Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Early life (1929–1951)

Family and childhood

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier was born on July 28, 1929, at Southampton Hospital in Southampton, New York, to Wall Street stockbroker John Vernou "Black Jack" Bouvier III and socialite Janet Norton Lee. Her mother was of Irish descent, and her father had French, Scottish, and English ancestry. Named after her father, she was baptized at the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola in Manhattan and raised in the Roman Catholic faith. Caroline Lee, her younger sister, was born four years later on March 3, 1933.

Jacqueline Bouvier spent her early childhood years in Manhattan and at Lasata, the Bouviers' country estate in East Hampton on Long Island. She looked up to her father, who likewise favored her over her sister, calling his elder child "the most beautiful daughter a man ever had". Biographer Tina Santi Flaherty reports Jacqueline's early confidence in herself, seeing a link to her father's praise and positive attitude to her, and her sister Lee Radziwill stated that Jacqueline would not have gained her "independence and individuality" had it not been for the relationship she had with their father and paternal grandfather, John Vernou Bouvier Jr. From an early age, Jacqueline was an enthusiastic equestrian and successfully competed in the sport, and horse-riding remained a lifelong passion. She took ballet lessons, was an avid reader, and excelled at learning foreign languages, including French, Spanish, and Italian. French was particularly emphasized in her upbringing.

In 1935, Jacqueline Bouvier was enrolled in Manhattan's Chapin School, where she attended grades 1–7. She was a bright student but often misbehaved; one of her teachers described her as "a darling child, the prettiest little girl, very clever, very artistic, and full of the devil". Her mother attributed this behavior to her finishing her assignments ahead of classmates and then acting out in boredom. Her behavior improved after the headmistress warned her that none of her positive qualities would matter if she did not behave.

The marriage of the Bouviers was strained by the father's alcoholism and extramarital affairs; the family had also struggled with financial difficulties following the Wall Street Crash of 1929. They separated in 1936 and divorced four years later, with the press publishing intimate details of the split. According to her cousin John H. Davis, Jacqueline was deeply affected by the divorce and subsequently had a "tendency to withdraw frequently into a private world of her own." When their mother married stockbroker and lawyer Hugh D. Auchincloss Jr., the Bouvier sisters did not attend the ceremony because it was arranged quickly and travel was restricted due to World War II. They gained three stepsiblings from Auchincloss's previous marriages, Hugh "Yusha" Auchincloss III, Thomas Gore Auchincloss, and Nina Gore Auchincloss. Jacqueline formed the closest bond with Yusha, who became one of her most trusted confidants. The marriage later produced two more children, Janet Jennings Auchincloss in 1945 and James Lee Auchincloss in 1947.

College and early career

In the fall of 1947, Jacqueline Bouvier entered Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, at that time a women's institution. She had wanted to attend Sarah Lawrence College, closer to New York City, but her parents insisted that she choose the more isolated Vassar. She was an accomplished student who participated in the school's art and drama clubs and wrote for its newspaper. Due to her dislike of Vassar's location in Poughkeepsie, she did not take an active part in its social life and instead traveled back to Manhattan for the weekends. She had made her debut to high society in the summer before entering college and became a frequent presence in New York social functions. Hearst columnist Igor Cassini dubbed her the "debutante of the year". She spent her junior year (1949–1950) in France—at the University of Grenoble in Grenoble, and at the Sorbonne in Paris—in a study-abroad program through Smith College. Upon returning home, she transferred to George Washington University in Washington, D.C., graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in French literature in 1951. During the early years of her marriage to John F. Kennedy, she took continuing education classes in American history at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

While attending George Washington, Jacqueline Bouvier won a twelve-month junior editorship at Vogue magazine; she had been selected over several hundred other women nationwide. The position entailed working for six months in the magazine's New York City office and spending the remaining six months in Paris. Before beginning the job, she celebrated her college graduation and her sister Lee's high school graduation by traveling with her to Europe for the summer. The trip was the subject of her only autobiography, One Special Summer, co-authored with Lee; it is also the only one of her published works to feature Jacqueline Bouvier's drawings. On her first day at Vogue, the managing editor advised her to quit and go back to Washington. According to biographer Barbara Leaming, the editor was concerned about Bouvier's marriage prospects; she was 22 years of age and was considered too old to be single in her social circles. She followed the advice, left the job and returned to Washington after only one day of work.

Bouvier moved back to Merrywood and was referred by a family friend to the Washington Times-Herald, where editor Frank Waldrop hired her as a part-time receptionist. A week later she requested more challenging work, and Waldrop sent her to city editor Sidney Epstein, who hired her as an "Inquiring Camera Girl" despite her inexperience, paying her $25 a week. He recalled, "I remember her as this very attractive, cute-as-hell girl, and all the guys in the newsroom giving her a good look." The position required her to pose witty questions to individuals chosen at random on the street and take their pictures for publication in the newspaper alongside selected quotations from their responses. In addition to the random "man on the street" vignettes, she sometimes sought interviews with people of interest, such as six-year-old Tricia Nixon. Bouvier interviewed Tricia a few days after her father Richard Nixon was elected to the vice presidency in the 1952 election. During this time, Bouvier was briefly engaged to a young stockbroker named John Husted. After only a month of dating, the couple published the announcement in The New York Times in January 1952. After three months, she called off the engagement because she had found him "immature and boring" once she got to know him better.

Marriage to John F. Kennedy

Jacqueline and U.S. representative John F. Kennedy met at a dinner party hosted by journalist Charles L. Bartlett in May 1952. She was attracted to Kennedy's physical appearance, wit and wealth. The pair also shared the similarities of Catholicism, writing, enjoying reading and having previously lived abroad. Kennedy was busy running for the U.S. Senate seat in Massachusetts; the relationship grew more serious and he proposed to her after the November election. Bouvier took some time to accept, because she had been assigned to cover the coronation of Elizabeth II in London for The Washington Times-Herald.

After a month in Europe, she returned to the United States and accepted Kennedy's marriage proposal. She then resigned from her position at the newspaper. Their engagement was officially announced on June 25, 1953. She was 24 and he was 36.

Bouvier and Kennedy married on September 12, 1953, at St. Mary's Church in Newport, Rhode Island, in a Mass celebrated by Boston's Archbishop Richard Cushing. The wedding was considered the social event of the season with an estimated 700 guests at the ceremony and 1,200 at the reception that followed at Hammersmith Farm. The wedding dress was designed by Ann Lowe of New York City, and is now housed in the Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston. The dresses of her attendants were also created by Lowe, who was not credited by Jacqueline Kennedy.

The newlyweds honeymooned in Acapulco, Mexico, before settling in their new home, Hickory Hill in McLean, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. Kennedy developed a warm relationship with her parents-in-law, Joseph and Rose Kennedy. In the early years of their marriage, the couple faced several personal setbacks. John Kennedy suffered from Addison's disease and from chronic and at times debilitating back pain, which had been exacerbated by a war injury; in late 1954, he underwent a near-fatal spinal operation. Additionally, Jacqueline Kennedy suffered a miscarriage in 1955 and in August 1956 gave birth to a stillborn daughter, Arabella. They subsequently sold their Hickory Hill estate to Kennedy's brother Robert, who occupied it with his wife Ethel and their growing family, and bought a townhouse on N Street in Georgetown. The Kennedys also resided at an apartment at 122 Bowdoin Street in Boston, their permanent Massachusetts residence during John's congressional career.

First Lady of the United States (1961–1963)

Campaign for presidency

On January 2, 1960, John F. Kennedy, then a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, announced his candidacy for the presidency at the Russell Senate Office Building, and launched his campaign nationwide. In the early months of the election year, Jacqueline Kennedy accompanied her husband to campaign events such as whistle-stops and dinners. Shortly after the campaign began, she became pregnant. Due to her previous high-risk pregnancies, she decided to stay at home in Georgetown. Jacqueline subsequently participated in the campaign by writing a weekly syndicated newspaper column, "Campaign Wife", answering correspondence, and giving interviews to the media.

Despite her non-participation in the campaign, Kennedy became the subject of intense media attention with her fashion choices. On one hand, she was admired for her personal style; she was frequently featured in women's magazines alongside film stars and named as one of the 12 best-dressed women in the world. On the other hand, her preference for French designers and her spending on her wardrobe brought her negative press. In order to downplay her wealthy background, Kennedy stressed the amount of work she was doing for the campaign and declined to publicly discuss her clothing choices.

On July 13, at the 1960 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, the party nominated John F. Kennedy for president. Jacqueline did not attend the nomination due to her pregnancy, which had been publicly announced ten days earlier. She was in Hyannis Port when she watched the September 26, 1960 debate—which was the nation's first televised presidential debate—between her husband and Republican candidate Richard Nixon, who was the incumbent vice president. Marian Cannon, the wife of Arthur Schlesinger, watched the debate with her. Days after the debates, Jacqueline Kennedy contacted Schlesinger and informed him that John wanted his aid along with that of John Kenneth Galbraith in preparing for the third debate on October 13; she wished for them to give her husband new ideas and speeches. On September 29, 1960, the Kennedys appeared together for a joint interview on Person to Person, interviewed by Charles Collingwood.

As first lady

On November 8, 1960, John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated Republican opponent Richard Nixon in the U.S. presidential election. A little over two weeks later on November 25, Jacqueline Kennedy gave birth to the couple's first son, John F. Kennedy Jr. She spent two weeks recuperating in the hospital, during which the most minute details of both her and her son's conditions were reported by the media in what has been considered the first instance of national interest in the Kennedy family.

Kennedy's husband was sworn in as president on January 20, 1961. At 31, Kennedy was the third youngest woman to serve as first lady, as well as the first Silent Generation first lady. She insisted they also kept a family home away from the public eye and rented Glen Ora at Middleburg. As a presidential couple, the Kennedys differed from the Eisenhowers by their political affiliation, youth, and their relationship with the media. Historian Gil Troy has noted that in particular, they "emphasized vague appearances rather than specific accomplishments or passionate commitments" and therefore fit in well in the early 1960s' "cool, TV-oriented culture". The discussion about Kennedy's fashion choices continued during her years in the White House, and she became a trendsetter, hiring American designer Oleg Cassini to design her wardrobe. She was the first presidential wife to hire a press secretary, Pamela Turnure, and carefully managed her contact with the media, usually shying away from making public statements, and strictly controlling the extent to which her children were photographed. The media portrayed Kennedy as the ideal woman, which led academic Maurine Beasley to observe that she "created an unrealistic media expectation for first ladies that would challenge her successors". Nevertheless, she attracted worldwide positive public attention and gained allies for the White House and international support for the Kennedy administration and its Cold War policies.

Although Kennedy stated that her priority as a first lady was to take care of the president and their children, she also dedicated her time to the promotion of American arts and preservation of its history. The restoration of the White House was her main contribution, but she also furthered the cause by hosting social events that brought together elite figures from politics and the arts. One of her unrealized goals was to found a Department of the Arts, but she did contribute to the establishment of the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, established during Johnson's tenure.

Assassination and funeral of John F. Kennedy

On November 21, 1963, the first lady and the president embarked on a political trip to Texas with several goals in mind. This was the first time that she had joined her husband on such a trip in the U.S. After a breakfast on November 22, they took a very short flight on Air Force One from Fort Worth's Carswell Air Force Base to Dallas's Love Field, accompanied by Texas Governor John Connally and his wife Nellie. The First Lady was wearing a bright pink Chanel suit and a pillbox hat, which had been personally selected by President Kennedy. A 9.5-mile (15.3 km) motorcade was to take them to the Trade Mart, where the president was scheduled to speak at a lunch. The first lady was seated to her husband's left in the third row of seats in the presidential car, with the Governor and his wife seated in front of them. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson and his wife followed in another car in the motorcade.

After the motorcade turned the corner onto Elm Street in Dealey Plaza, the first lady heard what she thought to be a motorcycle backfiring. She did not realize that it was a gunshot until she heard Governor Connally scream. Within 8.4 seconds, two more shots had rung out, and one of the shots struck her husband in the head. Almost immediately, she began to climb onto the back of the limousine. Clinton J. Hill, Special Agent, Secret Service, ran to the car and leapt onto it, directing her back to her seat. As Hill stood on the back bumper, Associated Press photographer Ike Altgens snapped a photograph that was featured on the front pages of newspapers around the world. She would later testify that she saw pictures "of me climbing out the back. But I don't remember that at all".

The president was rushed for the 3.8-mile (6.1 km) trip to Parkland Hospital. At the first lady's request, she was allowed to be present in the operating room. President Kennedy never regained consciousness.

He died not long after, aged 46. After her husband was pronounced dead, Kennedy refused to remove her blood-stained clothing and reportedly regretted having washed the blood off her face and hands, explaining to Lady Bird Johnson that she wanted "them to see what they have done to Jack". She continued to wear the blood-stained pink suit as she boarded Air Force One and stood next to Johnson when he took the oath of office as president. The unlaundered suit became a symbol of her husband's assassination, and was donated to the National Archives and Records Administration in 1964. Under the terms of an agreement with her daughter, Caroline, the suit would not be placed on public display before 2103. Johnson's biographer Robert Caro wrote that Johnson wanted Jacqueline Kennedy to be present at his swearing-in in order to demonstrate the legitimacy of his presidency to JFK loyalists and to the world at large.

Life following the assassination (1963–1975)

The Camelot epitaph

On November 29, 1963—a week after her husband's assassination—Kennedy was interviewed in Hyannis Port by Theodore H. White of Life magazine. In that session, she compared the Kennedy years in the White House to King Arthur's mythical Camelot, commenting that the President often played the title song of Lerner and Loewe's musical recording before retreating to bed. She also quoted Queen Guinevere from the musical, trying to express how the loss felt.

The era of the John F. Kennedy's presidency has subsequently been referred to as the "Camelot Era" and "Camelot" became his presidency's epitaph. According to White, it sought to portray "a magic moment in American history, when gallant men danced with beautiful women, when great deeds were done, when artists, writers and poets met at the White House and the barbarians beyond the walls were held back". However, historians have later argued that the comparison was not appropriate, with Robert Dallek stating that Kennedy's "effort to lionize [her husband] must have provided a therapeutic shield against immobilizing grief". White himself would later admit the characterization was a "misreading of history". At the same time, Jackie Kennedy's effort to promote the myth of Camelot has been described as having "forever tied her family to the idea of royalty".

Mourning period and later public appearances

Kennedy and her children remained in the White House for two weeks following the assassination. Wanting to "do something nice for Jackie", President Johnson offered an ambassadorship to France to her, aware of her heritage and fondness for the country's culture, but she turned the offer down, as well as follow-up offers of ambassadorships to Mexico and the United Kingdom. At her request, Johnson renamed the Florida space center the John F. Kennedy Space Center a week after the assassination. Kennedy later publicly praised Johnson for his kindness to her.

Kennedy spent 1964 in mourning and made few public appearances. In the winter following the assassination, she and the children stayed at Averell Harriman's home in Georgetown. On January 14, 1964, Kennedy made a televised appearance from the office of the attorney general, thanking the public for the "hundreds of thousands of messages" she had received since the assassination, and said she had been sustained by America's affection for her late husband. She purchased a house for herself and her children in Georgetown but sold it later in 1964 and bought a 15th-floor penthouse apartment for $250,000 at 1040 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan in the hopes of having more privacy. During the summer of 1964, Kennedy retreated to Salutation in Glen Cove, Long Island.

In the following years, Kennedy attended selected memorial dedications to her late husband. She also oversaw the establishment of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, which is the repository for official papers of the Kennedy Administration. Designed by architect I.M. Pei, it is situated next to the University of Massachusetts campus in Boston.

Despite having commissioned William Manchester's authorized account of President Kennedy's death, The Death of a President, Kennedy was subject to significant media attention in 1966–1967 when she and Robert Kennedy tried to block its publication. They sued publishers Harper & Row in December 1966; the suit was settled the following year when Manchester removed passages that detailed President Kennedy's private life.

During the Vietnam War in November 1967, Life magazine dubbed Kennedy "America's unofficial roving ambassador" when she and David Ormsby-Gore, former British ambassador to the United States during the Kennedy administration, traveled to Cambodia, where they visited the religious complex of Angkor Wat with Chief of State Norodom Sihanouk. According to historian Milton Osborne, her visit was "the start of the repair to Cambodian-US relations, which had been at a very low ebb". She also attended the funeral services of Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta, Georgia, in April 1968, despite her initial reluctance due to the crowds and reminders of President Kennedy's death.

Relationship with Robert F. Kennedy

After her husband's assassination, Jacqueline Kennedy relied heavily on her brother-in-law Robert F. Kennedy; she observed him to be the "least like his father" of the Kennedy brothers. He had been a source of support after she had suffered a miscarriage early in her marriage; it was he, not her husband, who stayed with her in the hospital. In the aftermath of the assassination, Robert effectively became a surrogate father for her children until eventual demands by his own large family and his responsibilities as attorney general required him to reduce attention. He credited her with convincing him to stay in politics, and she supported his 1964 run for United States senator from New York.

The January 1968 Tet Offensive in Vietnam resulted in a drop in President Johnson's poll numbers, and Robert Kennedy's advisors urged him to enter the upcoming presidential race. When Art Buchwald asked him if he intended to run, Robert replied, "That depends on what Jackie wants me to do". She met with him around this time and encouraged him to run after she had previously advised him not to follow Jack, but to "be yourself". Privately, she worried about his safety; she believed that Bobby was more disliked than her husband had been and that there was "so much hatred" in the United States. She confided in him about these feelings, but by her own account, he was "fatalistic" like her. Despite her concerns, Jacqueline Kennedy campaigned for her brother-in-law and supported him, and at one point even showed outright optimism that through his victory, members of the Kennedy family would once again occupy the White House.

Just after midnight PDT on June 5, 1968, an enraged Jordanian gunman named Sirhan Sirhan mortally wounded Robert Kennedy minutes after he and a crowd of his supporters had been celebrating his victory in the California Democratic presidential primary. Jacqueline Kennedy rushed to Los Angeles to join his wife Ethel, her brother-in-law Ted, and the other Kennedy family members at his bedside in Good Samaritan Hospital. Robert Kennedy never regained consciousness and died the following day. He was 42 years old. After Bobby's death, Jacqueline Kennedy reportedly suffered a relapse of the depression she had suffered in the days following her husband's assassination nearly five years prior. She came to fear for her life and those of her two children, saying: "If they're killing Kennedys, then my children are targets ... I want to get out of this country."

Marriage to Aristotle Onassis

On October 20, 1968, Jacqueline Kennedy married her long-time friend Aristotle Onassis, a Greek shipping magnate who was able to provide the privacy and security she sought for herself and her children. The wedding took place on Skorpios, Onassis's private Greek island in the Ionian Sea. After marrying Onassis, she took the legal name Jacqueline Onassis and consequently lost her right to Secret Service protection, which is an entitlement of a widow of a U.S. president. The marriage brought her considerable adverse publicity. The fact that Aristotle was divorced and his former wife Athina Livanos was still living led to speculation that Jacqueline might be excommunicated by the Roman Catholic church, though that concern was explicitly dismissed by Boston's archbishop, Cardinal Richard Cushing, as "nonsense". She was condemned by some as a "public sinner", and became the target of paparazzi who followed her everywhere and nicknamed her "Jackie O".

In 1968, billionaire heiress Doris Duke, with whom Jacqueline Onassis was friends, appointed her as the vice president of the Newport Restoration Foundation. Onassis publicly championed the foundation.

During their marriage, Jacqueline and Aristotle Onassis inhabited six different residences: her 15-room Fifth Avenue apartment in Manhattan, her horse farm in Peapack-Gladstone, New Jersey, his Avenue Foch apartment in Paris, his private island Skorpios, his house in Athens, and his yacht Christina O. Onassis ensured that her children continued a connection with the Kennedy family by having Ted Kennedy visit them often. She developed a close relationship with Ted, and from then on he was involved in her public appearances.

Aristotle Onassis's health deteriorated rapidly following the death of his son Alexander in a plane crash in 1973. He died of respiratory failure aged 69 in Paris on March 15, 1975. His financial legacy was severely limited under Greek law, which dictated how much a non-Greek surviving spouse could inherit. After two years of legal wrangling, Jacqueline Onassis eventually accepted a settlement of $26 million from Christina Onassis—Aristotle's daughter and sole heir—and waived all other claims to the Onassis estate.

Later years (1975–1990s)

After the death of her second husband, Onassis returned permanently to the United States, splitting her time between Manhattan, Martha's Vineyard, and the Kennedy compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts. In 1975, she became a consulting editor at Viking Press, a position that she held for two years.

After almost a decade of avoiding participation in political events, Onassis attended the 1976 Democratic National Convention and stunned the assembled delegates when she appeared in the visitors' gallery. She resigned from Viking Press in 1977 after John Leonard of The New York Times stated that she held some responsibility for Viking's publication of the Jeffrey Archer novel Shall We Tell the President?, set in a fictional future presidency of Ted Kennedy and describing an assassination plot against him. Two years later, she appeared alongside her mother-in-law Rose Kennedy at Faneuil Hall in Boston when Ted Kennedy announced that he was going to challenge incumbent president Jimmy Carter for the Democratic nomination for president. She participated in the subsequent presidential campaign, which was unsuccessful.

Following her resignation from Viking Press, Onassis was hired by Doubleday, where she worked as an associate editor under an old friend, John Turner Sargent, Sr. Among the books she edited for the company are Larry Gonick's The Cartoon History of the Universe, the English translation of the three volumes of Naghib Mahfuz's Cairo Trilogy (with Martha Levin), and autobiographies of ballerina Gelsey Kirkland, singer-songwriter Carly Simon, and fashion icon Diana Vreeland. She also encouraged Dorothy West, her neighbor on Martha's Vineyard and one of the last surviving members of the Harlem Renaissance, to complete the novel The Wedding (1995), a multi-generational story about race, class, wealth, and power in the U.S. The book was later adapted as a miniseries in 1998, starring Halle Berry and Lynn Whitfield and produced by Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions.

As an editor for Doubleday, Onassis also persuaded top singer Michael Jackson to write his 1988 memoir Moonwalk. The book would be published by Doubleday, with Onassis serving as an editor for it as well. Though initially reluctant to do so, Onassis would also provide the Moonwalk's foreword as well. Moonwalk, which was later acknowledged to have had great input from both Onassis and the book's second manuscript writer Stephen Davis, would top the New York Times best seller list and sell 1 million copies by the end of its run. Despite being Michael Jackson's memoir, and the third and final manuscript being written by Jackson with editing assistance from Shaye Areheart, the Wall Street Journal stated in 2010 that Moonwalk was in fact Onassis' "most successful book," due to her prominent role in supervising its writing for Doubleday and managing its input.

Illness, death, and funeral

In November 1993, Onassis was thrown from her horse while participating in a fox hunt in Middleburg, Virginia, and was taken to the hospital for examination. A swollen lymph node was discovered in her groin, which was initially diagnosed by the doctor to be caused by an infection. The fall from the horse contributed to her deteriorating health over the next six months. In December, Onassis developed new symptoms, including a stomach ache and swollen lymph nodes in her neck, and was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. She began chemotherapy in January 1994 and publicly announced the diagnosis, saying the initial prognosis was good. She continued to work at Doubleday, but by March the cancer had spread to her spinal cord, brain and liver, and by May it was deemed terminal.

Onassis made her last trip home from New York Hospital–Cornell Medical Center on May 18, 1994. The following night at 10:15 p.m., she died in her sleep at her Manhattan apartment at age 64, with her children by her side. In the morning, her son, John F. Kennedy Jr., announced his mother's death to the press saying she had been "surrounded by her friends and her family and her books, and the people and the things that she loved". He added that "she did it in her very own way, and on her own terms, and we all feel lucky for that."

On May 23, her funeral Mass was held a few blocks away from her apartment at the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola—the Catholic parish where she was baptized in 1929 and confirmed as a teenager—and asked for no cameras to film the event, for privacy. She was interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, alongside President Kennedy, their son Patrick, and their stillborn daughter Arabella. President Bill Clinton delivered a eulogy at her graveside service.

She left an estate that its executors valued at US$43.7 million (equivalent to $94.9 million in 2025).

Legacy

Popularity

Jacqueline Kennedy's marriage to Aristotle Onassis caused her popularity to decline sharply among an American public who viewed it as a betrayal of the assassinated president. Her lavish lifestyle as Onassis's "trophy wife", in contrast to "the shy, selfless, and sacrificing mother the American public had come to respect" as First Lady, led the press to portray her as "a spendthrift and a reckless woman".

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis took conscious control of her public image and, by the time of her death, succeeded in rehabilitating it. By moving back to New York City after Onassis's death, working as an editor for Viking Press and Doubleday, focusing on her children and grandchildren, and participating in charitable causes, she reversed her "reckless spendthrift" image. She also reestablished her relationship with the Kennedy family and supported the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum.

Onassis remains one of the most popular First Ladies. She was featured 27 times on the annual Gallup list of the top 10 most admired people of the second half of the 20th century; this number is surpassed by only Billy Graham and Queen Elizabeth II and is higher than that of any U.S. president.

Both Tina Turner and Jackie Joyner-Kersee have cited Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as an influence.

Style icon

Jacqueline Kennedy became a global fashion icon during her husband's presidency. After the 1960 election, she commissioned French-born American fashion designer and Kennedy family friend Oleg Cassini to create an original wardrobe for her appearances as First Lady. From 1961 to 1963, Cassini dressed her in many of her ensembles, including her Inauguration Day fawn coat and Inaugural gala gown, as well as many outfits for her visits to Europe, India, and Pakistan. In 1961, Kennedy spent $45,446 more on fashion than the $100,000 annual salary her husband earned as president.

Kennedy preferred French couture, particularly the work of Chanel, Balenciaga, and Givenchy, but was aware that in her role as first lady, she would be expected to wear American designers' work. After noticing that her taste for Paris fashion was being criticized in the press, she wrote to the fashion editor Diana Vreeland to ask for suitable American designers, particularly those who could reproduce the Paris look. After considering the letter, which expressed her dislike of prints and her preference for "terribly simple, covered-up clothes," Vreeland recommended Norman Norell, who was considered America's first designer and known for his high-end simplicity and fine quality work. She also suggested Ben Zuckerman, another highly regarded tailor who regularly offered re-interpretations of Paris couture, and the sportswear designer Stella Sloat, who occasionally offered Givenchy copies. Kennedy's first choice for her Inauguration Day coat was originally a purple wool Zuckerman model that was based on a Pierre Cardin design, but she instead settled on a fawn Cassini coat and wore the Zuckerman for a tour of the White House with Mamie Eisenhower.

In her role as first lady, Kennedy preferred to wear clean-cut suits with a skirt hem down to middle of the knee, three-quarter sleeves on notch-collar jackets, sleeveless A-line dresses, above-the-elbow gloves, low-heel pumps, and pillbox hats. Dubbed the "Jackie" look, these clothing items rapidly became fashion trends in the Western world. More than any other First Lady, her style was copied by commercial manufacturers and a large segment of young women. Her influential bouffant hairstyle, described as a "grown-up exaggeration of little girls' hair," was created by Mr. Kenneth, who worked for her from 1954 until 1986. Her tastes in eyewear were also influential, the most famous of which were the bespoke pairs designed for her by French designer, François Pinton. The coinage 'Jackie O glasses' is still used today to refer to this style of oversized, oval-lensed sunglasses.

Historical assessments

In 2020, Time magazine included her name on its list of 100 Women of the Year. She was named Woman of the Year 1962 for her efforts in uplifting American history and art.

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis is seen as being customary in her role as first lady, though Frank N. Magill argued that her life was validation that "fame and celebrity" changed the way that first ladies are evaluated historically. Hamish Bowles, curator of the "Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years" exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, attributed her popularity to a sense of unknown that was felt in her withdrawal from the public which he dubbed "immensely appealing". After her death, Kelly Barber referred to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as "the most intriguing woman in the world", furthering that her stature was also due to her affiliation with valuable causes. Historian Carl Sferrazza Anthony summarized that the former first lady "became an aspirational figure of that era, one whose privilege might not be easily reached by a majority of Americans but which others could strive to emulate". Since the late 2000s, Onassis's traditional persona has been invoked by commentators when referring to fashionable political spouses. A wide variety of commentators have positively credited the work of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in restoring the White House, including Hugh Sidey, Letitia Baldrige, Laura Bush, Kathleen P. Galop, and Carl Anthony.

Since 1982, Siena Research Institute has periodically conducted surveys asking historians to assess American first ladies according to a cumulative score on the independent criteria of their background, value to the country, intelligence, courage, accomplishments, integrity, leadership, being their own women, public image, and value to the president. Consistently, Onassis has ranked between the third and eighth most highly regarded first ladies in these surveys. In terms of cumulative assessment, Onassis has been ranked:

8th-best of 42 in 1982

7th-best of 37 in 1993

4th-best of 38 in 2003

3rd-best of 38 in 2008

3rd-best of 39 in 2014

4th-best of 40 in 2020

Honors and memorials

A high school named Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School for International Careers, was dedicated by New York City in 1995, the first high school named in her honor. It is located at 120 West 46th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, and was formerly the High School of Performing Arts.

Public School 66 in the Richmond Hill neighborhood of Queens, New York City, was renamed in honor of the former First Lady.

The main reservoir in Central Park, located in Manhattan near her apartment, was renamed in her honor as the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir.

The main entry foyer on East 42nd Street, across from Pershing Square, into Grand Central Terminal in New York City was renamed The Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Foyer, in honor of her work in the 1970s of saving the terminal.

The Municipal Art Society of New York presents the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Medal to an individual whose work and deeds have made an outstanding contribution to the city of New York. The medal was named in honor of the former MAS board member in 1994, for her tireless efforts to preserve and protect New York City's great architecture. She made her last public appearance at the Municipal Art Society two months before her May 1994 death.

Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Hall at the George Washington University (her alma mater) in Washington, DC.

The White House's East Garden was renamed the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden in her honor.

In 2007, her name and her first husband's were included on the list of people aboard the Japanese Kaguya mission to the Moon launched on September 14, as part of the Planetary Society's "Wish Upon The Moon" campaign. In addition, they are included on the list aboard NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission.

A school and an award at the American Ballet Theatre have been named after her in honor of her childhood study of ballet.

Portrayals

Jaclyn Smith portrays Jacqueline Kennedy in the 1981 television film Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, depicting her life until the end of the JFK presidency. The film's producer Louis Rudolph stated an interest in creating a "positive portrait of a woman who I thought had been very much maligned," comments that were interpreted by John J. O'Connor of The New York Times as erasing any chances of critique toward her. Though Smith received praise for her performance, with Marilynn Preston calling her "convincing in an impossible role", Tom Shales wrote "Jaclyn Smith couldn't act her way out of a Gucci bag".

Blair Brown portrays Jacqueline Kennedy in the 1983 miniseries Kennedy, set during the Kennedy presidency. Brown used wigs and makeup to better resemble Kennedy and said through playing the role she gained a different view of the assassination: "I realized that this was a woman witnessing the public execution of her husband." Jason Bailey praised her performance, while Andrea Mullaney noted her resemblance to Kennedy and general shyness. Brown was nominated for a television BAFTA as Best Actress and a Golden Globe as Best Actress in a Miniseries or Television Film.

Marianna Bishop, Sarah Michelle Gellar, and Roma Downey portray Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in the 1991 miniseries A Woman Named Jackie, covering her entire life until the death of Aristotle Onassis. Of being contacted for the role, Downey reflected: "I thought I was a strange choice because I didn't think I looked anything like her and I was Irish." Half of Downey's wardrobe was designed by Shelley Komarov and Downey stated that though she had long harbored "great respect and admiration" for Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, she was unaware of the troubles in her childhood. Reviewer Rick Kogan praised Downey with doing "a surprisingly fine job in the demanding title role", while Howard Rosenberg lamented Downey's performance failing to "pierce this thick glaze of superficiality". Ability credited the role with raising Downey's profile. In 1992, the miniseries won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries.

Rhoda Griffis portrays Jacqueline Kennedy in the 1992 film Love Field, set shortly before and in the aftermath of JFK's assassination. It was Griffis's feature film debut. Griffis said she had been told by her orthodontist of her resemblance to Kennedy and was cast as her upon walking into the auditions for the role.