Episode 23: Lessons Not Learned
The summer is over, and for our young heirs and heiresses that means returning to school. Money doesn’t guarantee popularity, especially when even the wealthy resent the wealthier.
Doris Duke, Barbara Hutton, Huntington Hartford, and Jakey Astor all return to their individual private and boarding schools. Isolated and alone, the heirs and heiresses must contend with their disapproving classmates. Frank Shields plans to transfer to a Connecticut private school near Barbara, and Louise Van Alen preps for her ongoing debutante activities.
Archival music provided by Past Perfect Vintage Music, www.pastperfect.com.
Publish Date: February 04, 2021
Length: 21:46
Opening Music: My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands
Section 1 Music: Plain Mary Jane by Mrs. Jack Hylton, Album The Great British Dance Bands
Section 2 Music: Ain’t She Sweet by Piccadilly Revels Band, Album Charleston – Great Stars Of the 20s
Section 3 Music: Sweet Sixteen And Never Been Kissed by Blue Mountaineers, Albums The Great Dance Bands & Play Hits of the 30s
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 023 – Lessons Not Learned
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 stock market soars, teen heiresses and future debutantes Barbara Hutton and Doris Duke made their way into the Newport in crowd bringing them into closer contact with teen heirs Jakey Astor and Huntington Hartford.
Now back to AS THE MONEY BURNS
Title
00:47
Lessons Not Learned
[Music fade out]
Episode Tag
00:49
01:01
[Music – Plain Mary Jane by Mrs. Jack Hylton, Album The Great British Dance Bands]
Section 1 – Story
[Music fade out]
01:12
Before the leaves change for fall, our young heirs and heiresses must endure an even bigger and more anxiety inducing annual ritual.
Their opulent Newport mansions humorously referred to as cottages will be replaced for the basic, simplistic, and even in some instances rustic experience of school.
Along Manhattan’s bustling streets, a limo inches down Park Avenue and turns on 82nd Street. Up ahead, the chauffeur watches as the tall and awkward, bright blonde Doris Duke in uniform walks to school. Some might consider it lucky she gets to go home every day, unless they remember her ambitious and disapproving mother Nanaline. The new school building is a bit further from her home but on the waterfront.
Excited and terrified, Doris hops up the steps at the prestigious Brearley School. Passing the beaver encrusted seals and logos in the hallways, she hopes one or two of her friends might still be there. The other teen girls whisper to each other, “She exposed herself in a white bathing suit,… exposed herself,… white bathing suit,… and exposed herself,… white bathing suit,… white bathing suit,…”
Flushed and confused, Doris darts into a bathroom and crumples to the floor crying. Obviously what happens in Newport, doesn’t stay in Newport.
02:31
Further out is the rustic St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, the all boys school is having tryouts for the tennis and squash teams. Doris’s Newport neighbor and richest boy Huntington Hartford awaits his turn from the bench. When called, all his summer practice at the Tennis Casino especially with Frank Shields has paid off. Huntington crushes it and not only makes the team but in one of the top positions. Back in the showers, the smaller, more Eastern European Huntington is hazed and ridiculed by his taller Anglo-Saxon classmates.
Inside his dorm room, Huntington scribbles escapist thoughts for an essay. A honk from a Rolls Royce, and out pops his mother Henrietta overly dressed up to the nines to take him for a celebratory dinner at Eagle Tavern. As they eat, Henrietta hungrily eyes every potentially available man to Hunt’s horror.
03:24
Also far away at Miss Porter’s in Farmington, Connecticut, the chubby budding fashionista Barbara Hutton stares at her plain bed stacked with multiples of the same dress in all colors. Her trunk and closet are stuffed full. In the shared room, her roommate’s side is far simpler. Everything is blatantly sparse and dull.
“How lovely you have the same dress both in blue and green.” An overly preppy head girl chimes from the door. “I much prefer my own in green to match my eyes.”
The girl leaves with her squad for the common room. They chatter their disdain rather loudly. These other well off girls have only one or two nice dresses. The code of the school is modesty. As Barbara winces at the criticisms, she runs across her book and sees a note stashed inside. She smiles at the summer memories of the Prince.
04:16
Avoiding her classmates, Barbara does her daily evening stroll around the perimeters. Lost in thought, she is interrupted by none other than the tall and lanky tennis champion Frank Shields. After basketball season, he plans to transfer to the nearby Roxbury in Cheshire on a full scholarship to prep for Yale. When Barbara and Frank warmly bid goodbye, the other females notice his presence with shock and envy.
04:41
Left behind in Newport, the proud young scion Jakey Astor pushes his food around in the dining hall at the very prestigious St. George’s. When he heads to the infirmary, the same set of teen boys from the summer cajole him with their sneer comments over his mingling with Doris and Barbara.
Over the weekend, Jakey takes an unlocked bike and not his own and rides away. He peddles past the small business part of town and the now fairly empty harbor. At Bailey’s Beach, Jakey grabs an ice cream soda crossing the female attendant who as a townie also remains. Along Cliff’s Walk, he stops in front of the Duke cottage Rough Point. Near his family cottage Beechwood, he angrily throws rocks into the crashing sea.
05:23
Outside Wakehurst, Jakey contemplates visiting his cousins dowager and society queen Daisy and her daughter reigning debutante Louise Van Alen, knowing that the brothers have already returned to London.
Inside Wakehurst, Louise debates the clothing for her ongoing debutante activities in New York. In her jewelry box, she picks up the tiny pearl she found in an oyster over Labor Day Weekend. She giggles nostalgically as her fingers toy with the ruby ring she secretly keeps around her neck. Louise pulls off the necklace and glances more closely at the blood colored stone. How did Prince Alexis ever afford such a beautiful ring? He must really love Louise and not her rival Silvia. Louise kisses the ring before hiding it again next to her heart.
06:08
In London, Louise’s brother Sam Van Alen gets ready for another semester at Cambridge studying architecture. While oldest brother Henry mills about as he prepares for his upcoming nuptials. Russian Prince Alexis Mdivani is nowhere to be found. Is he playing polo or back with Silvia?
06:28
[Music – Ain’t She Sweet by Piccadilly Revels Band, Album Charleston – Great Stars Of the 20s]
Section 2 – History & Historiography
[Music fade out]
06:39
The goal of an elite education is naturally exclusionary in order to ensure privileges stay within a select set of individuals. But this is more than the scholastic aspects, it is the social network built within this particular system.
Education definitely has changed A LOT over the *last century*. While elite boys would receive a more classical education in preparation for attending an Ivy school, the curriculum for females was often much more dire. Their education prepared them for running a *wealthy* household, thus a big achievement was that these girls would make their own beds and not their servants.
07:13
This was more like a finishing school on manners and etiquette, with a few subjects like language or sewing, but rarely more rigorous instructions. There was also a strong sentiment that while education improved males’ lives and minds, in contrast it would ruin females making them too opinionated and otherwise unmarriageable. And girls going to college? Nanaline Duke sneered at the idea of Doris ruining herself by becoming a teacher and therefore undesirable for a society marriage.
The elite boarding school was set up to restrict access of the nouveaux riche preserving cultural identity and isolation for old money. Of course, like almost all things, the nouveaux riche with their vast sums of money eventually find their way in. And in those private settings, that provided a harsh divide. Old money preferred to hide wealth with modesty, while new money flaunted it.
08:05
Barbara Hutton, Doris Duke, and Huntington Hartford constantly had trouble in school. They felt criticized by classmates who envied their large fortunes. The classmates would later claim that money wasn’t the issue but that the outcasts weren’t sociable, didn’t understand the rules of modesty, and often would isolate from the groups. Despite the highest pedigree, Jakey Astor too had issues in school resulting in a constant upset stomach. Regardless, they all suffered ridicule and bullying from the pack furthering their isolation. That’s a tale and rationale as old as time.
Of course, there are several schools well known today, but for story context here is a little more information on the schools attended by our main characters.
08:47
Brearley School in Manhattan was founded in 1884 by Samuel Brearley, who actually set up a curriculum somewhat equivalent to a more classical male education. Since 1926, women have solely served in the top position as headmistresses. There have been several buildings that served the school, with it making a major move to its current location on 83rd Street in 1929. In several recent years, the Brearley School has ranked as the 2nd best both in prep and all-girls schools in the nation.
The Brearley alumnae include Doris Duke, Caroline Kennedy and her daughters Rose & Tatiana Schlossberg, tv hostess Abiola Abrams, media executive Elisabeth Murdoch, Olympic silver medalist fencer Emily Cross, Sex & the City writer Jenny Bicks, and actresses Anne Baxter, Kyra Sedgewick, Alexandra Daddario, and Tea Leoni.
09:42
St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire spans over now 2,000 acres with 4 ponds and an old mill on the property. Established in 1856, the all boys Episcopalian school would be one of the first boarding schools to accept females in 1971. The school was very rustic and austere, not allowing early students to own a car nor bike on the premises. Though wealthy students attended, the atmosphere was money doesn’t matter. In 1884, it would build the first squash court in the US. It has a 6 day school week with Wednesdays and Saturdays being half days for sports and athletics.
Famous St. Paul’s alumni include Huntington Hartford, Jakey’s father & Titanic casualty John Jacob Astor IV, banker JP Morgan Jr, newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, Doris’s cousin Angier Biddle Duke, screenwriter James Vanderbilt, entrepreneur and 4 Hour Work Week author Tim Ferris, poker champion Annie Duke (no relation to Doris), actor Judd Nelson, princess & actress Catherine Oxenberg now more known for taking down the NXIVM sex cult. Among the fictional alums, James Bond attended though he didn’t graduate.
10:57
Miss Porter’s in Farmington, Connecticut was established in 1843 by Sarah Porter. She insisted on a curriculum including chemistry, botany, geology, astronomy as well as the languages, arithmetic, trigonometry, history, and geography. Athletics in tennis, horseback riding, and baseball were also present by 1867.
Famous Miss Porter’s alumnae include Barbara Hutton, Gloria Vanderbilt, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis and her sister Lee Radziwill, their cousin Edith Bouvier Beale (Little Edie of Grey Gardens), actress and Barbara Hutton’s cousin Dina Merrill, the future socialite & famous debutante Brenda Frazier, Tibetan nun Pema Chodron, screenwriter Susannah Grant, actress Mamie Gummer (Meryl Streep’s daughter), and Victoria de Lesseps. Fictional attendees include Katherine Hepburn’s character in 1938’s Holiday, Fallon Carrington in the original 1981 Dynasty, Sally Draper in Mad Men, and Joanne in the musical Rent.
12:03
Located on 204 acres, the Roxbury School in Cheshire, Connecticut was founded in 1794 and is the 11th oldest boarding school in the United States, the oldest continuous school building in use in Connecticut, and 10th oldest schoolhouse in the US. It would first serve as a way to train young men for clergy, and later a more classical education in English, Latin, Greek, philosophy, mathematics, and sciences. For a period, it was training ground for less academically focused young men to prepare for Yale. Originally called the Episcopal Academy of Connecticut, by 1900s Cheshire School, in 1917 changed to Roxbury School, and from 1937 to present as the Cheshire Academy. From 1806-1917 and from 1969-present, the school was coed and permitted female students.
Famous Roxbury / Cheshire Academy alumni include Frank Shields, Wimbledon champion Sidney Wood, financier & industrialist JP Morgan, novelist Robert Ludlum, rapper Talib Kweli, and actor James Van Der Beek.
13:13
In Newport, Rhode Island, St. George’s School was founded in 1896, later becoming co-educational in 1972. The school is Episcopal with a long history of sending its students to the most prestigious universities. St. George’s is referred in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s first novel This Side of Paradise referring to it as “prosperous and well-dressed.” Today, its sailing vessel Geronimo, a 69 foot sloop, takes students on 6 weeks long sailing voyages.
Illustrious alumni include multiple members of the Astor family – Vincent Astor, Jakey aka John Jacob Astor VI, and their sister’s son and nephew Prince Ivan Obolensky. Jacques Cousteau’s grandson Phillippe Cousteau Jr, Modern Family actress Julie Bowen, commentator Tucker Carlson, entertainment host Billy Bush, Bloomberg anchor Peter Cook, poet Ogden Nash, former DC Entertainment president and Warner Brother Interactive chief content officer Diane Nelson.
14:16
Of course, it would be great to be part of a group of people who were illustrious, talented, and prestigious and achieved great and noteworthy things. It would be nice to think that basic admission was a guarantee for everything else that was the best in life.
But as much as school in about an education and in these cases a network, without a doubt school also provides hard and valuable lessons in socialization. No matter the background, the desire for friends which are most easily acquired during the school years still is one the very primary needs. The current isolation caused by the ongoing pandemic and lockdowns should stress that point as children and adolescents struggle today with that very need.
14:55
Because in the end, there are no guarantees. And it doesn’t matter how many elite or top people you have in these alumni like associations, the ones who end up mattering the most are the ones who are by your side – your friends – who shape you. Our heirs and heiresses didn’t have that. Money and elite admission doesn’t buy nor guarantee true friendships.
15:16
[Music – Sweet Sixteen And Never Been Kissed by Blue Mountaineers, Albums The Great Dance Bands & Play Hits of the 30s]
Section 3 – Contemporary & Personal Relevance
[Music fade out]
15:30
My summer in Rhode Island was a glimpse into a world only described from afar via books, tv, or movies. My only previous northeast experiences were a trip to New York as a kid and spending one summer in New Hampshire with my best friend’s family after 6th grade, and that was more middle class.
15:57
Now I was off to spend 7 weeks taking 2 college courses on scholarship during the summer between my junior and senior years of high school. My original plans thwarted after missing Nationals by getting 3rd in State History Fair, the documentary competition that first gave me the skills to create this podcast. So it’s pretty obvious that I was a highly involved academic student. This summer was going to be a chance for me to consider the next stage of my life – college. And confession, escape from my worst fear.
My older brother was battling cancer. The day before leaving, I sat on his ICU bed sharing a pizza as he excitedly contemplated about essentially an unsupervised extended summer camp in a college dorm. I felt guilty and scared, not sure he’d still be there when I returned. My brother proudly encouraged me to go and enjoy it.
16:51
The Brown University courses definitely were grueling but doable. I had a sweet first romance, met people from all over the US and several foreign countries, and would play cards (bloody knuckles and slap) in the evening and ultimate frisbee on the weekends. Did I mention I used to be a tomboy? Due to multiple situations, I was often more surrounded by guys than girls. As my own high school experience was pretty isolating, it was wonderful to have so many friends.
17:19
Only there was one complication – spending 7 weeks in closely confined proximity with a group of girls. The formation of new tribes in a new place, the mix of a Californian Berkeley girl, a supersmart girl from Maryland, another from Pennsylvania, and a couple of private and boarding school girls from New England. We were about 7 total on average eating together, sleeping near each other, and taking the same classes. In general, it was good, but there were times the snobbishness came out.
Snobbery rarely appeals to me, and I don’t care what the reasons. Mostly, I hate the need to put someone else down. Now, I’m the youngest of 4 siblings and 5 neighborhood kids. Growing up, I was the endless target of teasing and am quite good natured and thick-skinned. I can hold my own. Yet these girls got weirdly vicious, and they couldn’t take it if you dished it back.
18:10
They constantly and blankedly told me I was stupid and getting a poor public high school education compared to their New England standards. Mocked for being a Texan. And ohhh then I got the guy everyone had a crush on despite their pretty pathetic attempts at him the week before. The claws got sharper. They were superior in every way.
After 5 weeks of their bullshit, I had had enough. By now, our little group of 7 girls were regularly surrounded by twice as many boys. They wanted to get rid of me and keep all the guys. They made a mistake.
18:46
At lunch on Monday, I randomly sat at another table. Immediately, my boyfriend and 4 closest card playing guy friends joined me. Each successive meal a few more guys defected from the old table. Within 2 days, all the guys (maybe 12-15) were with me alone, and the girls off by themselves for a solid week.
You see I had befriended the boyfriend first when he arrived. I had our regular male card group, and with ultimate frisbee almost every guy in the program played regularly with me as the only girl. Somehow I became the gateway for the guys and girls to mix together.
19:24
The girls apologized over and over and begged me to come back. I did like a few but I was tired of the 2 worst – I had enough to deal with when I went back home, and I wasn’t going to waste the remainder of my experience on petty bullshit.
However I knew the guys had their crushes, and we were all pretty nerdy. I gave the guys a vote if I should go back. Endearingly, they vowed to stick with me no matter what, but I got them to admit yes they liked having the girls too. We made a deal. I’d go back for them, but if there were any more problems it would be over.
20:00
Everyone behaved, and a few got to kiss their crushes during our final week. Overall, it was an amazing experience. It was paradise in the middle of what would be the most hellish year of my life.
As in life, our story has far more darker times coming just around the corner. I might seem like an open book, but I haven’t revealed all the secrets yet.
20:22
Need an escape? Come check out New York Adventure Club and all it’s wonderful webinars featuring familiar places and interesting topics. My own two recurring webinars covering the first two Waldorf-Astoria hotels with some storylines and characters from As The Money Burns will be featured next on Thursdays Part 1 February 4th and Part 2 February 11th. $10 live with 1 week access afterwards. Available via www.nyadventureclub.com and the News & Events section at asthemoneyburns.com.
Hook
20:57
[Music – My Heart Belongs to Daddy by Billy Cotton, Album The Great British Dance Bands]
Next when we return to AS THE MONEY BURNS…
As the long perfect Indian summer ends, there is one final party to attend. Only the Wall Street Crash takes out more than stocks, and all that is known will soon be questioned.
Until then…
Credits
21:14
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, or Instagram. Transcripts, timeline, episode guide, and character bios are available at asthemoneyburns.com.
21:46
THE END