Evelyn Maurine Norton Lincoln – Navy Wife & Secretary To President John F. Kennedy

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From contemporary press reports:

EVELYN NORTON LINCOLN, 85, who was the personal secretary to President John F. Kennedy, died Thursday (May 11, 1995) in Georgetown University Hospital of complications after surgery for cancer.

Mrs. Lincoln was Kennedy’s personal secretary from January 1953, when he started his first term in the Senate, until his death November 22, 1963, when she was in the motorcade in Dallas when he was assassinated.

Mrs. Lincoln was born June 25, 1909, on a farm in Polk County, Nebraska. Her father, John N. Norton, was a member of the House of Representatives. She came to Washington in 1930 with her husband, Harold W. Lincoln, and the two got involved in politics.

She was known for visiting Kennedy’s grave at Arlington National Cemetery every year on the anniversary of his death. In 1988, on the 25th anniversary, she went alone to the grave and laid three red roses near its eternal flame.

Mrs. Lincoln also was the author of two best-selling books, “My 12 Years With John F. Kennedy” and “Kennedy and Johnson.”

President Kennedy’s personal secretary, was remembered Friday, May 19, 1995, in a ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Lincoln’s ashes were placed in a niche in a sepulcher at the cemetery after a brief prayer service attended by about 50 people, said Adrien Creecy, spokeswoman for the cemetery.

Lincoln died May 12. She was 85.

Lincoln was Kennedy’s personal secretary from January 1953, when he started his first term in the Senate, until his death November 22, 1963. She was in the motorcade in Dallas when he was assassinated.

She is survived by her husband, Harold W. Lincoln, 84, a World War II veteran. They were married 64 years and lived in Chevy Chase, Maryland.

Honorably discharged veterans and their spouses can use the cemetery as their final resting place, Creecy said.

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