Rosemary Kennedy, sister of late president, dead at 86

Published: 2005-01-20

CENTERVILLE, Mass. (CNS) -- A funeral Mass was celebrated Jan. 10 at Our Lady of Victory Church in Centerville for Rosemary Kennedy, sister of the late President John F. Kennedy. Kennedy, 86, died Jan. 7 of natural causes at Fort Atkinson Memorial Health Hospital in Jefferson, Wis. Born with a mild form of mental retardation, she had been cared for at St. Coletta of Wisconsin in Jefferson, a school for the mentally disabled, for the last 57 years of her life after a botched frontal lobotomy further reduced her mental capacity. The oldest daughter of Joseph P. and Rose Kennedy, she was born in Boston on Sept. 13, 1918. Her three surviving sisters -- Eunice Kennedy Shriver, 83, Patricia Kennedy Lawford, 80, and Jean Kennedy Smith, 76 -- and her sole surviving brother, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., 72, were at her bedside when she died. "Our sister Rosemary has gone today to be with God. She left us peacefully, with her brother and sisters at her side, and we are happy for her that she now has eternal life with God," said a Jan. 7 statement from the Kennedy family.

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