Jenny Sanford  Jennifer Sullivan Sanford (born September 11, 1962) is the former First Lady of South Carolina and a former investment banker. She was married to Governor Mark Sanford. Sanford was born and raised in Winnetka, Illinois, an upscale suburb of Chicago, the daughter of Susan Reynolds and John William Sullivan. She is the second of five children born to an Irish Catholic family. Sanford's family was prominent in the area. Her great-grandfather, Joseph W. Sullivan, co-founded Skil Corporation, which manufactured the first portable electric saw. Her uncle and another grandfather, both lawyers, headed the Winston and Strawn law firm. Sanford also is the niece of Anne Reynolds Skakel, who was the wife of Rushton Skakel, who in turn is the brother of Ethel Kennedy. Sanford attended Woodlands Academy, an all-girls Catholic school in Lake Forest, Illinois. She graduated "magna cum laude", earning her bachelor's degree from Georgetown University in 1984. Sanford met her future husband, Mark Sanford, at a beach party in the Hamptons on Long Island. She later talked about the meeting in an interview with "The Post and Courier": "It wasn’t exactly love at first sight. It was more like friendship at first sight." The couple married in 1989 and had four sons. It was not until the couple's second son was born that Mark Sanford announced his entry into politics. She later told "The Greenville News", "It was quite a surprise to me. When he told me, I was in the hospital, and we had just delivered our second son. So we had a 15-month-old and a newborn, and he says to me, ‘I’m going to run for Congress.’" In 1994, she managed her husband's successful campaign for the United States House of Representatives, as well as his successful campaign for Governor of South Carolina in 2002. Sanford also acted as her husband's advisor while he was in Congress. According to the Governor's website, she assisted him daily during his first term as Governor, and co-managed his successful re-election campaign in 2006. In 2005, she launched the Healthy South Carolina Challenge, an initiative to reduce the incidence of chronic preventable disease. She serves on the boards of several non-profits, including the Hollings Cancer Center, the Drayton Hall historical property in Charleston, the Coastal Community Foundation and the Children’s Hospital Advisory Fund.