Kennedy curse
(Redirected from Kennedy Curse)
The Kennedy curse is a series of deaths, accidents, assassinations, and other calamities involving members of the American Kennedy family.[a] The alleged curse has primarily struck the descendants of businessman Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., but it has also affected family friends, associates, and other relatives. Political assassinations and plane crashes have been the most common manifestations of the "curse". Following the Chappaquiddick incident in 1969, Ted Kennedy said he questioned if "some awful curse did actually hang over all the Kennedys."[9][10] Skeptics argue that it is not improbable for a large extended family to experience similar events over the course of several generations.[11][12]
Chronology
[edit]Events linked to the alleged curse include:
Kennedy deaths
[edit]- August 12, 1944 – Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., brother of John F. Kennedy, died when the military aircraft he was piloting exploded over East Suffolk, England.[13]
- September 9, 1944 – William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, newlywed husband of Kathleen Kennedy, was fatally shot by a German sniper while leading his company near Heppen, Belgium.[14]
- May 13, 1948 – Kathleen "Kick" Kennedy (formally known as Kathleen Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington) died in a plane crash alongside her lover Peter Wentworth-Fitzwilliam, 8th Earl Fitzwilliam, Pilot Peter Townsend and Navigator Arthur Freeman near Saint-Bauzile, France.[4][5][6][15]
- October 3, 1955 – Three months after the birth of Ethel Kennedy's (wife of Robert F. Kennedy) fourth child David, her parents, George and Ann Skakel, were both killed in a plane crash in Union City, Oklahoma.[16]
- August 23, 1956 – Arabella Kennedy, daughter of John F. Kennedy, died at birth.[17]
- November 11, 1957 - John Joseph Dowdle III, husband of Ethel Kennedy's sister, Georgeann Skakel, died at 39 of unknown causes.[18]
- August 9, 1963 – Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, son of John F. Kennedy, died of infant respiratory distress syndrome two days after his premature birth on August 7 at Otis Air Force Base, Massachusetts.[17]
- November 22, 1963 – 35th U.S. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas while riding in a presidential limousine.[17]
- September 23, 1966 – George Skakel Jr., brother of Ethel Kennedy, was killed in a single-engine plane crash in Idaho at the age of 46.[19]
- May 18, 1967 – Joan Patricia Skakel, George Skakel Jr.'s widow, died at her home in Greenwich, Connecticut, after choking on a piece of meat while eating dinner. She was 39 years old.[19]
- June 6, 1968 – U.S. senator and Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy died of gunshot wounds received the night before in Los Angeles following his victory in the California primary.[4][5][6][15]
- December 20, 1969 – Michael Temple Canfield, ex-husband of Lee Radziwiłł, died of a heart attack at age 43 on a BOAC airplane flying from New York to London.[20]
- January 23, 1973 – Alexander Onassis, stepson of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, died in a hospital as a result of injuries sustained in an air crash at Hellinikon International Airport at the age of 24.
- March 4, 1973 – Anne Elizabeth Reynolds Skakel, wife of Ethel Kennedy's brother, Rushton Skakel, died of brain cancer at 41.[21]
- January 23, 1974 – Athalia Ponsell Lindsley, who dated Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. until his death, was murdered at her home.[22]
- October 10, 1974 - Tina Onassis Niarchos, ex-wife of Aristotle Onassis who later married Jacqueline Kennedy, died an acute edema of the lung after suffering a drug overdose. [23]
- April 25, 1984 – David A. Kennedy, son of Robert F. Kennedy, died of a drug overdose in a Palm Beach, Florida, hotel room.[24]
- September 28, 1991 – Margaret Alexandra Dowdle, daughter of Ethel Kennedy's sister, Georgeann Skakel Dowdle Terrien, died at 39 of natural causes.
- May 19, 1994 – Jacqueline Lee Kennedy Onassis, wife of John F. Kennedy, died of lymphoma that was discovered at a hospital visit after a fall from a horse.
- December 31, 1997 – Michael LeMoyne Kennedy, son of Robert F. Kennedy, died in a skiing accident after crashing into a tree in Aspen, Colorado.[25][1][4][5][6][26][15]
- November 19, 1998 - Christina Onassis, stepdaughter of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, was found dead in a bathtub at age 37 in an Argentine mansion where she was staying, an autopsy revealed she died of a heart attack caused by acute pulmonary edema. [27]
- July 16, 1999 – John F. Kennedy Jr. died with his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy and her sister Lauren Bessette when the plane he was piloting crashed off the coast of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts.[28]
- August 10, 1999 – Anthony Radziwiłł, son of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' sister, Lee Radziwill, died at 40 after a ten-year battle against cancer.[29]
- September 11, 2001 – Robert "Bob" Speisman, son-in-law of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' longtime companion Maurice Tempelsman, was killed in the September 11 attacks. Speisman was a passenger on American Airlines Flight 77 when it crashed into the Pentagon.[30]
- September 16, 2011 – Kara Anne Kennedy, daughter of Ted Kennedy, died at 51 after suffering a heart attack at a health club in Washington, D.C.[31]
- May 16, 2012 – Mary Richardson Kennedy, wife of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., died by suicide on the grounds of her home in Bedford, New York.[15][32]
- September 26, 2014 - Josephine Ethel Kennedy Kerr dies the day of her birth. She was the granddaughter of Michael Kennedy and the great-granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel Kennedy (from whom she received her middle name)[33]
- September 4, 2018 – Christopher Kennedy Lawford, son of Patricia Kennedy Lawford, died at 63 of a heart attack after having a medical emergency at a yoga studio in Vancouver, Canada.[34]
- August 1, 2019 – Saoirse Kennedy Hill, granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy, died of an accidental drug overdose at the Kennedy Compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts.[35]
- April 2, 2020 – Maeve Kennedy McKean, granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy, disappeared with her eight-year-old son, Gideon Joseph Kennedy McKean, during a short canoe trip in Chesapeake Bay.[36] Their bodies were recovered from the bay later that week.[37] Autopsies revealed that both had accidentally drowned in the turbulent and chilly water.[38]
- December 30, 2025 – Tatiana Schlossberg, granddaughter of John F. Kennedy, died at 35 following complications with acute myeloid leukemia.[39][40] In publicly announcing her diagnosis in the New Yorker a month prior, Schlossberg wrote that "I have added a new tragedy to [my mother's] life, to our family's life, and there's nothing I can do to stop it."[41]
Kennedy disabilities
[edit]- November 1941 – Rosemary Kennedy, age 23, struggled to read and write, and she suffered from mood swings, seizures, and violent outbursts. During birth, Rosemary was deprived of oxygen as her mother and her nurse waited for the doctor to arrive.[42] As she grew older, she became more rebellious, and the family worried she would do something that could tarnish the Kennedy reputation.[43] In an attempt to cure or treat his daughter, Joseph Kennedy secretly arranged for her to undergo a prefrontal lobotomy, which was seen by some as a promising treatment at the time[by whom?] for various mental illnesses. Instead of benefiting Rosemary, the now discredited procedure left her mentally and physically incapacitated. Rosemary remained institutionalized in seclusion, in rural Wisconsin, until her death in 2005.[4][5][6][26][15] Her family remained distant for most of Rosemary's life, but Eunice Kennedy Shriver, her sister, grew close to her later in life. Eunice went on to found the Special Olympics and the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation, which researches developmental and intellectual disabilities.[43]
- November 17, 1973 – Edward M. Kennedy Jr., age 12, had his right leg surgically amputated as a result of bone cancer. He underwent an experimental two-year drug treatment to cure the cancer.[44][45]
Other incidents
[edit]- June 19, 1964 – U.S. senator Ted Kennedy survived a plane crash that killed one of his aides as well as the pilot. The plane was on its way to a Democratic State Convention in Springfield.[46] The plane crashed in an apple orchard near Southampton, Massachusetts. The senator was pulled from the wreckage by passenger (and fellow senator) Birch Bayh. Kennedy spent five months in a hospital recovering from a broken back, a punctured lung, broken ribs, and internal bleeding.[4][5][15][47] Following the crash, Robert F. Kennedy remarked to aide Ed Guthman: "Somebody up there doesn't like us."[48]
- July 18, 1969 – Ted Kennedy accidentally drove his car off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts, resulting in the drowning death of 28-year-old passenger Mary Jo Kopechne.[4][5][6][7][15] In his televised statement a week later, Ted said that on the night of the incident, he wondered "whether some awful curse did actually hang over all the Kennedys."[49] Ted did not report the accident to the police until the next morning and pled guilty to a charge of leaving the scene of an accident.[50]
- August 13, 1973 – Joseph P. Kennedy II was the driver of a Jeep in Nantucket, Massachusetts, that crashed and left his passenger, Pam Kelley, paralyzed. Fellow passenger and brother David A. Kennedy was injured.[4][6][26]
- October 23, 1975 – In London, a bomb exploded under a car belonging to member of Parliament Hugh Fraser, who was hosting Caroline Kennedy. They were about to drive to Kennedy's art class, but had not yet gone out to the car. The explosion killed prominent cancer scientist Gordon Hamilton Fairley and his dog as they walked nearby.[51]
- April 1, 1991 – William Kennedy Smith was arrested and charged with the rape of a young woman at the Kennedy estate in Palm Beach, Florida. The subsequent trial attracted extensive media coverage.[52] Smith was acquitted.[1][3][4][26]
- May 4, 2006 – U.S. congressman Patrick J. Kennedy crashed his automobile while intoxicated into a barricade on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., at 2:45 a.m. He later revealed an addiction to prescription medications Ambien and Phenergan and pleaded guilty to driving under the influence of prescription drugs, sentenced to one year probation and a fine of $350.[53][54]
- April 25, 2026 – Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife, Cheryl Hines, were present at the 2026 White House correspondents dinner shooting. They and everyone else in attendance were unharmed.
See also
[edit]- Curse of Tippecanoe
- Dead Kennedys
- Lincoln–Kennedy coincidences urban legend
- Second-term curse
- Sedgwick family, another prominent New England family that faced similar experiences
- Von Erich family, an American professional wrestling family that faced similar experiences
Notes
[edit]References
[edit]Citations
- 1 2 3 "Kennedy Family Tragedies". The Washington Post. July 18, 1999. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- ↑ Carr, Pat; Hulteng, Lee. "Kennedy Family Tragedies". The Courant. Hartford, Connecticut. Archived from the original on April 23, 2014. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- 1 2 McGrory, Brian (July 18, 1999). "Family Overshadowed by a Litany of Tragedy". The Boston Globe. Archived from the original on November 17, 1999. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Klein, Edward (2004). The Kennedy Curse: Why Tragedy Has Haunted America's First Family for 150 Years. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-0-312-31293-0.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Jones, Sam; Tran, Mark (August 26, 2009). "History of the Kennedy Curse". The Guardian. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "The Kennedy Curse". Hartford Courant. Archived from the original on August 28, 2009. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- 1 2 "Is Pat's Crash Part of Kennedy Curse?". Good Morning America. May 5, 2006. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- ↑ Lacayo, Richard (August 26, 2009). "Ted Kennedy, 1932–2009: The Brother Who Mattered Most". Time. Archived from the original on August 30, 2009. Retrieved August 26, 2009.
- ↑ Selk, Avi. "Ted Kennedy spoke of a family curse after deadly Chappaquiddick crash. Maybe he was right". National Post. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- ↑ "American Rhetoric: Ted Kennedy -- Chappaquiddick Speech". www.americanrhetoric.com. Retrieved January 1, 2026.
- ↑ "Kennedy Curse". The Skeptic's Dictionary. Retrieved August 29, 2009.
- ↑ O'Dowd, Niall (September 18, 2011). "Talk of a Kennedy Curse Is Nonsense, Latest Death of Kara Revives Idle Chatter". IrishCentral. Retrieved May 19, 2012.
- ↑ Renehan, Edward J. Jr. (2002). The Kennedys at War, 1937–1945. New York: Doubleday. p. 304. ISBN 978-0-385-50165-1.
- ↑ "Obituary: Major Lord Hartington". The Times. September 19, 1944. p. 6.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Negrin, Matt (May 16, 2012). "Kennedy Curse: A Political Family's Troubled Life". ABC News. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ↑ "Accident Investigation Report" (PDF). napoleon130.tripod.com. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 8, 2024. Retrieved March 10, 2026.
- 1 2 3 O'Brien, Shane (September 1, 2023). "Who was Arabella Kennedy?". irishcentral.com. Retrieved March 9, 2024.
- ↑ "Obituary for John J. DOWDLE (Aged 39)". Chicago Tribune. November 12, 1957. p. 33. Retrieved May 10, 2026.
- 1 2 "Kennedy In-Law Chokes to Death". The New York Times. May 19, 1967. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
- ↑ "MICHAEL To CANFIELD OF HARPER & ROW, 43". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 14, 2026.
- ↑ "MRS. RUSHTON SKAKEL". The New York Times. March 7, 1973. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 10, 2026.
- ↑ "New puzzle added in Florida murder". The Pantagraph. Bloomington, Illinois. January 26, 1974. p. 1. Retrieved September 23, 2021 – via newspapers.com.
- ↑ "High Society". The Guardian. October 17, 1999. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved June 24, 2026.
- ↑ Stuart, Reginald (April 26, 1984). "Robert Kennedy's Son David Found Dead In Hotel". The New York Times. Retrieved March 9, 2024.
- ↑ Balz, Dan (January 2, 1998). "Legacy of Untimely Death Continues". The Washington Post. p. A4. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- 1 2 3 4 King, John (July 17, 1999). "Tragedy Has Repeatedly Stalked Kennedy Clan". CNN. Archived from the original on July 8, 2003. Retrieved February 15, 2008.
- ↑ Saxon, Wolfgang (November 20, 1988). "Christina Onassis, Shipping Magnate, Dies at 37". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved June 24, 2026.
- ↑ "JFK Jr. killed in plane crash". History. February 9, 2010. Retrieved November 23, 2025.
- ↑ Nemy, Enid (August 12, 1999). "Anthony Stanislas Radziwill, 40, Award-Winning TV Producer". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved April 23, 2026.
- ↑ "Robert Speisman "Bob"". Voices Center for Resilience. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
- ↑ Harris, Elizabeth A. (September 17, 2011). "Kara Kennedy, Daughter of Edward Kennedy, Is Dead at 51". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
- ↑ "RFK Jr.'s Troubled Estranged Wife Found Dead in NY". Google News. Associated Press. May 16, 2012. Archived from the original on May 20, 2012. Retrieved May 16, 2012.
- ↑ "Josephine Ethel Kerr". Kennedy Family Tree. Retrieved July 23, 2026.
- ↑ Tsang, Amie (September 6, 2018). "Christopher Kennedy Lawford, Actor and Author Who Battled Addiction, Dies at 63". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved February 28, 2026.
- ↑ Spillane, Geoff (November 1, 2019). "Saoirse Kennedy Hill died of accidental overdose, document shows". Fall River Herald News.
- ↑ Osborne, Mark (April 4, 2020). "Daughter, grandson of Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, RFK's daughter, presumed dead in canoe accident". ABC News. Retrieved April 4, 2020.
- ↑ "The body of Maeve Kennedy Townsend McKean, 40, was located by Charles County Dive and Rescue". WEAU. Associated Press. April 6, 2020. Archived from the original on April 7, 2020. Retrieved April 7, 2020.
- ↑ Carlson, Adam; Kantor, Wendy Grossman; Neumann, Sean (April 8, 2020). "Cause of Death Revealed for Kennedy Granddaughter Who Had Vanished in Canoe Accident with Son". People. United States: Meredith Corporation. Archived from the original on April 9, 2020. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
- ↑ Esposito, Laura. "How Tragedy Stalks the 'Cursed' Kennedys", The Daily Beast, December 31, 2025. Retrieved January 1, 2026.
- ↑ Stahl, Jay. "Tatiana Schlossberg and the curse of tabloid cruelty", USA Today, December 31, 2025. Retrieved January 1, 2026.
- ↑ Schlossberg, Tatiana. "A Battle With My Blood", The New Yorker, November 22, 2025. Retrieved January 1, 2026.
- ↑ Serena, Katie (November 2, 2017). "The Forgotten Kennedy Sibling Who Was Lobotomized So That JFK Could Succeed". All That's Interesting. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- 1 2 "Rosemary Kennedy, The Eldest Kennedy Daughter (U.S. National Park Service)". National Park Service. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- ↑ BG Series
- ↑ Clymer, A Biography, pp. 205–208.
- ↑ "Senator Kennedy Tells of His Rescue in Plane Crash (Published 1964)". The New York Times. October 20, 1964. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- ↑ "The Luck of the Kennedys". Check-Six.com. May 8, 2008. Retrieved May 1, 2012.
- ↑ Larry Tye. Bobby Kennedy: The Making of a Liberal Icon, p. 320
- ↑ Kennedy, Edward. "Address to the People of Massachusetts on Chappaquiddick." 25 July 1969. https://americanrhetoric.com/speeches/tedkennedychappaquiddick.htm
- ↑ Pruitt, Sarah (September 4, 2018). "Ted Kennedy's Chappaquiddick Incident: What Really Happened". History. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
- ↑ Weinraub, Bernard (October 24, 1975). "Bomb Kills a Doctor Near London Home Of Caroline Kennedy". Retrieved March 27, 2025.
- ↑ Dunne, Dominick (March 1992). "The Verdict". Vanity Fair. Archived from the original on April 15, 2012. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ↑ "Rep. Kennedy entering rehab after crash - May 5, 2006". CNN. Archived from the original on June 12, 2020. Retrieved June 12, 2020.
- ↑ "Life After Fender Bender - Roll Call". August 21, 2009. Archived from the original on August 21, 2009.
Book sources
- Klein, Edward (2004) The Kennedy Curse: Why Tragedy Has Haunted America's First Family for 150 Years. New York: St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 978-0-312-31293-0
