Kennedy Family Tree

Joseph and Rose Kennedy: where the family begins

Both sides of the family descend from Irish Catholic immigrants who arrived in Boston in the late 1840s, during the Great Famine. Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. was the son of P. J. Kennedy, a saloon keeper and state legislator; Rose Fitzgerald was the daughter of John F. “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, a congressman and mayor of Boston. They married in 1914.

Joseph made a fortune in banking, the stock market, film and real estate, served as the first chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and was US ambassador to the United Kingdom when the Second World War began. He set up trust funds so that his children could spend their lives in public service, and he was openly ambitious for one of his sons to become president.

The nine Kennedy children

Joseph and Rose had nine children between 1915 and 1932. Four of them died violently or young, a pattern that led the press to speak of a “Kennedy curse”.

• Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. (1915–1944), a Navy pilot killed in action.
• John F. Kennedy (1917–1963), the 35th President of the United States.
• Rosemary Kennedy (1918–2005), who spent most of her life in care after a failed lobotomy.
• Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy (1920–1948), who married the Marquess of Hartington and died in a plane crash.
• Eunice Kennedy Shriver (1921–2009), founder of the Special Olympics.
• Patricia Kennedy Lawford (1924–2006), married to the actor Peter Lawford.
• Robert F. Kennedy (1925–1968), Attorney General and Senator, assassinated in 1968.
• Jean Kennedy Smith (1928–2020), US ambassador to Ireland.
• Edward M. “Ted” Kennedy (1932–2009), Senator for Massachusetts for 47 years.

JFK’s family: Jacqueline, Caroline and John Jr.

John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953. Of their four children, two survived infancy: Caroline, born in 1957, and John Jr., born in 1960, just after his father’s election. A daughter, Arabella, was stillborn in 1956, and a son, Patrick, died two days after his birth in August 1963.

John F. Kennedy Jr. founded the political magazine George and died in 1999 when the plane he was piloting crashed off Martha’s Vineyard, killing him, his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy and her sister. Caroline Kennedy, a lawyer and author, has served as US ambassador to Japan and to Australia. She and her husband, the designer Edwin Schlossberg, have three children: Rose, Tatiana (who died in 2025) and Jack.

Robert F. Kennedy’s eleven children

Robert and Ethel Kennedy had the largest branch of the family: eleven children, the youngest born six months after Robert was killed. Several entered public life. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend was Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, Joseph P. Kennedy II served in the House of Representatives, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer, ran for president in 2024 before becoming Secretary of Health and Human Services. Joseph II’s son Joseph P. Kennedy III was also a congressman, the fourth generation of Kennedys in office. Ethel Kennedy died in 2024 at 96.

Ted Kennedy and the Shriver branch

Ted Kennedy, the youngest child, married Joan Bennett in 1958; they had three children, Kara, Edward Jr. and Patrick, a congressman from Rhode Island. After their divorce he married Victoria Reggie in 1992. Eunice Kennedy and Sargent Shriver, the first director of the Peace Corps, had five children; their daughter Maria Shriver, a journalist, married Arnold Schwarzenegger and was First Lady of California.

Reading a large family like the Kennedys

With 9 children, 29 grandchildren and dozens of great-grandchildren, the full Kennedy family does not fit on one sheet of paper. The chart above shows the best-known people in each branch. In your own tree, a large family is easier to handle if you print one branch at a time, for example only the descendants of Robert and Ethel, or a pedigree chart of one person’s ancestors. Our guide to printing a family tree explains which paper sizes keep names readable.