WARRENTON, Va. Rachel "Bunny" Mellon left a small island to the Massachusetts Audubon Society, a library to an unspecified charity, jewelry to a former first daughter, and $20 million in cash along with artwork and real estate to Stacy B. Lloyd III, her son by her first marriage. [26] Three of her most important paintings, two by Rothko and one by Richard Diebenkorn, were sold privately before the Sotheby's auction for a reported $250 million. Mellon eventually gave Edwards more than $6 million, Young said. Stressing that her sympathies have always been with Edwards rather than his wife, who died last year from cancer, she confides, "You know that John had a hard time with Elizabeth." With love and inexpressible gratitude for all the joy and help you have always given me. The 35-year-old Lloyd, a Washington investment adviser, adds, "As I explained to the jury, imagine a very handsome man who is well liked and respected, and there are two women vying for his affections.". Indeed. Most of her modern-art collection will be sold, along with three quarters of the acreage of the farm. Until recently the philanthropist, whose net worth exceeds $400 million, was primarily known as a passionate gardener and discreet woman with a discerning eye. I want to come back. Another note from Jackie that Bunny inserted into one of her little blue daily datebooks went the other way, with Jackie comforting her friend about some problem and telling her, Dont worry, we will just beat the world back again., When in 1989 Jackie looked back at their years as friends, she wrote, Ever since Ive known you (33 years ago this spring) you have meant as much to me as any person in my life. Thanking Bunny for her love and care, her wise and strong support, and for all she had meant to the Kennedy children, Jackie closed with, I want you to be as happy as you make me.. They would talk about flowers for hours, mesmerized by one another's company. After Lambert divorced Lloyd, she and Paul Mellon were married on May 1, 1948. She had not given an extended interview in more than a quarter century. This page was last edited on 20 November 2022, at 15:10. (The Kennedy biographer Sally Bedell Smith quotes Jackie as saying to Ted Kennedys wife, Joan, All Kennedy men are like that . that are necessary and important for his campaign please send the bills to me It is a way to help our friend without government restrictions.. In going through her papers in the months after her death, I found that she had wrapped many important keepsakes, such as gifts from her Grandpa Lowe, in white paper and tied them up with a blue ribbon, using the two colors as signals to show how precious the things were to her. After his funeral, for which Mellon arranged flowers, Lady Bird Johnson asked Mellon to resume her work on the White House grounds. Jackie had, in fact, quickly come to understand that she had become a piece of public property and that there was a pressing need to have what she wore in the White House years be a uniform. Jackie honored her friends creative achievementssomething that Bunny welcomed. Together, the couple collected and donated more than a thousand works of art, mostly eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European paintings, to the National Gallery of Art and established the Yale Center for British Art. Style included a great deal more than the cut of clothing or a period of interior decoration. Huffman introduced Mellon to John Edwards in 2006. [37], "Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon, Banking Heiress And Jacqueline Kennedy Friend, Dies At 103", "Rachel Mellon, Heiress Known for Garden Designs, Is Dead at 103", "Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon, arts patron and confidante of Jackie Kennedy, dies at 103", "Edwards Case Casts Spotlight on a Long Reclusive Donor", "The House in the Virginia Hunt Country That Is Home to the Paul Mellons", "The Private World of a Great Gardener: Rachel Lambert Mellon", "How Bunny Mellon Re-invented the White House Rose Garden", "Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy: A Reminiscence", "President Kennedy's Garden: Rachel Lambert Mellon's Redesign of the White House Rose Garden", "The Money Behind John Edwards: Heiress Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon, Age 100", "Mellon Estate in Antigua Goes on the Market for $14.5 Million", "Bunny Mellon's $250 Million Rothkos Sold in Private Sale", "Property from the Collection of Mrs. Paul Mellon: Masterworks", "Sotheby's to auction Paul and Bunny Mellon estate", "Liaison Says Heiress Rued Edwards Donations", "Donor's family testifies in Edwards probe", "John Edwards Meets Privately with Bunny Mellon, Potential Witness in Cover Up Case", "Arts patron, heiress Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon dead", "At Bunny Mellon's funeral, music from Bette Midler and a John Edwards appearance", Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation, Inc. website, Wine & Country Life Magazine, "Discover Bunny Mellon's Oak Spring Garden", Wine & Country Life Magazine, "The Allee, Greenhouse and Topiaries at Oak Spring Farm", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rachel_Lambert_Mellon&oldid=1122910202, Pages using infobox person with multiple spouses, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Horticulturalist, art collector, philanthropist. She had a son, Stacy Barcroft Lloyd III, and two step-children, Timothy Mellon and Catherine Warner. JFK had just published Profiles in Courage, a volume of studies of senatorial political bravery that had won the 1957 Pulitzer Prize and would help him in his run for the presidency.They met in 1958 when Adele Astaire Douglass, an old friend of Bunny and Pauls and then a Virginia neighbor, brought her guest Jackie to Oak Spring for tea not long after the birth of her daughter, Caroline. "She is just shocked.". She is not afraid to face the future. A giver of parties and designer of landscapes brimming with imagination and magic, she herself tended to the expressionless and forbidding, a society figure with an almost pathological dislike for publicity, who loved coming home from galas to water the plants at night. As the second wife of financier Paul Mellon, she helped him amass a renowned art collection, hundreds of works ranging from Czannes to Rothkos, either donated to the National Gallery in Washington or still hanging on her walls. 1533before 1588) A Young Daughter of the Picts, ca. Sometimes Bunny felt very alone in her effort to maintain this balance. Stepping up to the polls with Paul, Bunny said, she found she didnt have anything to write with. She kept her gift private from the world and so have you. Ever since she married Paul Mellon in 1948, she has been consumed by turning his Virginia farm into a magnificent showcase. Bunny Mellon is aristocratic American history personified, a woman who has entertained two generations of British royalty (Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip in 1957 and, three decades later, Charles and Di), lent her jet and accompanied Jackie Kennedy to Martin Luther King Jr.'s funeral, gardened in clothes designed by Givenchy, and searched the world for art treasures with an open checkbook and an astute eye. According to the indictment, Huffman signed over the checks to Young. Mellon described in the 37-page federal criminal indictment as "Client 5, an elderly heiress" nearing her 100s "had not the slightest inkling" that anything was wrong with her investments with Starr, who had been a friend and financial advisor for three decades, her lawyer said. [7][36] Her funeral was held at Trinity Episcopal Church in Upperville, which the Mellons had gifted to the community in 1960. She believed deeply in what he was saying.. I don't like complicated people." His view of his grandmother's relationship with Edwards? She planted a variety of pear and apple trees around the perimeter of the garden, as well as honey locust and sassafras trees, which she and her landscaping team carefully pruned over decades.. He claims, "Bunny and I were the last people on earth who knew about the girlfriend and the baby. Only two years before Jackie won her settlement, Paul Mellon, for the first time and thanks to Forger, had settled an annual $500,000 on Bunny, allegedly for charity, meaning that she no longer had to ask her husband for every cent of his money she spent. She was born into a well-to-do Princeton family. She goes over daily to inquire about construction, a woman caught between present and past. A 350 year old house, the main property consists of seven bedrooms and five full baths with270 degrees of water views, the listing states. Outspoken: Bunny Mellon (left) is seen here with her stepdaughter Eliza Lloyd in 1964. [4][23] Her main residence, Oak Spring Farms, was a 4,000-acre (1,600ha) estate in Virginia, that had its own 1-mile (1,600m) long airstrip to accommodate her Falcon 2000. The Strange Promise of a Genuine Squirrel Coat. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved, Lisa Marie Presley was never the same after sons suicide in new home, James Cordens abandoned mansion heads a step closer to demolition, Hugh Jackman puts his dream minimalist Hamptons home up for rent, Barbara Walters daughter sold her Fla. getaway after dementia diagnosis. She soon began to support him with an increasing number of campaign contributions. In 2004 in the opening essay for the Metropolitan Museums exhibition Jacqueline Kennedy: The White House Years, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., who was Jackies friend and ally, wrote that underneath a veil of lovely inconsequence she developed a cool assessment of people and an ironical slant on life. Eventually I will get rid of it, if only because the thought of someone else carting it to a secondhand shop after my own death is too depressing. She was a poor Bouvier, by the standards of the society in which she moved. She laughs, saying, "Oh, you're bad. Susan Zakin was born in New York City, where she attended the Brearley School and Columbia Universitys Graduate School of Journalism. One day these gems may turn up, but my take is that the fantastical yet practical Bunny might just as likely have given Jackie a solid gold Schlumberger box of real paints. Mellon, who passed away in 2014 at 103, was famously known for her significantlydesigned gardens, including her most heralded 1962 creation of the White House Rose Garden. She and Paul Mellon supported many philanthropic endeavors, but were also known to indulge. She says she was drawn to him by "his very deep intelligence. . You are a poet like Emily Dickinson in your gardens, in your houses, in the way you see nature and all of life. As far as we know, their intention is to keep it as the historic property it is and has always been, Crocker told the Cape Cod Times. It is a way to help our friend without government restrictions. Mellon has not been accused of wrongdoing (she even paid gift taxes), but Edwards was indicted in June for violating campaign-finance laws. You dont even have to talk. [2][3] Her paternal grandfather, chemist Jordan Lambert, was the inventor of Listerine, which was later marketed by her father. She had endured worse, including the 2008 death of her daughter Eliza, who had been left quadriplegic when hit by a car years earlier. Although charming, its hardly a match for the other treasures on those walls, but it was painted by Jackie and was therefore another precious reminder of their times together. Jackie Kennedy and Bunny Mellon, whose friendship is explored in Mac Griswolds new book. Mellon also was known for her exquisite taste both in fashion and in decorating. She has always cared greatly beyond herself., Her grandson, Lloyd, said, I think she was trying to help (Edwards) for the right reasons, believed in him, and I think frankly he just took advantage of a lot of opportunities that she gave him.. When Mellon became aware of the use of her funds for this purpose, she reportedly came to regret the donations, but maintained that Edwards "would have been a great president. We may earn commission on some of the items you choose to buy. The True Story of Jackie & Bunny's Friendship, Randall Hagadorn / Courtesy of Gerard B. Lambert III, Mark Shaw Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Personal Papers John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty Images, Jackie Kennedy and Queen Elizabeth's Relationship, Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. That was the best part. Lloyd, who was questioned by the grand jury about whether she was coerced, says with a laugh, "You can't tell my grandmother what to do. Mellons family and her longtime personal attorney said she died of natural causes at her beloved 4,000-acre Oak Spring Farms in Virginias horse country, where she entertained royalty, stars and politicians but from which she rarely ventured. Joseph Campbell, the 20th-century writer on myth best known for The Hero with a Thousand Faces, saw what he thought might be the dangers of Jackies life after JFKs assassination. Forger, then at the white- shoe law firm of Milbank, Tweed, eventually worked exclusively for Bunny, who set up an elegant office for him and his staff on West 57th Street in New York City. Mellon, now blind, lives in luxurious seclusion on her 2,000-acre Virginia farm, cosseted by a staff of 120 loyal retainers. She classed her deception as fun, and with a Why not? air she dismissed Edwardss infidelity to a dying wife as the sort of thing one might expect from an attractive man like him. "I thought the church was charming and sent her a little note," he recalls. "I don't think she's been gullible." Letitia Baldrige, Jackie's White House social secretary, recalls, "They were very close. Bunny answered him, writing so was she [Jackie]we saw life like that, going on to add that no matter how self-importantly people took themselves or their doing, we could see the simpler side, and wondered why the fuss?, Bunny contrived not to understand why it was difficult for serious people to grasp what the simpler side was for her and her friend two women who, by birth, wealth, and their grasp of power, were essentially living on another planet. ", The centenarian's friends view her tolerant attitude to John Edwards's affair as an outgrowth of her own marital experiences. "It's hard being 100 and blind. I know the coats history, so much larger than onewomans, and I can give it a proper send-off. Bunny Mellon breaks her silence on John Edwards, insists they were great friends. After spending most of her life trying to avoid the spotlight, she was thrust into it when Edwards was indicted in 2011 for using what prosecutors alleged was campaign money, including $750,000 from Mellon, to hide mistress Rielle Hunter and their child during Edwards 2008 Democratic presidential bid. They often painted together on Cape Cod: in the Garden Library at the bottom of stairs to Bunnys study hangs a summery watercolor of a pale blue hydrangea in a pot. The guest list entailed flying in many of the D.C. and New York regulars who had danced at Elizas coming-out party; the band played foxtrots from the Great American Songbook before moving on to rock and roll; and the food was deliciousstriped bass, lamb, string beans, salad, peaches. [19][20] Mellon completed her work on the garden in close collaboration with Irvin Williams who, among other responsibilities, she tasked with finding and introducing magnolia trees to the garden. Just one week prior to his indictment, in late May 2011, Edwards visited Mellon at her Upperville estate. Be kind. "I don't know what I've done that has made people so interested in me, more than anyone else." "It was just terrible because I trusted him, and we're in sort of a hole because of that, and it hasn't been returned," admits Mellon, who is in danger of losing another $6 million in investments made by Starr that are now underwater. The following month, Mellon's lawyer told the Manhattan District Attorney's office that the transfer was never requested nor approved, the complaint says. As her lawyer Alex Forger puts it, "She's well off, but her assets are not liquid. . Her interests in gardening were first cultivated while watching Olmsted Brothers gardeners tend her family's New Jersey home. "They were on the same wavelength," says one of Isabell's friends. Scarred by his parents' acrimonious divorce, Paul proved to be an emotionally remote husband with a wandering eye. The indictment quotes a note from Mellon: "I was sitting alone in a grim mood, furious that the press attacked Senator Edwards on the price of a haircut. Cristofaro Munari, attrib. At the time, what kept most of us from seeing the dowdiness was the luster of glamour conveyed by Jackies trim, big-shouldered, athletic figure and then, in rapid hindsight, the burnished armor of tragedy. Write it nice, friendly, nongossipy. Hers is a regime of no tolerance for the mediocre. She had little patience for those she considered superficial or boring and chose her friends carefully. Her art collection included a Rothko reportedly worth $125 million. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Thanks for contacting us. He gave her a life of infinite luxuryThe Washington Post once pronounced Bunny the "Most Envied Hostess in the Country Today"but at a cost. [28] Shortly thereafter, in May 2000, her daughter Eliza was hit by a truck while crossing a Manhattan street, causing a severe brain injury and full-body paralysis. Yet now the private Mellon, who turns 101 on Aug. 9, has become front-page news for her unwitting involvement in two unrelated criminal cases. [10][17] A longtime friendship with the Kennedy family was initiated by a 1958 visit to Oak Spring Farms by Jacqueline Kennedy, whom Mellon later advised on fine arts and antiques during the Kennedy White House restoration. After prosecutors learned that Edwards had visited Mellon on May 26even as his lawyers were conducting unsuccessful plea-bargain negotiations prior to the indictmenthe was banned from contacting his benefactor. the fact that you are splashed in the Daily News, she wrote to accompany a piece about RFKs funeral that she mailed to Bunny. Eliza spent the remaining eight years of her life under round-the-clock care at Oak Spring Farms, and died in 2008. Lloyd, her grandson, says, "I don't think there's ever going to be a moment for her to sit back and reflect. She created another White House garden that was named in honor of Kennedy after her death. [14] In December 2010, four of her relatives were subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury.[33]. What extravagance, breathed Jackie, or so the story goes. MANHATTAN Listerine heiress and philanthropist Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon has preferred to shun the media spotlight since long before her financial largesse became Through it all, she never sought publicity. Sandra Lees Revenge Romance Takes a Twist, Mugrabi Divorce Settled: "She Asked for $100 Million", Gianna Reisen is Transforming the NYCB, One Step at a Time, Kai Thomass Debut Novel is Historical Fiction at its Best, Janet Malcolm Finally Covers the One Subject She Avoided: Herself. Mellon, who passed away in 2014 at 103, was famously known for her significantly designed gardens, including her most heralded 1962 creation of the White
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