--- title: Inside Jackie Kennedy's Wedding to Aristotle Onassis: Photos description: America was shocked by Jackie Kennedy's surprise marriage to Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis on Oct. 20, 1968. Here's Why. canonical: https://time.com/5427682/jacqueline-kennedy-wedding-jackie-o/ author: Olivia B. Waxman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-10-19T16:23:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:42:11.810Z article:section: History og:title: Inside Jackie Kennedy's Wedding to Aristotle Onassis: Photos og:description: "Reaction in the U.S. and abroad ranged from dismay to a kind of shocked ribaldry," TIME reported the following week og:url: https://time.com/5427682/jacqueline-kennedy-wedding-jackie-o/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt983739f8e8074b41/69893cf5656a3f1f80bd5bcf/jackie-kennedy-onassis-wedding-1968.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2405 og:image:height: 1353 og:image:alt: jackie-kennedy-onassis-wedding-1968 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Inside Jackie Kennedy's Wedding to Aristotle Onassis: Photos twitter:description: "Reaction in the U.S. and abroad ranged from dismay to a kind of shocked ribaldry," TIME reported the following week twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt983739f8e8074b41/69893cf5656a3f1f80bd5bcf/jackie-kennedy-onassis-wedding-1968.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Inside the Day That Turned Jacqueline Kennedy Into 'Jackie O.' > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-sub-2026q3/newsletters?i=976f57da-e577-4108-bd3a-9d7749f98a94&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1) * TIME Subscriptions: [time.com/subscribe-agent](/c/time-sub-2026q3/subscribe?i=976f57da-e577-4108-bd3a-9d7749f98a94&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1) ## Video: 100 Photographs: Windblown Jackie [Watch (HLS stream): 100 Photographs: Windblown Jackie](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/5cl7Mr7y.m3u8) (8:22)  _Published 2016-09-08. This candid shot of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis by a paparazzi pioneer with a disregard for restraining orders embodies all that is controversial and artful about celebrity portraiture_  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Oct 19, 2018 4:23 PM UTC  Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, embracing her daughter, Caroline Kennedy, and her new husband, Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis at their wedding reception aboard the yacht, Christina, shortly after they tied the knot on the Island of Skorpios, Greece, on Oct. 21, 1968. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, embracing her daughter, Caroline Kennedy, and her new husband, Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis at their wedding reception aboard the yacht, Christina, shortly after they tied the knot on the Island of Skorpios, Greece, on Oct. 21, 1968. Express Newspapers—Getty Images  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Oct 19, 2018 4:23 PM UTC While Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy was the one married to President John F. Kennedy, many Americans felt married to the idea of the two of them. Their relationship was central to the concept of the Kennedy [“Camelot”](http://100photos.time.com/photos/hy-peskin-kennedy-camelot) that is still the object of so much national nostalgia. So it was that many took the news hard when, nearly five years later after his assassination, the 39-year-old former First Lady felt ready to move on. She remarried 50 years ago this Saturday, wedding the flamboyant Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle “Ari” Onassis, who claimed to be 62 but had once had a passport that placed him a few years older than that. “Everything, from sugared almonds to the waiting yacht, was ready to celebrate the new life of Mr. and Mrs. Aristotle Onassis,” TIME noted in its coverage of the secret Greek Orthodox wedding ceremony. “Everything, that is, except what is known as ‘the world,’ which seemed unable to comprehend or accept the match.” The magazine explained the level of shock in that Oct. 25, 1968, cover story: --- > “” --- The nuptials also came as a shock in a more basic sense because of how suddenly the wedding happened. Even the bride’s mother said it was a surprise, and [LIFE magazine](https://books.google.com/books?id=FUkEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA3&dq=%22november+1,+1968%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjmkJPnxN7dAhWro1kKHU2GBksQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=jackie&f=false) quoted her as saying her daughter informed her by calling to ask her if she could get on a plane the very next day. Jackie’s younger sister Lee Radziwill said the engagement was a surprise to her too. She had dated Onassis previously, and the way the news was handled would end up souring their [relationship](https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2016/04/jackie-kennedy-lee-radziwill-sisterhood). However, in the context of the other shocking events of the momentous year that was 1968, covering the wedding, as former Time Inc. publisher James R. Shepley wrote in a note to readers, “offered a pleasant, if hectic, change of pace” for reporters “in a year that has seen more than its share of grim news.”  Jackie Kennedy Onassis talks to her guests at her wedding reception. Bill Ray/Time & Life Pictures—Getty Images Unsurprisingly, there was a lot of speculation about what exactly drew the two together. Some Kennedy-watchers speculated that she, as a paparazzi target, was attracted to his private security detail. “The idea that he owned a yacht and could just literally sail her away from all of her troubles and take her to this private island, a place where she could just be reclusive, was incredibly appealing,” Tina Cassidy, author of a biography of the former First Lady, _Jackie After O,_ says in the 2017 documentary [_Jackie: A Tale of Two Sisters_](https://www.netflix.com/title/80158579). But he also had had his eye on her for a while. Cassidy notes that he was one of the first visitors to the White House after the assassination, arguing, “I think people also believed that Onassis was always looking for an angle with Jackie, and it wasn’t until after Robert Kennedy’s assassination that he felt like he had a window and could put the moves on her.”  after their wedding in Scorpios, Greece on Oct. 20, 1968\. Kennedy's son, John Kennedy Jr. is at left, fore. Bill Ray/Time & Life Pictures—Getty Images Jackie Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis and husband Aristotle Onassis right Unfortunately, the pair did not live happily ever after. As TIME reported in his 1975 obituary, “After the honeymoon, the marriage was filled with what one intimate of Ari’s called ‘the nights of long silences.’ Jackie loved concerts, ballet and theater; Onassis preferred raucous bouzouki music, belly dancers and at times the company of roistering Greek businessmen. Much of the time they lived separate lives.” He was never the same after the sudden death in 1973 of his only [son](https://www.nytimes.com/1973/01/24/archives/alexander-onassis-only-son-of-the-magnate-dies-of-injuries.html). He expressed the idea that President Kennedy’s death had cursed his wife, and in turn, him, calling her “the witch,” according to TIME’s 1994 obituary for the former First Lady. But the public, even after the wedding, maintained its soft spot for Jackie. She became “Jackie O.,” a nickname that first [appeared](http://time.com/vault/issue/1969-03-21/page/38/) in the pages of TIME a few months after the wedding, and the fascination with her life [never faded](http://100photos.time.com/photos/ron-galella-windblown-jackie) — even when it was impossible to know the exact reason for every little thing going wrong in it. In fact, as a symbol of grace in times of sadness, her personal struggles perhaps in the end made Americans love her even more. ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] Jackie claimed I invaded her privacy, I don't believe I did. Once you're a celebrity, always a celebrity. You have to face it. You're a celebrity, you're fair game in public areas. Jackie was fair game. [ MUSIC ] The role of the paparazzi when I shot in the 60s, 70s, even the 80s, was great freedom. It was a golden era, one to one, you could move about. Gotta get good angles for expression, that's my forte. To get the genuine expressions on their face, the face is the main thing. So I would, [ LAUGH ] I shouldn't say it, I shouldn't say, attack. I would approach celebrities, and if they protested I would stop and honor their wishes. Number one, you have to have a car. You cannot rely on taxis cuz they're not gonna pass lights. You have to hide of course. Without looking thorough the viewfinder you want to get eye contact. You have to see people. Windows of limousine. Put the camera and the strobe close to the window to penetrate the light so you don't get a reflection. That's why I got the great pictures of **** Jagger with his eyes, lips open, his mouth open. [ MUSIC ] When you look at celebrities and you see the circle of cameramen around them, I always think of piranhas snapping. When you think about it. The first piranha was Ron Galella, only he was a shark because he swam a lone. That stuff didn't exist before Galella. You have to create your own standards and live by them. Galella was the first There is a direct line of dissent. [ MUSIC ] The center of Manhattan was my golden city to shoot pictures. And Jackie was my golden girl of course. [ LAUGH ] I first saw Jackie at the Wildonstone Gallery on Madison Avenue. In May, 1967. She had big, wide eyes and she whispered softly. And she hardly gave interviews. And it was her mystique that created her glamour, her mystique. And we want to know more about her And that's the great thing about glamour, mystery. I knew her address. That was a good thing. 1040 5th Avenue. I got better pictures at her apartment. Nobody in the way. And she was my favorite ideal subject because she would be full of life. She would move and I was good at capturing movement. And I liked people in action, being themselves. I don't know how many pictures of Jackie I got. There's so many, it might be a million. I just don't count my pictures. [ MUSIC ] Jackie went to Central Park on a bike with John Junior on a bike. I got the information from the doorman next door. And I got them coming down the path and she's like it's you again. She ordered the Secret Service agents to smash his camera. But he didn't smash my camera. But she sent two other agents after to me to get the film. I sued her for interfering with my livelihood, or the agents were or pushing me around, interfering. And the outcome of that was bad. I had restriction of 50 yards from Jackie and I couldn't go near her apartment for a hundred yards. But I appealed and this was brought down to 25 feet. I made a tape measure and I extended it with Jackie, as a joke, that's why I broke the injunction, 25 feet and I said that in the trial. I said it's impractical, cuz there's people in the way, objects in the way. I can't operate 25 feet away. [ NOISE ] There was a model, Joy Smith, who needed portfolio pictures. And I'm a fool for beauty, I did it For her free. So I said, I'll pick you up and we'll go to Central Park. Maybe I'll discover Jackie. And as we left the park, Jackie comes out the back entrance and walks toward Madison Avenue on 85th Street. Then she turns north. On the corner I did a brilliant thing. I took a taxi because you have to hide to get the off guard picture. And between 89th and 90th I took two shots from the back window but she didn't see me or hear me because of the noise and then the driver did something I didn't ask. He blew his horn, he was interested in Jackie. And Jackie turns at the corner of 90th and I get my wind blown Jackie. Beautiful. The exclusive picture, spontaneous, off guard, unrehearsed. But Jackie doesn't see who I am, cuz I have the camera in front of my face. But the moment I get out of the taxi, she knew me and put the glasses on. And I got her another block, from 90th to 91st, and then she turned west. And then I gave one of my cameras to Joy Smith. I said take a couple of pictures of me, I prefocused [ MUSIC ] The camera 15 ft and she got two great shots of me running after Jackie. I shot Jackie from behind and then Jackie turns around and says are you please with yourself? I said yes, thank you and goodbye and left. I call it my Mona Lisa because the smile was on her eyes and lips. The beginning of the smile. And she had no makeup. No hairdo. Natural beauty. The hair blowing in the wind. Nice soft light. What was the most true about her was that she had innate style. Whatever she wore, whether it was this season's or last season's or some 50 year old piece that she pulled out of her closet looked great. And the persistence of the image of wind blown Jacque proves that, because it doesn't matter. Her. It's almost an undatable photograph. It was the iconic photograph of the American celebrity aristocracy. And it created a genre. Granted how intrusive the paparazzi have become in the years since when Jackie He was taken. I think that we can look at Ron [ UNKNOWN ] as relatively benign. And the question is, where do you draw the line? How can you sleep at night when you do this for a living? Is a valid question. And either you can sleep at night or you can't. [ MUSIC ] I never felt guilty photographing Jackie. It's true that I pushed the First Amendment to the limits, perhaps. But that's what it takes. But I don't think it's immoral or bad, I think it was great. [ MUSIC ] And I'm glad that I preserved these images when no one else did. I did it. 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