To a generation of Americans, Jacqueline Kennedy typified style and grace as America’s first lady.
Born Jacqueline Bouvier in Southampton, N.Y., she attended Vassar College and The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Her first job was the “Inquiring Camera Girl” at the Washington Times-Herald.
She met John F. Kennedy in 1952 when he was representing Massachusetts in Congress as a Democrat; they married in 1953.
The youngest first lady in decades, Kennedy made an enduring mark on the White House. She founded the White House Historical Association; led a restoration of the White House; and supported Congress in passing a law that officially made the White House a museum. In 1962, she led a nationally televised tour of the executive mansion.
Her pillbox hats, headscarves and well-coiffed bouffant hairstyle set fashion trends for American women.
After her husband’s assassination, Kennedy moved to New York City, where she married her second husband, wealthy Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis, in 1968.
She died in 1994 and was later buried next to the former president and two of their children — a stillborn daughter and a son who died as a newborn — in Arlington National Cemetery just outside the nation’s capital.
— Morgan Chalfant
photo: Getty Images