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Scott and Jenn revisit St. Mary’s Church in Newport, Rhode Island, where Senator John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier on September 12, 1953, in a spectacle likened to America’s “Camelot” moment.

🎥 Video from the church

📍 Google Maps to St Mary's

🎥 Video version of this podcast

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The humidity in Newport that September morning was heavy, but it was nothing

compared to the pressure, the sheer electric weight of expectation.

You're standing on the sidewalk outside St. Mary's Church, and

honestly, you can barely breathe.

It feels like the entire eastern seaboard has descended on this

one little corner of Rhode Island.

There are over 2000 people packed behind police barricades, craning their necks

just to catch a glimpse of a veil.

It's a media frenzy.

Cameras flashing like summer lightning.

Scent of expensive perfume mixing with the exhaust of a

hundred idling limousines inside.

It's not just a wedding, it's a political coronation.

You're squeezed into a pew.

Looking around, there's the future of American power sitting just rows away.

Senators, diplomats, socialites.

You spot Vice President Nixon and former President Truman chatting quietly

with Ed Sullivan, only three feet away from the Asters and the Vanderbilt.

You see the Kennedys a dynasty in the making their energy

radiating off the altar.

As Jacqueline Bouvier walks down that aisle, the air in the church changes.

It's no longer just a ceremony.

It's the birth of a myth.

You can feel it in your bones.

This isn't just a senator marrying a photographer.

This is the beginning of something that will define an era.

It's chaotic.

It's glamorous, and for every person here it feels like we're watching history.

Hold its breath.

Then the doors open.

The organ swells.

Fast forward to today, the cameras are gone.

The crowds have dispersed, but the stone and stained glass of St. Mary's remain.

That's where Jen takes us in this episode.

She's walking the same aisles, standing in the same light where a young Jack

and Jackie stood unknowingly stepping toward a future and a tragedy that

would change the world forever.

Welcome to Talk With History.

I'm your host Scott here with my wife and historian Jen.

Hello.

On this podcast, we give you insights to our history inspired while travels.

YouTube channel journey and examine history through deeper conversations

with the curious, the explorers and the history lovers out there living

love.

Alright, before we start, Jen, it's been a little while since I've had a good five

star review to read for the podcast for.

So for our podcast listeners, we're coming into busy season,

coming into the summertime.

Everybody's on the road and listening.

So if you're on the road and your loved one is sitting next to you in the

car, tell 'em to get on their phone.

Open up the podcast app, drop us a five star review and I'll review.

I'll read it here on the podcast.

So this video, yeah, you actually recorded probably like six months ago.

Yeah.

Um, we are recording this podcast episode March of 26.

You recorded this back in September, I think.

And.

It was beautiful time of year up there in Newport.

One of your last kind of, um, cruises for American Cruise Line, and you got up to

Newport and you got to go see the church.

Where JFK married then Jacqueline Bouvier.

Yeah, so as maybe some of our listeners don't know, I'm the historian on American

Cruise Line, one of the historians and I do the history talk every night.

Uh, after we've gotten underway again, before we pull into port the next day

and I get, I talk about where we're going next and history about it, and

usually before we pull into Newport, uh, and anytime I do this whole New

England island area, the Kennedy's is something you just can't Yeah.

Avoid, right?

There's so much immersed in Martha's Vineyard and off the coast of, you know.

Massachusetts Kenny Bun Port, but Newport, and when we pull in with

the American cruise line, we're right beside Hammersmith Farm.

And so most people don't realize that our ship docks right beside that farm

where, uh, the Auckland clauses lived.

And that is.

Jackie's stepfather, and that's where her mother marries into that family,

and that's where they will have their wedding reception and then all through

JFK's presidency, they will visit there.

That'll be where they kind of vacation and then they sail out of

the harbor where we are actually.

With, uh, American Cruise Line.

So all those famous sailing pictures, that's all from Newport.

And if you know anything about Newport, it's a big sailing town anyway, so

anytime we're on the tram with American Cruise Line, we'll stop, we'll drive

right by St. Mary's Church, and I always point out that's where they got married.

Well, I never had a chance to actually go there, and you never know how

much these historic locations, um.

Embrace their historic stories.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's, it, it definitely varies from what you've seen.

Yes.

From, from spot to spot.

Some places don't wanna be really associated with those historic stories.

They wanna tell a different story, but this church embraces the marriage

and they have photographs of it.

And even when I approach them about filming inside, she was like, yes,

please do, please tell this story.

We want more people to know.

We want more people to visit.

We actually have the original, uh, kneeling.

Uh, what did, what do they call those prayer?

Kind of like, I don't know.

That's a good question.

I, I don't know if they have an official name.

We, I say it in the video, the prayer kneeler that they use and it's the only

picture from inside, from the wedding.

They actually have those where they're kneeling and, and saying a prayer during

the, the mass that is their wedding.

Um, and so.

It was super cool, right?

Because what you don't realize is, as you're walking up to the church is those

famous photographs really have the, the architecture of the doorway behind

them, and you're standing right there

and it hasn't changed, right?

Mm-hmm.

Like the one for our listeners, our, you, you can probably picture in your head.

JFK and Jackie walking out of the church.

You know, black and white picture, pretty typical kind of this, this,

uh, this kind of pope type arch.

Right.

Kind of an arch up has a point.

And then within that it's got this circular kind of design typical

of, of that, that architecture.

Yeah.

You know, pop.

Yeah.

Big brown mason masonry.

Yeah.

Ma masonry over the door.

Mm-hmm.

And so you can picture that in your head, you know, those two, kind

of the picture kind of from down below, catching them coming out.

Because if you watch our video.

For our listeners, I'll link this in the show notes.

If you watch our video, I found one picture that had been taken from up

high and just this mass of people outside the church as they start walking

out, and so the fact that you get a couple clean photographs of those two.

Come walking out.

That's what you can picture in your head.

And you're standing right at those doors,

standing right at those doors.

So what you have to know about this historically is really,

this is the birth of Camelot.

So when we talk about Camelot and the Kennedys, this is their

fairytale story of American royalty.

And this wedding really mimics those.

Images you have of British royalty getting married.

Yeah.

Like this looks a lot like Diana when she got married.

It looks a lot like, uh, princess Kate when she gets married to William.

Like this is America's version of this and it looks just like

it picks it, it picture perfect.

Looks like that.

And so the church is a very big church.

St. Mary's, Roman Catholic Church is uh.

It could hold 800 people.

Yeah,

it's huge.

And that's how many people came to that wedding.

And uh, inside is just beautiful.

And we'll talk more about the church history, but that's not where Jackie

had originally gone to church.

That's not where she wanted to get married.

Now you have to realize she's a local.

Yeah, she's a Newport local.

Like this is where she has been raised.

And if you know anything about, we've talked about before,

the Gilded Age and these, uh, aristocratic families of America.

She's part of that.

That's why she lives in Newport.

That's why she's raised in Newport.

Yeah.

So she comes from some of that old money.

She comes from that old money.

When you think of the, are you, like you said, the Rockefellers, the

Asters, and all these people that live in Newport, the Vanderbilt.

We've been to those gilded age mansions.

Jackie Boer is part of that her mother has married into, even though Boer was that,

and her father is part of that, he has.

It's basically swindled the money away with his habits and he has gambling

habits and uh, intoxication habits.

So he has liquor habits and that's also prevents him from walking

her down the aisle that day.

Yeah,

that's one of the things that I, when I, I cut some little, couple

facts I'm gonna try to bring up here.

That was one of the things that I brought up.

'cause you can see there's some very quick.

Um, you can find it on YouTube.

And I put it, I clipped it in the video, very quick footage, video footage of them

walking out of, of her getting out of her limousine with her stepfather and then

getting ready to walk into the church.

Um, but that's why it's her stepfather and not her father.

Yes.

And the Akin Clause family.

Now, if you've seen our videos from Newport, we've gone to

Jackie's mother's Graves.

They, they are both buried.

They're in Newport.

So you have to think.

This is very much an aristocratic family.

Now the Kennedys want to be a part of this crowd, right?

They're not really born into this crowd, but their family has high

ambitions and much very high ambitions for John F. Kennedy at the time.

He's a senator and, uh, marrying into this type of family meets their ambitions.

Yeah.

And so you can kind of, I wouldn't say it was an arranged

marriage, but she was an approved.

Person to, to date and to pursue.

Let's put it that way.

I, but this wedding is just.

Beautiful.

Uh, Robert Kennedy is in like a full on tuxedo with the tails.

Her dress is gorgeous and they have all of these attendants, which you'll learn later

in history, will be like his brothers.

Yeah, his sisters.

Her sister, right?

So these people are gonna play bigger parts in American history and they

are the attendance to their wedding.

So it was just super cool to walk down that.

Aisle, you have full access to all of that.

They sat in Pew 10 when they would come back to Newport and worship.

You can, I sat in Pew 10.

I give you a full vantage point of what it would look like to

see the church from Pew 10.

So what they saw every time they would come in and then I walk you over to

where the wedding couple had, um.

Had prayed on the kneeler and the photograph that exists

from the wedding, uh, are those nailers and those are original.

Uh, when Scott was making the video, he's like, there's not

a lot of pictures from inside.

Yeah.

From inside the wedding, from inside the chapel.

And I was like, well, I don't know if that was socially a norm at the time.

Right.

Nowadays, yeah.

We take a ton of pictures everywhere, but I don't know if that was.

At the time, not considered prudent to be photographing inside a church.

And it's so interesting because that just lends to the exclusivity of the event.

Yes.

Right.

So at the time, partly it was, you know, it was 53, right?

Mm-hmm.

So

yeah, September 12th, 1953,

September 12th, 1953.

So photography was everywhere, right?

Obviously we've got news reels of this, and so they could have been in

there, but it just wasn't a thing.

Right like it is nowadays.

And again, that lent to how exclusive this was.

And that was, I think, was it Jackie Kennedy's?

Um.

Jacque Le Bo's father who kind of worked, or maybe it was on the

Kennedy side, worked the guest list.

Oh, it was the Kennedy's.

It was.

It was the Kennedy's.

Right.

So they worked this guest list and they've got political rivals there,

but they had like just everybody there.

It was when I looked up a list of, I kind of just typed into Google,

tell me the list, gimme a list of famous names of people who were at

the the JFK wedding and I started reading it and I was like, oh my gosh.

Right.

Truman had just had just left office, right?

He was, he was there.

Nixon was vice president.

And so it was just, and, and, and that, those are just two people.

Ed Sullivan.

Ed Sullivan was there.

Um,

it was a, it was a who's who of society like you wanted to be at this wedding.

Very much like when we saw in our lifetime when we saw the Kate and William wedding.

Yeah.

And it was so much like celebrities and.

High ranking people from around the world.

It was kind of a com, a hodgepodge of both.

This is exactly what this wedding was, uh and like, and to what Scott

said, maybe a lot of people didn't want to be photographed or didn't

want all the spotlight there.

So you have a difference in how many people at the ceremony than how

many people come to the reception.

Oh, yes.

So because the church only holds 800.

That's how many people came to the ceremony.

But then Hammersmith Farm, which is like a horse farm, where do you see a

lot of Jacqueline Vier on the horses?

And they basically have the reception outdoors.

Yeah.

And they can put all these tables outdoors that 1200 people come to the reception.

And this is when you first, I mean, I would say it probably starts happening

before this, but I kind of get the feeling that this is when they first become.

Bigger than their own lives.

Yeah.

And you know, we're talking a lot about right now in, in Media

is John F. Kennedy Jr's wedding.

Right.

1996 he gets married on an island, a secluded island with 30 people

and they keep it very secret.

But it was still a huge media frenzy.

Yes.

Right.

Not there, but just the, the fact that it happened

and I think he really.

Was influenced by what happened to his parents because this is where

you really start to see their really pawns even in their own wedding.

Yeah.

Like Jackie doesn't wear a dress she wants to wear.

Yeah, I have that.

I have that note here.

So you bring that up and that's one of the facts that I brought up is.

So there's this, the famous dress, right, designed by am

Lowe beautiful, beautiful dress.

I mean it, you can see the pictures.

And if, if for our listeners and our watchers, like I've put pictures of

her, you know, in her dress at the reception and um, at the wedding ceremony.

She's absolutely gorgeous.

Her dress looks amazing on her.

I think you said it something like 50 yards of fabric,

which is Yes, because it's

pleated,

which is crazy.

So much

pleading

and it's heavy.

But Ann Lowe was, who was a prominent African American designer at the time.

She wasn't really given public credit then, but it, it came out later.

Um, but I guess Jackie actually preferred more, the more sleek.

Kind of French style.

And so she, I guess from what I saw when I looked up, she told

her Jackie Re reportedly told her French, she looked like a lampshade.

Um, and, you know, kind of like a, a patchwork quilt.

I don't know if that's true.

I'd have to go and, and di dive deep and see, um, and, and that stuff.

But it's interesting.

Like you said, even within their own wedding, it's, Hey, here's

the dress you're gonna wear.

Yeah.

So she wants something more sleek.

Kind of like what Carolyn Bessette will wear when she marries John F. Kennedy

Jr. She just wears that plain silk gown.

That also is a fashion iconic dress, but that's what Jackie wants to wear.

But her family's like, how are people gonna.

See that?

Yeah,

you have 800 people.

You need something that has some, some

presence.

Girth to it.

Yeah, some presence.

And so that's why there's like 50 yards of fabric.

It's pleated, it kind of sticks out.

And I can see where she gets this patch where quilt kind of thing.

'cause it looks like quilting, almost like the design, but it, it stands out.

The dress basically could.

Looks like it could stand on its own without a person in it.

Yeah.

Right.

And Jackie Kennedy at the time, um, vie Kennedy, she's a, she's small,

she's small, framed, like this dress is really like making her double the size.

Oh, it, but she looks amazing in it.

It, I mean the, the reception pictures, which are where you get

the most, most of the pictures.

It.

It's just absolutely stunning.

It's, it's storybook.

Picturesque.

Oh, the dress is iconic for sure.

But you can see why her family wanted her to wear something like

that and kind of forced it upon her.

Like most brides think it's their day.

I decide, well, not in this case.

When you start to think of this American royalty, Camelot, this

is the first time we're gonna see, like we know John F. Kennedy.

W had a lot of autonomy while his brother was alive, but once his brother was

killed and he got pushed to the front of the family as their token, like what

they want to, to move through society.

And so, you know, John F. Kennedy is really like being

pushed into the spotlight.

Yeah.

And here he is marrying into society.

Yeah.

And she is starting to feel, she, I'm sure she felt it beforehand, but

she's starting to also have this same, like, I don't get the choice this is.

Chosen for me,

it seems to me like this, for the Kennedys, this was the tipping

point that really brought them into the status that they wanted.

Yes, this was it.

And like I said, it was a see who's who of society at the wedding, A huge

reception, beautiful photographs.

And it all starts September 12th, 1953, and you can visit that church today.

Yeah.

And so a couple other interesting facts.

So you talked about the 1200 people that went to reception,

so I guess the receiving line.

Right where you're kind of standing there saying hello to your guests

was they stood there for three hours and greeted every single person

that came through three hours.

I know.

Well, you can imagine we, we've been married 20 years and I told Scott when

we were getting married, everyone wants their moment with the bride and groom.

Yeah.

Everyone wants that moment to say.

Congratulations.

I

shook their hand.

Yeah.

You know, a small anecdote,

and we only had 125 at our wedding.

Yeah.

You can imagine 1200 people.

Everyone wants their moment.

Yeah.

With you.

So some other things here, we, I, I kind of took a look at some

of the facts around their wedding and compared them to modern day.

Norms.

Right?

Because I just thought that was interesting.

And so in 1953, the guest list was about 1200 people, right?

As you mentioned at the reception nowadays, I mean, it's still

considered large if you're only from anywhere from two to 500.

And that's at the, at, that's at the high end, right?

Not, not everybody's gonna have 500 people at their wedding.

This wedding had 1200.

The dress back then, it costs about $500.

That was in 53, which in today's money would be almost 6,000.

Now, today there's some brides out there that are spending a hundred

grand, tens of thousands of dollars.

So that's, but again, iconic picture.

At the time, the venue that was at the Hammersmith farm,

again, that was family estate.

Again, today, people are dropping tons of money, you know, to, to.

Host their wedding reception somewhere.

I'm sure they had to rent everything still in.

Yeah, in catering.

And we don't really do that whole reception line as much anymore.

It's not as common.

Not as common.

What we did is we went to the tables.

Yeah, we, so, and that's what people will do.

They'll get up and walk around.

They won't necessarily stand there at a reception line.

Um, so again, kind of difference in, in media presence, right?

Back then it was Life Magazine and Local Press.

Today it's all social media stuff.

And then, um, nobody, I couldn't find anywhere online what the total estimated

cost of the the JFK wedding was.

Right?

And then on high, high end weddings, people are spending hundreds of

thousands, if not a million dollars.

Right.

Not the average person, but we're talking high society type folks.

Yeah.

So just kind of an interesting comparison to them at the time.

And what I'll call high society or the rich the wealthy are are doing nowadays.

Yeah, they were definitely setting a precedence because it wasn't like society.

People weren't getting married and having huge weddings that was happening.

They just weren't the media frenzy and.

This is a marriage of society and politics and so that that didn't happen as much.

And so this really was setting a precedence for what was going to be.

Again, Camelot, and again, we're talking about this beginning of this

whole Fair Tale America royalty story.

This is the start of it all, and the church is very historic for Newport.

Yeah.

And that was another thing going there like they built in around 1828.

So they were talking about how in 2028 they was gonna have their 200

anniversary, one of these original Newport churches, but also during the Civil War.

The Naval Academy is moved from Annapolis to Newport.

If you know anything about Newport, we've talked about it before.

It has this big naval presence there as where Scott went to graduate

school, uh, we're we're going back there for more of his training.

Uh, and so they moved.

The Naval Academy there for protection for the North during the Civil War.

And they used this church as their chapel?

Yeah.

For the Naval Academy.

For the Naval Academy, yeah.

And if you know John F. Kennedy served in the United States Navy, right?

He used, that's one of the things I say in the video, he says,

with a lot of pride, I can say I served in the United States Navy.

And I just love that about him because of course we can relate to that.

And so to be married in that church, I'm sure he knew that history.

Getting married there as well.

But I just think it's comes kind of full circle that you're a former naval

officer who's gonna eventually come.

President of the United States is married in a church that once served

the United States Naval Academy.

Uh, it's a, again, it, it embraces the story.

So they want you to visit, they open the church up for visitors.

It's

beautiful inside.

It's that classic.

Roman Catholic style stained glass windows and the Oregon has been there for forever.

I think the Oregon's super old.

Yes, it's a beautiful church.

You know, if you're up in the Newport area in the summertime, great, great place

to swing by and, and visit real quick

and lots of, uh, stained glass windows and.

I think it's free to visit.

I left a donation so it's there for you.

It's available to you.

I definitely recommend going in there and seeing it 'cause it is just one

of those awestruck moments of American history that you get to stand there in

the presence of, uh, of American royalty.

As you stand in the quiet of St. Mary's, the thing that

strikes you isn't the opulence.

It's the intimacy of the space.

Despite the 1200 guests and media helicopters, at the end of the day,

it was just two people in a wooden pew making a promise in a small.

Seaside Church.

We call it Camelot now, but in 1953 it was just a beginning.

And while the marriage would eventually face trials that would

break the heart of a nation that day in Newport remains frozen in time.

A perfect golden moment of American royalty before the world changed forever.

Now next time you're in Newport, take a walk down Spring Street,

sit in Pew 10 and listen closely.

You might just hear the echoes of the organ playing for a

young senator and his bride.

We'll talk to you next time.

Thank you.

It's a good outro.

This has been a Walk with History.

Production Talk with History is created.

Hosted by me, Scott Benny.

Episode Researched by Jennifer Benny.

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