The Thised Pen of Jackie Onassis - Hood College

The Thised Pen of Jackie Onassis

A Lifelong Writer, She Had Her Way With Words
yBy Donnie Radcliffe OS/ f
Washington Post Staff Writer er planned to write a memoir."
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See WRITINGS, C5, Col 1

as she protected her chil-
dren.

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openly had diaries, but I
was never aware that Jack-
ie did," said Nancy Tucker-
man, the former First La-
dy's childhood friend,
spokeswoman and confi-
dante. "I don't think she ev-

Jac'kise Dogs Have Their Day on Coronation Cruise

Rare

Witings

WRITINGS, From Cl From her newspaper days, Jacqueline Bouvier's illustration

book. "Maybe when I'm 90," she had Johnson, the library archivist, said
originally replied, which he took to the terms of White's gift prohibit re-
mean "never." leasing the tape until a year after
Onassis's death.
But this time she was more ex-
pansive in her response. "People Johnson also said the library has
change," Wise writes in Newsweek. very little written material by the
"The person she might have written former First Lady, nor is there any
about 30 years ago 'is not the same signed correspondence between her
person today. The imagination takes and President Kennedy. "To the ex-
over.' " Citing as an example Isak tent that it exists," he said, "she re-
Dinesen's memoir, "Out of Africa," tained it as personal property." If, in-
Onassis said Dinesen left out how deed, that is the case, her personal
badly her husband had treated her. letters and diaries almost certainly
She created a new past, in effect. are part of her estate.
And why sit indoors with a yellow
pad writing a memoir when you But other letters, which she wrote
could be outdoors?" to family, friends, associates and col-
leagues, do exist. "I would never
Jacqueline Onassis counseled her publish any I have," said Tuckerman.
children to be equally cautious in "I don't think she would want me to."
how they spent their words. When
Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg remi- Still, as Onassis's mystique grows
nisced about her father on the 75th and her signature becomes increas-
anniversary of his birth, on her ingly valuable, more and more of her
mother's advice she left out refer- correspondence is likely to enter the
ences to bedtime stories JFK used to market.
tell her. As columnist Jonathan Alter
recounts it, "Jackie believed that Her letters have always been
when you tell something deeply per- sought by collectors. According to
sonal to people you don't know, it Manhattan autograph dealer Charles
ceases to be yours." Hamilton: "All the dealers I know
are sold out. People are offering let-
Determined to keep her spoken ters to me left and right, but virtual-
words out of the public domain until ly all of those were signed by her
well after her and her children's secretaries. When you see her Ken-
deaths, Onassis donated a series of nedy signature, you know it's hers
four taped interviews with author
William Manchester to the John F.
Kennedy Library and Museum in
Boston with the proviso that they
not be made public until the year
2067. Made in 1964 and '65, when
Manchester was writing "The Death
of a President," the tapes total 220
minutes and fill 151 pages.

Also under protection in the li-
brary vaults is the so-called "Came-
lot" interview she taped with Theo-
dore H. White in 1963 in the days
immediately following President
Kennedy's assassination. William

because she did a beautiful K, a Jacqueline Onassis's career in
knockout K." Even rarer, he said, is publishing officially dates to 1975,
correspondence she signed as Onas- the year of Onassis's death, when
sis. another childhood friend, Letitia

In 1970, it was Hamilton to whom Baldrige, who had been her White
a Wall Street lawyer tried to sell House social secretary, suggested
four letters Jacqueline Kennedy she give editing a try because she al-
wrote between April 18, 1963, and ways had enjoyed writing and being
Nov. 13, 1968 to former deputy de- with writers. But in 1951, she and
fense secretary Roswell Gilpatric. her sister, Lee Bouvier Radziwill,
Gilpatric said he discovered they had collaborated on a family "book"
were missing only after learning sof- when they spent a summer touring
rom Maxine Cheshire, then a Wash-
ington Post columnist. • Europe on the largess of their step-
father and mother.
Seized under subpoena the same
day Gilpatric's wife was filing sepa- They weren't the Bronte sisters,
ration papers, the letters created a Radziwill wrote in the foreword to
sensation and became known as On- "One Special Summer," which Dela-
assis's "Dear Ros" letters. They corte Press published commercially
thanked Gilpatric for his letter about in 1974. But they often "put pen to
the baby she was expecting, a toy paper, particularly when we gave
helicopter he sent to her son John presents to our mother . . . since
and a "slim little volume" of poems she far preferred something we had
he had sent her. written or drawn to anything we

Responding to his wishes to her might buy for her."
for "a happiness that certainly is en-
titled her" after her marriage to Describing their division of labor,
Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle On- Radziwill said she wrote about "most
of their adventures" and sister Jackie

assis, Mrs. Onassis wrote: "Dearest did the drawings, the poetry and the
Ros, I would have told you before I sections on Rome and Spain. The
left—but then everything happened work never made the bestseller list,
so much more quickly than I'd but it wound up on the bookshelves
planned. I saw somewhere what you of many a Jackie fan. In it, her spare,
had said and I was very touched— whimsical drawings and her tongue-
dear Ros—I hope you know all you in-cheek observations portray a priv-
were and are and will ever be to ileged, if faltering, nobility in a Eu-
me—With my love, Jackie." rope she would return to conquer

Through a spokesman, Onassis just 10 years later as the 31-year-old
denied that she had contributed to wife of America's 35th president.
the breakup of the Gilpatrics' mar-
riage. "They are very close friends," The book's centerpiece, however,
the spokesman said. "He was at the is young Jackie Bouvier's epic poem
Onassises' first anniversary party. about two American girls on a fling
. . . He was a very good friend of that only a sister-turned-her-Boswell
President Kennedy too." Responded might someday interpret. It begins:
Gilpatric's wife, the former Madelin
Thayer, to a reporter for the Chica- "Oh, were not at all what you
think we are

go Daily News: "I have my own feel- "We've traveller's checks and a
ings about that, but I won't go into little car—

them. Just say it was a particularly "And passports we know we
warm, close, long-lasting relation-
never must lose

ship." "We wear white gloves and we

Hamilton dealt in other letters shine our shoes
written by Onassis, among them
several to actor Basil Rathbone as "But in Venice we looked for a
he prepared to do a Shakespeare falling star . . .
reading at a White House State Din-
ner for a visiting grand duchess. Bi- "Danced a quadrille with the
ographers might see in the former Jack of Spades
First Lady's correspondence with
Rathbone the makings of a future "Waltzed down the shadows of
editor. She thought the Richard II's long arcades
farewell speech was "ideal," she
"I had a lover named Olio'
Delmonico

"And he stole a kiss by the Ca'

wrote the actor, but "I just hope it Rezzonico

has no lines about kings being des- "When dawn touched the top of

pots that will make the poor grand Salutes' dome

duchess think everyone wants to "We whispered false names and
push her off her throne! If there is
some insidious line, you could leave we stole back home
."it
"Oh, were not at all what we

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