through this, Rose was able to help advance not only the political career of her husband (who became the first SEC Chairman in 1934 and later the Ambassador to the UK from 1938 to 1940) but also her children, who all represented Massachusetts in some way.
In 1960, Rose’s son, then-Senator John F. Kennedy, ran for the Democratic nomination for president. Through his own hard work and his father’s money, Kennedy won the nomination and faced off against Vice-President Richard Nixon for the presidency.
Although almost in her seventies, Rose maintained a fairly active role in her son’s campaign (as did other members of the Kennedy family), using her position as a “rich old lady” and a leading member of the lace curtain Irish to gain media attention for her son’s campaign.
Once JFK won the presidency and was sworn in as the 35th President of the United States in 1961, Rose’s celebrity status continued to grow.
Regularly attending state functions and dinners, journalists routinely photographed her stood or sat next to her son at these events – an unprecedented move for a mother of the sitting president.
Having all the money in the world, Rose also began to focus on giving back to the community, heading several philanthropic projects and sponsoring many more.
Death
On November 18 1969, Rose Kennedy lost her husband, Joe, after a series of strokes, which left him unable to walk or speak. Happening in the same decade she’d lost two of her sons, it’s claimed that Rose called the 1960’s the “worst decade” of her life.
Six years later, Rose suffered from her own stroke which rendered her unable to walk, forcing her to use a wheelchair for the rest of her life.
Continually unwell from then on, Rose Kennedy continued to live at the Kennedy Compound in Hyannis Port, supported by a full-time team of nurses and doctors to look after her.
On July 22 1990, Rose Kennedy celebrated her 100th at the Kennedy Compound, surrounded by her four surviving children (Rosemary Kennedy was still alive, but lived in a mental institution in Wisconsin) and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Four and a half years later to the day, on January 22 1995, Rose Kennedy, the matriarch of the Kennedy family, died at the Kennedy Compound following complications with pneumonia, where she was surrounded by family.
A private funeral was held for Rose Kennedy at the Old St. Stephen’s Church in Brookline, Massachusetts (where she’d been baptized 104 years earlier) and was attended by over 70 close friends and family, as well as dignitaries such as then-Governor William F. Weld.
Her 28 grandchildren and 41 great-grandchildren were all in attendance, with her only surviving son, Senator Ted Kennedy, delivering her eulogy.
The funeral, whilst private, was covered by several major news networks including the Associated Press and C-SPAN, with thousands gathering outside the church to pay their respects to the matriarch of America’s most famous political dynasty.
After the funeral, Rose Kennedy was laid to rest next to her husband at the Holyhood Cemetery in Brookline, Massachusetts.
Legacy
As the matriarch of the Kennedy family that defined US politics for the 20th century, Rose Kennedy is partly responsible for the legacy the Kennedys as a whole have left, given the fact that without her, they’d have never been born.
This has seen her portrayed literally hundreds of times in movies and TV shows, such as by Geraldine Fitzgerald in the 1983 TV miniseries Kennedy, by Diana Hardcastle in the 2010/2011 miniseries The Kennedys and by Georgie Glen in the 2016 film Jackie.
Beyond that, Rose Kennedy also holds the distinction of being one of only six American women to be granted the title of Papal Countess, having been given the title in 1951 by Pope Pius XII for her philanthropy and raising the US’s three most influential Catholic politicians.
Sadly, due to how noble titles were awarded to women by the papacy, the title of Countess Kennedy was only for life, and thus none of Rose’s descendants have the title.
Throughout her life, Rose Kennedy met some pretty interesting people, from military leaders, to business leaders to world leaders. Along the way, she began collecting their autographs, a hobby she kept for the rest of her life.
Among those autographs in her collection was one from Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. Today, her collection sits in the JFK Presidential Library and Museum.
Being perhaps the most influential female Irish-American to have ever lived, several things in both the US and Ireland are named in honor of Rose Kennedy, such as the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Bridge in Ireland and the Rose Kennedy Greenway in downtown Boston.
Owing to her position as the matriarch of the family, several other members of the Kennedy clan have been named in her honor.
To date, two members of the clan bear some variant of her name, the most famous of whom is probably her eldest daughter, Rosemary, who was born as Rose Marie Kennedy, whilst the other is her great-granddaughter (via Caroline Kennedy) Rose Kennedy Schlossberg.
Relationships With Her Children
Though historians tend to agree that it was Joe Kennedy that had the largest impact on his children’s careers, as the woman who raised them, Rose Kennedy did have a surprisingly large impact on her children’s lives too, even if it pales in comparison to Joe’s.
Joe Jr.
By far his father’s favorite child, as he wanted Joe to become the US’s first Irish Catholic president, Joe Jr. spent most of his time with his father (when he was at home and not away on business), spending relatively little time with his mother by comparison.
Regardless, when his father wasn’t at home, Joe Jr. could often be found with his mother, who often told him war stories she’d read about. Along with what his father had instilled in him, created an immense feeling of patriotism in Joe.
Incidentally, this is what caused him to refuse to go back to the US after completing his 25 missions and sign up for the top-secret Operation Aphrodite which ultimately resulted in his death.
Much like his younger brother, John, Joe Jr. had a special relationship with his maternal grandfather, John F. “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, which his mother encouraged, believing that her father – Boston’s first Irish Catholic Mayor – could teach the boys a lot.
Indeed, the bond between Joe and Honey Fitz was so strong that it led to Honey Fitz offering to help Joe run for the US House in 1946, who accepted his grandfather’s offer.
However, Joe’s death caused Honey Fitz to offer this to his other grandson, John, who likewise accepted it. The Fitzgerald name still carried weight in the state and ultimately helped John get elected.
John
Having named her first son in honor of her husband, when Rose Kennedy gave birth to another son on May 29 1915, she fought tooth and nail to name her son “John Fitzgerald” after her father – John Francis Fitzgerald.
Aside from being the driving force behind JFK’s name and raising him almost singlehandedly, Rose also passed along her love of history to her second son, who became a vivacious student of history thanks to his repeated hospital operations.
Indeed, as a child, Rose Kennedy read history books to all her children, primarily American history, such as the American Revolution, the early United States, the Civil War, and the Spanish-American War she lived through.
Had Joe not been killed in action during WWII, which caused John to become the family’s designated future president, John would’ve likely gone on to become a history professor and journalist, due to the influence his mother had on him!
Being the mother of nine boisterous children, who were famous even before the White House for making as much noise as possible, Rose Kennedy naturally needed to find a way to get away from it all.
To begin with, she merely erected a small prefab cabin on the Hyannis beach near the Kennedy family compound, but these were later blown away. Instead, she started visiting Paris, where she went quite a few times in the 1930’s.
This gave her a love for both the city and the French language. When John came to getting a wife, he married Jackie Lee Bouvier, who similarly shared her love of Paris and the French language, with both women speaking the language and bonding over it.
Although we’ll never know for certain, this likely influenced JFK towards Jackie, even if only a little and subconsciously.
Rosemary
In 1917, Rose fell pregnant for a third time, this time being a girl rather than a boy. Arriving at the hospital already in labor, the nurse informed her that the doctor wasn’t available and order Rose to cross her legs, which forced the baby’s head to stay in the birth canal.
This lasted for two hours, causing a harmful loss of oxygen to the baby.
Even in spite of this, Rose Kennedy spent very little time in the hospital after the fact, before being allowed to leave, which she promptly did, believing her baby daughter, who they’d named Rose Marie Kennedy in her honor, was completely healthy.
Raising her children, Rose was one of the first to notice that Rosemary wasn’t hitting the usual development stages a child usually reaches (such as learning to crawl, walk and speak).
Embarrassed, Rose hid this fact from everyone, including her most trusted friends and family, convincing them that the young Rosemary was developing just as every other child her age was.
Although Joe Kennedy Sr. tends to get most of the blame for it (which he rightly deserves), Rose Kennedy also played a minor role in the decision to lobotomize Rosemary, which arguably made the entire situation worse.
Before, Rosemary had only had violent outbursts and randomly attacked people, beyond having the mental capacity of a fourth grader. After, she was unable to walk or speak and had to spend the rest of her life in a mental facility in Wisconsin.
Bobby
Growing up, Joe Kennedy Sr. disliked his third son, Bobby, viewing him as the “runt” of the family (as he once said) as he believed Bobby was too soft on people.
Perhaps wanting to protect a son she believed her husband was too harsh on, or due to Bobby’s desire to please his father, Bobby and Rose Kennedy formed a close bond that lasted for Bobby’s entire life.
From an early age, Rose taught Bobby the power of religion, with the two praying together for hours on end everyday. Even after he left home, Bobby continued to practice his religion more seriously than any other Kennedy sibling.
Wanting to impress his mother, Bobby got a paper round as a child. Whilst the pay was next to nothing (especially considering his father’s immense fortune) it impressed his mother as it showed his strong work ethic.
However, she was a little disappointed to say the least, when she discovered he was using the family’s chauffeur and Rolls Royce to make deliveries. Safe to say, Bobby’s paper round ended soon after.
In his later life, Bobby was able to impress both his parents by becoming the US Attorney General and later, a politician in his own right.
Despite his earlier contempt for Bobby, Joe Kennedy Sr. once claimed Bobby was “hard as nails” for his ruthless pursuit of his goals. At the same time, his mother claimed that he was “America’s most compassionate public figure”.
Other Children
Throughout their childhood, Rose Kennedy reinforced to her children that the Kennedy family was stronger together, whilst divided they fall. Even as children, she encouraged them to work and plan things together.
As they got older and started running for public office, all the Kennedy siblings worked on aspects of their siblings’ campaigns, which all contributed to the family political successes.
Being proud of her Irish ancestry, Rose also taught her children to revere Ireland.
Whilst this made them popular particularly among Irish-Americans, it has also caused them some controversy, mostly when Jean Kennedy Smith supported giving a known IRA terrorist and Sinn Fein leader, Gerry Adams, a visa to travel to the US.
After public outcry, Kennedy revoked her support.
Rose similarly taught her children to give back, something that her daughter Eunice (later Mrs. Sargent Shriver) took to heart, coming to be the executive vice president of the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation and the creator of the Special Olympics.
In 1944, Rose’s second daughter, Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy, announced her intention to marry William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, a British peer who was a member of the Anglican Church.
Refusing to convert to Catholicism as he’d be disowned by his family and lose his title, Rose Kennedy refused to give her daughter permission to marry him.
Following the deaths of her other three sons, Ted Kennedy, the only one of Rose Kennedy’s sons still alive, became his mother’s instant favorite, as he was the only one of her children who could carry on the rest of her legacy.
This is why he was able to deliver her eulogy after her death in 1995.
What do you think of Rose Kennedy? Was she a savvy behind-the-scenes politician or just a caring mother? Tell me in the comments!