November 10, 2010 • 42 mins
History is full of astonishing events, and the history of marriage is no exception. Listen in as Sarah and our special guest, Candace, explore five of the most show-stopping, opulent weddings in history, including Charles and Diana, Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier III, John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette, Louis XIV, and Victoria and Albert.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how
Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, welcome to the podcast. I'm
Sarah Dowdy and I'm very happy to be here with
a very special guest today. Hi everybody, it's Candice. She's
(00:23):
back vintage stuff you missed in History class podcasting. Well,
in Canadas, we always get emails asking where you've gone
or where you are, and I usually just say she's
sitting right behind me in the cube. But I mean
you could probably elaborate a little more than that. Well,
I have switched my focus from history to weddings, which
(00:44):
is actually a lot of fun. I've been working on
the TLC Weddings website, and if you haven't visited yet,
you really should, even if you're not planning a wedding yourself.
You can get some fun information on modern trends and
classic trends, fashion tips, fast and tips, flower tips. All
of that, and one more fun piece of vintage stuff
(01:05):
you missed in history class news that pertains to weddings.
One of your other favorite hosts from the Days of
your Jane McGrath, just recently got engaged, so she'll be
flooding that website to congratulations with Jane and Um. I'm
very excited to record this episode with UGANDAE and so
we actually picked a theme that was sort of fitting
(01:26):
with Candice's new role at Housta Forks and tlc Um
and that is, of course, weddings. And when we picked
these five weddings, I told Sarah we should pick some
of our favorite weddings in history, and all but one
turned out to have rather sad endings. So we're going
to start with the happiest and when we're done, go
(01:46):
ahead and get out your vintage lace Hankyes, because all
goes down very lovely weddings, but some kind of sad marriages.
We picked tragedies, I guess. But yeah, this first one
is good and it's probably one of the best known
historical weddings, i'd say, just because of how many wedding
trends it ultimately established. Right, We'll say that the marriage
(02:08):
of Victoria and Albert on February tenth, eighteen forties set
some precedents for modern brides. And most of you probably
know that the reason bride today were white is because
Victoria started that tradition. She started so many trends she did,
I think using ether during childbirth. That's a cool Victoria trend.
Thanks for that, Victoria. So here's a little history on Victoria.
(02:31):
She became queen in eighteen thirty seven and she was
just eighteen years old, and her wedding was the first
one since fifteen fifty four when a throned queen took
a husband. And we mentioned that she set the tone
for modern weddings by wearing white, but she also chose
when to wed and whom. Yeah, they were a love match,
(02:52):
which was something quite surprising for royalty in general at
the time, but especially a queen choosing who she's going
to marry. And the person she chose with Albert, who
was her German cousin, the Prince Consort. They met in
eighteen thirty six and were engaged just three years later.
And while I personally hate snakes and demanded a big
honking diamond, Victoria asked or received rather a snake ring
(03:17):
with diamond eyes, which seems so punk for Victoria. It's
just not in keeping at all with the woman I
imagine her. But I guess snakes are more of a
trend back then. It was a symbol actually, the snakes
coil symbolized the bonds of eternal love, just like we
think of the circle of a wedding Van Cleopatri style.
(03:39):
I guess, there you go, um, But this is an
old superstition. I guess that a rainy wedding day is
actually good luck. And maybe in this case it proved
too true because they had a rainy wedding day, but
ultimately a very happy marriage together they did. It was
an early wedding, it was in the middle of the day,
(04:01):
and it was followed by a breakfast. Celebration took place
at St James's Palace, and they had a very grand
procession from Buckingham Palace to St James's and the procession
included her twelve bridesmaids. And I mentioned she had a
white gown, which was unusual for the time because before
her any time of royal got married, she would wear
(04:22):
a very heavy brocade gown and lots of jewels and
ermine cloak. And she wanted something lighter and more feminine.
But the one aristocratic element that she did demand was
handmade lace. Yeah, didn't it take about two hundred people
to make all of the lace? It did, And by
this time in the Victorian era, a lot of fabric
(04:43):
making was automated or a machine made, but she wasn't
real that's right. So it was a happy day and
an even happier wedding night. We have a little glimpse
from Victoria's journal and she had this to say about it.
The wedding night was all moonlight and roses and a
fair wind and the pleasures of sex. So it sounds
(05:05):
like a good time for the satisfied couple. But I
mean they go on to have a very successful marriage
and a successful reign. It's actually debt free, which is
kind of amazing considering um how much a queen would
normally spend. Right, but that just goes to demonstrate one
of the concepts that we associate with Victorianism, and that's thrift, friends,
(05:29):
frugality's right. And Jillian gil who's a biographer who wrote
we two about Victoria and Albert, she says that their
relationship illustrates so many different Victorian concepts and these are
just a few. You've got faith and thrift, which we've mentioned, discipline, patriotism, responsibility,
and stability. They really were a model for the whole country.
(05:50):
And they also have a very fruitful marriage. They have
nine kids, and they also helped popularize that family portrait
of you know, the doting mother and the dutiful father
and all of their babies and children surrounding them. Which
is needless to say that when Albert died in eighteen
sixty one, Victoria was just crushed. There had been some
(06:11):
of the happiest years of her life, and without him
she became very depressed and more black until her death
in nine one, when she died from natural causes. Our
next wedding and marriage on this list is going to
be equally grand, but a lot more tragic than the last.
It's also a royal wedding though. It's Louis the fourteenth
(06:32):
and Maria Theresa of Spain um, So we're gonna give
a little background on this just because they're The circumstances
of the couple's birth are really interesting, I think, so
Louis the fourteenth was a surprise. The French were really
hoping for an air but his mother was thirty six,
almost thirty seven years old, and she hadn't given birth
(06:52):
to a living child yet. Then all of a sudden
outcomes Louis the fourteenth, this healthy baby boy, and only
five days later his mother and brother, Philip the Fourth,
who is the King of Spain, has a daughter, and
Anne is immediately thinking, oh, well, perfect, as most modern
(07:13):
mothers would, there are your cousin's. This little niece of
mine can someday be the wife of my son. This
was especially an especially tantalizing match because Maria Theresa had
a claim to the Spanish throne at one point, so
it would be a very nice match for the King
of France. But okay, so they're not just cousins. This
(07:35):
is a little disturbing to modern listeners, probably their double cousin.
So they're the product of a French brother and sister
married to a Spanish brother and sister. Um. And actually
one of the families is the Habsburgs too, and they're
notoriously inbred already. So it's amazing that this line continues.
It's actually a successful match. Um. But it doesn't seem
(07:59):
like this marriage is necessarily going to happen for a while,
and that's because Spain and France are just constantly at
war with each other. Um. But guess what. Finally they
work out a piece in the Piece of the Pyrenees
in sixteen fifty nine, and a major part of the
deal is going to be cementing the alliance with this
(08:20):
marriage between cousins. Yes, and Louis had actually already found
his first great love, but he was prepared to do
his part and to marry Maria Theresa. And similarly, she's
ready to do her part for God and country and
family as well. Yeah, and she's had this rather sad
childhood too, is is so many of these royal kids do.
(08:42):
She loses her mother really early. Um, So, I think
she's looking forward to having a new maternal figure in
Anne of Austria, her aunt who has really taken her
on as a protege almost her entire life. After the
engagement was arranged, Louis wrote to Marie Therese to it
was not without constraint that I yielded up till now
(09:04):
to the arguments which prevented me from expressing to your
Majesty the sentiments of my heart. And then he continued,
I am delighted to begin to reassure her Majesty by
these lines that happiness could not arrive at anyone who
more passionately wishes for it, nor anyone feel themselves happier
in possessing it. So that's a nice sweet letter. It's
in very formal terms, but phil before thinks it's a
(09:27):
little too much for his daughter to even be receiving,
won't let her read the letter. Uh. Finally, the proxy
marriage goes through, which I've always thought is so such
a strange custom. But I guess you don't want to
send your unmarried virgin daughter off across Europe alone unless
she's this legally wedded woman. But they have this proxy
(09:49):
marriage in Spain. It's near the border. It takes place
on June three, sixteen sixty, and of course Louis isn't there.
That's why it's a proxy marriage. There's this Spanish dignitary.
So I just can't imagine how strange it would be
to go up there, have all the valves read and
her sided, and there's this stranger standing next to you. Yes,
(10:09):
this proxy ceremony was definitely not a precursor of the
modern wedding. And what made it even stranger for the
French is that Maria Theresa was decidedly Spanish. Yes, I mean,
think of those wide skirts he might recognize in Velaska's paintings,
because of course Vlaska's is the court painter at the time.
Um She also has these piles of false hair, the
(10:32):
sort of Buffont styled hair under like a sixteen sixty
snicky on they so all these jewels. I think the
French people in attendance were kind of shocked, maybe a
little disappointed, disapproving of this future queen of theirs, but
you know, what are you gonna do? Not much so
now she becomes Marie Terrez and she's ready for Lily. Yeah.
(10:55):
So France's royal party has been on the way. It
takes a while to to stay in these days, and
the wedding is planned for June nine near Bordeaux. Queen
Anne is so excited. This is her life long, or
not her life long, but as long as her son's
been around, this has been her dream for him. And
she's really sweet too. She even writes to Marie um
(11:18):
back when the engagement is set up that addressing her
as her daughter and her niece. So she's definitely looking
forward to bringing this new daughter into her life. And
this is a wedding at its best. It's essentially a
family reunion too, which is what weddings really are today. Yeah, definitely.
So the couple catch their first glimpse of each other
(11:39):
when the brother and sister Philip and Anne are finally
reunited after four years, which is unbelievable. I can't imagine
going you're an only child, I am an only house,
so I guess I really can't imagine. She really can't.
But I mean it's just a strange. I mean, they're
in contact with each other during that time, but how
(12:00):
strange to be at war with your own brother's right
with your sibling. Um. They have a very restrained meeting,
these two siblings after so long. They don't hug each other,
but they both apparently had tears in their eye. But meanwhile,
the young people are trying to figure out how to
catch a little glimpse of each other. What am I
getting into? What does he look like? What does she
look like? Exactly? Um Louie has given permission to ride
(12:22):
near the window of the chamber where this meeting is
happening and where um Maria is, And instead of being
discreet and riding by kind of far away, just getting
his little peek at her, he wants to come disguise
to the door and actually meet her. He's not allowed
to do this. Um Murray is not allowed to acknowledge
his salute, but they do get to catch this glimpse
(12:45):
of each other, and he pronounces that she'll be easy
to love, and she admits that he is certainly very handsome,
which Louis had a major reputation for being a handsome
guy and a youth. So despite his dashing good lucks,
when she has to leave Spain, she's very tearful. This
is goodbye to Helm and she knows that her new
life is about to begin, and this is a very
(13:05):
grave matter for someone of her age. Yeah, definitely. So
the real marriage happens just a couple of days later,
June and night, and it takes place in the thirteenth
century church. And I think this is such an interesting detail.
But it's such a big deal that the wedding happens
here that the door the couple passes through is blocked
(13:26):
up after the ceremony. It's still blocked up today. So
if you wanted to go through it, too bad you
could not lock down that aisle um and she I
guess her style gets a little more French in the
in the days between the proxy marriage. In this marriage,
she wears a gown covered in Florida lee, and her
hair she doesn't have all this fake snooky hair on anymore.
(13:49):
She has her nice, thick blonde hair. It's actually so
thick that they can't really attach the crown to it
very well. And her train is carried by two princesses,
and she cuts as much of a figure as she can.
I guess she's very pale. She's these bright blue eyes.
She has a habsburg lip, which we would not really
(14:10):
regard as a very beautiful feature nowadays, but at the
time status symbol. Yeah, it meant you were your royalty,
you were in good job exactly. Meanwhile, Louis is in
black velvet and jewels, and immediately after the ceremonial dinner,
he escorts her to the boudoir. Yeah, and Anne closes
(14:33):
the curtains on them, which I think would be a
little awkward. I guess it's good they didn't stick around.
That happens with some of the royal couples we've discussed before.
The parents actually hang around. So this is a plus again,
not not a tradition that was carried over into into
modern weddings, not um. And this is interesting. Supposedly, Murray
(14:54):
Trius uses the opportunity of their first night together to
make Louis p almost that he'll always spend the night
with her, or at least he'll come to bed with
her eventually, and I mean over the course of their marriage.
There's some pretty late nights where he's out and about,
but he really does always come back to her bed
and then gets up and goes to his own room.
(15:16):
In the morning. She sleeps in as many of the
Spanish royals did. I just think that's a it's kind
of a sweet gesture. It is well in considering that
he was her only family in her home. It was
important to her to have that continuity. Uh So, at
least in bed. The relationship, the marriage, it's a good one.
(15:39):
But from a practical point of view. Whereas you may
enjoy reading the newspaper with your spouse or going to
the park grey and taking, they don't have anything to
do together. No, And and one of the major problems
there she has not been taught French, or at least
very good French, which seems like a very big oversight
for somebody who might grow up to be the French
(16:01):
an integral part of a good marriage. Seking the thing,
but I think it was literally I think it would
definitely help. And she doesn't even really make a big
effort to learn French. She sticks to all of her
Spanish women and her dwarves and hangs out with her dogs,
and she loves gambling and not all of the more
intellectual pursuits that Louie is so fond of. She's not
(16:23):
into dancing. She's really shy. You know. They just they
really don't. They don't click much in common with each other. Um.
I do think it's it's interesting to learn a little
bit about her, though, because we think so much of
Louis in relation to all of his famous mistresses, and
we think about his later marriage, which actually Katie and
(16:44):
I did a podcast on Madame de Mountaine m about
a year ago. But I feel like his wife never
really gets any play here. Well, she certainly had her
play today and and we will conclude her life story
in the Tale of their Marriage by saying that she
died after a very sudden illness at just age forty five.
(17:04):
And according to our records, one of the things that
she said before leaving his world was since I have
been Queen, I have had only one happy day. We
don't know what day. That was, probably a dwarf day,
not the wedding, not the wedding day. And this is
maybe even more tragic. After death, Louis said, this is
(17:25):
the first trouble she has ever given me, which, oh,
that's heartbreaking, it is. And on that note from Louis,
let's flash forward to another very eligible bachelor of his time,
and that is the dashingly handsome jfk Jr. And everyone
in the United States who was around at the time
(17:47):
of John Kennedy's dath remembers little John John flashing his
salute and being just the cutest child and the whole country.
And as he got older, he became very handsome, very rugged,
very outdoorsy, very athletic, and incredibly desirable. He was deemed
the nation's most eligible bachelor. And he was thirty five
when he met the twenty nine year old Caroline. The sets, yeah,
(18:10):
and they dated for about two years. And the way
they met is great, modern and hip it is. And
people talk about Caroline as being like the more modern
version of a Jackie. She had the class, she had
the posture, she had the carriage, she had the clothes,
but she put a more contemporary spin on the things
(18:31):
that she did. She was a publicist at Calvin Klein
and one of the things that she did for Calvin
Klein was helps celebrities pick close and of course jfk Jr.
Was quite a celebrity. So when he came in shopping
four some suits, she was hooked up with him. And
I would like to say that the rest of his history,
but it was a little complicated because they were never
(18:51):
formally linked in the public eye. There were rumors abounding
that he was still dating Darryl Hannah and Caroline, of course,
being the sassy blonde she was, was a commodity in
her own right, and at this time JFK Jr. Was
the owner and co editor of the political magazine George,
so very much on the New York social scene, very
(19:13):
much a hot item. So who would have thought that
this couple could have escaped to an island in the
United States, gotten married and no one knew about it.
Suddenly they're married. It's it's unbelievable that they managed to
get away with it. It It was the ultimate secret wedding.
And um, I have to brag a little bit because
(19:34):
where they chose to wed Cumberland Island, which is a
barrier island, in Georgia. It's just eighteen miles by three miles.
This is actually just off the peninsula where I grew
up in St. Mary's, Georgia, and it's near where my
grandfather grew up. So we both have claimed to thing
to compend. And if you've never made it to Cumberland,
you simply must go. It's gorgeous. There are fantastic ruins
(19:56):
of great homes that were owned by the Yes, they
were own by the Carnagies back in the day. And
there is still an in a fantastically expensive and luxurious
and gray field where you can stay and wild horses
run the beach, beautiful untouched beaches. And there's no bridge either,
so if you get there you have to take a ferry. Yes,
so Caroline and JFK Jr. Flying to the St. Mary's
(20:19):
airport and uh, some women come out from the county
courthouse to issue their marriage licenses and they file for
them separately. And like I said, there's been no formal
engagement announcement, no formal wedding announcement. No one knows that
this is happening, not even the people involved in arranging
the wedding. Right. Well, there are a few people who
(20:39):
have an idea as to what's going on, and that
would include Go Go Ferguson, whose family had lived on
the island for six generations. She helped plan the wedding
and she designed their wedding bands. And then the White
House Rose Garden designer Rachel Bunny Mellon was in the
now and the man who had been Jackie's lifelong butler
did the altar green. But other people who were more
(21:02):
shall we say, the talent at the wedding, thank you
the talent at the wedding, like for instance, the Usue
Florida man who came in to seeing gospel acapella. He
had no idea that he'd be singing for JFK Jr.
And Caroline Bassett, and he describes how before the ceremony began,
they pulled him aside and said, we'd really like READU
sing amazing Grace. And he's sort of wide eyed at
this point, I can't believe this is happening. And if
(21:25):
you look at the one picture and that's so popular
in the media of this wedding, it's of of John
and Caroline descending the steps of this eighteen nineties three
cabin it's essentially a cabinet's the first African Baptist church
on the island. There was no electricity, so the whole
ceremony was illuminated by candle light. And he's in a
suit and his father's watch. And she's in this gorgeous
(21:48):
pearl white silk crape gallanbine her sister Rodriguez, and she's
got silk gloves and a rolled silk tool veil and
a hair clip that belonged to Jackie. Oh, and he's
kissing her hand. It's just gorgeous. It's modern royal to well,
and her gown kind of kicked off a look for
that style, I'd say it did. It's that zipper less
over the head she it's the opposite of the princess exactly.
(22:11):
It's that form fitting style. And it's the kind of
style that earned her this description and w magazine when
they called Caroline a cool blonde with something sexy, even
raunchy about her. I like the little voice and emphasis
you put on that unchy about her, But it was
sweet about the wedding. Is that. According to at least
one report, when she came down from the church steps,
(22:33):
she was carrying a bouquet lily at the valley, and
supposedly one of the wild horses of Cumberland came out
and nibbled from it. And I think that might be sensational,
I I have they're really shy. They are shy. And
I had a friend once who went with me to
the island when I was in college, and there are
new porter partties on Cumberland. Once you hit the beach,
and she was relieving herself behind a sand dune and
(22:55):
horse snuck up on her. But that was the closest
I have ever heard of a horse coming to a human.
And I went on a class trip in about fourth grade,
so it wouldn't have been too long before this wedding actually,
and the horses came up near our campsite, but as
soon as they saw us, they were out of there,
not nibbling on any bouquase. Well maybe they knew that
it was Caroline Basette Kennedy's bouquet. Well anyway, so all
(23:18):
of that aside, horse stories, et cetera. Um. They had
a very nice reception at the gray Field End. It
was perfectly intimate and private, only about forty guests. And
you may be thinking forty people. That's not even the
whole Kennedy plan. Well, no, it wasn't. They had to
leave some people out to ensure their privacy, and after
the wedding occurred, it wasn't until Sunday afternoon. I believed
(23:41):
that the press kind of got a hint of what
had happened, and by the time they descended on Cumberland,
the couple was gone for their honeymoon in Turkey, and
one of the earliest confirmations of the marriage came from
Caroline Kennedy Schlosberg, who flashed a thumbs up sign at
a reporter who took her picture. Pretty discreet, pretty family.
(24:01):
Um so this, unfortunately, it sounds like a lovely wedding,
but it unfortunately culminated in a very tumultuous marriage. And
some would say this is all part of the Kennedy curse.
But the marriage did not work out as far as
we can tell, and they were married for just a
few short years before uh their sad deaths. But uh,
(24:23):
he wanted kids, She wasn't sure she wanted kids. They
both accused each other of having affairs. They lived apart.
Caroline did not enjoy being scrutinized by the public their
reports that she was depressed and continued to use cocaine,
and her sister Lauren urged the two of them to
reconcile and attend Rory Kennedy's wedding together and more at
(24:44):
this vineyard, and this was in the summer of John
agreed to fly all three of them in his single
engine plane and as you may remember, it crashed in
the ocean on July six, and navy divers later recovered
their bodies. So another tragic wedding on our list, But
we have the beautiful picture and I'm sure that that
is how the couple would would want to be remembered.
(25:08):
So from one cool blonde to another. The next lady
in our list is the beautiful Grace Kelly and her
marriage to the Prince of Monaco. So Grace Kelly is
definitely known for living up to her name. You know,
she's stylish, she's beautiful. She was described by Alfred Hitchcock
as a snow covered volcano, just because when you look
(25:31):
at her in screen, she looks so poised and collected,
but there's so much emotion underneath. She seems like she
could just erupt at any moment, and I think from
what I read about her, that's kind of how she
was in person. She was a very fiery woman who
sort of kept it all in a neat package. And
(25:52):
what was interesting about Grace Kelly is that she knew
what she wanted in life, but her family didn't expect
that much from her. Know, they really didn't. She was
the third child of four of a very prominent Philadelphia family.
She has these amazing athlete parents. Her father was an Olympian,
her mother was the first woman to teach viz ed
(26:14):
at penn Um. But yeah, they she didn't really live
up to the family standard. She was really shy, she
wasn't athletic, she was kind of sickly. She had asthma
when she was a kid. But she was really serene,
and she was also really full of imagination. At one
point she told her older sister one day, I'm going
to be a princess, which probably most little girls say that,
(26:37):
and but in this story it seems like very telling
mine um and she gets into acting because of all
that imagination. It's not something her family initially approves of,
but she proves very good at it, and she had
to train herself to speak in a in a lower
tone and less nasally. But I suppose when you're from
(26:59):
a family of athletes and you can't play the field,
you have to play on the stage, and she was
determined to make that work. Yeah, she wasn't really well
suited for the stage though, um partly because of that boy.
She just didn't have much power behind it. But on
camera she was absolutely stunning, and she once she got
going on this film career, it was this amazing burst
(27:22):
of success and great films. She won an Academy Award.
It's weird, though, It's not like she started with a
few little parts and worked up from there. Most of
her success comes from this one screen test from nineteen
fifty which she didn't even get the part she was
auditioning for, but it got shown around Hollywood and she
(27:44):
became an overnight success. She really john Ford saw it,
Alfred Hitchcock saw it, they cast her, and she just
went from there. She's also pretty well known in her
Hollywood days for working out a really sweet studio deal.
Studios at the time would basically make their stars sign
their lives away, but she worked out a nice deal
(28:05):
where she could be a little more flexible with the
projects she chose and it paid off in she won
an oscar, she had four films and theaters, and she
made more money than any other female star. So this
is the pinnacle of her career. It looks like she's
just gonna keep on going and have decades ahead of
her great success. And then suddenly, suddenly she decides that
(28:29):
despite dating around and hooking it with some very eligible bachelor's,
she wants to get married. Yeah, according to her friend
and biographer Gwen Robbins, she didn't want to have to
age in Hollywood, which I can kind of understand that,
especially at this time. They're just may have not been
very many parts in another decade or two. But she
(28:51):
meets her princes at the nineteen Ken Film Festival, and
this is of course Rainier Grimaldi and he's the Prince
of Monico, which is a French principality, and it's it's tiny,
the postage it's a postage stamp, Sarah, I think that
you mean to know, is smaller than Central smaller than
Central Park. Um, but very beautiful, very picturesque. It looks
(29:16):
like old Europe. And so she sees that he's got
an offer she can't refuse, and um, not only that,
she has an offer that he can't refuse because his
former girlfriend, also an actress, was barren, so he needs
to ensure that he can create an air otherwise Monaco
gets handed over to France. So despite Grace Kelly having
(29:40):
all the features that he desires, he still demands that
when they get married. Uh, she hand over a two
million dollar dowry, which that's from life. I just I
can't get over that number. I mean, she her family
was very well off and she earned a lot of
money herself. That is so much money in the nineteen fifties.
(30:02):
One of her last films is kind of interesting considering
her future. It was called The Swan and in it
she played a princess, so while Rainier was courting her,
she was actually playing the part of a princess. A
dressed herself exactly and in the plot of the film,
she's torn between her younger love and the prince who
(30:23):
she's intended to marry. She ends up choosing the prince.
It all works out for her story in the end.
I can't imagine if that if the movie had been
a little different, it might have not fit very well.
And that film wrapped in December nine, and that marked
their official engagement on December twenty eight, so just a
(30:44):
few days after Christmas, she gets the best present ever,
a twelve carrot emerald cut diamond flanked by two by
She probably had to buy it herself, considering that you
better get a good ring. And what's funny about all
of these different subplots adding up into this, This one
big arc of her storyline is that she was engaged
(31:05):
at the time to fashion designer a like Cassini. So
Grace gets married in what is called the wedding of
the century. We're gonna have another one of those on
this list in a minute. Held held your Royal horse. Yeah,
but she calls it the Carnival of the century. And
it's easy to understand why. She arrives in Monaco on
a ship with an entourage of sixty six people. And
(31:26):
the law and tradition of the country has that a
civil ceremony comes before the religious ceremony. So that first
event takes place on April eighteenth n s and it's
in the throne room of the palace, and it's presided
by a high court official, and she wears this very
sharp beige lace dress and hat um it looks like
(31:49):
something she'd wear in a movie. Almost um. And then
they appear, they wave on the balcony to the crowd,
and then the big ceremony, the religious one happens the
next day, and that's the one that you'd probably recognize
pictures from right. And at the ceremony, there were two
thousand reporters. That's more reporters than there were guests. But
(32:10):
the guest list did have some very important people on it,
some v i p s for that day and age,
Carrie Grand Gloria Swanson, Ava Gardner, Conrad Hilton, Aristotle On Nassis,
but not in attendance. Notably it was Queen Elizabeth the
second it's a little too Dick Lasse reposedly thought there
were just too many movies guys. That's never held me
(32:31):
back from attending any events. But this, I mean, with
all this press, with all these stars there, this is
sort of the first major press event that we you know,
like we could think of later wedding, I mean, the
wedding might talk a film by MGM. Yeah, it's it's
this big to do. It's film by MGM. It's broadcast
live to thirty million people in Europe and bars even
(32:55):
make up. The signature cocktail called the Princess Cocktail with
bourbon and grenadine and fresh cream does not sound very
good to me. It sounds cool and icy like Grace
Kelly though. So this Grand Cathedral ceremony, Grace wore an
ivory gown made of silk, tafia and lace, and it
was designed by the famous Hollywood costume or Helen Rose.
(33:15):
It took six weeks and thirty six seamstresses to make.
It required twenty five yards of silk tafia, a hundred
yards of silk net, a hundred and twenty five year
old rose point lace from a museum. I mean, I
just bought some Halloween costume fabric this weekend, two yards.
I'm trying to imagine buying a hundred yards fabric Before
(33:37):
Grace Kelly. Uh, No one really did the big poofy
ballgowns for a wedding. This was unheard of, and today
that style is sort of alternately called ball gown or
princess style. And when you hear refer to princess style,
that's based off Grace Kelly's wedding. How about that? Thank you, TLC. Candice,
I sent my my hat to you. So the couple,
(33:59):
it's not a particular really intimate wedding surprise with all
these people here. The couple stay directed at the high altar,
and Kelly was visibly nervous during the whole thing. She
just just kind of whispering, um. Just if you you
can actually look up videos of it. And she looks
like eyes on the prize, not looking anywhere else, like
(34:21):
she's afraid she'll fall over or something. Um. But at
the end, this message from the Pope was read out loud,
and then the couple drove off through Monte Carlo and
a convertible and left their honeymoon, which was a multi
weeek cruise aboard a yacht. And on their honeymoon, she
became pregnant with Caroline, and she later popularized the Hermes
(34:45):
bag the Kelly because she would she would use this
really oversized purse to hide her what we did day
would call her baby bump. That was in a tabloid.
Today there'd be a little arrow, little question she isn't she?
But despite the joys of carrying a child and giving
birth to a child, married life was a little sour
(35:06):
for Grace Kelly. Yeah, she had hoped that maybe she'd
still be able to work a little bit, go to
Hollywood every now and then and make a movie. Her
husband was not into that idea. In fact, supposedly he
banned her films from even showing in Monaco. UM and
she later told her friend John Foreman, I know where
(35:26):
I'm going to be every single day for the rest
of my life, and that was not said in like
a happy way. I'm going to be in Monico, where
it's funny and beautiful. Um. Again, Monico smaller than Central Park,
so we can imagine kind of a restrictive, if glamorous life.
And she died tragically in a car crash in nineteen
(35:49):
And that untimely segue brings us to the last wedding
on our list. And by now you may have guessed
what it is. One of the biggest wedding spectacles of
our time, and that would be the wedding of Diana
and Charles. So Charles and I knew each other when
they were they were children, and they weren't exactly close
in age when they got married. She was twenty and
(36:11):
he was thirty two, but they had associated their families had,
so they were not unfamiliar with each other, and when
he proposed with a giant oval sapphire surrounded by fourteen diamonds,
thank you very much. She was a teacher, so she's
coming from not a modest exactly background, but something that
is not quite in the public eye to something that
is incredibly on the forefront of British society. Definitely, and
(36:36):
on her wedding day again, like Sarah was saying, you
can see footage of Grace Kelly's wedding online. You can
also see plenty of footage of Charles and Die's wedding
and she wore one of the most famous wedding gowns
of all time. It was an ivory silk gown designed
by David and Elizabeth Emmanuel and had lace accents and
big puffy sleeves hello nineteen eighties, gathered with little ribbons
(36:59):
and on four The designers didn't accommodate for the fact
that she would be transported to the wedding site in
a glass carriage, so when she got out she was
a little wrinkled. It must have been hot and uncomfortable
in the carriage. And as to mention that twenty five
ft train taking up that much space, and the dress
was made in just four months. And these people who
designed the gown, the Emmanuels, they were the same designers
(37:21):
who put together the dress that she wore. Wind Arles
and I announced their formal engagement and this was sort
of the start of maybe a couple of people in
British society raising an eyebrow at Diana because the dress
was very highly criticized. People said it was too low cut,
and it was black, and at the time black didn't
necessarily mean that you were a chic and meant that
(37:43):
you were in mourning. I think Diana later proved black
was one of the best colors on her though, definitely.
So this wedding was televised in fifty eight countries. It
was an hour and a half long ceremony that had
thirty five hundred in attendance and seven hundred fifty million
watching on DV and I believe in neglected to say
(38:04):
the date, So let me correct that right now, ju Lie.
And not only is this a national holiday in Britain,
but it's a total moneymaker. There's so much memorabilia going
around displaying the new Royal couple, porcelain plates and cups
and stamps and photo collages, and in one story I
read there was a woman who had been seven hundred
(38:26):
dollars for a slice of cake from the wedding. Yeah,
and of course I was attended by a lot of
bridesmaids too, and most of them were had royal connections,
but not all of them. There was one little girl
named Sarah Jane who was the daughter of Charles friend
and longtime horse trainer, and she actually kept up a
correspondence with Diana after the wedding and basically explained to
(38:48):
Diana that she was miserable at boarding school and I
had done her time at boarding school too, so she
commiserated and how to suite letter writing campaign with her.
But if you believe in uhi or telltale signs, there
were a couple of gaffs during the ceremony that perhaps
predicted the marriage would not be a fairy tale one. Yeah,
she got Charles names out of order, she did. He
(39:10):
has a lot, of course, yes, And the name that
she essentially called him was his father's name. And then
he forgot to kiss her at the altar. They later
did a public kiss on the balcony at Buckingham Palace,
but that was a gaff for sure, definitely, But after
those gaffs, after the ceremony is complete and they make
their appearance to the public, they go in their honeymoon
(39:30):
at the family estate in Broadlands, and then they go
on a twelve day Mediterranean cruise, much like Grace Kelly. Again,
it's kind of an abbreviated Mediterranean cruise but still um
and Diana's brother, who was only about sixteen at the
time of the wedding, later revealed that she had a
terrible headache for the entire thing because she had this
(39:51):
tierra pinching her her temples and head. Yeah, she wasn't
used to wearing a tiara obviously, and even though it
came from this spend her family was um one of
their heirlooms. Yeah, we know from dies later works in
her life she was probably more comfortable in the garb
of humanitarian worker than wearing her tr although she did
(40:14):
cut a fabulous figure in an evening gown as well.
She just she wore so many hats. Not to make
a pun there, but she did. And then the marriage again,
this is another one that ends on a sad note.
It did not work out and you all probably know
why Charles supposedly had kept up his romantic dalliances with
Camilla Parker Bowls, to whom he is now married. So
(40:35):
the couple separated in the late nineteen eighties and formally
announced their split in Nino, and then on August thirty one,
Diana was killed in a car crash. Yeah, and Charles
got a little credit after that for insisting that she'd
be given a royal funeral even though that wasn't the
protocol since they were a divorce couple. And that also
(40:58):
was televised on TV and in the world watched on
very sadly to see the princess gone way too earline,
but it kind of brings us to our clothes here.
There's another possible royal wedding on the horizon, at least
all the gossip mag's keep on covering it trying to
guess what it is. And that is of course between
Charles and Diana's eldest son William and his longtime girlfriend Kate.
(41:24):
So we'll see if we have another royal wedding to
add to this list. Hopefully, if it does take place,
it'll be a much happier marriage than some of these
and a less wringled wedding gown. Definitely. All right. Well,
I guess that about wraps it up. Do you have
anything else you want to add? Thank you so much
for having me. Yeah, it's been fun, canvas Um. If
(41:44):
you want to email us or suggest any other favorite
royal wedding stories, you can find us on Twitter at
Miston History. We're on Facebook, and we also, of course
have an old fashioned email address. It's History podcast at
pasta works dot com. And if you want to look
for any of Candice's great wedding content, you can find
it at TLC. And if you want to learn a
(42:06):
little more about royalty, go to the homepage and search
for royalty at www dot how stuff works dot com,
the House stuff Works dot com. My phone app is
coming soon. Get access to our content in a new way, articles, videos,
and more all on the go. Check out the latest
podcast and blog posts, and see what we're saying on
(42:27):
Facebook and Twitter. Coming soon to iTunes
Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how
Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, welcome to the podcast. I'm
Sarah Dowdy and I'm very happy to be here with
a very special guest today. Hi everybody, it's Candice. She's
(00:23):
back vintage stuff you missed in History class podcasting. Well,
in Canadas, we always get emails asking where you've gone
or where you are, and I usually just say she's
sitting right behind me in the cube. But I mean
you could probably elaborate a little more than that. Well,
I have switched my focus from history to weddings, which
(00:44):
is actually a lot of fun. I've been working on
the TLC Weddings website, and if you haven't visited yet,
you really should, even if you're not planning a wedding yourself.
You can get some fun information on modern trends and
classic trends, fashion tips, fast and tips, flower tips. All
of that, and one more fun piece of vintage stuff
(01:05):
you missed in history class news that pertains to weddings.
One of your other favorite hosts from the Days of
your Jane McGrath, just recently got engaged, so she'll be
flooding that website to congratulations with Jane and Um. I'm
very excited to record this episode with UGANDAE and so
we actually picked a theme that was sort of fitting
(01:26):
with Candice's new role at Housta Forks and tlc Um
and that is, of course, weddings. And when we picked
these five weddings, I told Sarah we should pick some
of our favorite weddings in history, and all but one
turned out to have rather sad endings. So we're going
to start with the happiest and when we're done, go
(01:46):
ahead and get out your vintage lace Hankyes, because all
goes down very lovely weddings, but some kind of sad marriages.
We picked tragedies, I guess. But yeah, this first one
is good and it's probably one of the best known
historical weddings, i'd say, just because of how many wedding
trends it ultimately established. Right, We'll say that the marriage
(02:08):
of Victoria and Albert on February tenth, eighteen forties set
some precedents for modern brides. And most of you probably
know that the reason bride today were white is because
Victoria started that tradition. She started so many trends she did,
I think using ether during childbirth. That's a cool Victoria trend.
Thanks for that, Victoria. So here's a little history on Victoria.
(02:31):
She became queen in eighteen thirty seven and she was
just eighteen years old, and her wedding was the first
one since fifteen fifty four when a throned queen took
a husband. And we mentioned that she set the tone
for modern weddings by wearing white, but she also chose
when to wed and whom. Yeah, they were a love match,
(02:52):
which was something quite surprising for royalty in general at
the time, but especially a queen choosing who she's going
to marry. And the person she chose with Albert, who
was her German cousin, the Prince Consort. They met in
eighteen thirty six and were engaged just three years later.
And while I personally hate snakes and demanded a big
honking diamond, Victoria asked or received rather a snake ring
(03:17):
with diamond eyes, which seems so punk for Victoria. It's
just not in keeping at all with the woman I
imagine her. But I guess snakes are more of a
trend back then. It was a symbol actually, the snakes
coil symbolized the bonds of eternal love, just like we
think of the circle of a wedding Van Cleopatri style.
(03:39):
I guess, there you go, um, But this is an
old superstition. I guess that a rainy wedding day is
actually good luck. And maybe in this case it proved
too true because they had a rainy wedding day, but
ultimately a very happy marriage together they did. It was
an early wedding, it was in the middle of the day,
(04:01):
and it was followed by a breakfast. Celebration took place
at St James's Palace, and they had a very grand
procession from Buckingham Palace to St James's and the procession
included her twelve bridesmaids. And I mentioned she had a
white gown, which was unusual for the time because before
her any time of royal got married, she would wear
(04:22):
a very heavy brocade gown and lots of jewels and
ermine cloak. And she wanted something lighter and more feminine.
But the one aristocratic element that she did demand was
handmade lace. Yeah, didn't it take about two hundred people
to make all of the lace? It did, And by
this time in the Victorian era, a lot of fabric
(04:43):
making was automated or a machine made, but she wasn't
real that's right. So it was a happy day and
an even happier wedding night. We have a little glimpse
from Victoria's journal and she had this to say about it.
The wedding night was all moonlight and roses and a
fair wind and the pleasures of sex. So it sounds
(05:05):
like a good time for the satisfied couple. But I
mean they go on to have a very successful marriage
and a successful reign. It's actually debt free, which is
kind of amazing considering um how much a queen would
normally spend. Right, but that just goes to demonstrate one
of the concepts that we associate with Victorianism, and that's thrift, friends,
(05:29):
frugality's right. And Jillian gil who's a biographer who wrote
we two about Victoria and Albert, she says that their
relationship illustrates so many different Victorian concepts and these are
just a few. You've got faith and thrift, which we've mentioned, discipline, patriotism, responsibility,
and stability. They really were a model for the whole country.
(05:50):
And they also have a very fruitful marriage. They have
nine kids, and they also helped popularize that family portrait
of you know, the doting mother and the dutiful father
and all of their babies and children surrounding them. Which
is needless to say that when Albert died in eighteen
sixty one, Victoria was just crushed. There had been some
(06:11):
of the happiest years of her life, and without him
she became very depressed and more black until her death
in nine one, when she died from natural causes. Our
next wedding and marriage on this list is going to
be equally grand, but a lot more tragic than the last.
It's also a royal wedding though. It's Louis the fourteenth
(06:32):
and Maria Theresa of Spain um, So we're gonna give
a little background on this just because they're The circumstances
of the couple's birth are really interesting, I think, so
Louis the fourteenth was a surprise. The French were really
hoping for an air but his mother was thirty six,
almost thirty seven years old, and she hadn't given birth
(06:52):
to a living child yet. Then all of a sudden
outcomes Louis the fourteenth, this healthy baby boy, and only
five days later his mother and brother, Philip the Fourth,
who is the King of Spain, has a daughter, and
Anne is immediately thinking, oh, well, perfect, as most modern
(07:13):
mothers would, there are your cousin's. This little niece of
mine can someday be the wife of my son. This
was especially an especially tantalizing match because Maria Theresa had
a claim to the Spanish throne at one point, so
it would be a very nice match for the King
of France. But okay, so they're not just cousins. This
(07:35):
is a little disturbing to modern listeners, probably their double cousin.
So they're the product of a French brother and sister
married to a Spanish brother and sister. Um. And actually
one of the families is the Habsburgs too, and they're
notoriously inbred already. So it's amazing that this line continues.
It's actually a successful match. Um. But it doesn't seem
(07:59):
like this marriage is necessarily going to happen for a while,
and that's because Spain and France are just constantly at
war with each other. Um. But guess what. Finally they
work out a piece in the Piece of the Pyrenees
in sixteen fifty nine, and a major part of the
deal is going to be cementing the alliance with this
(08:20):
marriage between cousins. Yes, and Louis had actually already found
his first great love, but he was prepared to do
his part and to marry Maria Theresa. And similarly, she's
ready to do her part for God and country and
family as well. Yeah, and she's had this rather sad
childhood too, is is so many of these royal kids do.
(08:42):
She loses her mother really early. Um, So, I think
she's looking forward to having a new maternal figure in
Anne of Austria, her aunt who has really taken her
on as a protege almost her entire life. After the
engagement was arranged, Louis wrote to Marie Therese to it
was not without constraint that I yielded up till now
(09:04):
to the arguments which prevented me from expressing to your
Majesty the sentiments of my heart. And then he continued,
I am delighted to begin to reassure her Majesty by
these lines that happiness could not arrive at anyone who
more passionately wishes for it, nor anyone feel themselves happier
in possessing it. So that's a nice sweet letter. It's
in very formal terms, but phil before thinks it's a
(09:27):
little too much for his daughter to even be receiving,
won't let her read the letter. Uh. Finally, the proxy
marriage goes through, which I've always thought is so such
a strange custom. But I guess you don't want to
send your unmarried virgin daughter off across Europe alone unless
she's this legally wedded woman. But they have this proxy
(09:49):
marriage in Spain. It's near the border. It takes place
on June three, sixteen sixty, and of course Louis isn't there.
That's why it's a proxy marriage. There's this Spanish dignitary.
So I just can't imagine how strange it would be
to go up there, have all the valves read and
her sided, and there's this stranger standing next to you. Yes,
(10:09):
this proxy ceremony was definitely not a precursor of the
modern wedding. And what made it even stranger for the
French is that Maria Theresa was decidedly Spanish. Yes, I mean,
think of those wide skirts he might recognize in Velaska's paintings,
because of course Vlaska's is the court painter at the time.
Um She also has these piles of false hair, the
(10:32):
sort of Buffont styled hair under like a sixteen sixty
snicky on they so all these jewels. I think the
French people in attendance were kind of shocked, maybe a
little disappointed, disapproving of this future queen of theirs, but
you know, what are you gonna do? Not much so
now she becomes Marie Terrez and she's ready for Lily. Yeah.
(10:55):
So France's royal party has been on the way. It
takes a while to to stay in these days, and
the wedding is planned for June nine near Bordeaux. Queen
Anne is so excited. This is her life long, or
not her life long, but as long as her son's
been around, this has been her dream for him. And
she's really sweet too. She even writes to Marie um
(11:18):
back when the engagement is set up that addressing her
as her daughter and her niece. So she's definitely looking
forward to bringing this new daughter into her life. And
this is a wedding at its best. It's essentially a
family reunion too, which is what weddings really are today. Yeah, definitely.
So the couple catch their first glimpse of each other
(11:39):
when the brother and sister Philip and Anne are finally
reunited after four years, which is unbelievable. I can't imagine
going you're an only child, I am an only house,
so I guess I really can't imagine. She really can't.
But I mean it's just a strange. I mean, they're
in contact with each other during that time, but how
(12:00):
strange to be at war with your own brother's right
with your sibling. Um. They have a very restrained meeting,
these two siblings after so long. They don't hug each other,
but they both apparently had tears in their eye. But meanwhile,
the young people are trying to figure out how to
catch a little glimpse of each other. What am I
getting into? What does he look like? What does she
look like? Exactly? Um Louie has given permission to ride
(12:22):
near the window of the chamber where this meeting is
happening and where um Maria is, And instead of being
discreet and riding by kind of far away, just getting
his little peek at her, he wants to come disguise
to the door and actually meet her. He's not allowed
to do this. Um Murray is not allowed to acknowledge
his salute, but they do get to catch this glimpse
(12:45):
of each other, and he pronounces that she'll be easy
to love, and she admits that he is certainly very handsome,
which Louis had a major reputation for being a handsome
guy and a youth. So despite his dashing good lucks,
when she has to leave Spain, she's very tearful. This
is goodbye to Helm and she knows that her new
life is about to begin, and this is a very
(13:05):
grave matter for someone of her age. Yeah, definitely. So
the real marriage happens just a couple of days later,
June and night, and it takes place in the thirteenth
century church. And I think this is such an interesting detail.
But it's such a big deal that the wedding happens
here that the door the couple passes through is blocked
(13:26):
up after the ceremony. It's still blocked up today. So
if you wanted to go through it, too bad you
could not lock down that aisle um and she I
guess her style gets a little more French in the
in the days between the proxy marriage. In this marriage,
she wears a gown covered in Florida lee, and her
hair she doesn't have all this fake snooky hair on anymore.
(13:49):
She has her nice, thick blonde hair. It's actually so
thick that they can't really attach the crown to it
very well. And her train is carried by two princesses,
and she cuts as much of a figure as she can.
I guess she's very pale. She's these bright blue eyes.
She has a habsburg lip, which we would not really
(14:10):
regard as a very beautiful feature nowadays, but at the
time status symbol. Yeah, it meant you were your royalty,
you were in good job exactly. Meanwhile, Louis is in
black velvet and jewels, and immediately after the ceremonial dinner,
he escorts her to the boudoir. Yeah, and Anne closes
(14:33):
the curtains on them, which I think would be a
little awkward. I guess it's good they didn't stick around.
That happens with some of the royal couples we've discussed before.
The parents actually hang around. So this is a plus again,
not not a tradition that was carried over into into
modern weddings, not um. And this is interesting. Supposedly, Murray
(14:54):
Trius uses the opportunity of their first night together to
make Louis p almost that he'll always spend the night
with her, or at least he'll come to bed with
her eventually, and I mean over the course of their marriage.
There's some pretty late nights where he's out and about,
but he really does always come back to her bed
and then gets up and goes to his own room.
(15:16):
In the morning. She sleeps in as many of the
Spanish royals did. I just think that's a it's kind
of a sweet gesture. It is well in considering that
he was her only family in her home. It was
important to her to have that continuity. Uh So, at
least in bed. The relationship, the marriage, it's a good one.
(15:39):
But from a practical point of view. Whereas you may
enjoy reading the newspaper with your spouse or going to
the park grey and taking, they don't have anything to
do together. No, And and one of the major problems
there she has not been taught French, or at least
very good French, which seems like a very big oversight
for somebody who might grow up to be the French
(16:01):
an integral part of a good marriage. Seking the thing,
but I think it was literally I think it would
definitely help. And she doesn't even really make a big
effort to learn French. She sticks to all of her
Spanish women and her dwarves and hangs out with her dogs,
and she loves gambling and not all of the more
intellectual pursuits that Louie is so fond of. She's not
(16:23):
into dancing. She's really shy. You know. They just they
really don't. They don't click much in common with each other. Um.
I do think it's it's interesting to learn a little
bit about her, though, because we think so much of
Louis in relation to all of his famous mistresses, and
we think about his later marriage, which actually Katie and
(16:44):
I did a podcast on Madame de Mountaine m about
a year ago. But I feel like his wife never
really gets any play here. Well, she certainly had her
play today and and we will conclude her life story
in the Tale of their Marriage by saying that she
died after a very sudden illness at just age forty five.
(17:04):
And according to our records, one of the things that
she said before leaving his world was since I have
been Queen, I have had only one happy day. We
don't know what day. That was, probably a dwarf day,
not the wedding, not the wedding day. And this is
maybe even more tragic. After death, Louis said, this is
(17:25):
the first trouble she has ever given me, which, oh,
that's heartbreaking, it is. And on that note from Louis,
let's flash forward to another very eligible bachelor of his time,
and that is the dashingly handsome jfk Jr. And everyone
in the United States who was around at the time
(17:47):
of John Kennedy's dath remembers little John John flashing his
salute and being just the cutest child and the whole country.
And as he got older, he became very handsome, very rugged,
very outdoorsy, very athletic, and incredibly desirable. He was deemed
the nation's most eligible bachelor. And he was thirty five
when he met the twenty nine year old Caroline. The sets, yeah,
(18:10):
and they dated for about two years. And the way
they met is great, modern and hip it is. And
people talk about Caroline as being like the more modern
version of a Jackie. She had the class, she had
the posture, she had the carriage, she had the clothes,
but she put a more contemporary spin on the things
(18:31):
that she did. She was a publicist at Calvin Klein
and one of the things that she did for Calvin
Klein was helps celebrities pick close and of course jfk Jr.
Was quite a celebrity. So when he came in shopping
four some suits, she was hooked up with him. And
I would like to say that the rest of his history,
but it was a little complicated because they were never
(18:51):
formally linked in the public eye. There were rumors abounding
that he was still dating Darryl Hannah and Caroline, of course,
being the sassy blonde she was, was a commodity in
her own right, and at this time JFK Jr. Was
the owner and co editor of the political magazine George,
so very much on the New York social scene, very
(19:13):
much a hot item. So who would have thought that
this couple could have escaped to an island in the
United States, gotten married and no one knew about it.
Suddenly they're married. It's it's unbelievable that they managed to
get away with it. It It was the ultimate secret wedding.
And um, I have to brag a little bit because
(19:34):
where they chose to wed Cumberland Island, which is a
barrier island, in Georgia. It's just eighteen miles by three miles.
This is actually just off the peninsula where I grew
up in St. Mary's, Georgia, and it's near where my
grandfather grew up. So we both have claimed to thing
to compend. And if you've never made it to Cumberland,
you simply must go. It's gorgeous. There are fantastic ruins
(19:56):
of great homes that were owned by the Yes, they
were own by the Carnagies back in the day. And
there is still an in a fantastically expensive and luxurious
and gray field where you can stay and wild horses
run the beach, beautiful untouched beaches. And there's no bridge either,
so if you get there you have to take a ferry. Yes,
so Caroline and JFK Jr. Flying to the St. Mary's
(20:19):
airport and uh, some women come out from the county
courthouse to issue their marriage licenses and they file for
them separately. And like I said, there's been no formal
engagement announcement, no formal wedding announcement. No one knows that
this is happening, not even the people involved in arranging
the wedding. Right. Well, there are a few people who
(20:39):
have an idea as to what's going on, and that
would include Go Go Ferguson, whose family had lived on
the island for six generations. She helped plan the wedding
and she designed their wedding bands. And then the White
House Rose Garden designer Rachel Bunny Mellon was in the
now and the man who had been Jackie's lifelong butler
did the altar green. But other people who were more
(21:02):
shall we say, the talent at the wedding, thank you
the talent at the wedding, like for instance, the Usue
Florida man who came in to seeing gospel acapella. He
had no idea that he'd be singing for JFK Jr.
And Caroline Bassett, and he describes how before the ceremony began,
they pulled him aside and said, we'd really like READU
sing amazing Grace. And he's sort of wide eyed at
this point, I can't believe this is happening. And if
(21:25):
you look at the one picture and that's so popular
in the media of this wedding, it's of of John
and Caroline descending the steps of this eighteen nineties three
cabin it's essentially a cabinet's the first African Baptist church
on the island. There was no electricity, so the whole
ceremony was illuminated by candle light. And he's in a
suit and his father's watch. And she's in this gorgeous
(21:48):
pearl white silk crape gallanbine her sister Rodriguez, and she's
got silk gloves and a rolled silk tool veil and
a hair clip that belonged to Jackie. Oh, and he's
kissing her hand. It's just gorgeous. It's modern royal to well,
and her gown kind of kicked off a look for
that style, I'd say it did. It's that zipper less
over the head she it's the opposite of the princess exactly.
(22:11):
It's that form fitting style. And it's the kind of
style that earned her this description and w magazine when
they called Caroline a cool blonde with something sexy, even
raunchy about her. I like the little voice and emphasis
you put on that unchy about her, But it was
sweet about the wedding. Is that. According to at least
one report, when she came down from the church steps,
(22:33):
she was carrying a bouquet lily at the valley, and
supposedly one of the wild horses of Cumberland came out
and nibbled from it. And I think that might be sensational,
I I have they're really shy. They are shy. And
I had a friend once who went with me to
the island when I was in college, and there are
new porter partties on Cumberland. Once you hit the beach,
and she was relieving herself behind a sand dune and
(22:55):
horse snuck up on her. But that was the closest
I have ever heard of a horse coming to a human.
And I went on a class trip in about fourth grade,
so it wouldn't have been too long before this wedding actually,
and the horses came up near our campsite, but as
soon as they saw us, they were out of there,
not nibbling on any bouquase. Well maybe they knew that
it was Caroline Basette Kennedy's bouquet. Well anyway, so all
(23:18):
of that aside, horse stories, et cetera. Um. They had
a very nice reception at the gray Field End. It
was perfectly intimate and private, only about forty guests. And
you may be thinking forty people. That's not even the
whole Kennedy plan. Well, no, it wasn't. They had to
leave some people out to ensure their privacy, and after
the wedding occurred, it wasn't until Sunday afternoon. I believed
(23:41):
that the press kind of got a hint of what
had happened, and by the time they descended on Cumberland,
the couple was gone for their honeymoon in Turkey, and
one of the earliest confirmations of the marriage came from
Caroline Kennedy Schlosberg, who flashed a thumbs up sign at
a reporter who took her picture. Pretty discreet, pretty family.
(24:01):
Um so this, unfortunately, it sounds like a lovely wedding,
but it unfortunately culminated in a very tumultuous marriage. And
some would say this is all part of the Kennedy curse.
But the marriage did not work out as far as
we can tell, and they were married for just a
few short years before uh their sad deaths. But uh,
(24:23):
he wanted kids, She wasn't sure she wanted kids. They
both accused each other of having affairs. They lived apart.
Caroline did not enjoy being scrutinized by the public their
reports that she was depressed and continued to use cocaine,
and her sister Lauren urged the two of them to
reconcile and attend Rory Kennedy's wedding together and more at
(24:44):
this vineyard, and this was in the summer of John
agreed to fly all three of them in his single
engine plane and as you may remember, it crashed in
the ocean on July six, and navy divers later recovered
their bodies. So another tragic wedding on our list, But
we have the beautiful picture and I'm sure that that
is how the couple would would want to be remembered.
(25:08):
So from one cool blonde to another. The next lady
in our list is the beautiful Grace Kelly and her
marriage to the Prince of Monaco. So Grace Kelly is
definitely known for living up to her name. You know,
she's stylish, she's beautiful. She was described by Alfred Hitchcock
as a snow covered volcano, just because when you look
(25:31):
at her in screen, she looks so poised and collected,
but there's so much emotion underneath. She seems like she
could just erupt at any moment, and I think from
what I read about her, that's kind of how she
was in person. She was a very fiery woman who
sort of kept it all in a neat package. And
(25:52):
what was interesting about Grace Kelly is that she knew
what she wanted in life, but her family didn't expect
that much from her. Know, they really didn't. She was
the third child of four of a very prominent Philadelphia family.
She has these amazing athlete parents. Her father was an Olympian,
her mother was the first woman to teach viz ed
(26:14):
at penn Um. But yeah, they she didn't really live
up to the family standard. She was really shy, she
wasn't athletic, she was kind of sickly. She had asthma
when she was a kid. But she was really serene,
and she was also really full of imagination. At one
point she told her older sister one day, I'm going
to be a princess, which probably most little girls say that,
(26:37):
and but in this story it seems like very telling
mine um and she gets into acting because of all
that imagination. It's not something her family initially approves of,
but she proves very good at it, and she had
to train herself to speak in a in a lower
tone and less nasally. But I suppose when you're from
(26:59):
a family of athletes and you can't play the field,
you have to play on the stage, and she was
determined to make that work. Yeah, she wasn't really well
suited for the stage though, um partly because of that boy.
She just didn't have much power behind it. But on
camera she was absolutely stunning, and she once she got
going on this film career, it was this amazing burst
(27:22):
of success and great films. She won an Academy Award.
It's weird, though, It's not like she started with a
few little parts and worked up from there. Most of
her success comes from this one screen test from nineteen
fifty which she didn't even get the part she was
auditioning for, but it got shown around Hollywood and she
(27:44):
became an overnight success. She really john Ford saw it,
Alfred Hitchcock saw it, they cast her, and she just
went from there. She's also pretty well known in her
Hollywood days for working out a really sweet studio deal.
Studios at the time would basically make their stars sign
their lives away, but she worked out a nice deal
(28:05):
where she could be a little more flexible with the
projects she chose and it paid off in she won
an oscar, she had four films and theaters, and she
made more money than any other female star. So this
is the pinnacle of her career. It looks like she's
just gonna keep on going and have decades ahead of
her great success. And then suddenly, suddenly she decides that
(28:29):
despite dating around and hooking it with some very eligible bachelor's,
she wants to get married. Yeah, according to her friend
and biographer Gwen Robbins, she didn't want to have to
age in Hollywood, which I can kind of understand that,
especially at this time. They're just may have not been
very many parts in another decade or two. But she
(28:51):
meets her princes at the nineteen Ken Film Festival, and
this is of course Rainier Grimaldi and he's the Prince
of Monico, which is a French principality, and it's it's tiny,
the postage it's a postage stamp, Sarah, I think that
you mean to know, is smaller than Central smaller than
Central Park. Um, but very beautiful, very picturesque. It looks
(29:16):
like old Europe. And so she sees that he's got
an offer she can't refuse, and um, not only that,
she has an offer that he can't refuse because his
former girlfriend, also an actress, was barren, so he needs
to ensure that he can create an air otherwise Monaco
gets handed over to France. So despite Grace Kelly having
(29:40):
all the features that he desires, he still demands that
when they get married. Uh, she hand over a two
million dollar dowry, which that's from life. I just I
can't get over that number. I mean, she her family
was very well off and she earned a lot of
money herself. That is so much money in the nineteen fifties.
(30:02):
One of her last films is kind of interesting considering
her future. It was called The Swan and in it
she played a princess, so while Rainier was courting her,
she was actually playing the part of a princess. A
dressed herself exactly and in the plot of the film,
she's torn between her younger love and the prince who
(30:23):
she's intended to marry. She ends up choosing the prince.
It all works out for her story in the end.
I can't imagine if that if the movie had been
a little different, it might have not fit very well.
And that film wrapped in December nine, and that marked
their official engagement on December twenty eight, so just a
(30:44):
few days after Christmas, she gets the best present ever,
a twelve carrot emerald cut diamond flanked by two by
She probably had to buy it herself, considering that you
better get a good ring. And what's funny about all
of these different subplots adding up into this, This one
big arc of her storyline is that she was engaged
(31:05):
at the time to fashion designer a like Cassini. So
Grace gets married in what is called the wedding of
the century. We're gonna have another one of those on
this list in a minute. Held held your Royal horse. Yeah,
but she calls it the Carnival of the century. And
it's easy to understand why. She arrives in Monaco on
a ship with an entourage of sixty six people. And
(31:26):
the law and tradition of the country has that a
civil ceremony comes before the religious ceremony. So that first
event takes place on April eighteenth n s and it's
in the throne room of the palace, and it's presided
by a high court official, and she wears this very
sharp beige lace dress and hat um it looks like
(31:49):
something she'd wear in a movie. Almost um. And then
they appear, they wave on the balcony to the crowd,
and then the big ceremony, the religious one happens the
next day, and that's the one that you'd probably recognize
pictures from right. And at the ceremony, there were two
thousand reporters. That's more reporters than there were guests. But
(32:10):
the guest list did have some very important people on it,
some v i p s for that day and age,
Carrie Grand Gloria Swanson, Ava Gardner, Conrad Hilton, Aristotle On Nassis,
but not in attendance. Notably it was Queen Elizabeth the
second it's a little too Dick Lasse reposedly thought there
were just too many movies guys. That's never held me
(32:31):
back from attending any events. But this, I mean, with
all this press, with all these stars there, this is
sort of the first major press event that we you know,
like we could think of later wedding, I mean, the
wedding might talk a film by MGM. Yeah, it's it's
this big to do. It's film by MGM. It's broadcast
live to thirty million people in Europe and bars even
(32:55):
make up. The signature cocktail called the Princess Cocktail with
bourbon and grenadine and fresh cream does not sound very
good to me. It sounds cool and icy like Grace
Kelly though. So this Grand Cathedral ceremony, Grace wore an
ivory gown made of silk, tafia and lace, and it
was designed by the famous Hollywood costume or Helen Rose.
(33:15):
It took six weeks and thirty six seamstresses to make.
It required twenty five yards of silk tafia, a hundred
yards of silk net, a hundred and twenty five year
old rose point lace from a museum. I mean, I
just bought some Halloween costume fabric this weekend, two yards.
I'm trying to imagine buying a hundred yards fabric Before
(33:37):
Grace Kelly. Uh, No one really did the big poofy
ballgowns for a wedding. This was unheard of, and today
that style is sort of alternately called ball gown or
princess style. And when you hear refer to princess style,
that's based off Grace Kelly's wedding. How about that? Thank you, TLC. Candice,
I sent my my hat to you. So the couple,
(33:59):
it's not a particular really intimate wedding surprise with all
these people here. The couple stay directed at the high altar,
and Kelly was visibly nervous during the whole thing. She
just just kind of whispering, um. Just if you you
can actually look up videos of it. And she looks
like eyes on the prize, not looking anywhere else, like
(34:21):
she's afraid she'll fall over or something. Um. But at
the end, this message from the Pope was read out loud,
and then the couple drove off through Monte Carlo and
a convertible and left their honeymoon, which was a multi
weeek cruise aboard a yacht. And on their honeymoon, she
became pregnant with Caroline, and she later popularized the Hermes
(34:45):
bag the Kelly because she would she would use this
really oversized purse to hide her what we did day
would call her baby bump. That was in a tabloid.
Today there'd be a little arrow, little question she isn't she?
But despite the joys of carrying a child and giving
birth to a child, married life was a little sour
(35:06):
for Grace Kelly. Yeah, she had hoped that maybe she'd
still be able to work a little bit, go to
Hollywood every now and then and make a movie. Her
husband was not into that idea. In fact, supposedly he
banned her films from even showing in Monaco. UM and
she later told her friend John Foreman, I know where
(35:26):
I'm going to be every single day for the rest
of my life, and that was not said in like
a happy way. I'm going to be in Monico, where
it's funny and beautiful. Um. Again, Monico smaller than Central Park,
so we can imagine kind of a restrictive, if glamorous life.
And she died tragically in a car crash in nineteen
(35:49):
And that untimely segue brings us to the last wedding
on our list. And by now you may have guessed
what it is. One of the biggest wedding spectacles of
our time, and that would be the wedding of Diana
and Charles. So Charles and I knew each other when
they were they were children, and they weren't exactly close
in age when they got married. She was twenty and
(36:11):
he was thirty two, but they had associated their families had,
so they were not unfamiliar with each other, and when
he proposed with a giant oval sapphire surrounded by fourteen diamonds,
thank you very much. She was a teacher, so she's
coming from not a modest exactly background, but something that
is not quite in the public eye to something that
is incredibly on the forefront of British society. Definitely, and
(36:36):
on her wedding day again, like Sarah was saying, you
can see footage of Grace Kelly's wedding online. You can
also see plenty of footage of Charles and Die's wedding
and she wore one of the most famous wedding gowns
of all time. It was an ivory silk gown designed
by David and Elizabeth Emmanuel and had lace accents and
big puffy sleeves hello nineteen eighties, gathered with little ribbons
(36:59):
and on four The designers didn't accommodate for the fact
that she would be transported to the wedding site in
a glass carriage, so when she got out she was
a little wrinkled. It must have been hot and uncomfortable
in the carriage. And as to mention that twenty five
ft train taking up that much space, and the dress
was made in just four months. And these people who
designed the gown, the Emmanuels, they were the same designers
(37:21):
who put together the dress that she wore. Wind Arles
and I announced their formal engagement and this was sort
of the start of maybe a couple of people in
British society raising an eyebrow at Diana because the dress
was very highly criticized. People said it was too low cut,
and it was black, and at the time black didn't
necessarily mean that you were a chic and meant that
(37:43):
you were in mourning. I think Diana later proved black
was one of the best colors on her though, definitely.
So this wedding was televised in fifty eight countries. It
was an hour and a half long ceremony that had
thirty five hundred in attendance and seven hundred fifty million
watching on DV and I believe in neglected to say
(38:04):
the date, So let me correct that right now, ju Lie.
And not only is this a national holiday in Britain,
but it's a total moneymaker. There's so much memorabilia going
around displaying the new Royal couple, porcelain plates and cups
and stamps and photo collages, and in one story I
read there was a woman who had been seven hundred
(38:26):
dollars for a slice of cake from the wedding. Yeah,
and of course I was attended by a lot of
bridesmaids too, and most of them were had royal connections,
but not all of them. There was one little girl
named Sarah Jane who was the daughter of Charles friend
and longtime horse trainer, and she actually kept up a
correspondence with Diana after the wedding and basically explained to
(38:48):
Diana that she was miserable at boarding school and I
had done her time at boarding school too, so she
commiserated and how to suite letter writing campaign with her.
But if you believe in uhi or telltale signs, there
were a couple of gaffs during the ceremony that perhaps
predicted the marriage would not be a fairy tale one. Yeah,
she got Charles names out of order, she did. He
(39:10):
has a lot, of course, yes, And the name that
she essentially called him was his father's name. And then
he forgot to kiss her at the altar. They later
did a public kiss on the balcony at Buckingham Palace,
but that was a gaff for sure, definitely, But after
those gaffs, after the ceremony is complete and they make
their appearance to the public, they go in their honeymoon
(39:30):
at the family estate in Broadlands, and then they go
on a twelve day Mediterranean cruise, much like Grace Kelly. Again,
it's kind of an abbreviated Mediterranean cruise but still um
and Diana's brother, who was only about sixteen at the
time of the wedding, later revealed that she had a
terrible headache for the entire thing because she had this
(39:51):
tierra pinching her her temples and head. Yeah, she wasn't
used to wearing a tiara obviously, and even though it
came from this spend her family was um one of
their heirlooms. Yeah, we know from dies later works in
her life she was probably more comfortable in the garb
of humanitarian worker than wearing her tr although she did
(40:14):
cut a fabulous figure in an evening gown as well.
She just she wore so many hats. Not to make
a pun there, but she did. And then the marriage again,
this is another one that ends on a sad note.
It did not work out and you all probably know
why Charles supposedly had kept up his romantic dalliances with
Camilla Parker Bowls, to whom he is now married. So
(40:35):
the couple separated in the late nineteen eighties and formally
announced their split in Nino, and then on August thirty one,
Diana was killed in a car crash. Yeah, and Charles
got a little credit after that for insisting that she'd
be given a royal funeral even though that wasn't the
protocol since they were a divorce couple. And that also
(40:58):
was televised on TV and in the world watched on
very sadly to see the princess gone way too earline,
but it kind of brings us to our clothes here.
There's another possible royal wedding on the horizon, at least
all the gossip mag's keep on covering it trying to
guess what it is. And that is of course between
Charles and Diana's eldest son William and his longtime girlfriend Kate.
(41:24):
So we'll see if we have another royal wedding to
add to this list. Hopefully, if it does take place,
it'll be a much happier marriage than some of these
and a less wringled wedding gown. Definitely. All right. Well,
I guess that about wraps it up. Do you have
anything else you want to add? Thank you so much
for having me. Yeah, it's been fun, canvas Um. If
(41:44):
you want to email us or suggest any other favorite
royal wedding stories, you can find us on Twitter at
Miston History. We're on Facebook, and we also, of course
have an old fashioned email address. It's History podcast at
pasta works dot com. And if you want to look
for any of Candice's great wedding content, you can find
it at TLC. And if you want to learn a
(42:06):
little more about royalty, go to the homepage and search
for royalty at www dot how stuff works dot com,
the House stuff Works dot com. My phone app is
coming soon. Get access to our content in a new way, articles, videos,
and more all on the go. Check out the latest
podcast and blog posts, and see what we're saying on
(42:27):
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