Episode 14: A Small Sum
There’s a lot of commotion when a $100 grand goes missing, but why is that a problem for multi-millionaires?
Trust in love and money can be dangerous things when mixed together.
Cobina Wright is constantly worrying over her husband Bill’s cheating with multiple women and ends up missing more pressing financial red flags. Nanaline Duke finally secures investment with Bill and is on the way to building her own personal fortune.
Archival music provided by Past Perfect Vintage Music, www.pastperfect.com.
Publish Date: October 15, 2020
Length: 19:59
Opening Music: My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands
Section 1 Music: Nightfall by Benny Carter & His Orchestra, Album Nightfall – Sophisticated Jazz Classics
Section 2 Music: These Foolish Things by Benny Carter, Album Perfect Blues
Section 3 Music: Just A Mood by Benny Carter & His Orchestra, Album Nightfall – Sophisticated Jazz Classics
End Music: My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands
AS THE MONEY BURNS
Podcast by Nicki Woodard
Episode 014 – A Small Sum
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.
00:28
Story Recap
While the teen heiresses battle to find love, Cobina Wright grows more aware of her husband Bill’s cheating. Nanaline Duke invests with Bill in order to build her own independent fortune.
Now back to AS THE MONEY BURNS
Title
A Small Sum
00:47
[Music fade out]
Episode Tag
There’s a lot of commotion when a $100 grand goes missing, but why is that a problem for multi-millionaires?
Trust in love and money can be dangerous things when mixed together.
00:58
[Music – Nightfall by Benny Carter & His Orchestra, Album Nightfall – Sophisticated Jazz Classics]
Section 1 – Story
[Music fade out]
01:08
Flash Forward: Early Autumn 1929, New York City
As golden leaves fall in the crisp air, opera singer Cobina Wright and the ever ambitious Nanaline Duke leave Grand Central station and slide into a chauffeured Rolls that takes them straight to Wright, Slade, and Co. The well-dressed ladies make their way into the prestigious high-rise office on Wall Street. It has the buzzing vibrancy of a busy stock brokerage firm during one of the best bull markets.
Cobina warmly greets employees as she guides Nanaline to Bill’s private office, where sits a rather plain jane and a little dumpy secretary. Cobina requests her husband Bill while eyeing the young woman suspiciously. The secretary alerts her that he is in a meeting, will be a bit longer, and offers both ladies coffee. Could this really be the “pretty young secretary” with whom Bill played house while Cobina was gone?
02:00
Since summer’s end and their quick jaunt to Biarritz, Bill has been attentively at Cobina’s side. It has been wonderful except he is now more prone to headaches. Cobina has opted not to pursue the doubts and rumors that plague her.
So much seems to have changed with the weather and seasons, friends too have had other concerns – one or another has sold their Rolls, a yacht, or a country home. All dismissed as the need to economize, fears of a market crash, or a depression. Such strange words indeed for the elite to utter in worry.
Out of the corner of her eye, Cobina spots Bill’s partner Newell Tilton. He nods politely, and she returns. Then cringes, last year Newell and Bill convinced her to sign a promissory note on their Long Island Sands Point home, lovingly referred to as Casa Cobina. Only recently, Cobina has finished restoring all the damage from a temporary renter while she was on tour. Why Bill rented it out at all makes absolutely no sense to her. He’s done so many odd things over the last year.
03:01
The ladies wait patiently discussing various little gossip amongst their set, when Bill emerges from the office and leads a group of executives towards the elevator. His actual pretty young secretary resumes her desk alleviating her temporary replacement. Bill ushers Cobina and Nanaline into his office.
There he pours on the charm towards Nanaline as he shows her various potential portfolios. Having passed the earlier investment test with a nice little payout over the last couple of months, she is delighted to finally be in, really in. Nanaline’s eyes sparkle with dollar signs.
Cobina watches them carefully, but she is thinking more about that pretty young secretary. That is likely the one the rumors keep telling her about. Cobina worries she’s losing Bill, and he seems so alive when playing the stock market. To get his attention, she dabbled a bit, but that only caused problems. He didn’t like his wife outshining him in his domain.
03:59
Nanaline particularly likes one set of stocks, yet it requires a hefty upfront entry investment. “It will take a few days to free up the funds and transfer them over.”
For a moment, Bill’s face drops but then flashes a great big smile. “That will be fantastic. Soon you will be making so much money in no time with this market, the other trustees will have to relent and invest for Doris too.”
Nanaline bristles at the mention of her daughter Doris, who has enough money. This is for her son Walker. A mother’s love knows no limits.
Later, Bill walks both ladies to the elevator and agrees to meet Cobina for the evening party honoring Maestro Arturo Toscanini. Bill greets another set of executives. These are not nearly as pleasant as the earlier group.
04:47
At their exquisite Sutton Place apartment, Cobina prepares for the party. Bill sends word he will be late due to an issue at the office. As she layers on the jewels, she finds Lil Cobina’s baby tooth. With a mother’s adulation, she smiles and kisses it. A little tear comes to her eyes almost ruining her makeup. She digs more jewelry out and runs across hidden in the bottom that distasteful article about some woman suing Bill for sharing an apartment. Cobina recoils and buries it further. Now her eyes are really watering. She does her breathing exercises transforming herself into the magnificent Madame Cobina.
In her sparkling refinery and wrapped in ermine, Cobina heads off to the party with her grand opera diva persona. As the evening proceeds amongst the New York Philharmonic set, another interruption sends Cobina to the door to find Bill with bloodshot eyes and disheveled.
05:40
Bill stammers, “I’ve got to go back to the office. I just sort of wanted to make sure you were alright.”
Concerned and confused, Cobina immediately retrieves her wrap. “Darling, I’m going with you.”
In the car, he doesn’t speak. She rolls up the window to block the chauffeur from hearing them. Bill proceeds to mutter about missing 90 some odd thousand dollars, banks going to shut them down in the morning,… It doesn’t make any sense.
They make it to Wall Street, where all the buildings are dark and quiet. Inside the all lit up Wright, Slade, and Company building, men rush about the corridors like a busy trading floor day. Around a large conference table, ten men pour over books and debate options and possibilities. Counting, cursing, swearing, sweating. The accountant Burns is bent over the ledgers endlessly going through the columns and crunching numbers.
06:35
Cobina makes her way into Bill’s private office and waits. She sees the pretty secretary flitting about pouring coffee. Cobina pulls off her earring and picks up the phone.
As time passes by, Bill comes to check on her. Cobina informs him that two banker friends will loan them the money before the 10am deadline. Bill sighs a big relief, but then shakes his head they still need to know how that money went missing.
She strokes his head as he leans into her.
07:02
The men work furiously into the night. Cobina and Bill hold hands in the silence. His anguish so palpable. Cobina wonders why such a fuss over a mere $100k. Surely, they could just transfer the money from one of their private accounts. She spent more on furniture during her last shopping spree for their new Sutton Place home.
Suddenly they hear a yell. The frazzled Burns runs to the door and points out the mistakes.
“The bank made recording errors. Here $7,250, here $31,000, and here they dropped the 0 and marked $1950 instead of $19,500.”
Bill looks confused. “That’s not half the amount necessary.”
Burns smiles, “Ah, we have to reverse the first two charges and add them back properly, that gives us $96k.”
07:52
Bill grabs the ledger looking at the dogged ear pages. He looks at Burns. Burns nods. It sinks in. Bill throws his arms in the air in celebration. He kisses the top of Cobina’s head. He goes out and thanks all the men for their dedication and hardwork. He picks up the pretty secretary and spins her in the air.
From afar, Cobina watches the celebration still confused. All this over a missing $100k?
Later in the car returning home, Bill is talking fast, excitedly, exhilarated, and energized. Exhausted and frustrated from all the chaos, Cobina begins to sob. Bill wraps his arms around her and strokes her head.
Comforting her, he dismisses the whole scenario as part of business. He soothes, “Don’t worry your pretty little head. There’s a mild panic on. Everybody is nervous. I’ll take care of us and everything will right itself shortly.”
08:48
To herself, Cobina has so many more questions.
A panic? After such a great and glorious summer, especially on the stock market. Exactly how bad could that get? Yes, economically they should be fine. Bill is excellent at business.
Only for her heart, that isn’t so clear. For now, she proved her worth as a devoted wife. Would that be enough to keep him from straying again?
End of Flash Forward – back to Newport Summer 1929
It’s another Society function. Cobina nurses her drink as she watches Bill flirt with another lady.
Love is in the air, but not in the right direction.
09:29
[Music – These Foolish Things by Benny Carter, Album Perfect Blues]
Section 2 – History & Historiography
[Music fade out]
09:39
Opera singer Cobina Wright is married to Man of the Floor stockbroker William May Wright. Her blond curly haired husband is a Newport blueblood and golden boy. They make a dashing couple everywhere they went, and Cobina hosts the most fabulous parties – the most infamous being their Circus Ball every January. When Cobina throws a party, everyone wants to come.
10:05
Cobina loves her life. It is nonstop decorating new homes, occasional special opera performances, and a few parties a year. Their Sands Point home in Long Island is complete with a mini house and mini Rolls for their curly headed tot Lil Cobina Jr. By 1929, Cobina finishes decorating their new Sutton Place apartment, a location they were tipped about during her special Maurice Ravel party where Hall Johnson and his choir performed.
To set up her homes, she would head over to Europe and pick out furniture. A Venetian bed, a 16th Century fountain, 18 foot long refectory table,… Her décor featured in the house-and-garden magazines for others to imitate.
10:45
Her last big shopping excursion happened the fall of 1928. Bill was supposed to accompany her, but at the last minute needed to stay behind and watch the market – something it never needed before. Disappointed she was joined by the infamous Fanny Brice (the inspiration behind Funny Girl) with her two kids, and Duchess Fernanda de Villa Rosa with her son Bobby Goelet. Without their menfolk, the women made the trip about the kids when not shopping and decorating. Lil Cobina played on the beach with the Queen of Greece’s children. Later Lil Cobina will be associated as a former paramour to the Queen’s nephew – the future Prince Philip of England, the Duke of Edinburgh and husband to reigning Queen Elizabeth II.
11:32
Only, if all of life was that simple and sweet. Before Cobina left on her excursion, she started hearing the rumors. Bill had other women – not one but plural. She thought that couldn’t be possible. It must be a mistake, a misunderstanding, mere rumor and scandal… They were so happy and perfect. She closed her eyes and left for her trip.
She hoped when she returned he would be done with his fling, a momentary indiscretion rectified. Instead rumors hit her everywhere, and even more greeted her when she returned. While she was gone, he was playing house with his secretary. Her friends warned her to consider her price in case of a divorce, but Cobina was committed to making the marriage work.
12:13
Odder he rented out their bay front Long Island home Sands Point, which they affectionately referred to as Casa Cobina with its peach-pink stucco. Previously, Bill and his new partner Newell Tilton convinced Cobina to sign over a promissory note on the property related to some business transaction at Wright, Slade, & Company. Cobina adored the home and was unwilling to sign anything that could risk it. Only Bill’s melancholy and withdrawal eventually forced her to yield.
During her European shopping excursion, the home was trashed due to the over partying renter. This was not a time when rich people rented things – especially not their homes, this isn’t AirBnB. The place was torn up with several expensive items missing. This was a lavishly set up house – with an adjacent mini replica for their tiny tot. So many guests delighted in staying there including Noel Coward.
13:03
From a concerned friend, Cobina got an article from the cheaper rag newspaper Graphic covering a lawsuit by another woman suing Bill for maintenance of $20k after sharing an apartment. When Cobina confronted Bill, he scoffed that it was blackmail for a failed stock endeavor. He righteously scolded that Cobina should know better after 8 years of a happy marriage. Even worse came the rumor that one of her friends was having an affair with Bill. Now Cobina is not sure whom to trust.
13:31
After her 1929 annual Circus Ball for which Swiss composer Arthur Honegger was the featured guest of honor, Cobina opted to join his Pro Musica Tour. Established in the early 1920s, Pro Musica Society was originally called the Franco-American Music Society by pianist E. Richard Schmidtz. The goal was to give rising European composers and performers a chance to appear to American audiences. By 1925, there were over 20 chapters and a quarterly publication. It is the same organization that Maurice Ravel toured in the Harlem Renaissance Episode 11 A Tall Order, and the same party where Bill and Cobina learned of a new building development to be known as Sutton Place.
14:13
Honegger praised Cobina’s rare talent and ability to sing both classic and modern music. Bill encouraged the tour as it would be a great distraction while the necessary repairs were made to Casa Cobina and the remaining construction at Sutton Place finished up.
Her brief return to the concert circuit also met with favorable press. In one article she was praised as having four careers – wife, hostess, millinery hat shop operator, and concert performer. She also was an occasional newspaper columnist on music and Society. This is a woman capable of doing anything.
14:46
In many ways, she did way more than that – always having a little calamity from here or there. Near Chicago, Cobina lost her jewelry case, but it wasn’t her diamond bracelet and other jewelry that upset her it was the missing baby’s tooth she was carrying with her. During another part of the trek, they had to stop the train afraid Cobina was thrown off into the mountains only to find Cobina under her furs sleeping in the wrong car.
On the tour, she was greeted by Charlie Chaplin in Hollywood. In reverse, Chaplin was her guest of honor at the opening of Sutton Place.
15:17
Now back to her regular life, Cobina is bound and determined to make her husband see the value in their relationship. She’s tried getting his attention by playing the stockmarket, and surprise surprise she does quite well, only he seems to resent it more. As long as she plays the dutiful wife, she fairs a little better.
But even their own daughter alerted her about daddy kissing the nanny. What is Cobina to do?
15:41
She is so consumed with his cheating that she neglects other pending signs of doom. That mere paltry sum of $100k in 1929, adjusted for inflation would be the equivalent of $1.5 million today. They were so conspicuously wealthy and were often aiding others in setting up new businesses. So why is there so much concern and worry over a such a small amount seems trivial, but is it?
I warned in the beginning there is so much to cover that not everything will be told chronologically – there will be flashbacks and flash forwards from time to time. Always tied to the present time within our story.
This is a small skip ahead to remind not all is what it seems in the world of money and love especially in 1929.
16:25
[Music – Just A Mood by Benny Carter & His Orchestra, Album Nightfall – Sophisticated Jazz Classics]
Section 3 – Contemporary & Personal Relevance
[Music fade out]
16:34
All relationships have their difficulties. We can get blindsided by so many things. Things we fear, things we can’t comprehend, things we wish were different. It can get so bad that we go into a deep pattern of denial.
Always using rose-colored glasses, even decades later, Cobina spoke about Bill with love, not anger, not bitterness, only the sweet memories of their lost fairytale.
Who wouldn’t want to hold on to the glamour and grandeur of a love and life like theirs?
17:04
But fairytales always involve nightmares, and hers has only begun. On the surface, everything is good as it always was. Only those pesky and persistent rumors make it clear something is wrong. Actually, she is focused on the wrong thing thus becoming blind to a far bigger danger.
Isn’t it ironic what we fear or dread? In reverse of the grass is always greener, once in the middle of a crisis we wish we could switch it to something different. When we’re being gaslit or dealing with an unknown, we somehow imagine it as something bad but still fixable. Then only to be confronted with something completely different.
17:40
I have said this is a story built out of my broken heart and broken dreams. My parallel journey started as a teen with her first romance happening in Rhode Island and even with 2 days in Newport, but the real hard one came over a decade later in another relationship. A marriage filled with passion and compatibility of my dreams and came with its counter opposite a complete nightmare.
I had always feared someone cheating on me. Understandable after the end of parents’ marriage. In the end, I was wishing that was the underlying problem, wishing that would be my way out. I knew there was a secret I didn’t understand, but my rationale always thought it was surmountable. I was not prepared for the truth. It was like being thrown into Alice in Wonderland or an episode of the Twilight Zone or maybe the escape from such unending madness. All of what didn’t make sense finally had more clarity and with that came pain.
In the end, heartbreak is heartbreak. But the truth can set you free.
18:39
If you are enjoying this world and want to see more, come check at my two webinars on the two original Waldorf Astoria Hotels pre-1929 Thursday November 19th and 1931 + later Thursday December 3rd both at 5:30pm EST / 4:30pm CST / 2:30pm PST at New York Adventure Club www.nyadventureclub.com. Live with 1 week recorded access afterwards. Only $10 each.
Hook
19:08
[Music – My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands]
Next when we return to AS THE MONEY BURNS…
Another prince comes to visit with his heiress wife. In a world where young heiresses dream of romantic love, this couple is the epitome of relationship goals.
Only will his presence cause problems for the current reigning royal?
Until then…
Credits
19:28
AS THE MONEY BURNS is an original podcast written, produced, and voiced by Nicki Woodard, based on historical research. Archival music has been provided by Past Perfect Vintage Music, check out their website at www.pastperfect.com.
Please come visit us at As The Money Burns via Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Transcripts, timeline, episode guide, and character bios are available at asthemoneyburns.com.
19:59
THE END