Marjorie Merriweather Post
Marjorie Merriweather Post (born March 15, 1887 in Springfield (Illinois) , † September 12, 1973 ) was the owner of General Foods and an art collector. With her estimated fortune of 250 million dollars it was one of the wealthiest women in the United States .
Life
parents house
Marjorie Merriweather Post was born in 1887 to entrepreneurs Charles W. Post and Ella Letitia Merriweather. CW Post founded the Postum Cereal Company , later Post Cereals .
Marriage to Edward Bennett Close
In 1905 Marjorie married Edward Bennett Close , a Greenwich, Connecticut-based investment banker . From this marriage the two daughters Adelaide and Eleanor emerged. In 1919 the couple divorced. With his second wife, Edward Close had their son William Taliaferro Close, who is the father of actress Glenn Close .
Marriage to Edward Hutton
Edward Francis Hutton was a Wall Street securities dealer and a multiple millionaire himself. His first wife, Blanche Horton, died of the Spanish flu in 1919 . Marjorie married him in 1920. In 1925 the couple had their only daughter, Nedenia. She became an actress and took the stage name Dina Merrill .
Edward had several affairs with other women. When these became known, the couple divorced in August 1935.
Marriage to Joseph Davies
In the same year she married the American lawyer Joseph E. Davies . Davies, who was also US President Woodrow Wilson's economic advisor , was appointed ambassador to Moscow , where the couple lived from 1937 to 1938. This period was filmed in the Hollywood film Ambassador to Moscow . In 1938 Davies became ambassador to Belgium . The couple returned to the United States in 1938. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1955.
Marriage to Herbert A. May
In 1958 Marjorie married for the fourth time. Her groom was the wealthy Pittsburgh businessman Herbert A. May . This marriage ended in divorce in 1964. After this marriage, she returned to her original name Marjorie Merriweather Post.
Achievements and lifestyle
economy
CW Post familiarized his daughter with corporate governance at an early stage. He taught her to oversee production and attend board meetings. When the father died in 1914, Marjorie, then 27 years old, took over the management of the company.
Her second husband Edward Hutton became chairman of the board and together the couple expanded the product range. After acquiring numerous other food companies, the name was changed to General Foods Corporation . The company was sold to Philip Morris in 1929 and is now part of Mondelēz International .
Luxury yacht Sea Cloud
Her then husband Edward had the four-masted barque Hussar II built as a wedding present. In the first few years, Marjorie took great care to furnish the yacht to her taste. To do this, she rented a warehouse in Brooklyn and initially built the interior there to scale. The Hussar II was the largest and most luxurious private yacht that ever existed. Between 1932 and 1935 the Huttons undertook numerous private cruises with prominent guests from the aristocracy, film and business world.
After the divorce, Edward Hutton wanted to use the name Hussar for his next yacht and so Marjorie renamed the Hussar II Sea Cloud and had the hull painted white. When Joseph Davies became ambassador to Moscow, the Sea Cloud was moved to Leningrad . During this time, Marjorie made many contacts with diplomats who liked to use the tap-proof Sea Cloud for meetings. When Davies was transferred to Belgium, the Sea Cloud was relocated to Antwerp .
Between 1942 and 1944, Marjorie made the Sea Cloud available to the United States Coast Guard for use in World War II . Then the yacht had to be extensively restored. In 1952, Marjorie sold the Sea Cloud to the dictator of the Dominican Republic , Rafael Trujillo .
Summer residence Mar-a-Lago
During her marriage to Edward Hutton, between 1924 and 1927, Marjorie had the summer residence Mar-a-Lago built in Palm Beach . The architect Joseph Urban designed the 10,219 m² property with 118 rooms in a Spanish style. The name is Spanish for "sea by the lake". In 1980, Mar-A-Lago was declared a National Historic Landmark . The property is now owned by Donald Trump .
Hillwood in Brookville
In addition to Mar-a-Lago, the Huttons owned Hillwood, a large estate in Brookville on Long Island .
Marjorie sold the property to Long Island University in 1954 for $ 200,000. The property became the Long Island University CW Post Campus , which at 1.24 km² is the university's largest campus.
Art collection
After Edward's marriage, the couple moved to New York, where they met influential families in society. From this she took over her interest in art and began buying furnishings for her New York apartment. She acquired the theoretical basis by attending several art courses.
During her time in Moscow, she began collecting Russian icons, porcelain, silver cutlery, and Fabergé jewelry , which formed the cornerstone of her legacy of Russian art. She was a long-time customer of the Cartier jeweler .
Her jewelry collection includes a pair of diamond earrings owned by Marie Antoinette , a diamond turquoise necklace that Napoleon I gave to his second wife Marie-Louise of Austria , the Blue Heart diamond of 30.82 carats and an emerald diamond -Collier from the possession of Ferdinand Maximilian of Austria .
Hillwood in Washington
After divorcing Joseph E. Davies, Marjorie bought the Hillwood Estate in Washington, DC in 1955 to live and to house her art collection. In 1958 she hired the art historian Marvin Ross, who advised her on further art purchases and the presentation of the objects in her house. After her death she left Hillwood as a public museum including the art collection. It can now be viewed as the Hillwood Museum, Estate & Gardens .
Awards
During the First World War , Marjorie Merriweather Post donated to building field hospitals in France . For this she was later accepted into the French Legion of Honor .
In 1971 she was one of the first three women to receive the Boy Scouts of America's Silver Fawn Award . The Silver Fawn Award was given to women between 1971 and 1974 as a counterpart to the Silver Beaver Award .
literature
- Nancy Rubin Stuart: American Empress: The Life and Times of Marjorie Merriweather Post . 1995, ISBN 0-679-41347-2 (English)
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original dated January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c Hillwood Museum, Estate & Gardens: Marjorie Merriweather Post ( Memento of the original from March 25, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . (English)
- ↑ MiamiHerald.com: Trump Honored for Preservation of Mar-A-Lago ( Memento of the original from April 24, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . March 2003. (English)
- ↑ History of The Mar-a-Lago Club ( Memento of the original from May 15, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English)
- ↑ Mar-A-Lago in the National Historic Landmarks Program (English)
- ↑ http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonydemarco/2014/06/07/the-marjorie-merriweather-post-cartier-jewelry-collection-opens-today/
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Merriweather Post, Marjorie |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Merriweather Post Close Hutton Davies, Marjorie |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American entrepreneur and founder of General Foods |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 15, 1887 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Springfield (Illinois) |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 12, 1973 |