Oldie Podcast - Antonia Fraser in conversation with Harry Mount on meeting JFK

Radio Oldie

As Americans go to the polls, listen to Antonia Fraser on taking a dip in the White House pool with President Kennedy – in Jackie Kennedy's swimming costume.

In March 1962, Antonia Fraser and her husband, Conservative MP Hugh Fraser, dropped in on President Kennedy at the White House. They joined him for a dip in the White House pool - and Antonia Fraser borrowed Jackie Kennedy's swimming costume

Hugh Fraser, my first husband, MP for Stafford and Stone since 1945, was an old friend of Jack Kennedy’s. They were exact contemporaries and first knew each other when Joe Kennedy was American Ambassador to London in 1938.
In 1962, Hugh was Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies. On his way back from an official visit to British Guiana, he joined me at the British Embassy in Washington, as guests of another contemporary, David Ormsby-Gore, the new Ambassador. We were invited to swim in the White House pool by the President.
In my photograph album, I wrote beneath the photo: Probably the most worthwhile photograph I have ever taken. First and foremost, Hugh bathing in the White House pool. Also present the President of the United States. I actually took this photograph myself, never believing it would come out (it was the last one on the reel). Our bathe in the White House pool was really the high point of our stay in Washington – and indeed of my stay in America. I managed to squeeze into Jackie Kennedy’s bathing dress and cavorted in the boiling pool [warmed up to help JFK’s back problems], hoping to catch the Presidential eye, while Hugh buttonholed him about British Guiana.