AS THE MONEY BURNS

Podcast by Nicki Woodard

Episode 138 – Kiss the Bride, Part 2 of 2

Outline

Third Marriage

Boxer

Series Tag

00:00

[Music – My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands]

AS THE MONEY BURNS is an original podcast by Nicki Woodard.  Based on historical research, this is a deep exploration into what happened to a set of actual heirs and heiresses to some of America’s most famous fortunes when the Great Depression hits.

Each episode has three primary sections.  Section 1 is a narrative story.  Section 2 goes deeper into the historical facts.  Section 3 focuses on contemporary, emotional, and personal connections.   

00:29

Story Recap

Doris Duke has finally turned 21 and inherited more than just her fortune.  Madeleine Astor faces another round of scandal before wedding #3.

Now back to AS THE MONEY BURNS

Title

00:45

Kiss the Bride, Part 2 of 2

[Music Fade Out]

Episode Tag

Wedding bells are ringing for trip down the aisle number three.  Only there is not an actual aisle, and not everyone is full of glee.  Part 2 of 2

01:07

[Music – Let’s Fall In Love For The Last Time by Mantovani, Albums The Great British Dance Bands & Tea Dance 2]

Section 1 – Story

[Music Fade Out]

01:23

Part 2 of 2

When the iceberg struck the Titanic on April 14^th, 1912, the disaster left much in its wake.  Colonel John Jacob Astor IV, aka “Jack,” put his young wife into lifeboat no. 6 before meeting his fate.  The young pregnant Madeleine Talmage Force Astor became a widow and a mother months later.  After several years, she gave up her Astor widow’s fortune to marry once again for love.

Other things would take longer.

01:58

It took her nearly 12 years to cross the ocean after surviving the Titanic.  On May 29^th, 1924, the press awaits for Madeleine to board the Aquitania, where a luxury suite is reserved for her with her son and Titanic baby John Jacob Astor VI, aka “Jakey,” her second husband William Dick, and their young sons William Dick, Jr. and John Henry Dick.  Only the family never appears.

02:30

The night before, an understandably anxious Madeleine has terrifying visions of another maritime disaster and refuses to go.  However days later Madeleine musters the strength and resolve to finally set out aboard the Berengaria on June 5^th, 1924. 

The press notes Jakey’s status as one of the richest children at the time.  He will suffer his own press attention throughout his life.  However distraction occurs when his older half-sister Ava Alice Muriel Astor marries exiled Russian Prince Serge Obolensky thus becoming more of a focus for the press.  The bride is given away by Viscount Waldorf Astor – the son of the very same cousin whose feud with Jack and Aunt Caroline Astor resulted in the Waldorf-Astoria hotel and Waldorf is the husband of Nancy Astor.  Neither of the bride’s brothers William “Vincent” Astor and Jakey attend their sister’s wedding.

03:30

Madeleine and family’s return trip also aboard the Berengaria is overshadowed by another more famous passenger the Prince of Wales, Prince David – future King Edward VIII – Duke of Windsor arriving in the United States on August 29^th, 1924.  Stories delight over his dancing on the ship with his own private orchestra and follows his trip to Long Island for polo and fun.  Luckily, the Prince takes all the attention, and Madeleine is left to a relatively more quiet existence for a little while.  Though she is spotted driving around with a young Jakey in the car.

Madeleine is never completely free of scandal or attention.  Only a year later 1925, she survives the Breakers Hotel fire in Florida along with her friend and another Titanic survivor, the Unsinkable Molly Brown.

Oh, how Madeleine misses her dear friend.  Molly passed away the year before in October 1932.

04:35

Thursday, November 9^th, 1933

At the Doctor’s Hospital in New York, Madeleine recovers from a broken shoulder sustained while in Bermuda with her young lover the fiery boxer Enzo Fiermonte.  Daily she receives a package of press clippings.

Astute and press weary, Madeleine has tried hard to avoid more scandal with her latest love.  She scours the newspapers to see if her attempts at deflection are successful.

05:04

Somewhat, but with news of her recent divorce and the new much younger lover, Madeleine is once again the topic of headlines.  Rumors of their engagement and pending marriage cause a feeding frenzy much like in her first marriage.

She chuckles slightly to herself in their misreporting.  Mistruths she wished were the real story.  The origin of her new love is hard to pin down.

Somewhat comforted and bound and determined to reunite, she sends word to Enzo and convinces him to marry her in New York after their failed attempt in Bermuda.

Previously, Enzo is prevented from entering Bermuda and New York by Madeleine’s former stepson William “Vincent” Astor.  Frustrated by all the delays, Enzo heads to Paris and hopes to revive his boxing career and somehow break free of Madeleine once and for all.  Their age difference he 26 and she 40 being the main complication.

Finally, he agrees to return.

06:10

Tuesday, November 14^th, 1933

On arrival, Enzo is greeted by Madeleine’s lawyer who lays out terms of their pending marriage.  Madeleine will retain the rights to and control of her fortune.  She will give Enzo a generous allowance.  Enzo denounces needing an allowance then signs over a dozen legal papers with it still included.  That afternoon, he visits Madeleine in the hospital.

The day before their nuptials, an older gray haired female friend of Madeleine warns Enzo not to marry as Madeleine is far too domineering and will make any man miserable unless she has her own way.

06:54

Monday, November 27^th, 1933

Somehow the press has not been alerted yet to the day’s activities.  Enzo heads back into the hospital undeterred by the public and private objections to their marriage.

Late in the afternoon, the sickroom is filled to the brim with flowers and has a champagne buffet on the side.  The only one to acknowledge his presence, future mother-in-law Mrs. William Force greets Enzo and warmly kisses him.   The other dozen friends and family remain aloof taking only formal notice of his arrival like it was a duty.

07:33

Arriving late, Jakey kisses his mother, shakes Enzo’s hand, then tells a joke which falls flat.  As well, her other sons William and John are none too pleased to be there either.

It takes a few minutes for the City Court official to arrange his papers.  Deputy city clerk Philip Hines officiates the marriage certificate at the bedside.  Municipal City Justice Vincent Lippe performs the official ceremony.

08:03

From her hospital bed, Madeleine marries Enzo. 

“For better, for worse,… I do…”

Upon uttering their vows, Enzo looks around the room to see one unsmiling face after another.  In his mind, he compares their silence in contrast to the warmer cozier nature of his first Italian wedding. 

The court official demands, “Aren’t you going to kiss the bride?”

Suddenly, Enzo snaps back to the reality of American customs.  There is no public kissing as part of the marriage ceremony in Italy.  He leans over and kisses Madeleine. 

The mood instantly shifts to a little more simulated gayety.  There are toasts of champagne, but the frigid hostility of those with whom Enzo must now spend his life is not a happy omen.

Madeleine’s cousin Philip Lyndon Dodge is also present and serves as liaison to the press, which has gathered by now.  He confirms the marriage and indicates that he does not think Enzo intends to return to the boxing ring.

Due to Madeleine’s wishes for their first night to be together, Enzo agrees to stay in the hospital in another room on the fourth floor.

09:21

The next day photos and headlines ring of the sudden marriage and its circumstances – the broken shoulder, ages of groom 26 and bride 40, plus Madeleine’s Titanic widowhood, and both their Nevada divorces this summer.

Other stories appear.  More reactions to the lynching over Brooke Hart’s kidnappers.  In a separate incident across the continent, another lynch mob in Maryland faces repercussions.  Yet, those stories do not dampen the thirst for scandal.

And once again, criticisms are leveled at Madeleine.  How dare she dishonor her gallant first husband Jack Astor who lost his life for her on the Titanic to now marry such a lowly and much younger man.  Some are appalled at Enzo’s profession of boxing.

Then there are others, more common folk, who revel in Enzo’s rise in the social hierarchy and state that a fit young man is of course a desirable mate if one could be so lucky. 

10:23

Would it be any surprise or more scandalous if the truth really be known – that she met her third husband the same way she lost her first husband on the ocean in a reverse crossing?

Heh, that January 1932 crossing aboard the Vulcania is another fateful trip.  One she hopes ends in happily ever after.  Always nervous during oceanic travel, her attending personal physician Dr. Moullowd invited the young handsome Enzo Fiermonte to dine with them and distract her for an evening.  Enzo became a much larger and longer distraction.  The clandestine couple would later return to New York aboard the ocean liner Olympic, the sister ship to the Titanic and the exact same ship Madeleine took with Jack on their way to Europe before the fatal return.

11:21

Now as the papers try to sort out the origin of their love story, some state they met during her Nevada divorce.  Others claim that they met on the beach in Lido where Enzo had befriended Jakey during the same spring 1932 trip, then later Enzo became the boxing instructor to her other sons.

Absolutely, Jakey wants no part in this story.  He too detests scandal.  In fact, he is close to deciding his own future fiancée, and one of the main contenders is the pretty Newport socialite Eileen Gillespie, the daughter of the earlier 1911 young newlywed couple Lawrence and Irene Gillespie mentioned from 1911 during Jack and Madeleine’s courtship and marriage.

12:08

Thursday, November 30, 1933

A “Car National” private car arranged by Jakey pulls up outside Pennsylvania train station.  Wincing in pain, Madeleine whispers, “Thank you,” to those attending her.

Inside the station, reporters swarm to get pictures and quotes of the newlyweds heading for their honeymoon. 

When one photographer gets too close, Enzo aggressively threatens “to knock the head off” of him. 

The ex-boxer defensively warns anyone else attempting to photograph his bride on a stretcher.  Madeleine, worried and distraught, is carried into a private railcar aboard the 10:30am train to Palm Beach.

Once she settles in, Enzo returns amicably and ready to pose for a photo.

12:58

As the train heads out, the rocking and rolling sound carries them away.  They travel down the coast to arrive around 4:30pm.  The private railcar comes with cook, maids, and a steward.  Her sons are not with them.  However, her private physician now Dr. Watson travels with them as well.  The cost of the car is $1000 (a little over $25k in 2026).  The price of privacy and deluxe accommodations.

13:29

By that afternoon, they arrive at their honeymoon villa in Palm Beach, the home of some long dead millionaire and feels more like a depressing mausoleum.  As Dr. Watson insists Madeleine rest, Enzo attempts to entertain himself swimming in the pool.  Slowly he realizes, the life of a goldfish is quite dull. 

Others have more exciting travel plans, aviator Charles Lindbergh and wife Anne Morrow Lindbergh are planning their trip back across the Atlantic, potentially leaving Cape Verde Africa for Brazil then head north.

Madeleine’s new marriage buzzes amongst other stories on capital “S” Society activities.  Still as one society column notes, few are keeping up with the Vanderbilts or the Mdivanis.