Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, welcome to the podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Sarah Dowdy and I'm very happy to be here with
Speaker 1: a very special guest today. Hi everybody, it's Candice. She's
Speaker 1: back vintage stuff you missed in History class podcasting. Well,
Speaker 1: in Canadas, we always get emails asking where you've gone
Speaker 1: or where you are, and I usually just say she's
Speaker 1: sitting right behind me in the cube. But I mean
Speaker 1: you could probably elaborate a little more than that. Well,
Speaker 1: I have switched my focus from history to weddings, which
Speaker 1: is actually a lot of fun. I've been working on
Speaker 1: the TLC Weddings website, and if you haven't visited yet,
Speaker 1: you really should, even if you're not planning a wedding yourself.
Speaker 1: You can get some fun information on modern trends and
Speaker 1: classic trends, fashion tips, fast and tips, flower tips. All
Speaker 1: of that, and one more fun piece of vintage stuff
Speaker 1: you missed in history class news that pertains to weddings.
Speaker 1: One of your other favorite hosts from the Days of
Speaker 1: your Jane McGrath, just recently got engaged, so she'll be
Speaker 1: flooding that website to congratulations with Jane and Um. I'm
Speaker 1: very excited to record this episode with UGANDAE and so
Speaker 1: we actually picked a theme that was sort of fitting
Speaker 1: with Candice's new role at Housta Forks and tlc Um
Speaker 1: and that is, of course, weddings. And when we picked
Speaker 1: these five weddings, I told Sarah we should pick some
Speaker 1: of our favorite weddings in history, and all but one
Speaker 1: turned out to have rather sad endings. So we're going
Speaker 1: to start with the happiest and when we're done, go
Speaker 1: ahead and get out your vintage lace Hankyes, because all
Speaker 1: goes down very lovely weddings, but some kind of sad marriages.
Speaker 1: We picked tragedies, I guess. But yeah, this first one
Speaker 1: is good and it's probably one of the best known
Speaker 1: historical weddings, i'd say, just because of how many wedding
Speaker 1: trends it ultimately established. Right, We'll say that the marriage
Speaker 1: of Victoria and Albert on February tenth, eighteen forties set
Speaker 1: some precedents for modern brides. And most of you probably
Speaker 1: know that the reason bride today were white is because
Speaker 1: Victoria started that tradition. She started so many trends she did,
Speaker 1: I think using ether during childbirth. That's a cool Victoria trend.
Speaker 1: Thanks for that, Victoria. So here's a little history on Victoria.
Speaker 1: She became queen in eighteen thirty seven and she was
Speaker 1: just eighteen years old, and her wedding was the first
Speaker 1: one since fifteen fifty four when a throned queen took
Speaker 1: a husband. And we mentioned that she set the tone
Speaker 1: for modern weddings by wearing white, but she also chose
Speaker 1: when to wed and whom. Yeah, they were a love match,
Speaker 1: which was something quite surprising for royalty in general at
Speaker 1: the time, but especially a queen choosing who she's going
Speaker 1: to marry. And the person she chose with Albert, who
Speaker 1: was her German cousin, the Prince Consort. They met in
Speaker 1: eighteen thirty six and were engaged just three years later.
Speaker 1: And while I personally hate snakes and demanded a big
Speaker 1: honking diamond, Victoria asked or received rather a snake ring
Speaker 1: with diamond eyes, which seems so punk for Victoria. It's
Speaker 1: just not in keeping at all with the woman I
Speaker 1: imagine her. But I guess snakes are more of a
Speaker 1: trend back then. It was a symbol actually, the snakes
Speaker 1: coil symbolized the bonds of eternal love, just like we
Speaker 1: think of the circle of a wedding Van Cleopatri style.
Speaker 1: I guess, there you go, um, But this is an
Speaker 1: old superstition. I guess that a rainy wedding day is
Speaker 1: actually good luck. And maybe in this case it proved
Speaker 1: too true because they had a rainy wedding day, but
Speaker 1: ultimately a very happy marriage together they did. It was
Speaker 1: an early wedding, it was in the middle of the day,
Speaker 1: and it was followed by a breakfast. Celebration took place
Speaker 1: at St James's Palace, and they had a very grand
Speaker 1: procession from Buckingham Palace to St James's and the procession
Speaker 1: included her twelve bridesmaids. And I mentioned she had a
Speaker 1: white gown, which was unusual for the time because before
Speaker 1: her any time of royal got married, she would wear
Speaker 1: a very heavy brocade gown and lots of jewels and
Speaker 1: ermine cloak. And she wanted something lighter and more feminine.
Speaker 1: But the one aristocratic element that she did demand was
Speaker 1: handmade lace. Yeah, didn't it take about two hundred people
Speaker 1: to make all of the lace? It did, And by
Speaker 1: this time in the Victorian era, a lot of fabric
Speaker 1: making was automated or a machine made, but she wasn't
Speaker 1: real that's right. So it was a happy day and
Speaker 1: an even happier wedding night. We have a little glimpse
Speaker 1: from Victoria's journal and she had this to say about it.
Speaker 1: The wedding night was all moonlight and roses and a
Speaker 1: fair wind and the pleasures of sex. So it sounds
Speaker 1: like a good time for the satisfied couple. But I
Speaker 1: mean they go on to have a very successful marriage
Speaker 1: and a successful reign. It's actually debt free, which is
Speaker 1: kind of amazing considering um how much a queen would
Speaker 1: normally spend. Right, but that just goes to demonstrate one
Speaker 1: of the concepts that we associate with Victorianism, and that's thrift, friends,
Speaker 1: frugality's right. And Jillian gil who's a biographer who wrote
Speaker 1: we two about Victoria and Albert, she says that their
Speaker 1: relationship illustrates so many different Victorian concepts and these are
Speaker 1: just a few. You've got faith and thrift, which we've mentioned, discipline, patriotism, responsibility,
Speaker 1: and stability. They really were a model for the whole country.
Speaker 1: And they also have a very fruitful marriage. They have
Speaker 1: nine kids, and they also helped popularize that family portrait
Speaker 1: of you know, the doting mother and the dutiful father
Speaker 1: and all of their babies and children surrounding them. Which
Speaker 1: is needless to say that when Albert died in eighteen
Speaker 1: sixty one, Victoria was just crushed. There had been some
Speaker 1: of the happiest years of her life, and without him
Speaker 1: she became very depressed and more black until her death
Speaker 1: in nine one, when she died from natural causes. Our
Speaker 1: next wedding and marriage on this list is going to
Speaker 1: be equally grand, but a lot more tragic than the last.
Speaker 1: It's also a royal wedding though. It's Louis the fourteenth
Speaker 1: and Maria Theresa of Spain um, So we're gonna give
Speaker 1: a little background on this just because they're The circumstances
Speaker 1: of the couple's birth are really interesting, I think, so
Speaker 1: Louis the fourteenth was a surprise. The French were really
Speaker 1: hoping for an air but his mother was thirty six,
Speaker 1: almost thirty seven years old, and she hadn't given birth
Speaker 1: to a living child yet. Then all of a sudden
Speaker 1: outcomes Louis the fourteenth, this healthy baby boy, and only
Speaker 1: five days later his mother and brother, Philip the Fourth,
Speaker 1: who is the King of Spain, has a daughter, and
Speaker 1: Anne is immediately thinking, oh, well, perfect, as most modern
Speaker 1: mothers would, there are your cousin's. This little niece of
Speaker 1: mine can someday be the wife of my son. This
Speaker 1: was especially an especially tantalizing match because Maria Theresa had
Speaker 1: a claim to the Spanish throne at one point, so
Speaker 1: it would be a very nice match for the King
Speaker 1: of France. But okay, so they're not just cousins. This
Speaker 1: is a little disturbing to modern listeners, probably their double cousin.
Speaker 1: So they're the product of a French brother and sister
Speaker 1: married to a Spanish brother and sister. Um. And actually
Speaker 1: one of the families is the Habsburgs too, and they're
Speaker 1: notoriously inbred already. So it's amazing that this line continues.
Speaker 1: It's actually a successful match. Um. But it doesn't seem
Speaker 1: like this marriage is necessarily going to happen for a while,
Speaker 1: and that's because Spain and France are just constantly at
Speaker 1: war with each other. Um. But guess what. Finally they
Speaker 1: work out a piece in the Piece of the Pyrenees
Speaker 1: in sixteen fifty nine, and a major part of the
Speaker 1: deal is going to be cementing the alliance with this
Speaker 1: marriage between cousins. Yes, and Louis had actually already found
Speaker 1: his first great love, but he was prepared to do
Speaker 1: his part and to marry Maria Theresa. And similarly, she's
Speaker 1: ready to do her part for God and country and
Speaker 1: family as well. Yeah, and she's had this rather sad
Speaker 1: childhood too, is is so many of these royal kids do.
Speaker 1: She loses her mother really early. Um, So, I think
Speaker 1: she's looking forward to having a new maternal figure in
Speaker 1: Anne of Austria, her aunt who has really taken her
Speaker 1: on as a protege almost her entire life. After the
Speaker 1: engagement was arranged, Louis wrote to Marie Therese to it
Speaker 1: was not without constraint that I yielded up till now
Speaker 1: to the arguments which prevented me from expressing to your
Speaker 1: Majesty the sentiments of my heart. And then he continued,
Speaker 1: I am delighted to begin to reassure her Majesty by
Speaker 1: these lines that happiness could not arrive at anyone who
Speaker 1: more passionately wishes for it, nor anyone feel themselves happier
Speaker 1: in possessing it. So that's a nice sweet letter. It's
Speaker 1: in very formal terms, but phil before thinks it's a
Speaker 1: little too much for his daughter to even be receiving,
Speaker 1: won't let her read the letter. Uh. Finally, the proxy
Speaker 1: marriage goes through, which I've always thought is so such
Speaker 1: a strange custom. But I guess you don't want to
Speaker 1: send your unmarried virgin daughter off across Europe alone unless
Speaker 1: she's this legally wedded woman. But they have this proxy
Speaker 1: marriage in Spain. It's near the border. It takes place
Speaker 1: on June three, sixteen sixty, and of course Louis isn't there.
Speaker 1: That's why it's a proxy marriage. There's this Spanish dignitary.
Speaker 1: So I just can't imagine how strange it would be
Speaker 1: to go up there, have all the valves read and
Speaker 1: her sided, and there's this stranger standing next to you. Yes,
Speaker 1: this proxy ceremony was definitely not a precursor of the
Speaker 1: modern wedding. And what made it even stranger for the
Speaker 1: French is that Maria Theresa was decidedly Spanish. Yes, I mean,
Speaker 1: think of those wide skirts he might recognize in Velaska's paintings,
Speaker 1: because of course Vlaska's is the court painter at the time.
Speaker 1: Um She also has these piles of false hair, the
Speaker 1: sort of Buffont styled hair under like a sixteen sixty
Speaker 1: snicky on they so all these jewels. I think the
Speaker 1: French people in attendance were kind of shocked, maybe a
Speaker 1: little disappointed, disapproving of this future queen of theirs, but
Speaker 1: you know, what are you gonna do? Not much so
Speaker 1: now she becomes Marie Terrez and she's ready for Lily. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So France's royal party has been on the way. It
Speaker 1: takes a while to to stay in these days, and
Speaker 1: the wedding is planned for June nine near Bordeaux. Queen
Speaker 1: Anne is so excited. This is her life long, or
Speaker 1: not her life long, but as long as her son's
Speaker 1: been around, this has been her dream for him. And
Speaker 1: she's really sweet too. She even writes to Marie um
Speaker 1: back when the engagement is set up that addressing her
Speaker 1: as her daughter and her niece. So she's definitely looking
Speaker 1: forward to bringing this new daughter into her life. And
Speaker 1: this is a wedding at its best. It's essentially a
Speaker 1: family reunion too, which is what weddings really are today. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: So the couple catch their first glimpse of each other
Speaker 1: when the brother and sister Philip and Anne are finally
Speaker 1: reunited after four years, which is unbelievable. I can't imagine
Speaker 1: going you're an only child, I am an only house,
Speaker 1: so I guess I really can't imagine. She really can't.
Speaker 1: But I mean it's just a strange. I mean, they're
Speaker 1: in contact with each other during that time, but how
Speaker 1: strange to be at war with your own brother's right
Speaker 1: with your sibling. Um. They have a very restrained meeting,
Speaker 1: these two siblings after so long. They don't hug each other,
Speaker 1: but they both apparently had tears in their eye. But meanwhile,
Speaker 1: the young people are trying to figure out how to
Speaker 1: catch a little glimpse of each other. What am I
Speaker 1: getting into? What does he look like? What does she
Speaker 1: look like? Exactly? Um Louie has given permission to ride
Speaker 1: near the window of the chamber where this meeting is
Speaker 1: happening and where um Maria is, And instead of being
Speaker 1: discreet and riding by kind of far away, just getting
Speaker 1: his little peek at her, he wants to come disguise
Speaker 1: to the door and actually meet her. He's not allowed
Speaker 1: to do this. Um Murray is not allowed to acknowledge
Speaker 1: his salute, but they do get to catch this glimpse
Speaker 1: of each other, and he pronounces that she'll be easy
Speaker 1: to love, and she admits that he is certainly very handsome,
Speaker 1: which Louis had a major reputation for being a handsome
Speaker 1: guy and a youth. So despite his dashing good lucks,
Speaker 1: when she has to leave Spain, she's very tearful. This
Speaker 1: is goodbye to Helm and she knows that her new
Speaker 1: life is about to begin, and this is a very
Speaker 1: grave matter for someone of her age. Yeah, definitely. So
Speaker 1: the real marriage happens just a couple of days later,
Speaker 1: June and night, and it takes place in the thirteenth
Speaker 1: century church. And I think this is such an interesting detail.
Speaker 1: But it's such a big deal that the wedding happens
Speaker 1: here that the door the couple passes through is blocked
Speaker 1: up after the ceremony. It's still blocked up today. So
Speaker 1: if you wanted to go through it, too bad you
Speaker 1: could not lock down that aisle um and she I
Speaker 1: guess her style gets a little more French in the
Speaker 1: in the days between the proxy marriage. In this marriage,
Speaker 1: she wears a gown covered in Florida lee, and her
Speaker 1: hair she doesn't have all this fake snooky hair on anymore.
Speaker 1: She has her nice, thick blonde hair. It's actually so
Speaker 1: thick that they can't really attach the crown to it
Speaker 1: very well. And her train is carried by two princesses,
Speaker 1: and she cuts as much of a figure as she can.
Speaker 1: I guess she's very pale. She's these bright blue eyes.
Speaker 1: She has a habsburg lip, which we would not really
Speaker 1: regard as a very beautiful feature nowadays, but at the
Speaker 1: time status symbol. Yeah, it meant you were your royalty,
Speaker 1: you were in good job exactly. Meanwhile, Louis is in
Speaker 1: black velvet and jewels, and immediately after the ceremonial dinner,
Speaker 1: he escorts her to the boudoir. Yeah, and Anne closes
Speaker 1: the curtains on them, which I think would be a
Speaker 1: little awkward. I guess it's good they didn't stick around.
Speaker 1: That happens with some of the royal couples we've discussed before.
Speaker 1: The parents actually hang around. So this is a plus again,
Speaker 1: not not a tradition that was carried over into into
Speaker 1: modern weddings, not um. And this is interesting. Supposedly, Murray
Speaker 1: Trius uses the opportunity of their first night together to
Speaker 1: make Louis p almost that he'll always spend the night
Speaker 1: with her, or at least he'll come to bed with
Speaker 1: her eventually, and I mean over the course of their marriage.
Speaker 1: There's some pretty late nights where he's out and about,
Speaker 1: but he really does always come back to her bed
Speaker 1: and then gets up and goes to his own room.
Speaker 1: In the morning. She sleeps in as many of the
Speaker 1: Spanish royals did. I just think that's a it's kind
Speaker 1: of a sweet gesture. It is well in considering that
Speaker 1: he was her only family in her home. It was
Speaker 1: important to her to have that continuity. Uh So, at
Speaker 1: least in bed. The relationship, the marriage, it's a good one.
Speaker 1: But from a practical point of view. Whereas you may
Speaker 1: enjoy reading the newspaper with your spouse or going to
Speaker 1: the park grey and taking, they don't have anything to
Speaker 1: do together. No, And and one of the major problems
Speaker 1: there she has not been taught French, or at least
Speaker 1: very good French, which seems like a very big oversight
Speaker 1: for somebody who might grow up to be the French
Speaker 1: an integral part of a good marriage. Seking the thing,
Speaker 1: but I think it was literally I think it would
Speaker 1: definitely help. And she doesn't even really make a big
Speaker 1: effort to learn French. She sticks to all of her
Speaker 1: Spanish women and her dwarves and hangs out with her dogs,
Speaker 1: and she loves gambling and not all of the more
Speaker 1: intellectual pursuits that Louie is so fond of. She's not
Speaker 1: into dancing. She's really shy. You know. They just they
Speaker 1: really don't. They don't click much in common with each other. Um.
Speaker 1: I do think it's it's interesting to learn a little
Speaker 1: bit about her, though, because we think so much of
Speaker 1: Louis in relation to all of his famous mistresses, and
Speaker 1: we think about his later marriage, which actually Katie and
Speaker 1: I did a podcast on Madame de Mountaine m about
Speaker 1: a year ago. But I feel like his wife never
Speaker 1: really gets any play here. Well, she certainly had her
Speaker 1: play today and and we will conclude her life story
Speaker 1: in the Tale of their Marriage by saying that she
Speaker 1: died after a very sudden illness at just age forty five.
Speaker 1: And according to our records, one of the things that
Speaker 1: she said before leaving his world was since I have
Speaker 1: been Queen, I have had only one happy day. We
Speaker 1: don't know what day. That was, probably a dwarf day,
Speaker 1: not the wedding, not the wedding day. And this is
Speaker 1: maybe even more tragic. After death, Louis said, this is
Speaker 1: the first trouble she has ever given me, which, oh,
Speaker 1: that's heartbreaking, it is. And on that note from Louis,
Speaker 1: let's flash forward to another very eligible bachelor of his time,
Speaker 1: and that is the dashingly handsome jfk Jr. And everyone
Speaker 1: in the United States who was around at the time
Speaker 1: of John Kennedy's dath remembers little John John flashing his
Speaker 1: salute and being just the cutest child and the whole country.
Speaker 1: And as he got older, he became very handsome, very rugged,
Speaker 1: very outdoorsy, very athletic, and incredibly desirable. He was deemed
Speaker 1: the nation's most eligible bachelor. And he was thirty five
Speaker 1: when he met the twenty nine year old Caroline. The sets, yeah,
Speaker 1: and they dated for about two years. And the way
Speaker 1: they met is great, modern and hip it is. And
Speaker 1: people talk about Caroline as being like the more modern
Speaker 1: version of a Jackie. She had the class, she had
Speaker 1: the posture, she had the carriage, she had the clothes,
Speaker 1: but she put a more contemporary spin on the things
Speaker 1: that she did. She was a publicist at Calvin Klein
Speaker 1: and one of the things that she did for Calvin
Speaker 1: Klein was helps celebrities pick close and of course jfk Jr.
Speaker 1: Was quite a celebrity. So when he came in shopping
Speaker 1: four some suits, she was hooked up with him. And
Speaker 1: I would like to say that the rest of his history,
Speaker 1: but it was a little complicated because they were never
Speaker 1: formally linked in the public eye. There were rumors abounding
Speaker 1: that he was still dating Darryl Hannah and Caroline, of course,
Speaker 1: being the sassy blonde she was, was a commodity in
Speaker 1: her own right, and at this time JFK Jr. Was
Speaker 1: the owner and co editor of the political magazine George,
Speaker 1: so very much on the New York social scene, very
Speaker 1: much a hot item. So who would have thought that
Speaker 1: this couple could have escaped to an island in the
Speaker 1: United States, gotten married and no one knew about it.
Speaker 1: Suddenly they're married. It's it's unbelievable that they managed to
Speaker 1: get away with it. It It was the ultimate secret wedding.
Speaker 1: And um, I have to brag a little bit because
Speaker 1: where they chose to wed Cumberland Island, which is a
Speaker 1: barrier island, in Georgia. It's just eighteen miles by three miles.
Speaker 1: This is actually just off the peninsula where I grew
Speaker 1: up in St. Mary's, Georgia, and it's near where my
Speaker 1: grandfather grew up. So we both have claimed to thing
Speaker 1: to compend. And if you've never made it to Cumberland,
Speaker 1: you simply must go. It's gorgeous. There are fantastic ruins
Speaker 1: of great homes that were owned by the Yes, they
Speaker 1: were own by the Carnagies back in the day. And
Speaker 1: there is still an in a fantastically expensive and luxurious
Speaker 1: and gray field where you can stay and wild horses
Speaker 1: run the beach, beautiful untouched beaches. And there's no bridge either,
Speaker 1: so if you get there you have to take a ferry. Yes,
Speaker 1: so Caroline and JFK Jr. Flying to the St. Mary's
Speaker 1: airport and uh, some women come out from the county
Speaker 1: courthouse to issue their marriage licenses and they file for
Speaker 1: them separately. And like I said, there's been no formal
Speaker 1: engagement announcement, no formal wedding announcement. No one knows that
Speaker 1: this is happening, not even the people involved in arranging
Speaker 1: the wedding. Right. Well, there are a few people who
Speaker 1: have an idea as to what's going on, and that
Speaker 1: would include Go Go Ferguson, whose family had lived on
Speaker 1: the island for six generations. She helped plan the wedding
Speaker 1: and she designed their wedding bands. And then the White
Speaker 1: House Rose Garden designer Rachel Bunny Mellon was in the
Speaker 1: now and the man who had been Jackie's lifelong butler
Speaker 1: did the altar green. But other people who were more
Speaker 1: shall we say, the talent at the wedding, thank you
Speaker 1: the talent at the wedding, like for instance, the Usue
Speaker 1: Florida man who came in to seeing gospel acapella. He
Speaker 1: had no idea that he'd be singing for JFK Jr.
Speaker 1: And Caroline Bassett, and he describes how before the ceremony began,
Speaker 1: they pulled him aside and said, we'd really like READU
Speaker 1: sing amazing Grace. And he's sort of wide eyed at
Speaker 1: this point, I can't believe this is happening. And if
Speaker 1: you look at the one picture and that's so popular
Speaker 1: in the media of this wedding, it's of of John
Speaker 1: and Caroline descending the steps of this eighteen nineties three
Speaker 1: cabin it's essentially a cabinet's the first African Baptist church
Speaker 1: on the island. There was no electricity, so the whole
Speaker 1: ceremony was illuminated by candle light. And he's in a
Speaker 1: suit and his father's watch. And she's in this gorgeous
Speaker 1: pearl white silk crape gallanbine her sister Rodriguez, and she's
Speaker 1: got silk gloves and a rolled silk tool veil and
Speaker 1: a hair clip that belonged to Jackie. Oh, and he's
Speaker 1: kissing her hand. It's just gorgeous. It's modern royal to well,
Speaker 1: and her gown kind of kicked off a look for
Speaker 1: that style, I'd say it did. It's that zipper less
Speaker 1: over the head she it's the opposite of the princess exactly.
Speaker 1: It's that form fitting style. And it's the kind of
Speaker 1: style that earned her this description and w magazine when
Speaker 1: they called Caroline a cool blonde with something sexy, even
Speaker 1: raunchy about her. I like the little voice and emphasis
Speaker 1: you put on that unchy about her, But it was
Speaker 1: sweet about the wedding. Is that. According to at least
Speaker 1: one report, when she came down from the church steps,
Speaker 1: she was carrying a bouquet lily at the valley, and
Speaker 1: supposedly one of the wild horses of Cumberland came out
Speaker 1: and nibbled from it. And I think that might be sensational,
Speaker 1: I I have they're really shy. They are shy. And
Speaker 1: I had a friend once who went with me to
Speaker 1: the island when I was in college, and there are
Speaker 1: new porter partties on Cumberland. Once you hit the beach,
Speaker 1: and she was relieving herself behind a sand dune and
Speaker 1: horse snuck up on her. But that was the closest
Speaker 1: I have ever heard of a horse coming to a human.
Speaker 1: And I went on a class trip in about fourth grade,
Speaker 1: so it wouldn't have been too long before this wedding actually,
Speaker 1: and the horses came up near our campsite, but as
Speaker 1: soon as they saw us, they were out of there,
Speaker 1: not nibbling on any bouquase. Well maybe they knew that
Speaker 1: it was Caroline Basette Kennedy's bouquet. Well anyway, so all
Speaker 1: of that aside, horse stories, et cetera. Um. They had
Speaker 1: a very nice reception at the gray Field End. It
Speaker 1: was perfectly intimate and private, only about forty guests. And
Speaker 1: you may be thinking forty people. That's not even the
Speaker 1: whole Kennedy plan. Well, no, it wasn't. They had to
Speaker 1: leave some people out to ensure their privacy, and after
Speaker 1: the wedding occurred, it wasn't until Sunday afternoon. I believed
Speaker 1: that the press kind of got a hint of what
Speaker 1: had happened, and by the time they descended on Cumberland,
Speaker 1: the couple was gone for their honeymoon in Turkey, and
Speaker 1: one of the earliest confirmations of the marriage came from
Speaker 1: Caroline Kennedy Schlosberg, who flashed a thumbs up sign at
Speaker 1: a reporter who took her picture. Pretty discreet, pretty family.
Speaker 1: Um so this, unfortunately, it sounds like a lovely wedding,
Speaker 1: but it unfortunately culminated in a very tumultuous marriage. And
Speaker 1: some would say this is all part of the Kennedy curse.
Speaker 1: But the marriage did not work out as far as
Speaker 1: we can tell, and they were married for just a
Speaker 1: few short years before uh their sad deaths. But uh,
Speaker 1: he wanted kids, She wasn't sure she wanted kids. They
Speaker 1: both accused each other of having affairs. They lived apart.
Speaker 1: Caroline did not enjoy being scrutinized by the public their
Speaker 1: reports that she was depressed and continued to use cocaine,
Speaker 1: and her sister Lauren urged the two of them to
Speaker 1: reconcile and attend Rory Kennedy's wedding together and more at
Speaker 1: this vineyard, and this was in the summer of John
Speaker 1: agreed to fly all three of them in his single
Speaker 1: engine plane and as you may remember, it crashed in
Speaker 1: the ocean on July six, and navy divers later recovered
Speaker 1: their bodies. So another tragic wedding on our list, But
Speaker 1: we have the beautiful picture and I'm sure that that
Speaker 1: is how the couple would would want to be remembered.
Speaker 1: So from one cool blonde to another. The next lady
Speaker 1: in our list is the beautiful Grace Kelly and her
Speaker 1: marriage to the Prince of Monaco. So Grace Kelly is
Speaker 1: definitely known for living up to her name. You know,
Speaker 1: she's stylish, she's beautiful. She was described by Alfred Hitchcock
Speaker 1: as a snow covered volcano, just because when you look
Speaker 1: at her in screen, she looks so poised and collected,
Speaker 1: but there's so much emotion underneath. She seems like she
Speaker 1: could just erupt at any moment, and I think from
Speaker 1: what I read about her, that's kind of how she
Speaker 1: was in person. She was a very fiery woman who
Speaker 1: sort of kept it all in a neat package. And
Speaker 1: what was interesting about Grace Kelly is that she knew
Speaker 1: what she wanted in life, but her family didn't expect
Speaker 1: that much from her. Know, they really didn't. She was
Speaker 1: the third child of four of a very prominent Philadelphia family.
Speaker 1: She has these amazing athlete parents. Her father was an Olympian,
Speaker 1: her mother was the first woman to teach viz ed
Speaker 1: at penn Um. But yeah, they she didn't really live
Speaker 1: up to the family standard. She was really shy, she
Speaker 1: wasn't athletic, she was kind of sickly. She had asthma
Speaker 1: when she was a kid. But she was really serene,
Speaker 1: and she was also really full of imagination. At one
Speaker 1: point she told her older sister one day, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be a princess, which probably most little girls say that,
Speaker 1: and but in this story it seems like very telling
Speaker 1: mine um and she gets into acting because of all
Speaker 1: that imagination. It's not something her family initially approves of,
Speaker 1: but she proves very good at it, and she had
Speaker 1: to train herself to speak in a in a lower
Speaker 1: tone and less nasally. But I suppose when you're from
Speaker 1: a family of athletes and you can't play the field,
Speaker 1: you have to play on the stage, and she was
Speaker 1: determined to make that work. Yeah, she wasn't really well
Speaker 1: suited for the stage though, um partly because of that boy.
Speaker 1: She just didn't have much power behind it. But on
Speaker 1: camera she was absolutely stunning, and she once she got
Speaker 1: going on this film career, it was this amazing burst
Speaker 1: of success and great films. She won an Academy Award.
Speaker 1: It's weird, though, It's not like she started with a
Speaker 1: few little parts and worked up from there. Most of
Speaker 1: her success comes from this one screen test from nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty which she didn't even get the part she was
Speaker 1: auditioning for, but it got shown around Hollywood and she
Speaker 1: became an overnight success. She really john Ford saw it,
Speaker 1: Alfred Hitchcock saw it, they cast her, and she just
Speaker 1: went from there. She's also pretty well known in her
Speaker 1: Hollywood days for working out a really sweet studio deal.
Speaker 1: Studios at the time would basically make their stars sign
Speaker 1: their lives away, but she worked out a nice deal
Speaker 1: where she could be a little more flexible with the
Speaker 1: projects she chose and it paid off in she won
Speaker 1: an oscar, she had four films and theaters, and she
Speaker 1: made more money than any other female star. So this
Speaker 1: is the pinnacle of her career. It looks like she's
Speaker 1: just gonna keep on going and have decades ahead of
Speaker 1: her great success. And then suddenly, suddenly she decides that
Speaker 1: despite dating around and hooking it with some very eligible bachelor's,
Speaker 1: she wants to get married. Yeah, according to her friend
Speaker 1: and biographer Gwen Robbins, she didn't want to have to
Speaker 1: age in Hollywood, which I can kind of understand that,
Speaker 1: especially at this time. They're just may have not been
Speaker 1: very many parts in another decade or two. But she
Speaker 1: meets her princes at the nineteen Ken Film Festival, and
Speaker 1: this is of course Rainier Grimaldi and he's the Prince
Speaker 1: of Monico, which is a French principality, and it's it's tiny,
Speaker 1: the postage it's a postage stamp, Sarah, I think that
Speaker 1: you mean to know, is smaller than Central smaller than
Speaker 1: Central Park. Um, but very beautiful, very picturesque. It looks
Speaker 1: like old Europe. And so she sees that he's got
Speaker 1: an offer she can't refuse, and um, not only that,
Speaker 1: she has an offer that he can't refuse because his
Speaker 1: former girlfriend, also an actress, was barren, so he needs
Speaker 1: to ensure that he can create an air otherwise Monaco
Speaker 1: gets handed over to France. So despite Grace Kelly having
Speaker 1: all the features that he desires, he still demands that
Speaker 1: when they get married. Uh, she hand over a two
Speaker 1: million dollar dowry, which that's from life. I just I
Speaker 1: can't get over that number. I mean, she her family
Speaker 1: was very well off and she earned a lot of
Speaker 1: money herself. That is so much money in the nineteen fifties.
Speaker 1: One of her last films is kind of interesting considering
Speaker 1: her future. It was called The Swan and in it
Speaker 1: she played a princess, so while Rainier was courting her,
Speaker 1: she was actually playing the part of a princess. A
Speaker 1: dressed herself exactly and in the plot of the film,
Speaker 1: she's torn between her younger love and the prince who
Speaker 1: she's intended to marry. She ends up choosing the prince.
Speaker 1: It all works out for her story in the end.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine if that if the movie had been
Speaker 1: a little different, it might have not fit very well.
Speaker 1: And that film wrapped in December nine, and that marked
Speaker 1: their official engagement on December twenty eight, so just a
Speaker 1: few days after Christmas, she gets the best present ever,
Speaker 1: a twelve carrot emerald cut diamond flanked by two by
Speaker 1: She probably had to buy it herself, considering that you
Speaker 1: better get a good ring. And what's funny about all
Speaker 1: of these different subplots adding up into this, This one
Speaker 1: big arc of her storyline is that she was engaged
Speaker 1: at the time to fashion designer a like Cassini. So
Speaker 1: Grace gets married in what is called the wedding of
Speaker 1: the century. We're gonna have another one of those on
Speaker 1: this list in a minute. Held held your Royal horse. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but she calls it the Carnival of the century. And
Speaker 1: it's easy to understand why. She arrives in Monaco on
Speaker 1: a ship with an entourage of sixty six people. And
Speaker 1: the law and tradition of the country has that a
Speaker 1: civil ceremony comes before the religious ceremony. So that first
Speaker 1: event takes place on April eighteenth n s and it's
Speaker 1: in the throne room of the palace, and it's presided
Speaker 1: by a high court official, and she wears this very
Speaker 1: sharp beige lace dress and hat um it looks like
Speaker 1: something she'd wear in a movie. Almost um. And then
Speaker 1: they appear, they wave on the balcony to the crowd,
Speaker 1: and then the big ceremony, the religious one happens the
Speaker 1: next day, and that's the one that you'd probably recognize
Speaker 1: pictures from right. And at the ceremony, there were two
Speaker 1: thousand reporters. That's more reporters than there were guests. But
Speaker 1: the guest list did have some very important people on it,
Speaker 1: some v i p s for that day and age,
Speaker 1: Carrie Grand Gloria Swanson, Ava Gardner, Conrad Hilton, Aristotle On Nassis,
Speaker 1: but not in attendance. Notably it was Queen Elizabeth the
Speaker 1: second it's a little too Dick Lasse reposedly thought there
Speaker 1: were just too many movies guys. That's never held me
Speaker 1: back from attending any events. But this, I mean, with
Speaker 1: all this press, with all these stars there, this is
Speaker 1: sort of the first major press event that we you know,
Speaker 1: like we could think of later wedding, I mean, the
Speaker 1: wedding might talk a film by MGM. Yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: this big to do. It's film by MGM. It's broadcast
Speaker 1: live to thirty million people in Europe and bars even
Speaker 1: make up. The signature cocktail called the Princess Cocktail with
Speaker 1: bourbon and grenadine and fresh cream does not sound very
Speaker 1: good to me. It sounds cool and icy like Grace
Speaker 1: Kelly though. So this Grand Cathedral ceremony, Grace wore an
Speaker 1: ivory gown made of silk, tafia and lace, and it
Speaker 1: was designed by the famous Hollywood costume or Helen Rose.
Speaker 1: It took six weeks and thirty six seamstresses to make.
Speaker 1: It required twenty five yards of silk tafia, a hundred
Speaker 1: yards of silk net, a hundred and twenty five year
Speaker 1: old rose point lace from a museum. I mean, I
Speaker 1: just bought some Halloween costume fabric this weekend, two yards.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to imagine buying a hundred yards fabric Before
Speaker 1: Grace Kelly. Uh, No one really did the big poofy
Speaker 1: ballgowns for a wedding. This was unheard of, and today
Speaker 1: that style is sort of alternately called ball gown or
Speaker 1: princess style. And when you hear refer to princess style,
Speaker 1: that's based off Grace Kelly's wedding. How about that? Thank you, TLC. Candice,
Speaker 1: I sent my my hat to you. So the couple,
Speaker 1: it's not a particular really intimate wedding surprise with all
Speaker 1: these people here. The couple stay directed at the high altar,
Speaker 1: and Kelly was visibly nervous during the whole thing. She
Speaker 1: just just kind of whispering, um. Just if you you
Speaker 1: can actually look up videos of it. And she looks
Speaker 1: like eyes on the prize, not looking anywhere else, like
Speaker 1: she's afraid she'll fall over or something. Um. But at
Speaker 1: the end, this message from the Pope was read out loud,
Speaker 1: and then the couple drove off through Monte Carlo and
Speaker 1: a convertible and left their honeymoon, which was a multi
Speaker 1: weeek cruise aboard a yacht. And on their honeymoon, she
Speaker 1: became pregnant with Caroline, and she later popularized the Hermes
Speaker 1: bag the Kelly because she would she would use this
Speaker 1: really oversized purse to hide her what we did day
Speaker 1: would call her baby bump. That was in a tabloid.
Speaker 1: Today there'd be a little arrow, little question she isn't she?
Speaker 1: But despite the joys of carrying a child and giving
Speaker 1: birth to a child, married life was a little sour
Speaker 1: for Grace Kelly. Yeah, she had hoped that maybe she'd
Speaker 1: still be able to work a little bit, go to
Speaker 1: Hollywood every now and then and make a movie. Her
Speaker 1: husband was not into that idea. In fact, supposedly he
Speaker 1: banned her films from even showing in Monaco. UM and
Speaker 1: she later told her friend John Foreman, I know where
Speaker 1: I'm going to be every single day for the rest
Speaker 1: of my life, and that was not said in like
Speaker 1: a happy way. I'm going to be in Monico, where
Speaker 1: it's funny and beautiful. Um. Again, Monico smaller than Central Park,
Speaker 1: so we can imagine kind of a restrictive, if glamorous life.
Speaker 1: And she died tragically in a car crash in nineteen
Speaker 1: And that untimely segue brings us to the last wedding
Speaker 1: on our list. And by now you may have guessed
Speaker 1: what it is. One of the biggest wedding spectacles of
Speaker 1: our time, and that would be the wedding of Diana
Speaker 1: and Charles. So Charles and I knew each other when
Speaker 1: they were they were children, and they weren't exactly close
Speaker 1: in age when they got married. She was twenty and
Speaker 1: he was thirty two, but they had associated their families had,
Speaker 1: so they were not unfamiliar with each other, and when
Speaker 1: he proposed with a giant oval sapphire surrounded by fourteen diamonds,
Speaker 1: thank you very much. She was a teacher, so she's
Speaker 1: coming from not a modest exactly background, but something that
Speaker 1: is not quite in the public eye to something that
Speaker 1: is incredibly on the forefront of British society. Definitely, and
Speaker 1: on her wedding day again, like Sarah was saying, you
Speaker 1: can see footage of Grace Kelly's wedding online. You can
Speaker 1: also see plenty of footage of Charles and Die's wedding
Speaker 1: and she wore one of the most famous wedding gowns
Speaker 1: of all time. It was an ivory silk gown designed
Speaker 1: by David and Elizabeth Emmanuel and had lace accents and
Speaker 1: big puffy sleeves hello nineteen eighties, gathered with little ribbons
Speaker 1: and on four The designers didn't accommodate for the fact
Speaker 1: that she would be transported to the wedding site in
Speaker 1: a glass carriage, so when she got out she was
Speaker 1: a little wrinkled. It must have been hot and uncomfortable
Speaker 1: in the carriage. And as to mention that twenty five
Speaker 1: ft train taking up that much space, and the dress
Speaker 1: was made in just four months. And these people who
Speaker 1: designed the gown, the Emmanuels, they were the same designers
Speaker 1: who put together the dress that she wore. Wind Arles
Speaker 1: and I announced their formal engagement and this was sort
Speaker 1: of the start of maybe a couple of people in
Speaker 1: British society raising an eyebrow at Diana because the dress
Speaker 1: was very highly criticized. People said it was too low cut,
Speaker 1: and it was black, and at the time black didn't
Speaker 1: necessarily mean that you were a chic and meant that
Speaker 1: you were in mourning. I think Diana later proved black
Speaker 1: was one of the best colors on her though, definitely.
Speaker 1: So this wedding was televised in fifty eight countries. It
Speaker 1: was an hour and a half long ceremony that had
Speaker 1: thirty five hundred in attendance and seven hundred fifty million
Speaker 1: watching on DV and I believe in neglected to say
Speaker 1: the date, So let me correct that right now, ju Lie.
Speaker 1: And not only is this a national holiday in Britain,
Speaker 1: but it's a total moneymaker. There's so much memorabilia going
Speaker 1: around displaying the new Royal couple, porcelain plates and cups
Speaker 1: and stamps and photo collages, and in one story I
Speaker 1: read there was a woman who had been seven hundred
Speaker 1: dollars for a slice of cake from the wedding. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and of course I was attended by a lot of
Speaker 1: bridesmaids too, and most of them were had royal connections,
Speaker 1: but not all of them. There was one little girl
Speaker 1: named Sarah Jane who was the daughter of Charles friend
Speaker 1: and longtime horse trainer, and she actually kept up a
Speaker 1: correspondence with Diana after the wedding and basically explained to
Speaker 1: Diana that she was miserable at boarding school and I
Speaker 1: had done her time at boarding school too, so she
Speaker 1: commiserated and how to suite letter writing campaign with her.
Speaker 1: But if you believe in uhi or telltale signs, there
Speaker 1: were a couple of gaffs during the ceremony that perhaps
Speaker 1: predicted the marriage would not be a fairy tale one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she got Charles names out of order, she did. He
Speaker 1: has a lot, of course, yes, And the name that
Speaker 1: she essentially called him was his father's name. And then
Speaker 1: he forgot to kiss her at the altar. They later
Speaker 1: did a public kiss on the balcony at Buckingham Palace,
Speaker 1: but that was a gaff for sure, definitely, But after
Speaker 1: those gaffs, after the ceremony is complete and they make
Speaker 1: their appearance to the public, they go in their honeymoon
Speaker 1: at the family estate in Broadlands, and then they go
Speaker 1: on a twelve day Mediterranean cruise, much like Grace Kelly. Again,
Speaker 1: it's kind of an abbreviated Mediterranean cruise but still um
Speaker 1: and Diana's brother, who was only about sixteen at the
Speaker 1: time of the wedding, later revealed that she had a
Speaker 1: terrible headache for the entire thing because she had this
Speaker 1: tierra pinching her her temples and head. Yeah, she wasn't
Speaker 1: used to wearing a tiara obviously, and even though it
Speaker 1: came from this spend her family was um one of
Speaker 1: their heirlooms. Yeah, we know from dies later works in
Speaker 1: her life she was probably more comfortable in the garb
Speaker 1: of humanitarian worker than wearing her tr although she did
Speaker 1: cut a fabulous figure in an evening gown as well.
Speaker 1: She just she wore so many hats. Not to make
Speaker 1: a pun there, but she did. And then the marriage again,
Speaker 1: this is another one that ends on a sad note.
Speaker 1: It did not work out and you all probably know
Speaker 1: why Charles supposedly had kept up his romantic dalliances with
Speaker 1: Camilla Parker Bowls, to whom he is now married. So
Speaker 1: the couple separated in the late nineteen eighties and formally
Speaker 1: announced their split in Nino, and then on August thirty one,
Speaker 1: Diana was killed in a car crash. Yeah, and Charles
Speaker 1: got a little credit after that for insisting that she'd
Speaker 1: be given a royal funeral even though that wasn't the
Speaker 1: protocol since they were a divorce couple. And that also
Speaker 1: was televised on TV and in the world watched on
Speaker 1: very sadly to see the princess gone way too earline,
Speaker 1: but it kind of brings us to our clothes here.
Speaker 1: There's another possible royal wedding on the horizon, at least
Speaker 1: all the gossip mag's keep on covering it trying to
Speaker 1: guess what it is. And that is of course between
Speaker 1: Charles and Diana's eldest son William and his longtime girlfriend Kate.
Speaker 1: So we'll see if we have another royal wedding to
Speaker 1: add to this list. Hopefully, if it does take place,
Speaker 1: it'll be a much happier marriage than some of these
Speaker 1: and a less wringled wedding gown. Definitely. All right. Well,
Speaker 1: I guess that about wraps it up. Do you have
Speaker 1: anything else you want to add? Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for having me. Yeah, it's been fun, canvas Um. If
Speaker 1: you want to email us or suggest any other favorite
Speaker 1: royal wedding stories, you can find us on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Miston History. We're on Facebook, and we also, of course
Speaker 1: have an old fashioned email address. It's History podcast at
Speaker 1: pasta works dot com. And if you want to look
Speaker 1: for any of Candice's great wedding content, you can find
Speaker 1: it at TLC. And if you want to learn a
Speaker 1: little more about royalty, go to the homepage and search
Speaker 1: for royalty at www dot how stuff works dot com,
Speaker 1: the House stuff Works dot com. My phone app is
Speaker 1: coming soon. Get access to our content in a new way, articles, videos,
Speaker 1: and more all on the go. Check out the latest
Speaker 1: podcast and blog posts, and see what we're saying on
Speaker 1: Facebook and Twitter. Coming soon to iTunes