Did John F Kennedy have an open casket at his wake or funeral?

Question

I was just wondering since i saw his autopsy photos on celebrity morgue.com. I see no facial damage, however they could of repaired the skull damage before the funeral.

Answer 1

John Fitgerald Kennedy was a Staunch Catholic and the open Casket was for his family and very closest friends. And I believe he was encased in glass? The face was not disturbed by the bullet but the cranial cavity was it was the back of his head and the side. The trauma would have disfigured the look and the structure of the face because to the skull damage so yes they did a lot of cosmetics including replacing the skull and hair. Oh the casket was closed to the public but not the immediate family and friends! Joseph, Rose, Bobby, Ted et al were all firm Catholics and no closed casket for private viewing and blessings and services prior to the televised version.

Answer 2

Open Casket Funeral Pictures

Answer 3

It is correct that there was no public viewing of John F. Kennedy remains. But close familymembers made use of the opportunity to take a final look at his embalmed body in the casket. Biographer William Manchester and other experts unanimously report that Jackie Kennedy reacted with the words "Oh no, that's not Jack" when she saw him in his casket. Even though this might be, to a certain degree, just a normal psychological expression of denial after the grievous lost, it probably was also a reaction to the fact that her husband's face had been severely wounded (mutilated mainly on the back of it) and undergone several hours of "restoration work" by the embalmers of the Gawler funeral home. It is a well known fact that almost half of his skull had been shot away, and the autopsy had not done any good to his appearance either. The embalmers had filled Kennedy's cranial cavity with plaster. Then they had used wax to restore the hole at the frontside of the skull near the hairline. They probably also had used some suture support to stretch the faceback to a more normal expression. The hair was rearranged to cover his wound and the pillow was modified to put the head in a better position. Finally the restorative work was covered with heavy layers of post mortem cosmetics. All this had the effect that the wounds which Kennedy had received were no longer visible, but that his heavily "improved" face looked very unnatural. As one embalmer commenting on the work of the Gawler experperts said: "Embalming is an exact science with sometimes inexact results. Sometimes we are able to produce a life-like visage, other times the result is a wax dummy appearance."
Another factor provoking Jackie's reaction might have been the fact that a so called "hinged cap" casket had been chosen for the former President. (See picture attached). Nowadays most American caskets are "perfection cut" half-couch caskets,which means that the top is cut in two halfs and the head end half is opened during viewing. This half opens up completely, which means that the mourners see the visible part of the face of the deceased partially from the side and partially from the top. In a "hinged-cap" casket style only the uppermost part of the casket top opens up for viewing, while the frame or "ogee" of the top (typically only of its head end half) remains attached to the rest of the casket (its body or base). This has the effect that the mourners have to look top down into the casket as into a box in which the deceased is more or less hidden.This perspective considerably adds to the unusual and unnatural appearance of the dead person in the casket. This casket style has become rather unpopular. Nowadays it is largely limited to traditional / orthodox jewish caskets. But at the time of Kennedy's death it was not that unusual because a hinged cap top is ideal for wooden luxury caskets equipped with a hermetically sealing inner bronze or copper liner with an oval plate glass top. These liners are no longer manufactured today. Both the high price of the Marsellus 710 African mahogany casket in which John F. Kennedy was buried as well as its "hinged cap" style seem to indicate that it was equipped with such a liner, as one could expect for a presidential casket. But in this case, the negative effect on the appearance of the deceased is aggravated: with the full-length glass lid closed over the body and only the head end cap of the outer wooden casket opened, the mourners cannot see anything of the body when approaching the casket. To see the face of the deceased one has to look down into the casket from a top position through the oval glass. In hinged-cap casket without inner glass top liner this negative effect can be mitigated by raising the face of the deceased so much that it protrudes a little bit above the opening of the cap. But in both cases the unnatural effect of seeing the loved one in a casket "box" is much stronger than in a perfection cut half-couch casket.

Answer 4

Jfk Casket

Answer 5

It doesn't really creep me out. It really just makes me sad. It's just so final and unbelievable. The reason why I hate open casket funerals are because I want my last image of that person to be an image of them alive. If seeing them lieing in a casket dead was the last time I saw them, that image stays with me for a long time and I try to forget it.

Answer 6

Who cares. He was from a family of boot leggers and an adulterer. Not near the hero people say he was. His brother Ted hides behind the Catholic church yet he is for abortion. Nope, not my kinda heroes.

Answer 7

Yes, Yes and Yes.

Answer 8

No, it was closed for both.

Answer 9

No.

Answer 10

no,