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Jackie Kennedy’s fairy-tale wedding was a nightmare for her African American dress designer
Washington Post ^ | 8/28/2019 | GBillian Brockell

Posted on 09/03/2019 8:05:21 PM PDT by simpson96

The 1953 wedding of Jacqueline Bouvier and then-Sen. John F. Kennedy was so perfect it is still being talked about more than 65 years later. As recently as 2017, gossip website The List was still calling it “the most beautiful wedding ever.” It was a fairy tale worthy of the legendary couple who would preside over Camelot.

But for Ann Lowe, who designed the bridal gown, it was a nightmare. First, the wedding dress was destroyed 10 days before the ceremony. Then the 24-year-old bride, who did not really like the gown in the first place, snubbed her.

Asked who made the dress, a viral tweet remembered this week, Jackie simply responded ”a colored dressmaker.”(snip)

By that point, Lowe had been working with the Bouviers for years, and she had a friendly relationship with 24-year-old Jackie, she later said. But it was not really Jackie’s show. The groom’s father — the famously domineering Joseph Kennedy — was involved in every detail of wedding planning, including the dress,(snip)

Lowe does not seem to have held a grudge about it, though. By 1964, she was telling the Saturday Evening Post how “sweet” Jackie Kennedy, by then a widow and former first lady, had been to her.(snip)

By the mid-1960s, she was tens of thousands of dollars in debt and in trouble with the IRS.

Then, an “anonymous friend” paid her back taxes, cutting her debts in half. Lowe suspected the anonymous friend was Jackie.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: 1960s; americanroyalty; camelot; dressmaker; jackiekennedy; kennedy; kennedys; mythmaking; racism
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To: Jane Long
I was no fan of the Kennedys, and having grown up with people who worked as DC insiders, I heard plenty of gossip about Jackie during my teens that gave me the creeps. Consequently, I never admired even little pieces of her and her elitist pretentions. So today is the first day in all these years that I've taken a good look at her wedding dress.

Wow. It is gorgeous. It is classic. It could be worn today without looking the least bit dated. Thanks for posting the picture.

I feel so sorry for the way its creator was treated. There was a black dressmaker to Mrs. Lincoln who has been biographed, and Jackie's should be. If Jackie did pay her bills, it was more than owed.

61 posted on 09/04/2019 12:38:01 PM PDT by Albion Wilde (It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it. --Douglas MacArthur)
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To: Albion Wilde

Jackie always kind of came off as a ditz to me.


62 posted on 09/04/2019 12:39:06 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: dowcaet

Not so much anymore but it used to be that you could tell that a Presidential election was coming up. Suddenly there would be movies and documentaries on John F Kennedy, Jacqueline Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald, and/or the Kennedy Clan. Basically calling the faithful back to the voting tribe central committee.


63 posted on 09/04/2019 2:41:38 PM PDT by dirtymac (Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.(DT4POTUS))
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Comment #64 Removed by Moderator

To: PhiloBedo
That should be a new FR rule. Anytime a former FLOTUS article is posted (like Big Mike) a picture of Melania.

That works for me.

65 posted on 09/04/2019 7:37:48 PM PDT by TChad
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