BOSTON — Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the presidential sister who founded the Special Olympics and helped demonstrate that the mentally disabled can triumph on the field of competition and lead productive lives outside institutions, died Tuesday at age 88.
Shriver had suffered a series of strokes in recent years and died at a Cape Cod hospital in the company of her husband, her five children and her 19 grandchildren, relatives said.
“She understood deeply the lesson our mother and father taught us: Much is expected of those to whom much has been given,” said her sole surviving brother, Sen. Edward Kennedy, who is battling a brain tumor.
She was the sister of President John F. Kennedy and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy; the wife of 1972 vice presidential candidate R. Sargent Shriver; the mother of former NBC newswoman Maria Shriver; and the mother-in-law of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California.
Her efforts for the mentally disabled were inspired in part by the struggles of her sister, Rosemary, who was given a lobotomy at age 23 and spent her life in an institution.
Realizing the mentally disabled were far more capable of playing sports than the experts said, Shriver started the first Special Olympics — a two-day event in Chicago — in 1968. It drew more than 1,000 participants from 26 states and Canada.
Now, more than 3 million athletes in more than 160 countries participate.
Shriver was born in Brookline, Mass., the fifth of nine children to Joseph P. Kennedy and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy.
She was the recipient of numerous honors, including the nation’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which she received in 1984.
With her death, Jean Kennedy Smith becomes the last surviving Kennedy daughter.
