Providencia Paredes, the special assistant to former US first lady Jacqueline Kennedy and believed to be one of the first people of Latino descent to work in the White House as part of a president’s inner circle, has died.
Gustavo Paredes, one of her sons, announced her death on Facebook.
Providencia Paredes died in Washington on Wednesday last week at the age of 90, he said.
Gustavo Paredes described his mother as a “pioneer, role model and icon for many,” and “a woman of immense will, passion, curiosity and a zest for life.”
Providencia Paredes was born in San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic, in 1924. She arrived in the US in 1948 alongside then-Dominican ambassador to the US Luis Francisco Thomen, for whom she did domestic work.
Soon after her arrival she met then-US representative for Massachusetts John F. Kennedy. When Kennedy became a US senator, he asked Providencia Paredes to continue working for him, and help his new wife with her affairs.
When Kennedy was elected president and moved into the White House in 1961, he sent for her.
“When he moved to the White House, he said: ‘I want Provi, because she is the best,’” Gustavo Paredes said, using his mother’s nickname. “That is how she ended up as Jackie’s personal assistant.”
During his presidency, Kennedy endeavored to improve relations between the US and Latin America.
In 1961, Kennedy established the Alliance for Progress, and proposed a US$20 billion loan to Latin American nations to promote democracy in the region.
Kennedy and his wife traveled to Puerto Rico, Mexico, Venezuela and Colombia and met with six presidents of Central American governments in Costa Rica.
In her role as special assistant, Paredes traveled the world with the Kennedys on personal and official trips.
Gustavo Paredes said there were only two trips his mother did not attend: one to Canada early in Kennedy’s presidency, and his last, to Dallas.
However, Providencia Paredes selected the light pink suit the first lady wore on the day the president was killed that has since become an emblem of his assassination.
In a 2013 interview, Providencia Paredes told Fox News Latino about seeing Jacqueline Kennedy for the first time after the president was killed.
“We went into a room, just she and I, and she broke down. She said: ‘They could have killed me, too.’ She said she was very afraid,” Providencia Paredes said.
Providencia Paredes remained close to the Kennedy family after the president’s assassination, later working for former US senator Robert Kennedy until his death, traveling with him to Los Angeles during his presidential campaign.
“She broke the barrier of what an American was: She was making trips with the president, representing the aspiration of the American dream,” Gustavo Paredes said. “From her humble beginnings in the Dominican Republic, she ended up flying around the world representing the country of her birth as well as her new-found country.”
She is survived by her sons, Gustavo Paredes, 60, and Hector Corporan, 69; and four grandchildren: Ariel Paredes, 35; Margarita Corporan, 42; Guillermo Corporan, 35; and Sofia Corporan, 28.
MINERAL DEPOSITS: The Pacific nation is looking for new foreign partners after its agreement with Canada’s Metals Co was terminated ‘mutually’ at the end of last year Pacific nation Kiribati says it is exploring a deep-sea mining partnership with China, dangling access to a vast patch of Pacific Ocean harboring coveted metals and minerals. Beijing has been ramping up efforts to court Pacific nations sitting on lucrative seafloor deposits of cobalt, nickel and copper — recently inking a cooperation deal with Cook Islands. Kiribati opened discussions with Chinese Ambassador Zhou Limin (周立民) after a longstanding agreement with leading deep-sea mining outfit The Metals Co fell through. “The talk provides an exciting opportunity to explore potential collaboration for the sustainable exploration of the deep-ocean resources in Kiribati,” the government said
The head of Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, was sacked yesterday, days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he no longer trusts him, and fallout from a report on the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack. “The Government unanimously approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to end ISA Director Ronen Bar’s term of office,” a statement said. He is to leave his post when his successor is appointed by April 10 at the latest, the statement said. Netanyahu on Sunday cited an “ongoing lack of trust” as the reason for moving to dismiss Bar, who joined the agency in 1993. Bar, meant to
Indonesia’s parliament yesterday amended a law to allow members of the military to hold more government roles, despite criticisms that it would expand the armed forces’ role in civilian affairs. The revision to the armed forces law, pushed mainly by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto’s coalition, was aimed at expanding the military’s role beyond defense in a country long influenced by its armed forces. The amendment has sparked fears of a return to the era of former Indonesian president Suharto, who ex-general Prabowo once served and who used military figures to crack down on dissent. “Now it’s the time for us to ask the
The central Dutch city of Utrecht has installed a “fish doorbell” on a river lock that lets viewers of an online livestream alert authorities to fish being held up as they make their springtime migration to shallow spawning grounds. The idea is simple: An underwater camera at Utrecht’s Weerdsluis lock sends live footage to a Web site. When somebody watching the site sees a fish, they can click a button that sends a screenshot to organizers. When they see enough fish, they alert a water worker who opens the lock to let the fish swim through. Now in its fifth year, the
RSS