Ethel Kennedy facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Ethel Kennedy
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Kennedy in 1968
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Ethel Skakel
April 11, 1928 Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
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| Died | October 10, 2024 (aged 96) Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
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| Education | Manhattanville College (BA) |
| Political party | Democratic |
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| Children | 11, including
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| Relatives | Kennedy family (through marriage) |
Ethel Kennedy (née Skakel SKAY-kel; April 11, 1928 – October 10, 2024) was an American human rights advocate. Kennedy was the wife of U.S. senator Robert F. Kennedy, a sister-in-law of U.S. president John F. Kennedy, and sixth child of George and Ann Skakel (née Brannack). Shortly after her husband's assassination in 1968, she founded the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, a non-profit charity working to reach his goal of a just and peaceful world. In 2014, Kennedy was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama.
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Early life and education
Ethel Skakel was born on April 11, 1928, in Chicago, Illinois, to businessman George Skakel and his former secretary Ann Brannack. She was the third of four Skakel daughters and the sixth-born of seven children.
Her father George was the founder of Great Lakes Carbon Corporation, now a division of SGLCarbon. He was a Protestant of Dutch descent while his wife Ann was a Catholic of Irish ancestry. The children were raised Catholic, and Ethel was a devout Catholic who attended mass regularly throughout her life.
Ethel and her siblings were raised in Greenwich, Connecticut. Ethel attended the all-girls Greenwich Academy, and graduated from the Convent of the Sacred Heart in the Bronx in 1945. In September 1945, Ethel began her college education at Manhattanville College, where she was a classmate of her future sister-in-law Jean Kennedy. She received a bachelor's degree from Manhattanville in 1949.
Ethel first met Jean's brother Robert F. Kennedy during a ski trip to Mont Tremblant Resort in Quebec in December 1945. During that trip, Robert began dating Ethel's older sister Patricia, but after that relationship ended, he began to date Ethel. She campaigned for Robert's older brother John F. Kennedy in John's 1946 campaign for Congress in Massachusetts' 11th congressional district, and she wrote her college thesis on his book Why England Slept.
Ethel's parents were killed in a 1955 plane crash.
Marriage and family
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Robert Kennedy and Ethel Skakel became engaged in February 1950 and were married on June 17, 1950, at Catholic St. Mary Church in Greenwich. The Boston Globe noted that the marriage "unites two large fortunes".
After Robert graduated from law school, the family settled in the Washington, D.C. area, and Robert went to work for the Justice Department. In 1952, Ethel and Robert moved into a rooming house in Boston, Massachusetts, and she helped contribute to her brother-in-law John's Senate campaign by organizing "tea parties" for potential voters.
In 1956, the Kennedys purchased Hickory Hill from Robert's brother John and his wife, Jacqueline. The 13-bedroom estate was situated on six acres in McLean, Virginia, (west of Washington, D.C.). Robert and Ethel held many gatherings at their home and were known for their impressive and eclectic guest lists. Ethel sold Hickory Hill for $8.25 million in December 2009. The couple also owned a home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod.
In 1960, Ethel's brother-in-law John F. Kennedy won the presidential election, at which time he appointed Robert to the post of attorney general. In 1962, President Kennedy assigned Ethel and Robert to tour 14 countries on a 28-day goodwill trip. Though the trip was said to be informal, the host countries viewed Robert and Ethel as stand-ins for the President and the First Lady.
On November 22, 1963, Ethel first learned of her brother-in-law's assassination from her husband. Ethel was reportedly devastated by the assassination and worried for her niece and nephew.
In 1964, Ethel supported her husband while he campaigned for and won a seat in the United States Senate, representing New York. During the campaign, Robert was accused of "carpetbagging", and Ethel made light of the criticism by suggesting the slogan, "There is only so much you can do for Massachusetts."
She urged her husband to enter the Democratic primary for the 1968 presidential election. Biographer Evan Thomas portrayed her as Robert's "most consistent advocate of a race for the White House".
Husband's assassination
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Shortly after midnight on June 5, 1968, Robert F. Kennedy was mortally wounded by Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles; he died the following day at the age of 42. President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a national day of mourning. Ethel sent Johnson a handwritten note on June 19, thanking him and his wife, First Lady Lady Bird Johnson, for the help they had given her and the Kennedy family. After her husband's assassination, Ethel publicly stated that she would never marry again, and indeed she never did, living her remaining 56 years as a widow. For a time, she was escorted to dinners, parties, and the theater by singer and family friend Andy Williams.
Children
Robert and Ethel Kennedy had 11 children during their 18-year marriage: Kathleen, Joseph, Robert Jr., David, Courtney, Michael, Kerry, Christopher, Maxwell, Douglas, and Rory, who was born after his father was assassinated. Kathleen served as lieutenant governor of Maryland from 1995 to 2003, Joseph represented Massachusetts' 8th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1987 to 1999, and Robert Jr. ran for president in the 2024 United States presidential election. Her grandson, Joseph Kennedy III, also served in the U.S. House of Representatives, representing Massachusetts' 4th congressional district from 2013 to 2021. Two of the Kennedys' sons, David and Michael, have died.
Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights
Ethel Kennedy founded the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights (now known as Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights) in 1968. In February 2001, Kennedy visited Rodolfo Montiel and another peasant activist at their jail in Iguala, presenting Rodolfo with the Chico Mendes Award on behalf of American environmental group the Sierra Club. In March 2016, Kennedy was among hundreds who marched near the home of Wendy's chairman Nelson Peltz in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of an effort by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, a farm workers' group, to convince the company to pay an additional one cent per pound of tomatoes to increase the wages of field workers. Kennedy's daughter Kerry was president of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, according to the Fund's 2022 annual report.
Later life
During the late 1970s, with a renewed commitment to public service, Kennedy focused much of her time and energy on various social causes, including the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Project. In 1992, Kennedy and her son Michael made a cameo appearance on the NBC sitcom Cheers in Boston.
During the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries, Kennedy endorsed Barack Obama. She publicly supported and held fundraisers at Hickory Hill for numerous politicians that included Virginia gubernatorial candidate Brian Moran. Kennedy hosted a $6-million fundraising dinner for Obama at Hickory Hill in June 2008. The $28,500-a-plate dinner was headlined by former Democratic presidential candidate and DNC chairman Howard Dean.
In 2012, Kennedy appeared in a documentary about her life, directed by her youngest child, daughter Rory. The documentary, entitled Ethel, covers Kennedy's early political involvement, her life with Robert F. Kennedy, and the years following his death when she raised eleven children on her own. It features interviews with Ethel and her children interspersed with family videos and archival photos.
In her later years, Kennedy resided at the Kennedy Compound in Massachusetts and in Palm Beach, Florida. She died on October 10, 2024 in Boston at the age of 96, after being hospitalized for a stroke she had the week prior. Following the news of her death, former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton gave tributes to Kennedy.
Legacy and awards
In 1981, President Ronald Reagan honored Kennedy with the Robert F. Kennedy medal in the White House Rose Garden. In 2014, a bridge over the Anacostia River in Washington, D.C., was renamed the Ethel Kennedy Bridge in her honor, in recognition of her advocacy for environmentalism and social causes in the District of Columbia. Also in 2014, Kennedy was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Obama for her dedication to "advancing the cause of social justice, human rights, environmental protection, and poverty reduction by creating countless ripples of hope to effect change around the world".
See also
In Spanish: Ethel Kennedy para niños
