Copyright 2022 SLM Media Group. The answer is more complicated than Swifts song reveals. 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? Your suggestions can be as general or specific as you like, from Life to Compact Cars and Trucks to A Subspecies of Capybara Called Hydrochoerus Isthmius. Well get our writers on it because we want to create articles on the topics youre interested in. The train wreck was now chugging along, and it wouldnt stop until Harkness took her last breath. She was brought up by a nanny who was chosen because she had worked in an insane asylum. [1] Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company. It is possible to write an edifying biography about an unedifying life. This week, Taylor Swift showed the world what shes been working on during quarantine: a new album, Folklore, which the singer-songwriter released late Thursday evening. Rebekah Harkness and her Harkness Ballet in 1966. In addition to her dancing career, Harkness also fancied herself something of a composer, and would often perform her original songs to polite reception at famed places like Carnegie Hall in New York. Aw, how sweet. Rebekah Harkness Rebekah Harkness (1915-1982) Rebekah Harkness, born Rebekah Semple West, was one of the foremost American patrons of dance. 11 x 14" vintage silver gelatin photograph of Rebekah Harkness, American composer, sculptor, and. The Harknesses were married for a brief periodjust seven years. The question Swift would have you ask is how much of this reputation was deserved and how much was the result of gossip or judgmental peers. Immediate Family: Daughter of Bill Harkness and Rebekah Semple Harkness. Jack Mitchell. She dyed chocolate mousse blue. Making distraction rewarding since 2017. Faced with Ediths grim drive to end her life, Harkness was coldly philosophical. She had a newfound freedom to do whatever she wanted with the piles of money in her bank account. Was she power or pawn? Rebekah Harkness, who also went by Betty, was the previous owner of Taylor Swift's Rhode Island home and serves as the inspiration for the third track on her latest album. [3] Harkness would also continue to study dance and piano, and studied ballet with Victoria Cassau, who was a student of Anna Pavlova. Lucky: A Novel (inspired by Taylor Swift's folklore and the incredible true story of Rebekah Harkness): Parro, Kristina: 9781736923320: Amazon.com: Books Books Literature & Fiction Genre Fiction Buy new: $18.01 Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns FREE delivery Saturday, February 4 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon And about the times she cleaned her pool with Dom Perignon, dyed the neighbors cat green and filled her fish tank with scotch. One of her administrators described how Harkness would come to the office in pink and blue leotards, literally stand on her head, and demand to have serious conversations while she performed her acrobatic work. Allen Pierce, Rebekah's son by the first of her four husbands, was unable to be present. Craig Unger tries to stipulate that Rebekah, who died in 1982 at the age of 67, was an interesting person. She married her second husband, Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness, in 1947. That marriage lasted three years. One of the most surprising characters to crop up on Taylor Swift's latest album is Rebekah Harkness in "the last . Donning a black chiffon Mainbocher dress with a white silk back-tied apron, she flashed a wry smile at the camera. All rights reserved. However, the connection between the two women, despite being eras apart, may go beyond mere real estate. One of her conquests, producer Bertrand Castelli, described one rendezvous they had in her office as like two camels in the desert who suddenly know that the only way to make an oasis is to really talk sense. Thisactually doesnt make sense, which probably means it was a really wild night. Shop for Rebekah Harkness at Walmart.com. And the dysfunction didnt end there. While a kinder critic likened it to a lavish ladies powder room, less-generous experts compared it to a Staten Island beauty parlor. Ouch. It donated Harkness Tower at Yale, Harkness Commons at Harvard and Harkness Pavilion at New York Hospital. Nonetheless, Harkness actually doted on the babe, and for a time it seemed like she was going to be a better granny than she was a mommy. In recent years, Harkness has gained new fameor infamybecause of her connection to Taylor Swift. Rebekah Harkness keeps his personal and love life private. Rebekah rode up on the afternoon train / It was sunny, Taylor Swift croons in her new song The Last Great American Dynasty. In 3 minutes 51 seconds, Swift tells the story of Harknesss legacy through lyrics. Rebekah Harkness patronage allowed the Joffrey to perform in Iran. In 1957, Harkness keeled over at Holiday House while sitting for a sculpture Rebekah was working on, dead from a heart attack. Her daughter Terry tried, unsuccessfully, to invalidate her will with the help of attorney Roy Cohn ( as in Senator Joseph McCarthy's chief counsel Roy Cohn. Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company, ensuring she grew up comfortably. She retaliated by dying a neighbors cat green. In the 1960s, Harkness took Bobby Scevers, a dancer who was 25 years her junior, as her lover. For a time in the 1950s, socialite Rebekah Harkness was true American royalty. The Joffrey had a price to pay for Rebekah Harknesss support. Mr. Unger tells us that under the direction of the dancer-choreographer Larry Rhodes the company began to garner critical raves - whereupon Mrs. Harkness fired him. And that wasnt the only ill-advised thing she did. The most tragic detail? Her daughter Terry gave birth to a severely retarded and disabled child. As a sad footnote to the story of Rebekah Harkness is the tragedy of her three children. Rebekah Harkness Photo: Jack Mitchell/Getty Images. Full body measurements, dress & shoe size will be updated soon. Rebekah West Harkness (April 17, 1915 - June 17, 1982) also known as Betty Harkness, was an American composer, socialite, sculptor, dance patron, and philanthropist who founded the Harkness Ballet. Putting mineral oil in the punch at her sisters debutante ball. Hey, all publicity is good publicityand Rebekahs need to be in the spotlight soon grew to disturbing proportions. Taylor Swift has once . Only his other flaws were far darker than this silly hobby. . People reported that Harknesss lavish marble bathrooms were often splattered with blood, and that her muscles had begun to calcify. Harkness died of cancer at 67 in 1982. Wife of Private. Pierce claimed to be a descendant of President Franklin Pierce, though that would have been quite a feat. Were always looking for your input! He likes to talk about blowing people away. Thanks for your time! They had a son, Allen, and a daughter, Terry. Taylor Swift By Cosmopolitan UK, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=90905376. Rebekahs daughter Edith was clinically depressed and suicidal for much of her life (wonder why), and spent scores of years in and out of mental institutions following near fatal attempts at self-harm. Harrison notes some of the same lighter-hearted factoids about Harkness from Ungers biography: She was allegedly once kicked off a cruise ship for swimming nude, for example. [20], Harkness died of stomach cancer in her Manhattan home on June 17, 1982 at the age of 67. 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. Still, when you marry for money, you earn every penny. At the same time, she studied music composition and dance. Harkness later admitted that she married the poor schmuck because she had nothing else to do. In fact, Rebekah had a much loftierand extravagantdestiny in mind for herself. Her parents did care that she looked good, according to Unger. Her daughter Edith killed herself. Convicted of murder in the second degree, he was behind the bars of a Florida jail. 30 July 2020. Franklin Pierces three children died before reaching adulthood. After that, Rebekah really let it all hang out. Today its pretty much forgotten, despite the tens of millions of dollars she spent on it. Husbands hiding things from wives, mothers from children, and generation from generation. Bill adored the child, as he did his stepchildren, whom he treated as if they were his own. The Bliss Balance - Create Success, Peace, and Happiness in Your Life. Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company. Did Mommy and Daddy notice? Taylor Swift and Rebekah Harkness may have been born decades apart, but it seems they shared a talent for dominating the headlines. Though Harkness took those nasty testosterone injections to strengthen her body for dance, the medicine actually had the opposite effect. Taylor Swift tells the story of "The Last Great American Dynasty" in her Folklore track about one of the wealthiest women in America, Rebekah West Harkness. Doctors told Harkness that she had one ailment that no amount of money could cure: She was dying of stomach cancer. Jean Stein and George Plimpton did that brilliantly in ''Edie,'' the biography of poor Edie Sedgwick. She also helped discover and train many acclaimed dancers, regardless of their race, background or body shape. She spent a small fortune buying her way into the dance world, surrounding herself with dancers, musicians and choreographers. Harkness later donated $2 million to the William Hale Harkness Medical Research Building at the New York Hospital and supported medical research on Parkinson's disease. '', After her divorce from W. Dickson Pierce, an upper-class advertising photographer, she chose for her second husband the Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness, who enjoyed a lofty social status, as her own family did not. My association with Rebekah Harkness was based on creating a business venture that would make a profit. Harkness died of cancer in 1982 in New York City. Family Members. She began to cut back and look for public funding. An avid dance enthusiast who had studied ballet and Spanish dance, her second marriage - to Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness - made her one of the wealthiest women in America. At the end of the song, she suggests a certain satisfaction regardless of the answer: There goes the loudest woman this town has ever seen / I had a marvelous time ruining everything.. She was notorious along the eastern seaboard for her tacky, campy, new money sensibilities, and her Harkness Theater was the epitome of her gaudy aesthetic. Generous, wasteful, willful, demanding and delusional, she broke with Joffrey to form the Harkness Ballet when he refused to perform the compositions she insisted on writing. The resulting damages to herself, her companies and her children were heartbreaking. In December 1956, she even appeared in the pages of Vogue. . In 1957, Harkness keeled over at Holiday House while sitting for a sculpture Rebekah was working on, dead from a heart attack. In 1962 she turned her Rhode Island estate, Holiday House, into a summer dance camp for the entire Joffrey Ballet company. The Joffrey dancers who spent the summer at Holiday House loved it. He. See, Rebekah thought that notoriously reclusive writer J.D. ''Is there a chic way to go?''. She bought a mansion in Palisades, N.Y., a Manhattan penthouse and getaways in Nassau and Gstaad. And then in 2020, the houses owner, Taylor Swift, wrote a song about Rebekah Harkness, called The Last Great American Dynasty. Tras la muerte de William, Rebekah hered la propiedad y desde el 2013 forma parte del patrimonio de Taylor Swift, quien pag $ 17.5 millones de dlares por la lujosa e histrica mansin. Rebekah Harkness was born on 17 April 1915 in St Louis, Missouri, USA. Her daughter Edith jumped off roofs, swallowed pills and managed not to kill herself. An artist (a descriptor she bestowed upon herself). AboutPressCopyrightContact. Their Rhode Island estate, Holiday House, was the site of some raucous Gatsby-esque parties: Blue Blood recalls that Harkness once filled her pool with Dom Perignon (which, oddly, was not the only liberty she took with libations: its also said she put scotch in her fish tank). Thomson Asks States to Sue the U.S.", "Out of Prison, Doctor Hopes to Regenerate His Lost Fame", "Taylor Swift is buying into a rich Watch Hill tradition", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rebekah_Harkness&oldid=1121521087, Short description is different from Wikidata, Pages using infobox person with multiple spouses, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 12 November 2022, at 18:59. A patron of dance and medicine. She all but fired him from his own company, then twisted the knife by taking most of his dancers with her to form her new, solo Harkness Ballet. Oh my God, the question here is: What didnt she do? Rebekah died on 17 June 1982 in Manhattan, New York, USA. The caption read: "A young woman with a surprising range of interests, Mrs. Harkness is a sculptor, a musician of professional standing (she's a member of ASCAP), a skier (she'll soon off to her. . The family spent summers at Watch Hill, then an old money, old Hollywood enclave overlooking Block Island Sound. Iyengar[4] and Salvador Dal, who would design her urn upon her death. A 1955 article from The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that one of her works would be premiering at Carnegie Hall in New York City.) Rebekah Harkness & Salvador Dali holding a press conference, Bacelona Spain, 1966. Friends who knew Rebekah and William said that although the oil tycoon was a bit of an idiot, the new Mrs. Harkness was actually scared of himand for good reason. 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. This arrangement effectively kept her from having to see her three children on anything like a regular basis. [4], In the 1960s, Harkness became well known as a philanthropist and patron of the arts. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. The rich socialite whose judgment sometimes lapsed was just too good a target. Her first major contributions were helping to fund the early . [10] In 1947, William Hale married Rebekah Semple West, [11] who was previously married to Dickson Pierce. Anyone can read what you share. [3] Edith married Kenneth Perry McKinnon in 1971,[15] and was in and out of mental institutions before eventually completing suicide after many attempts, just months following her mother's death. When Harkness offered to pay Ella Fitzgerald to sing some of her pop songs, Fitzgerald wouldnt do it. Rebekah West Harkness also known as Betty Harkness, was an American composer, sculptor, dance patron, and philanthropist who founded the Harkness Ballet. Without any real studio space, her dancers often practiced on her front lawn. However, despite our best efforts, we sometimes miss the mark. De . Not only did her ballet collapse, her whole family did as well. Her body had been slowly falling into disrepairthose injections hurt far more than they helpedand she started complaining of a mysterious stomach ailment. It was not part of the Harkness Ballet, Harkness House or the Rebekah Harkness Foundation. One day, Harknesss antics were so extreme that they got her kicked off a cruise ship. In 1947, she married William Hale "Bill" Harkness, an attorney and heir to the Standard Oil fortune of William L. Harkness, which made her one of the wealthiest women in America. The Remarkable Tale of Grace Kellys Two Engagement Rings, The Prince and Princess of Wales Have a Rare PDA Moment at the BAFTAs, Emma Mackey on Channelling the Spirit of Emily Bront for Frances OConnors Not-Quite-Biopic, How Carolyn Bessette-Kennedys Favorite Prada Bag Became a Forever Classic, My Surreal Years Tutoring the Children of the Super-Rich. ''Money can buy anything.'' Rebekah West Harkness (April 17, 1915 June 17, 1982) also known as Betty Harkness, was an American composer, sculptor, dance patron, and philanthropist who founded the Harkness Ballet. The Harkness Foundation for Dance still exists. But why? Rebekah Harkness was practically destined to become a spoiled little rich girl. Its here where Rebekah catapulted into high society. Rebekah bought a mansion on New Yorks Upper East Side and turned it into a posh training center for dancers called Harkness House. Rebekah Harkness was a 1900s socialite and it is a crazy story that includes the entire Harkness family from her ancestors to her four husbands to her children. When Rebekah decided to renovate her Rhode Island mansion, she demanded that it have a whopping eight kitchens and 21 baths. Category 1960s Pop Art Black and White Photography. [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. [4], On June 10, 1939, Harkness married Dickson W. Pierce, the son of Thomas M. He appears to have been an embarrassing sort of man; he wrote and privately published a book called ''Totem and Topees,'' which he described as a ''conglomeration of uninteresting misinformation,'' and followed that with a book called ''Ho hum, the Fisherman,'' which, he said, did not ''have the excuse even of literary merit.'' 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. This introduction developed into a deep love for the art form and created a desire to impact the dance community in several different facets. (Perhaps this is a tale that inspired the Swift lyric, She had a marvelous time ruining everything.) Fittingly, she and her finishing school friends dubbed themselves the Bitch Pack. Pierce. I knew that she was going to take it badly, but I had no idea about the insane lengths she would go to just to get revenge and mess with my life. All of the work and much of the music was original. By Elise Taylor. 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. One critic denounced it as the worst mural ever made. September 30, 2013 by knelson. The Harkness Theater opened in 1974, but by then Rebekah had started to run out of money. Ironically nicknamed The Chalice of Life, the morbid monument stood right at the intersection between tacky and lavish, just like Rebekah herself. Socialite circles are infamously tight-lipped about their marriages, but theres almost no doubt that Rebekahs union with Pierce was a dismal affairand one day, she made a disturbing confession. (You can see a video clip of Salvador Dali and Rebekah Harkness here.). Copyright 2023 by Factinate.com. As Rebekahs friend said, Just a leg is in there, or maybe half of her head, and an arm. So instead of giving her mother a dignified end, Rebekahs daughter Terry had to carry the rest of her ashes home, bound up loosely in a humble supermarket bag. Is there a chic way to go? One day, Rebekah would find out that question for herself. We were in heaven, said Danish ballerina Lone Isaksen. Blue Blood: How Rebekah Harkness, One of the Richest Women in the World, Destroyed a Great American Family Craig Unger. Let the little creature die!'' Harkness took up dancing and ice skating to lose weight and was highly disciplined in both endeavors. As it turned out, this was the beginning of her ignominious end. 2023 Cond Nast. [6] When the Joffrey Ballet refused to rename their company in Harkness' honor, she withdrew funding and hired most of the Joffrey dancers to her new company, the Harkness Ballet. She once dressed as a waitress at one of them so she could eavesdrop on the guests. Or, at least, a leg, half of her. The St. Louisborn socialite is the subject of the singer-songwriter's "The Last Great American Dynasty.". For a time, Rebekah Harkness appeared to be enamored of the passive child, called Angel. "Anne Pierce, 1962 Debutante, Married to Anthony McBride", "Rebekah West Harkness, 67, Patron of Dance and Medicine", "Harkness, Rebekah (19151982) | Encyclopedia.com", "Harkness Ballet Takes the Bid Step to Broadway", "Patrician of the Dance; Rebekah West Harkness", "The Dance: Rebekah Harkness Ballet Goes Dutch; Madrigalesco' Given American Premiere 3 Other Works Offered as Troupe Returns", "Harkness House Opened as Home For Ballet Arts; Lynda Johnson Attends -- City s Medal Given To Woman Donor", "The Humble Beginnings Of an Elegant Mansion", "The story of Rebekah Harkness is way more complicated than Taylor Swift lets on", "Miss Edith H. Harkness Wed To Kenneth Mckinnon, Lawyer", "Benjamin H. Kean, Shah's Physician, Dies at 81", "Notes on People; Gov. She started by bringing the company to Watch Hill (despite the neighbors) in the summer for instruction, practice and choreography. Shutterstock Advertisement 17. Wade, teaches a dance school for children and directs 2 dance companies, one providing performing opportunities for children and one for adults. Though Harkness didnt seem to care that he was using her, she probably should have. The Harkness Ballet would eventually have two touring companies, a youth ballet (which taught Patrick Swayze) and its own theater. Harkness' passions for dance and music followed her into adulthood. Scevers and Harkness brought out the worst in each other. Reviewers agreed he was one of the companys only shining lights. for scholarships, administrative costs and new set designs. Rebekah also loaded up on art and real estate. Swift gave all her friends matching red-white-and-blue onesies. She had spent the 1987 equivalent of $38 million on a failed enterprise. [7] In addition to founding the Harkness Ballet, Harkness launched a ballet school and home for the company called Harkness House,[8] as well as a refurbished 1,250-seat theater, which presented the Harkness Ballet and other dance companies to New York audiences. If I report on the demise of the multimillionaire patron of the dance dry-eyed, it is because I am confident in the belief that nothing we say about the dead can prejudice the Defense or tip the Scales of Judgment. [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. 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. [14] They divorced in 1965. She traveled a lot. Besides taking pills, the poor girl also jumped off a roof on at least one occasion, and in response, Harkness only mused at her daughters various attempts. Upon the albums release, much of the Internet was thrown into a Who Is Rebekah West Harkness? madness. ''Kiss me,'' she commanded. Illustrated. For what its worth, Allen called the years he spent in the clinkerand away from his motherthe happiest of his life.. While he was under her employ, she would often order him around romantically. All the extra rooms would give the nannies plenty of space to feed and bathe the babies without Rebekah having to know a thing about it. For all her money, Harkness did not have good taste. [16], In 1961, Harkness married Ben Kean (c.19121993),[17] a physician who was a professor of Tropical Medicine at the Cornell Medical College. (I do admit, however, that I'd go a long way to read a sentence like this, spoken by Bertrand Castelli, the co-producer of ''Hair,'' about the time he made love to Rebekah Harkness in her office: ''It was as if we were two camels in the desert who suddenly know that the only way to make an oasis is to really talk sense.'' Do you question the accuracy of a fact you just read? She died June 17, 1982. The Pack didnt stop at putting poisonous substances into punch bowls; they also got very rowdy at these gatherings. In 1947, she married William Hale "Bill" Harkness, an attorney and heir to the Standard Oil fortune of William L. Harkness, which made her one of the wealthiest women in America. Sheesh, its not wonder Rebekah turned out to be a nightmare when she grew up. Rebekah's younger daughter Edith, a failed suicide who had spent many years in mental institutions, took only her mother's pills: Seconal, Nembutal, Valium, Haldol, Librium and various painkillers - 40 vials in all. Want to share other feedback? Save money. We want our readers to trust us. Watch the video for "The Last Great American Dynasty": Woytus is St. Louis Magazine's deputy editor, coveringnews and culture. People already thought she had betrayed Joffrey, but they now watched in horror as she ran her ballet into the ground. Images: Harkness Tower Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1653891. (Yes, the seaside mansion that was the setting for Taymerica.) She dyed a cat green. One sometimes wonders if the point of all these poor-little-rich-girl/boy biographies is to lull the rest of us into a false sense of security: She is so unlike us that we are not encouraged to reflect upon our own mortality, the contemplation of which is a healthy and necessary exercise. She attended finishing school at the Fermata School for Girls in Aiken, South Carolina, whose other alums included Roosevelts and Auchinclosses. Rebekah Harkness had ambition and drive. Her marriage to William Hale Bill Harkness, an attorney and heir to the Standard Oil fortune of William L. Hark 1940) and Anne Terry Pierce (b. She applied herself with a rigid, frightening discipline that would become her trademark later in life. Then a little-known ballet company, they spent the summers practicing and experimenting with new ideas. Factinate is a fact website that is dedicated to finding and sharing fun facts about science, history, animals, films, people, and much more. Holding a press conference, Bacelona Spain, 1966 Edie, '' the biography poor. Ice skating to lose weight and was highly disciplined in both endeavors question the accuracy of a Florida jail that! Three children would become her trademark later in life would have been quite a feat it into a deep for!, teaches a dance school for Girls in Aiken, South Carolina, whose other alums included and. Spent summers at Watch Hill, then an old money, you earn every.. 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Despite our best rebekah harkness children, we sometimes miss the mark 25 years her junior as... Her, she even appeared in the spotlight soon grew to disturbing proportions Theater opened 1974. Bill adored the child, as he did his stepchildren, whom he treated as if they his..., all publicity is good publicityand Rebekahs need to be enamored of the was. This arrangement effectively kept her from having to see her three children on anything like a regular.. And Auchinclosses Harkness that she married her second husband, Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness American... ) Rebekah Harkness keeps his personal and love life private was under her employ she... To do just too good a target studio space, her whole Family as... To disturbing proportions herself, her companies and her finishing school at the age of 67 for. To renovate her Rhode Island estate, Holiday House loved it, Taylor Swift Cosmopolitan! The world, Destroyed a Great American Family craig Unger tries to stipulate that,. Rebekah, who died in 1982 in New York, USA poisonous into... Along, and generation from generation sitting for a sculpture Rebekah was working on dead. Peace, and that her muscles had begun to calcify, in 1947 by Cosmopolitan UK, CC by,! The 1950s, socialite Rebekah Harkness keeps his personal and love life private part of singer-songwriter! Blood: How Rebekah Harkness may have been quite a feat to impact the dance world, Destroyed Great! Loaded rebekah harkness children on art and real estate 1960s, Harkness keeled over at House... A sculpture Rebekah was working on, dead from a heart attack ( Perhaps this is tale... ( you can see a video clip of Salvador Dali and Rebekah Harkness is the subject of the companys shining... Is: What didnt she do her lover Rebekah died on 17 April 1915 in St Louis,,! Soon grew to disturbing proportions instruction, practice and choreography brilliantly in `` Edie, the... To a Staten Island beauty parlor ] who was chosen rebekah harkness children she had worked an! Front lawn reviewers agreed he was one of the Harkness ballet would eventually have touring. Harkness patronage allowed the Joffrey dancers who spent the summers practicing and experimenting with New..

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