Shriver dies at age 88

Boston -- Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who emerged from a powerful male-dominated political family to found the Special Olympics and become a leading advocate of the mentally disabled, died Tuesday at the age of 88.

With the passing of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the nation has lost an unwavering defender of the vulnerable, Concerned Women of America. Along with her much-touted work as founder of the Special Olympics, Mrs. Shriver was also a staunch pro-life advocate. Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser remembers Eunice and her role with the Susan B. Anthony List as well as other pro-life efforts including the ground-breaking 1992 ad in the New York Times protesting the Democratic Party's embrace of the abortion-rights agenda in its platform. Yet, Dannenfelser adds that Shriver's greatest influence was not political, but through her encouragement of those who fight for "the least of these" on a daily basis.

Ms. Shriver died after she was hospitalized recently in Hyannis, the Massachusetts town on Cape Cod synonymous with the Kennedy dynasty.

"Her work transformed the lives of hundreds of millions of people across the globe and they in turn are her living legacy," her family said in a statement.

She was married to Sargent Shriver, whose long public service career included starting the Peace Corps under Eunice's brother, President John F. Kennedy.

Eunice was born July 10, 1921, the middle child of the nine children of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and his wife, Rose.

As a child, she wanted to compete athletically against her brothers, including John, who would be elected president in 1960 and slain in 1963; Robert, a New York senator whose presidential bid ended with his assassination in 1968; and Edward, who has served as senator from Massachusetts for more than 45 years.

Edward Kennedy is battling brain cancer, diagnosed in May 2008.

Ms. Shriver was always a part of her Democratic brothers' political campaigns but her advocacy work crossed party lines. Republican President Ronald Reagan praised her "enormous conviction and unrelenting effort ... on behalf of America's least powerful people" in 1984 when he awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor.

Well into her 80s, Ms. Shriver still was seen in the halls of the U.S. Capitol seeking support for her cause.

She started the Special Olympics Games in 1968 to foster fitness and self-esteem for those with mental retardation. Her concern for the mentally handicapped was attributed to her relationship with older sister Rosemary, who was said to have been mildly retarded and spent the majority of her life in long-time care facility after a lobotomy.

"I had enormous affection for Rosie," Ms. Shriver said in a National Public Radio interview in 2007. "If I had never met Rosemary, never known anything about handicapped children, how would I have ever found out? Because nobody accepted them anyplace."

The genesis for the Special Olympics was the summer camps that Ms. Shriver put on herself for retarded children at her family's Maryland estate. In 1968 she opened the first U.S. Special Olympics games and 40 years later the event had grown to include 190 nations.

In addition to athletic competition, the Special Olympics became a public service organization that advocated research, rights and better care for its constituents. Her son Timothy became the organization's chairman.

The Shrivers' other children are Maria, a former television journalist who married California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger; Bobby, a lawyer and philanthropist; Mark, a former Maryland state legislator now in charity work; and Anthony, who also founded a group to help the mentally handicapped.

Eunice was a debutante who was presented at the Court of St. James while her father Joseph Kennedy was U.S. ambassador to Britain. Early in her professional life, she worked for the State Department and then with women prisoners in West Virginia.

Ms. Shriver campaigned with her husband when he was the vice presidential candidate with George McGovern in 1972, and when he made his own failed bid for the Democratic nomination for president in 1976. Matthew Bigg, Reuters reporting.

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