Profile
Photos
Comments
This is the final of five posts on women whom I admire. Eunice Kennedy Shriver is a woman of tremendous faith and strength. Her efforts on behalf of mental retardation have changed the futures of untold thousands--perhaps millions of children. I include her because she used her humanity and her faith to make a difference. That is my goal...to make a difference through my faith and my humanity.
Eunice Kennedy Shriver's Olympic Legacy
Listen Now [7 min 18 sec] add to playlist
EnlargeShriver
has been a lifelong advocate for people with mental retardation; she
founded the Special Olympics in 1968. Above, Shriver stands with
athletes in South Africa in 2002. Courtesy of the Special Olympics
Eunice
Shriver was the fifth of nine Kennedy children. Edward (from left),
Jeanne, Robert, Patricia, Eunice, Kathleen, Rosemary and John stand
with their parents, Rose and Joseph Patrick Kennedy, in London in 1937.
Not pictured is the eldest Kennedy child, Joseph Patrick Jr. Keystone/Getty Images
“I
was always trying to find my brothers, not my sisters... I wanted to
play football, and I was very good. I was always the quarterback.”
Eunice Kennedy Shriver
Above,
Shriver and a child play catch in Paris in preparation for the 1970
games. Today, the Special Olympics includes more than 2.25 million
people in 160 countries. Liaison/Getty Images
Shriver
speaks at the first Special Olympics Games in Chicago in 1968. She told
the athletes, "In ancient Rome, the gladiators went into the arena with
these words on their lips: 'Let me win. But if I cannot win, let me be
brave in the attempt.' Let us begin the Olympics." Courtesy of the Special Olympics
“I
had enormous affection for Rosie. If I [had] never met Rosemary, never
known anything about handicapped children, how would I have ever found
out? Because nobody accepted them anyplace.”
Eunice Kennedy Shriver
Shriver
looks out over the stadium at the first Special Olympics games.
Throughout her life, Shriver was close with her sister Rosemary, who
was born with mild mental retardation. Courtesy of the Special Olympics
“She
had the genius to see that she, in fact, was capable of major
achievements helping these kids, and that's what she did. She dedicated
her life to it.”
Edward Shorter, Author of 'The Kennedy Family and the Story of Mental Retardation'
Shriver
and her husband, Robert Sargent Shriver Jr., applaud athletes at the
Third International Special Olympics held in Park City, Utah, in 1985. Courtesy of the Special Olympics
At
85, Shriver is still actively working as an advocate for people with
mental retardation. Above, she sits with a baseball team at the 2006
Special Olympics Summer Games in Ames, Ia. Courtesy of the Special Olympics
“It's
so outrageous, still, in so many countries. They're not accepted in the
schools. They're not accepted in play programs. They're just not
accepted. We have much to do.”
Eunice Kennedy Shriver
Eunice
Kennedy Shriver, photographed Feb. 26, 2007, while listening to her
son-in-law, Gov. Arnold Schwarzegger, speak in Washington, D.C. AFP/Getty Images
Morning Edition, April 5, 2007 · When Eunice Shriver was growing up — the middle child in her famous
family — she developed a passion for competition and sports.
"I
was always trying to find my brothers, not my sisters," she says. "I
wanted to play football, and I was very good. I was always the
quarterback."
Those football-playing brothers included Jack and
Bobby Kennedy. Shriver's love of sports led her to later start the
Special Olympics, which gave people with mental retardation the
opportunity for athletic competition.
Today, Shriver is still working — every day — as an advocate for people with mental retardation.
A Longtime Advocate
Shriver
walks gingerly down the marble halls of a Capitol office building,
holding onto the arm offered by her son, Tim Shriver. She's a
pencil-thin woman, in a camel-hair coat with a fur collar.
She
walks into an office to meet Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA). Shriver quickly
takes off her watch and puts it on the table, to keep the meeting
short. It's also a friendly warning for Tim; he runs Special Olympics
now.
"She's already telling me we have to end the meeting," Tim Shriver jokes to the senator. "We haven't even started yet."
"You're on a stopwatch," Harkin replies.
Harkin is a long-time supporter. It's a busy day, but he meets with the Shrivers for 15 minutes.
The
Shrivers and their delegation are on Capitol Hill to seek several
million dollars to expand health care and other programs run by Special
Olympics.
A Family History
No family has
done more than the Kennedys to change negative attitudes about mental
retardation. Back when having a family member with retardation was a
source of secrecy and shame, President John Kennedy, in 1962, spoke of
his family's own experience. One of the Kennedy children, Rosemary, was born with mild mental retardation.
"Those
of us who have seen children live in the shadow [of mental
retardation]," he said, "know that a country as rich as ours can't
possibly justify this neglect."
President Kennedy set up research
centers on mental retardation. Robert Kennedy inspected squalid state
mental institutions. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) helped write the Americans
with Disabilities Act. And it was Eunice Kennedy Shriver who was always
on the phone nagging her more famous brothers to take action.
"I
had enormous affection for Rosie," Shriver says. "If I [had] never met
Rosemary, never known anything about handicapped children, how would I
have ever found out? Because nobody accepted them anyplace."
Rosemary's
disability worsened after she had a lobotomy, an operation that was
meant to help her. She spent most of her life at a private institution
in Wisconsin and died in 2005. Eunice Shriver visited regularly and
made mental retardation a constant cause.
"Eunice is a remarkable woman," says history professor Edward Shorter, author of The Kennedy Family and the Story of Mental Retardation.
"It was extraordinary of her to conceive that she, too, could play a
role comparable to that of her brothers," Shorter says. "Her leadership
role would be in the area of mental retardation rather than on the big
political stage, because in the 1950s, she couldn't get on that
political stage. Women weren't tolerated there."
'Never as a Burden'
Shriver
saw that just as political roles were limited for her, many more
opportunities were limited for people with mental retardation. Shorter
says she rejected the role of society woman and took over the family
foundation.
"She had the genius to see that she, in fact, was
capable of major achievements helping these kids, and that's what she
did. She dedicated her life to it," says Shorter.
She also
opened her home. In 1962, an exhausted mother got Shriver on the phone.
The woman wanted to know what to do because no summer camp would accept
her child with mental retardation.
"I said, 'You don't have to
talk about it anymore. You come here a month from today. I'll start my
own camp. No charge to go into the camp, but you have to get your kid
here, and you have to come and pick your kid up.' [I] said, 'Thanks
very much,' and I hung up the phone."
For years, Eunice Shriver
ran that summer camp — for no charge — at Timberlawn, the family estate
in Maryland. She would get in the pool and teach kids to swim. Her own
children — Robert, Maria, Tim, Mark and Anthony — were just little kids
in those days.
"Talk to Timmy," says Shriver, "[He'll] tell you
horror stories about how they were left in the house and nobody to play
with because [I] was out teaching swimming."
There were scores of
noisy campers, counselors, horses, soccer games and obstacle courses.
Lyndon Johnson came once. Robert McNamara, too.
Tim Shriver says Camp Shriver—for all its chaos—is a big reason all his siblings stay involved in the issue.
"The
great gift that we had as kids," Tim Shriver says, "was never to be
introduced to disability or intellectual disability as a cause but more
as an activity. Never as a burden, but rather as a joy. Our
introduction to people with special needs was to swim or to play
kickball or to go horseback riding. Part of her genius [has] always
been to create things that are appealing, create opportunities that are
joyful that people want to join, that make things fun."
The Games
That
summer camp led Eunice Shriver and her husband, Sargent, to start the
Special Olympics. Eunice Shriver opened the first national games. It
was the summer of 1968, in Chicago, just weeks after the assassination
of Robert Kennedy and before the riotous Democratic convention.
"In
ancient Rome, the gladiators went into the arena with these words on
their lips," Shriver told the athletes, "Let me win. But if I cannot
win, let me be brave in the attempt. Let us begin the Olympics."
What
began that year has grown. The 2007 World Games will be held in
Shanghai. Eunice Shriver plans to be there, along with athletes from
160 countries.
In recent years, she hasn't always been on the
cutting edge of issues. Other advocates and her sons pushed to make
Special Olympics more than a once-a-year sporting event. It's now a
place where participants get linked to health care and community
programs and start lasting friendships.
At 85—rich and accomplished—she could retire or go on glamorous vacations.
But
don't try telling Eunice Shriver to relax. When asked why she continues
to work so tirelessly on the issue she replies: "Because it's so
outrageous, still. In so many countries. They're not accepted in the
schools. They're not accepted in play programs. They're just not
accepted. So we have much to do."
And so Shriver keeps at it. The
same week she lobbied senators for Special Olympics, Shriver also went
to a congressional hearing and a gathering of governors. She met with
the secretary of education and then with college presidents—to ask for
education programs after high school.
Every year, Shriver brings
a parent of a disabled child and someone who works in disabilities to
Washington. They work on Capitol Hill for the year, then most go back
to their states, where they have become a new generation of leaders.
Earlier
this month, more than three dozen former Kennedy Fellows gathered in
the ballroom of a Washington hotel to hold their first-ever reunion.
There was a sense in the room that this might be a last chance to honor
Shriver. She has been hospitalized several times; two years ago she had
a small stroke.
Shriver stepped carefully to the podium. When she
got there, she made clear that she will keep fighting for people with
intellectual disabilities.
"We've got to be so proud of what our
special friends do and their future," said Shriver, "Their possibility
of really bringing to the world something that really resembles peace
and hope and faith and love – that's what they can do. And we're so
proud of them. And we want to keep going all the time, the next 20
years. I'm going. You come with me?"
Excerpt: 'The Kennedy Family and the Story of Mental Retardation'
NPR.org, April 4, 2007 · In 1968, Eunice Shriver was forty-seven years old. Her father had
ceased to exercise tutelage over her since his stroke seven years
earlier. Her husband, a willing partner in all her enterprises, had
turned his intense energy on other goals, and it was Eunice herself who
now called the shots at the Kennedy Foundation. Ever since the
President's Panel in 1962, she had acquired a sovereign presence on the
national stage, and even though she herself was a poor administrator,
she felt comfortable in evoking grand designs and directing their
execution...
In short, Eunice came into her own with the
Special Olympics. It is not grandiose to speak of her as articulating a
distinctive vision of the role of athletics in the lives of MR
children, because she had the wisdom and maturity to formulate such a
vision...
The ideas, the essence of the vision, came from Eunice.
First of all, why was she so drawn to the Special Olympics, as opposed
to any of the other vehicles for helping the mentally retarded that
came along? It was partly because of her own tropism toward athletics.
As Sarge said, "If Eunice hadn't been a sportswoman, she wouldn't have
thought of the Special Olympics." Also, she was more at ease with
athletes than with scientists. According to Donald Stedman, "She felt
very uncertain standing up there talking about chromosomes. [Sports]
was something she felt that she could talk about and feel comfortable.
She was very uncomfortable with neurologists, psychiatrists, and the
rest, although she knew she needed them. She would tell me that. I
could tell. I'm a psychologist. I could see how pained she was."
Why
did she admire athletes so much? As Stedman said, "She admired them for
their endurance. She's a long-distance runner herself in a metaphorical
sense. She liked gutting it out, excellence of that type. She's not
anti-intellectual, but she put a big premium on performance."
It
does seem to be true that Eunice felt a physical resonance with
athletics, with events that challenged the body, an inheritance of
decades of swimming and sailing at the Cape and of touch football on
the back meadow at Timberlawn.
But Eunice had one more deep
psychological wellspring. It was a quality that knocks awry the vicious
media image of the Kennedy family as elitist and patrician. Eunice
Shriver was very much a democrat. Having no patience with the
voluptuousness of the rich, she herself lived almost ascetically and
brought up her children in a materially rather tightfisted household.
(Anthony and Bobby Shriver, at least, believed themselves continually
short of cash. Anthony, circa age eleven, once reproached the much
older Bobby: "I feel … that you place too much emphasis on money. I do
realize that neither one of us have very much money … I suppose I
should not entertain myself in the same manner you do, because I am so
much younger and have less money.
Thus Eunice made the Shriver
home a household like all the others (except for being a little
larger), shunning the imperial aura with which her father had
surrounded himself. "Eunice had this kind of common touch," said
Stedman. "It's an interesting contrast. On the one side, she's a
Brahmin, a very high–toned person, but she had this populist sense that
the Olympics allowed her to play out … It would be something that
everybody could have and everybody could participate in." As Eunice
said at one point, Special Olympics teaches "that all human beings are
created equal in the sense that each has the capacity and a hunger for
moral excellence, for courage, for friendship and for love. Whatever
the speed of our feet or the power of our arms, each of us is capable
of these highest virtues. Intelligence does not limit love, nor does
wealth produce friendship."
It was this quality of populism that
led Eunice to the core of her vision of the Special Olympics-that
through sports not only do we help the mentally retarded, but they also
help us. She constantly emphasized growth: we grow as we help those
with mental retardation grow. Only somebody intently attuned to the
lives of the parents and their suffering would have understood that the
Special Olympics was not just a classical act of noblesse oblige,
handing something down patronizingly to the suffering poor, but of
self-help as well.
This indeed is a gift.
Thank you for sharing this inspiring woman with us.