When Jackie Kennedy (then known as Jacqueline Bouvier, later known as Jackie O.) first met John F. Kennedy Jr. and his big, rambunctious family, she was coming to the table with a world of reservations, having broken off a previous engagement to John Husted when the constraints of that expected family life felt too overwhelming. Employed as “Inquiring Camera Girl” at the Washington Times-Herald, Jackie valued her freedom above most else, and knew that joining the Kennedy family would mean giving up much of her privacy and ability to move as she pleased — concerns that recently hampered Meghan Markle during her time as a member of the royal family.
A new episode of Wondery podcast Even the Rich on Jackie Kennedy reveals that the former First Lady’s early encounters with the Kennedy family actually had a lot in common with how wives like Meghan (or Kate Middleton, or Diana Spencer) would feel upon meeting the royal family, from the level of commitment that was expected to the family’s respective affinities for outdoor games. When it comes to American royalty like the Kennedys, an outsider like Jackie coming in may well have felt as foreign as they would meeting the British royal family — suggesting that, at a certain level of power, a new set of rules to which the royals and Kennedys both ascribe kicks in.
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