AS THE MONEY BURNS

Podcast by Nicki Woodard

Episode 094 – The Hunter Class

Outline

Cannes

Horse Show

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.   

00:30

Story Recap

While Newport has an influx of millionaires for Tennis Week, Barbara Hutton grows closer to Prince Alexis Mdivani in France.

Now back to AS THE MONEY BURNS

Title

00:44

The Hunter Class

[Music Fade Out]

Episode Tag

Despite small implosions everywhere, some hide their true situations while prancing around like prized ponies at a horse show.

01:02

[Music – Did You Mean It? By Jack Hylton, Album The Great British Dance Bands]

Section 1 – Story

[Music Fade Out]

01:19

As the 1932 summer drifts into fall, many of the wealthy find themselves in places like the French Riviera.  A nice escape from the harsher realities of the lingering Great Depression.

On the sunny beaches in the Cote D’Azur region, the handsome, toned, and tanned heir to two fortunes James H.R. Cromwell, aka “Jimmy,” enjoys the surf and Café Society.  He is the son of the fabulously wealthy and supreme society hostess Mrs. Eva Stotesbury, who as a widow remarried his stepfather E.T. “Ned” Stotesbury when Jimmy was a teen.  Jimmy has been having a rather busy year, which started off a little more controversial with some legal matters, but now it’s been smooth sailing and back to focusing on the happier elements of life.

02:04

Already, Jimmy has been linked to two other potential beauties to become his second wife – Billie Dove in early spring and by summer the beautiful Italian Lydia Anita Vittoria Bodrero, the former Mrs. Valentine Everit Macy, Jr.  Jimmy’s first wife and automobile heiress Delphine Dodge has already remarried to Raymond Baker.  Jimmy and Delphine’s 12 year old daughter Christine Cromwell bounces between the two with occasional parental custody fights.

02:34

As the young, tall, and no longer awkward heiress Doris Duke too enjoys the sun while dealing with the glaring oversight of her socially ambitious mother Nanaline Duke.  Doris is a little more stylish than her former hand-me down clothes of her pre-debutante days.  Since her bow at Buckingham Palace and her somewhat smallish 600 person debutante ball at Newport where Jimmy was her escort, Doris has been a much sought after target of fortune hunters.  Security concerns further ramp up after the tragic Lindbergh kidnapping, and Nanaline is fiercely protective over the Duke fortune.

03:11

When mother and daughter walk back into their hotel lobby in Cannes, they run into Jimmy and his parents – the Stotesburys.  The former astonished, and the latter delighted.  The first encounter between Jimmy and Doris occurred back in Bar Harbor in 1929 and ended with a naked Jimmy crawling into bed with a frightened and shocked Doris.  The nearly 16 year age difference alone did not help matters.  Nothing happened except Doris falling into a pool of tears.

And yes, he then served as her escort a year later for her 1930 coming out ball.  Another attempted pairing occurs on Valentine’s Day 1931 in Palm Beach, once again Hope Diamond owner Evalyn Walsh McLean made an effort throwing a party for Doris.  Evalyn along with Jimmy’s mother Eva agree the two would make an excellent match.  Nanaline at first too likes the idea.  Jimmy would later trail Doris around Europe that year.

04:10

Now it’s 1932.  Due to fears of growing discontent from the Great Depression and threats of ransacking, the Stotesburys close their large Philadelphia mansion Whitemarsh Hall and loan its excellent artwork collection to a local museum before packing up and heading off to Europe in June 1932.  Jimmy joins them on their travels, and once again he continuously runs into Doris from locale to locale as she fends off other would be suitors.  Nanaline hires private detective Max Krone as a love spy to weed out more obvious fortune hunters.  Doris gets at least one proposal a week.

04:48

Back in London, Doris escapes the sugary and overly suffocating adulations from the Earl of Poulett.  Another evening, she dances with Lord Fairhaven to Nanaline’s delight.  Nanaline fancies Doris marrying at least a count and making a good royal match – the most prestigious social position of all.

Another precaution, Doris has an alarm installed in her limousine.  When one overly ardent suitor lunges at her, she pushes the button.  Alarms sound off.  The limo halts, and the trailing behind detectives open the door and eject the young gentleman.  Fair to say in an understatement, one reject is a little more than miffed by this treatment. 

05:32

Meanwhile, Doris and Jimmy engage in exchanging letters, both teasing and antagonistic.  The aloof Doris runs tepid and cold when Jimmy becomes a little too aggressive.  Yet, she also seems to crave the attention of such a highly desirable male.

Afterall Jimmy is a thoroughbred stud with his own trail of wannabe Mrs. Cromwell #2.  He is so good-looking and maneuvers adeptly in elite and royal circles.  He possesses all the proper breeding and is very well versed in social customs – both which rules to follow and which to break.  He is a member of all the best clubs and travels with a fairly lively crew.  Getting into enough trouble to be interesting, but not so much to be problematic.  He oozes charm, sophistication, and a tad bit of naughtiness.  Catnip for sure.

Then add the fact he comes from 2 fortunes makes him a prize catch.  He would never need to be a fortune hunter.

06:38

For Jimmy, Doris has some fabulously desirable traits – mostly her vast fortune to which she will soon come into control in another year or two, unlike the other heiresses who are still many years away from the death that would release their funds.  Doris is young which would make her a good acolyte for his revolutionary ways.  She should be pliable and under the sway of the more sophisticated older man, the daddy’s girl who needs another daddy to take care of her.  He also harbors political ambitions that she should sponsor more than willingly.  

Ummm, Jimmy is as oblivious as he is handsome, often seeing the world through rose-colored lenses without a true sense of reality.  He is a bit spoiled, a little entitled, but fairly well-intentioned and blatantly unaware of his actual selfishness.  He prances around confidently knowing he is a catch.

07:35

Along the sandy beaches, the semi flaky paramours run into another vacationing couple – debonair British Sir Alec Cunningham-Reid, a World War I war hero and former member of Parliament, and his heiress wife Ruth Mary Clarisse Ashley.  The couple is dubbed in the press “England’s wealthiest girl and handsomest man” upon their marriage in 1927.

As Doris maneuvers about the Riviera, Jimmy is never too far behind.  When she blows a cold breeze, he chastises her with statements about his other more amiable lover Lydia.  The lovely Lydia decorated his 277 Park Avenue apartment with flowers and bon voyage gifts only to have her heart broken when he left in pursuit of Doris that summer.

08:25

Now, Nanaline would be more than thrilled at a potential merger if they live off Jimmy’s money, then the Duke fortune can be can be used for poor dear Walker Inman, Nanaline’s oldest child and Doris’s older half-brother though not a Duke heir.

Only Jimmy’s playboy antics are rubbing Nanaline the wrong way, and that of course makes him far more tantalizing to Doris.  He offers her entrée to the jazz clubs and nightlife she finds appealing.  Nanaline worries that Jimmy might corrupt Doris.  Nanaline fears Doris has inherited the Duke dispositions of both race and class blind openness with a highly intense sex drive.  Every time Jimmy shows up, Nanaline rankles, and Doris’s former French governess and still companion and Nanaline’s own occasional secret lover Jenny Renaud normally encouraging to Doris now watches in protective trepidation at this older potential suitor.

09:26

The Stotesburys too come off very inviting and even offering advice and guidance.  In most circumstances, Nanaline would be thrilled at the entrée into the upper echelons so evaded by the more humble Duke name, and there is no way Nanaline would ever want to upset the society queen Eva by an outright refusal.    However Nanaline senses something is up.  She notes the strange behaviors of the flamboyant Stotesburys.  Their concerns over safety at Whitemarsh Hall.  Their claims being a bit too loud and doth protest too much.

Of course, everyone has been dinked by the Stock Market collapse, but could theirs have been a little more?  E.T.’s money comes mainly from stock and finances.  Nanaline herself lost a huge bulk, so she is more than aware of the telltale signs of hiding and diversion.  She won’t speak them out loud and accidentally expose her own red flags.  But she grows suspicious and cautious.  And yet, despite keeping Doris constantly on the move, Jimmy and the Stotesburys manage to appear inevitably.

10:38

After one late luncheon, Eva politely dismisses herself as she needs to settle some pressing important matters.  Though they might be abroad at this moment, the Stotesburys are still actively involved in the Philadelphia Riders and Drivers’ Association horse show.  E.T. serves as a vice president on the Executive Committee.  Eva is chairwoman of the September Fete Committee and oversees the details all the way from Cannes.  This year Rush Hospital for Consumptives is the primary beneficiary for the fundraising.

11:09

The 12^th Annual Horse Show at Wissahickon Farms is held in Whitemarsh Township near their own Stotesbury estate Whitemarsh Hall in the neighboring Springfield Township.  Wissahickon Farms has 3 natural water jumps and wide fields.  Everyday, the event ends with dinner dances.  Spectators and riders move about from the stables to the clubhouse onto to the grandstands then the picturesque Tally-Ho Terrace. 

This year there are 119 classes for entry.  Deadline for registration was back on August 22^nd, 1932.  The events are held over the weekend of September 22^nd, 23^rd, and 24^th, 1932.

Only last year, children joined the competitions starting off on ponies onto saddle horses then the hunter class.  They learn poise and posture as well as quick decision making and self-reliance.  Unlike the Royal Ascot and other race activities, Wissahickon is more a show piece exhibition for those devoted to the sport and true sportsmanship with events like jumping, prancing, and obstacle courses.  On both ponies and horses, riders graduate up from saddler to harness as they demonstrate skills and agility more than pure speed.

12:25

On Friday, September 22^nd, 1932, Mrs. William DuPont’s horse Quarryman wins the Venezuelan trophy, this year’s special prize.  Second place in the event goes to Bon Diable owned by Mrs. John Hay Whitney.  Mid-afternoon showers cause two tumbles.  One has face lacerations from a fall, and a different rider is thrown from his horse then kicked in the face.  Later in a separate event, another gentleman is thrown over his horse’s head during the hurdles but is uninjured.

On Saturday, September 23^rd, 1932, Mrs. John Hay Whitney’s grey gelding (eh-hem a castrated male) Two Leggons wins blue during her competitions in the large classes for hunters.  Hunters being a form of horse jumping judged not only by objective heights but also on stylistic presentations. Hunters are based on skills relevant to field hunting and involve additional elements like manners, comfortable riding, safety, while also showing a little more artsy in presentations.  Versus the pure jumper classes focus on the fastest clean round which are only marked on objective criteria such as faults despite style while running through refusals, runouts, rails down, falls,… while performing heights and speed, essentially thrills and spills of a more jock mentality with boldness and athleticism. 

For the overall events, the Wissahickon Challenge trophy is won by Oldtown Hill Farm of Newbury, Massachusetts.  Among the other trophies, the Fairmont Challenge Trophy is presented by E.T. Stotesbury and considered for the champion of the entire show.

14:10

Mrs. Whitney also has a bit of a scare after her prized crossed Cairn and Border terrier Tiger went missing but is returned by two local youths.  By the way, an annual dog show for the Wissahickon Kennel Club also occurs here in May during Memorial Day weekend.

Ever the lover of animals, Doris finds herself curious about the events and a potentially more enchanting life away from Nanaline’s constant supervision and disapproval.  Eva smiles as she parades Jimmy off to Venice away from of the young heiress.

Hmmm, just who is the trophy, and who is the prize?  And who will control the reigns if this union is ever made?