Over eight months, I investigated what really happened on the tiny Massachusetts island of Chappaquiddick on July 18, 1969, when Sen. Ted Kennedy drove his car off a narrow wooden bridge an accident which took the life of his passenger, 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne. And were grateful for that.. Back in the Sixties, Douglas Kiker had been one of the top reporters for NBC News, covering such major stories as the Vietnam War, and the civil rights movement, and he was one of the elite journalists who were part of the Bobby and Ethel's elite circle. Kopechne's funeral was held on July 22, 1969, at St. Vincent's Roman Catholic Church in Plymouth, Pennsylvania, and she was buried in the parish cemetery there. Adds Potoski, his mom: Mary Jos parents never had her final hours explained to them. NEW YORK -- After 20 years of silence, the parents of Mary Jo Kopechne say the only satisfaction they received in the aftermath of their daughter's drowning at Chappaquiddick is that it kept Sen. Edward M. Kennedy 'from becoming president.'. Mainstream publishers and producers gave the story a wide berth. The scandal haunted him, and the Democratic party, for decades and was also blamed for ruining his presidential prospects. Bobby had often thrown caution to the wind when pursuing women, even at Hickory Hill, so it was no surprise to Kennedy insiders that he would 'come on' to Mary Jo Kopechne in the family home. They answer, many resoundingly, with a yes. Advertising Notice His wife Joan angrily rejected claims that the pair had been heading to the beach for a midnight swim, while he and his friends lied about the amount of alcohol consumed at the party. While Kennedy survived, Kopechne, his passenger, drowned. 'I'm angry at every one of those girls,' she said. But her story was forgotten.. Mary Jo Kopechne died in the car accident that occurred at Chappaquiddick Island in 1969. You can find out more and change our default settings with Cookies Settings. He also said that he got no encouragement from the district attorneys office to order one. 'He was worried about himself, not Mary Jo,' her husband said. I made it very clear that Im not about the Right or the Left. The site of the 1969 Chappaquiddick Island crash involving Sen. Ted Kennedy and Mary Jo Kopechne. Mary Jo Kopechne, a marine science graduate student, died in a car accident with US Senator Ted Kennedy in September 1969, aged 20. In the ensuing court case, Kennedy pleaded guilty to a minor charge of leaving the scene of an accident and received the minimum sentence of two months in prison which the judge generously suspended. Copyright 2023 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Kopechnes said they got little emotional support from Kennedy and sat in frustrated silence as Mary Jo's name 'was dragged through the mud.'. The Chappaquiddick Incident. For years, Powers was best known for arranging orgies between Teds brother John F. Kennedy and his legendary mistress, Mafia moll Judith Campbell Exner. Locals discovered the car in the water the next day, July 19th, and alerted the police. Like the Kennedys - and especially Ethel - Mary Jo was a staunch catholic, had attended parochial schools, and had spent a year teaching at the Mission of St. Jude in Montgomery, Alabama. Well never know what the third thing was., 6. They were all in the car when it went off the bridge. That evening Kennedy went on national television and offered an extensive mea culpa, claiming, among other things, that he was not under the influence of alcohol, and that there was 'no truth whatever to the widely circulated suspicions of immoral conduct' regarding his behavior and that of Mary Jo's on the night of the accident. This resulted in the drowning death of his 28-year-old passenger Mary Jo Kopechne, who was trapped inside the vehicle. I was unsuccessful in the attempt.. But that neither he nor his female passenger realized Mary Jo was in the back seat. After obtaining a business degree, she taught. Gwen Kopechne, Mary Jos mother, always regretted that she had opposed an autopsy for her daughter. Feb. 28 (UPI) -- The World's Ugliest Dog Contest, held annually in California, announced applications are now available for owners of aesthetically-challenged canines seeking to prove the unsightliness of their pooches. mary jos death was officially ruled as drowning and/or suffocation. 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Georgetta Potoski, a cousin and confidant of Mary Jo's, shares insight on 'The Story.' Somebody is hiding something. Liberal Americans chose to put politics before people, and in 1980 he was a contender for the Democratic Partys presidential nomination beaten to it eventually by Jimmy Carter. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. Map showing the key places involved in the accident that killed Mary Jo Kopechne, Mary Jo Kopechne was a school teacher and a political campaign specialist who died in a car accident at Chappaquiddick Island on July 18, 1969. Sometimes Id like to scream a lot but Im trying to hold it back, said Gwen Kopechne, the mother of Mary Jo, to the Boston Globe. He was a great man. There must be something he could tell me that would lift this heavy burden from my heart.'. The obvious explanation is that he was drunk, didn't want the police to test him, and so he delayed reporting it until after he had talked with his lawyer, etc. Of all the lies that Kennedy and his army of lawyers and cronies later cooked up to explain away the tragedy in an effort to salvage his political career, he was never able to satisfactorily explain why he waited ten hours before reporting the accident. 'She said he was just a good politician. Search instead in Creative? In a televised speech a week after the accident essentially a plea to Massachusetts voters to re-elect him Kennedy admitted his failure to report the accident was indefensible, but still dared to portray himself as the victim. At a minimum, there was kissing, and this was happening when she was working at Hickory Hill'. I felt strongly that if these girls were notified that an accident had taken place and Mary Jo had, in fact, drowned, that it would only be a matter of seconds before all of those girls, who were long and dear friends of Mary Jos, would go to the scene of the accident and enter the water with, I felt, a good chance that some serious mishap might have occurred to any one of them, he told author Leo Damore. He shamelessly played on Americans grief for his assassinated brothers John and Bobby, and wondered whether some awful curse did hang over all the Kennedys. Kennedy dove into the water repeatedly to try and save the girl until going into shock. They went out of their way to try to influence me. REMEMBERING MARY JO: U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's car is pulled from water on July 19, 1969. ', And an elderly woman stood in the crowd holding a red, white, and blue sign that read: 'KENNEDY FOR PRESIDENT, 1972.'. I saw him! It hung over him like a permanent cloud, a friend tells PEOPLE. Mary Jo Kopechne didn't about her relationship with Ted Kennedy, Bussell said she had received a number of invitations from Bobby and Ethel to attend parties at Hickory Hill, but noted that she spent 'much more time with Robert Kennedy than with Ethel. As he wrote in his 2009 memoir, True Compass, Atonement is a process that never ends maybe its a New England thing, or an Irish thing, or a Catholic thing, Maybe all of those things. THEY'RE STILL SMALL FIRMS BUT THEY'RE PROPELLED BY BIG, MARKET-WINNING IDEAS. Kennedy managed to. A little before 2 oclock on the morning of July 19, 1969, C. Remington Ballou and his family were on their boat, which was moored close to the ferry channel. twenty eight year old mary jo, an ex-campaigner for senator robert kennedy, met the formers brother ted at a political celebration on chappaquiddick island. Ted Kennedy: His Darkest Secret Mary Jo Kopechne Was Pregnant Special Report! When you erase your phone number from your website, you erase your reputation. However, Mary Jo had left behind her purse and hotel room key at the party suggesting she was intending to return. He then saw the small boat drift toward a larger boat that had crossed the channel to the Chappaquiddick landing. She hails from Reading where she liveswith her partner Niall and a beautiful daughter, Frankie. Unfortunately, there are some very powerful people who tried to put pressure on me not to release this movie, claims Byron Allen, an entertainment mogul whose company is releasing the new film. Seen on safari: Crocodile swings from elephant's tail. As the host of the party in question, Ted brought the women together for a reunion that included Kennedys cousin, Joseph Gargan, and former U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts Paul Markham. The results of my reporting can be heard in Cover-Up, which PEOPLE produced with Cadence 13. They say it addresses the flaws and discrepancies in Kennedys account that haunted them. SYND 11-12-69 MARY JO KOPECHNE PARENTS GIVE PRESS STATEMANT, (11 Dec 1969) Parents of Mary Jo Kopechne, who died in Edward Kennedy's car at Chappaquiddick Island, give press statement after court denies exhumation of her body Find out more about AP Archive: aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: twitter.com/AP_Archive Facebook: facebook.com/APArchives Instagram: instagram.com/APNews/ You can license this story through AP Archive: aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/fe6d64dcd5a09832cca6f6a23a40ebb1, Mary Jo Kopechne's cousin reacts to 'Chappaquiddick' film, Speculation continues about the circumstances surrounding Mary Jo Kopechne's death and Senator Ted Kennedy's actions. Mary Jo Kopechne was a school teacher and a political campaign specialist who died in a car accident at Chappaquiddick Island on July 18, 1969. Ted Kennedys Death: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know, Mary Jo Kopechnes Death: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know, Copyright 2023 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. [Kopechne] was an intelligent, strong woman who worked for the Bobby Kennedy campaign in a high capacity and did really great work, including transcribing and then adding to the speech he gave about Vietnam, Allen says. That backdrop of an already distracted news media provided Teds team with time for damage control, and further obscured the truth about what actually happened. Destructive 'Super Pigs' From Canada Threaten the Northern U.S. Her death, and the actions taken by U.S. At the same time, she told the wire service United Press International, I believe everything Ted said. She didnt pay heed to allegations that Kennedy and Kopechne were going for a midnight swim when the accident happened. That speech is one of the few scenes in which the writers of Chappaquiddick took liberties with the facts of the case. I think all of them were shut up. As one family insider told me: 'It's bringing up all that same old Chappaquiddick scandal s**t again. In a speech given a week after the accident, he maintained that he was sober, and that there was no truth, no truth whatever to the widely circulated suspicions of immoral conduct that have been leveled at my behavior and [Kopechnes] regarding that evening.. Scantily-clad supermodels once again take center stage in the new edition from photographer Emma Summerton, The spellbinding adventures and misadventures of brilliant British photographer David Yarrow, In Customer Service, Talk Isn't Cheap, but It Is Essential. Astonishingly, even at a time when the U.S. media is obsessed by the subjugation of women by predatory, powerful men following the allegations against movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and Mr Trump (neither of whom, as far as we know, has left a dead body in their wake), criticising Kennedy has proved a challenge for many. 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