Julia Stimson Thorne (September 16, 1944 - April 27, 2006) was an American writer and the first wife of former U.S. Senator and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
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Early life
Thorne was born in New York City, the daughter of Alice Smith (Barry) and Landon Ketchum Thorne, Jr. Her maternal great-grandfather was journalist David S. Barry and her paternal great-great-grandfather was Alfred Lebbeus Loomis, a physician who served as president of the Association of American Physicians. Her brothers are Landon Ketchum Thorne III of Beaufort, South Carolina and her twin brother David Thorne of Brookline, Massachusetts. She spent much of her childhood in Rome and attended the international school, Marymount in Rome while her brother David attended the Overseas School of Rome. Her father had been appointed to a diplomatic post and was publisher of The Voice of the Daily American. She attended the Foxcroft School in Middleburg, Virginia. She took classes at the New York School of Interior Design and Radcliffe College.
Thorne met Kerry in 1963 at her family's estate in Bay Shore, New York on Long Island. Kerry was a Yale classmate of Thorne's twin brother David. Thorne married Kerry on May 23, 1970 and divorced on July 25, 1988, after a six-year separation. She and John had two daughters together:
- Alexandra Forbes Kerry (born 1973)
- Vanessa Bradford Kerry (born 1976)
During their marriage, Julia began showing signs of depression and later wrote that she had at one time contemplated suicide. She overcame depression by 1990, and by all accounts the two had an amicable relationship.
She married Richard J. Charlesworth in 1997 and they moved to Bozeman, Montana. On May 7, 1997, two years after his remarriage, Kerry publicly announced that he had requested an annulment from the Roman Catholic Church of his marriage to Thorne.
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Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign
She endorsed Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign, stating, "I think he is an immensely talented statesman, and I am 100 percent behind him".
Books
She was the author of the books You Are Not Alone: Words of Experience and Hope for the Journey Through Depression (1993) (with Larry Rothstein) (ISBN 0-06-096977-6) and A Change of Heart: Words of Experience and Hope for the Journey Through Divorce (1996) (ISBN 0-06-095105-2).
Death
She was being treated for transitional-cell carcinoma, a form of cancer. Thorne died of bladder cancer in Concord, Massachusetts.
Ancestry
Julia Thorne was a direct eleventh generation descendant of John Bowne, a defiant activist in the struggle for religious freedom. William Thorne Sr., third signatory of the Flushing Remonstrance is also an ancestor. Thorne was also a distant cousin of John Kerry through their common ancestor Elizabeth Fones.
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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