Travel is people. You may go abroad to see the famous sites, but what you remember best are the people you meet. Among them, like unex-pected treasure, are a few memorable contacts that will make your travels unique, special, and delightful. "People" is devoted to some of those you may come in contact with during your Home At First travels.

This article first appeared in April, 2007.

— FIRST OF A SERIES —
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Catherine of Aragon’s parents were the King &   Queen of Spain, Ferdinand & Isabella, the same
monarchs who financed Columbus’s voyage of
discovery to America in 1492 seven years after
      Catherine was born.

CONTEMPORARY PORTRAIT OF
QUEEN CATHERINE OF ARAGON
AT ABOUT 40 YEARS OF AGE.
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Catherine of Aragon was married twice herself. Her first
husband was Arthur, the older brother of Henry VIII.
First son of Henry VII and Crown Prince of England, he
married Catherine when she was 15 and he 13 years
 old. The union would have helped ensure peace between
 Europe’s two great maritime powers, and would have affected
 the colonizing of the Americas by Britain and Spain.

 CROWN PRINCE ARTHUR, PRINCE OF WALES, ELDER
 SON OF KING HENRY VII, BROTHER OF KING HENRY VIII,
 1ST HUSBAND OF CATHERINE OF ARAGON.

Before Arthur could become King Arthur — his father,
Henry VII was still alive — Arthur died, leaving Catherine a teenage widow living in a strange land.
No children resulted from Catherine’s first marriage.

KING HENRY VII, FOUNDER
OF THE TUDOR DYNASTY
AND TWICE FATHER-IN-LAW
OF CATHERINE OF ARAGON.

Arthur’s healthy, strong, handsome younger brother,
Henry, fell for his brother’s young widow. His father, the king, had had a change of heart about joining the
Tudors with the Spanish royal family and forbade his
second son from marrying Catherine. Four years went by, then Henry VII died. Young Henry became King Henry VIII and immediately took Catherine of Aragon as his queen in a joint coronation in 1509.

CATHERINE OF ARAGON—
TEENAGE WIDOW IN A STRANGE LAND.
 

Every monarch’s first duty is to provide an heir to
ensure continuity and security to the realm. Catherine worked hard to meet this goal. She had at least seven pregnancies, of which four lasted to term. Of these, two boy babies were born alive. One of these lived more than one month. Another son died shortly after birth. A daughter, her first child, was stillborn and premature. One child, a daughter, lived. She grew up to become Queen Mary I, known to history as Bloody Mary.

PRINCESS MARY, DAUGHTER OF CATHERINE OF ARAGON.
LATER SHE WOULD BECOME QUEEN MARY I, "BLOODY MARY".
 

ANNE BOLEYN, FOR
WHOM HENRY VIII HAD
HIS 24-YEAR MARRIAGE
TO CATHERINE OF ARAGON ANNULLED.
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During their marriage Catherine’s husband Henry VIII
pursued a series of relationships with other women. By the time Catherine was 42 years old Henry was considering how he could replace her with one of his younger woman friends, who could produce a male heir. Henry decided that he deserved an annulment to his marriage with Catherine because she had once been married and had failed to produce any living male children. When one of Henry’s girlfriends, Anne Boleyn, turned up pregnant, Henry put pressure on the Pope to provide special dispensation for the annulment. When the Pope — an ally of England’s great rival, France — turned down the request, Henry pursued a different strategy. He had England’s highest cleric, Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer, declare Henry’s married dissolved. Henry was now free to marry Anne Boleyn.

Catherine was no longer queen. Her new title — one she never accepted — was Princess Dowager of Wales. She no longer lived in the royal palace at Hampton Court and at the Tower of London, where she had been patron of the neighboring St. Katharine’s hospice. Rather, she was exiled to various less-than-queenly castles in rural England and along the border with Wales. She no longer saw her daughter, Mary, who would eventually  become Queen of England. Early in 1536, two and a half years after her marriage to Henry VIII had been annulled, Catherine of Aragon died in Kimbolton Castle north of London in Cambridgeshire. Catherine was under a kind of house arrest in Kimbolton Castle for refusing to   acquiesce to Henry and his church and accept her annulment and demotion from Queen. It is believed that Catherine’s ghost haunts the castle. A procession — not the grand procession of a queen brought Catherine’s remains to Peterborough Abbey, where they were buried. Three years later the fallout from Henry VIII’s separation from the Church of Rome over his annulment from Catherine of Aragon caused him to close, destroy, or simply take over Catholic churches, monasteries, and abbeys throughout Britain. Among those he closed was Peterborough Abbey, but not for long. The king soon re-opened the grand church as Peterborough 

KING HENRY VIII. PORTRAIT
ATTRIBUTED TO HANS EWORTH FROM
ABOUT 1545, TWELVE YEARS AND FIVE WIVES AFTER ENDING HIS MARRIAGE WITH CATHERINE OF ARAGON.

Cathedral, home church of the region’s bishop in Henry’s new Anglican state church. Catherine’s grave remains in its place by the High Altar.

Live like a Queen when you come to London.
Stay at HOME AT FIRST’s Apartments at St. Katharine’s Marina.
They’re all named after their famous neighbors at the
Tower of London next door: the wives of Henry VIII.
For example, see HOME AT FIRST's Catherine of Aragon Apartment.
 

— END OF PART ONE —
LEARN ABOUT HENRY VIII & ALL SIX OF HIS WIVES:

DIED: 19 MARCH, NEAR NEWTOWN SQUARE, PA—
Bob Fry, longtime resident of Swarthmore, PA, and, with his wife Betsy, longtime friend and supporter of Home At First. Bob was an avid traveler, as he was an avid outdoorsman, family man, friend, and husband. Bob enjoyed life and he helped others enjoy their lives, too. When Bob walked into the room he brought fresh air with him, and everyone breathed easier. Survived by Betsy, their children Lynn, Rob, and Ted, and their families.

BOB FRY