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Quick Growth. If Ambassador Joe had a motto, it might well be Operando Tutus, Secure by Operating. Joseph Patrick Kennedy's father came over from Ireland, became the mellow-voiced boss of Ward 2 in East Boston. Joe was a newsboy, candy butcher, bus operator, Harvard graduate ('12), bank president, shipbuilder, film magnate and a Wall Street operator who left behind a monumental observation: "Anyone can lose his shirt in Wall Street if he has sufficient capital and inside information." Then he became first chairman of the Securities & Exchange Commission, under Franklin Roosevelt, first chairman of the Maritime Commission and last peacetime Ambassador to the Court of St. James's. At the time of prohibition repeal, Joe set up Somerset Importers, Ltd., secured the U.S. distribution of Haig & Haig, King William IV, other famed brands. The venture was successful.
Back in 1914, while he was just getting started, Joe married Rose Fitzgerald, daughter of onetime Mayor John Francis ("Honey Fitz") Fitzgerald of Boston. She presented him with four boys and five girls; in recent years she has not been well.
Short Ceremony. Ever since the business with the monasteries, the Caven dishes have been unswervingly Protestant.
In recent years they have been known as positively anti-Catholic. Before the Catholic Church will issue a dispensation permitting marriage with a non-Catholic, there must be agreement that all offspring will be brought up in the Church. Kathleen paid a visit to Archbishop Godfrey, the Apostolic Delegate, who did not need to tell her that if she married outside the Church her children would be regarded by the Church as illegitimate. He told her. Lord Hartington declined to marry in the Church, or to agree that future Caven dishes would be Catholic. Kathleen decided to marry anyway. The Duke, the Duchess, the Dowager Duchess and the Marchioness capitulated.
Last week, the debate concluded, the Marquess of Hartington repaired to the Chelsea Registry Office, accompanied by his best man, the Duke of Rutland. Both wore Guards' uniforms and snug Sam Brownes. Fifteen minutes later Kathleen Kennedy arrived in delphinium pink suede crepe, a short mink jacket and a little hat of pink & blue ostrich feathers. Lieut. Joseph Kennedy Jr., U.S.N.R., came to give his sister away.
Seven minutes later, in the bare, plain registry room, livened only by carnations on the table, Kathleen became the Marchioness of Hartington. A man named Stream performed the ceremony. After wards the Cavendishes and the Kennedys kept their counsel. But the day before the wedding Kathleen's mother, ill in a Boston hospital, sent out word that she was "too sick to discuss the marriage." If Lord Hartington succeeds to the title, becomes the 11th Duke of Devon shire, his Duchess will find herself the Mistress of the Royal Robes, first lady In waiting to the Queen. The Queen may well be Princess Elizabeth.
* The English have never forgiven him for the remark (which he rather half-heartedly denied having made) that "Democracy is finished in England."