Romance and heartbreak (and revenge) ballads make up the primary focus of most albums; however, her newest album, Folklore, which debuted today, features a song, titled "The Last Great American Dynasty," about a New England philanthropist and patron of the arts, Rebekah West Harkness. She lost card game bets with Salvador Dal. By signing up you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement. Rebekah Harkness's height Unknown & weight Not Available right. Let the little creature die!'' Rebekah Harkness Rebekah Harkness (1915-1982) Rebekah Harkness, born Rebekah Semple West, was one of the foremost American patrons of dance. He was in prison. She had a marvelous time ruining everything, Swift crooned. She danced, too, and composed music. With her help, the Joffrey won international renownsomething she wanted for herself. When Swift bought the house, a local writer for The Day reminded her of the time a body washed up on the beach under her Watch Hill mansion. She bought a mansion in Palisades, N.Y., a Manhattan penthouse and getaways in Nassau and Gstaad. The most tragic detail? Did Mommy and Daddy notice? REBEKAH HARKNESS earned a bachelor's degree in psychology and a master's degree in social work from the University of Utah. Besides despising Rebekahs children, Scevers also hated her disabled granddaughter Angel. But Rebekah made the most of it. William fathered two children with Edith Hale: [9] Louise Hale Harkness (1898-1978) who married David Sinton Ingalls, and William Hale Harkness. Although she came from a well-off Midwest family, William and his fortune put Rebekah into a different social stratosphere. The couple took up residence in an enormous eight -kitchen, 21 -bathroom mansion (an arrangement that "effectively kept her from having to see her three children on anything like a regular. She developed an addiction to injections of B-vitamins, painkillers and testosterone. For a time in the 1950s, socialite Rebekah Harkness was true American royalty. First, a brief biography: Born Rebekah Semple West in St. Louis in 1915, Harkness was a divorce whose second marriage was to Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness. .more Get A Copy After Rebekah Harkness died in 1982, her daughter Terry took her mother's remains home in a Gristede's shopping bag, according to a story in the New York Times. Her parents packed Rebekah off to finishing school. All the essentials: top fashion stories, editors picks, and celebrity style. . The 16-track album, Swifts eighth, features a song titled The Last Great American Dynasty, about the late St. Louisbornsocialite Rebekah West Harkness, whom Swift paints as an eccentric. Please reach out to us to let us know what youre interested in reading. You won't want to miss this episode about the muse for Last Great American Dynasty by Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift bought the former Holiday House in 2013 for a reported $17.75 million in cash. Rebekah died on 17 June 1982 in Manhattan, New York, USA. Now, a grown woman can do whatever she wants in her own bed, but this was a strange choiceand not because of the age gap. Live better One could almost feel sorry for her. According to Blue Blood, a book by Craig Unger, Harkness wrote in her scrapbook that at Fermata, she set out do everything bad. An example of her mischievousness? for scholarships, administrative costs and new set designs. The St. Louisborn socialite is the subject of the singer-songwriter's "The Last Great American Dynasty.". rebekah harkness children. Was she power or pawn? Shed had a brief, unhappy marriage to a doctor in the early 1960s. 30 July 2020. She attended finishing school at Fermata in Aiken, South Carolina, from 1929 to 1932, before pursuing advanced instruction in harmonic . Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company. ''I can't believe it took her this long to succeed.'') Our credibility is the turbo-charged engine of our success. The lovely pair only made it four years before divorcing. A philanthropist. Pierce claimed to be a descendant of President Franklin Pierce, though that would have been quite a feat. Dancer Lawrence Rhodes said it was one of the few times he was embarrassed to be in a ballet. If you hear oil and think Russian Oligarch rich, youd be pretty much right. Swift later connects herself to Harkness in the final moments of the song: Holiday House sat quietly on that beach / Free of women with madness, their men and bad habits / And then it was bought by me, Who knows, if I never showed up, what couldve been / There goes the loudest woman this town has ever seen / I had a marvelous time ruining everything, I had a marvelous time ruining everything / A marvelous time ruining everything / A marvelous time / I had a marvelous time, Also in the song, Swift mentions some of Harkness antics. While Bill Harkness was alive, he and Rebekah threw raucous parties every weekend. Harkness had to do everything in styleeven when it came to moving on to the next life. Then she stole most of the Joffrey dancers for her own ballet company the Harkness. However, the connection between the two women, despite being eras apart, may go beyond mere real estate. She would pay for dancers nose jobs at the drop of a hat, and buy office desks for her administrators that cost months worth of New York rent, a generosity that often made her middle-class secretaries supremely uncomfortablenot that Harkness noticed. However, a 1988 biography of Harkness titled Blue Blood, written by former New York Magazine editor and Vanity Fair contributor Craig Unger, reveals a much sadder, tragic story. Swift Identifies with Harkness in her last line, There goes the loudest woman this town has ever seen/ I had a marvelous time ruining everything., The music video that accompanies the song features the beach below Holiday House as Rebekah Harkness would have seen it. She got thrown off a cruise for swimming nude in the pool and swearing at the crew. It might also have been interesting to see how a feminist writer would have assimilated the facts of Rebekah Harkness's sorry life. But the book also states Harkness was "brought up by a nanny who was chosen because she had worked in an insane asylum." We are told by Mr. Unger - who is an uncomfortable stranger in the world of the rich, unused to deciphering nuances of caste - that the Harknesses' seven-year marriage was a happy one. ''Kiss me,'' she commanded. Swift gave all her friends matching red-white-and-blue onesies. She was 67.) All rights reserved. Hey, all publicity is good publicityand Rebekahs need to be in the spotlight soon grew to disturbing proportions. Her parents did care that she looked good, according to Unger. From petty paybacks to insane acts of karma, these bitter people somehow found the most ingenious ways. Or, at least, a leg, half of . Born Rebekah Semple West on April 17, 1915, in St. Louis, Missouri; died on June 17, 1982, in New York City, second daughter and one of three children of Allen Tarwater (a stockbroker) and Rebekah Cook (Semple) West; attended Rossman and John Burroughs schools in St. Louis; graduated from Fermata, a finishing school in Aiken, South Carolina, The building, according to Craig Unger, the author of this rich-man/eye-of-the-needle biography, was in a state of putrefaction, ''crumbling like Tara after the Civil War.'' (Watch it here.). See the article in its original context from. But beneath the elegant surface lurked a driven woman tormented by personal demons. ''So absurd,'' Mr. Scevers pronounced. She once dressed as a waitress at one of them so she could eavesdrop on the guests. The parties continued when she brought the entire Joffrey to Watch Hill in 1962 and 1963. We were in heaven, said Danish ballerina Lone Isaksen. By 1980, many of Harknesss old friends had dropped off, and she was left with only her most sycophantic hangers-on. When we do, we depend on our loyal, helpful readers to point out how we can do better. A patron of dance and medicine. [16], In 1961, Harkness married Ben Kean (c.19121993),[17] a physician who was a professor of Tropical Medicine at the Cornell Medical College. She died June 17, 1982. [9] Through the William Hale Harkness Foundation, she sponsored construction of a medical research building at the New York Hospital and supported a number of medical research projects. I myself wouldn't give the time of day to anyone who cleaned her pool out with Dom Perignon, put mineral oil in the punch at her sister's debutante ball and (all in the middle of the Great Depression) got tossed off an ocean liner for shouting obscenities, throwing dinner plates at an orchestra of Filipinos gamely playing the American national anthem, and offending the sensibilities of her fellow passengers by swimming nude - for which actions she counted herself witty. She was born Rebekah Semple West in 1915 to a wealthy family in St. Louis, Missouri. Well, Rebekah Harkness was not to be outdone by anyone, and she commissioned her own Harkness Blue, which she used to upholster the velvet Louis XIV-style chairs she had placed in her dance studio. ''You see,'' she said. . Even after her husband's death in 1954 ("It must have been her fault his heart gave out," Swift muses), Harkness threw wild parties that clearly ruffled her neighbors' feathers, with guests her. The children were visiting Bill's family and Alfonso had left . Harkness was jealous to an absolute fault, and even to her own detriment. The Harknesses were married for a brief periodjust seven years. The latest fashion news, beauty coverage, celebrity style, fashion week updates, culture reviews, and videos on Vogue.com. Reviewers agreed he was one of the companys only shining lights. She married her second husband, Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness, in 1947. Ugh. In 1973, at 36 and with his grad-student days not far behind him, Lauersen married 58-year-old Rebekah Harkness, widow to William Hale Harkness, of the Harkness philanthropic dynasty. When Rebekah decided to renovate her Rhode Island mansion, she demanded that it have a whopping eight kitchens and 21 baths. Fast forward 60 years, and another thin, rich, beautiful white woman bought Holiday House. Vogue may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. To zero peoples surprise, the Harkness family was utterly dysfunctional. She was surrounded by a group her son Allen described as ''all the fairies flying off the floor, the blackmailing lawyers, the weirdos, the people in the trances.'' Rebekah Harkness was born on 17 April 1915 in St Louis, Missouri, USA. Harkness had three husbands. Harkness started acting out early in her adolescence, and her antics would put any other mean girl to shame. In the first verse of The Last Great American Dynasty, Swift sings that the ceremony was charming, if a little gauche / Theres only so far new money goes.. To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. Taylor Swift's, new song titled 'The Last Great American Dynasty' is about Rebekah Harkness, the scandal-ridden socialite who once owned the Watch Hill, Rhode Island mansion Swift purchased in 2013 Reportedly, the baby Angel innocently pulled a ribbon from Harknesss perfectly coifed hair. She believed in reincarnation. Rebekah Harkness Net Worth. But it is clear that as a spoiled young woman growing up in St. Louis between the wars,. [2], After graduating in 1932, she and a group of female friends formed the Bitch Pack, a sub-culture of local debutantes who enjoyed subverting society events, including lacing punchbowls with mineral oil and performing stripteases on banquet tables. Were always looking for your input! Surprise, surprise, this phase didnt last long. St. Louis, MO 63119
She hoped that the fourth time would be the charm, but the socialite had no such luck. By 1982, the end was near for Harkness, yet tragically her son Allen wasnt there. She dyed a cat green. [1] Before their divorce in 1946, they had two children; Allen Pierce (b. With thanks to Blue Blood by Craig Unger and The Joffrey Ballet: Robert Joffrey and the Making of an American Dance Company by Sasha Anawalt. She even started a company of her own in 1964: the Harkness Ballet. My mom never told me how her best friend died. In its day, the Harkness would train more professional dancers than any other company. Iyengar[4] and Salvador Dal, who would design her urn upon her death. From . . Rebekah Harkness Photo: Jack Mitchell/Getty Images. It was not part of the Harkness Ballet, Harkness House or the Rebekah Harkness Foundation. . Catherine of Aragon was King Henry VIIIs first wife and longest-lasting Queen of England. 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