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On 12 September 1953, President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963), then a dashing young senator on-the-rise from Massachusetts, married Jacqueline Bouvier (1929-1994), a bright, witty, and stylish reporter for the Washington Times-Herald, who would later become one the most famous women in the world. The Kennedy-Bouvier wedding was the major social event of the year. Ten bridesmaids, fourteen ushers, and six hundred guests assembled in St. Mary's Church, Newport, Rhode Island, where Archbishop Richard Cushing (1895-1970) performed the ceremony. The reception, attended by fourteen hundred guests, was held at nearby Hammersmith Farm, the summer home of Jackie's mother, Janet Lee Auchincloss (1907-1989), and stepfather, Hugh Auchincloss (1897-1976), a wealthy Washington, D.C., lawyer and stockbroker.
Among those attending the wedding was Jackie's friend Toni Frissell (1907-1988), the celebrated photographer whose work graced the pages of Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Sports Illustrated magazines throughout a long and exciting career that included a stint as a foreign correspondent in Europe during World War Two and several photojournalism assignments in England in the 1950s. While working for Harper's Bazaar, Frissell was assigned to take photographs at the Kennedy-Bouvier wedding reception. Frissell later wrote that she had difficulty getting the couple alone for photographs. "The Kennedy family was somewhat overwhelming. There are so many of them and they are so vital that they are bound to take over any place like a swarm of locusts."1 Jackie saw to it that Frissell got some good shots, but Carmel Snow (1890-1961), Harper's editor phoned Frissell after the wedding to say that she had changed her mind about publishing the photographs, stating "There's been such notoriety they are worthless to Harper's Bazaar."2 When the magazine also refused to pay Frissell for her time or expenses, the photographer resigned and shortly thereafter took a position with Harper's rival, Vogue, for whom she had worked previously.
Although deemed unpublishable by Snow, Jackie wrote in this handwritten undated letter to Frissell that the photographs "were unbelievably perfect," and she had a hard time deciding which proofs to have printed. Many readers of this letter shake their heads in disbelief when Jackie suggests she may have to cross some selections off her list if the projected cost is "too fabulously expensive." Perhaps some of Mrs. Auchincloss's well-known thriftiness uncharacteristically surfaced in her daughter, but whatever the reason, most readers have difficulty reconciling Jackie's statement with the fact that she had just married into one of the country's wealthiest families and that her own personal estate, at the time of her death in 1994, was valued at approximately $50 million.
Before her death, one of the last books Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis worked on while a senior editor at Doubleday was Toni Frissell Photographs: 1933-1967, which Frissell's daughter produced from the extensive collection of photographs and personal papers that her mother had donated to the Library of Congress in 1971. Sidney Frissell Stafford dedicated this book to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.
1. Toni Frissell as quoted by George Plimpton in his Introduction to Toni Frissell Photographs: 1933-1967 (New York: Doubleday, 1994), xxxiv.
2. Ibid.
Janice E. Ruth, Manuscript Division
For Additional Information
For additional information on the Toni Frissell Collection, you can leave this site and read a summary catalog record for the collection.
Reproduction Number:
A39 (color slide; page 1) A40 (color slide; page 2)
Related Terms:
Auchincloss, Hugh (1897-1976) | Auchincloss, Janet Lee (1907-1989) | First ladies | Frissell, Toni (1907-1988) | Harper's Bazaar (Magazine) | Journalists | Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald) (1917-1963) | Onassis, Jacqueline Kennedy (1929-1994) | Photographers | Photojournalism | Presidents | Snow, Carmel (1890-1961) | Vogue (Magazine) | Weddings | Women
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