Jolie Gabor

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Jolie Gabor
Born Jancsi Tilleman
Died April 1, 1997
Palm Springs, California, U.S.
Occupation Socialite, jeweler
Spouse Vilmos Gábor (m. 1914–1939) «start: (1914)–end+1: (1940)»"Marriage: Vilmos Gábor to Jolie Gabor" Location: (linkback://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jolie_Gabor)
Howard Peter Christman (m. 1947–1948) «start: (1947)–end+1: (1949)»"Marriage: Howard Peter Christman to Jolie Gabor" Location: (linkback://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jolie_Gabor)
Odon de Szigethy, aka Edmond de Szigethy (1957-1989; his death)

Jolie Gabor de Szigethy (born September 29, circa 1896 — died April 1, 1997[1][2]) was a Hungarian-American jewelry entrepreneur, socialite and lecturer best known as the mother of the actresses Zsa Zsa Gabor, Eva Gabor, and Magda Gabor.

Contents

[edit] Family

Born Jancsi Tilleman in Budapest, she was the third child and third daughter of a Austro-Hungarian Jewish couple, Josef Tilleman and his Austrian-born wife, Franceska (née Reinherz), proprietors of a prosperous jewelry shop called "The Diamond House".[3] Her first name, however, is usually used for males in Hungary: "My parents were so eager to have a son they named me Jancsi, which translated comes out Little John or Johnny," Gabor said later in life.[4]She had two elder sisters, Janette and Dora; a younger sister, Rozsika (aka Rosalie), and a younger brother, Sebastian.[5][6][7][8] By her brother — who was killed in a bombing raid in World War II, along with their mother — Jolie Gabor was an aunt of Annette Tilleman, wife of Hungarian-American congressman and Holocaust survivor Tom Lantos.[9][10][2] After the death of Josef Tilleman, her mother married Dr. Miksa Kende, a physician.[11]

The year of Gabor's birth is murky. She claimed to have been born in 1900 and once jokingly said she had lied so much about her age she didn't remember her actual birth date.[12][13] Her obituary in The New York Times gave a birth year of 1900.[14] On a passenger manifest dated 30 December 1945, however, Gabor gives her age as 45 years and two months, which would mean, if true, she had been born in September or October 1899.[15] Published accounts of her third marriage, in 1957, have Gabor stating her age as 54, which would mean an unlikely birth year of 1903. Author Dominick Dunne stated, in 1995, that Jolie Gabor was believed to be 109, which would mean a birth year of approximately 1886.[16] The 1987 edition of Biographical Dictionary, however, states that Gabor's birthday was 29 September 1896, as does the 1959 International Celebrity Register.[17][18]

Her mother's family, the Reinherzes, had established jewelry shops in Vienna, and one of Franceska Tilleman's uncles helped his niece and her husband open The Diamond House, located at 54 Rakoczy Ut, in downtown Budapest, which specialized, despite the shop's name, in artificial pearls.[19][20][21]

[edit] Career

In the 1930s, Gabor opened Crystello, a shop selling crystal and porcelain in Budapest, as well as Jolie's, a handmade-costume-jewelry shop at 4 Kigyo Utcza in Budapest; she also established a branch of Jolie's in the Hungarian city of Győr.[22] Eventually there were five Jolie's locations in the Budapest area.[23] The firm's jewels also incorporated semiprecious stones and were admired for their old-fashioned settings and workmanship.[24] "Just like Bulgari is known in Rome, that's how well-known I was in Budapest," Gabor said. "Jolie's did so well that at holiday time they were standing outside in line waiting until somebody goes out from the inside."[25] The rise of Nazism in Germany forced her to curtail her retail business, Gabor recalled, "Everybody told, 'Jolie is crazy to go now to Berlin and Leipzig for jewelry.' I never went again."[26]

She was forced to close the stores when Hungary was occupied by the Germans, at which time she and other family members fled to Portugal.[27] They was assisted by Dr. Carlos Almeida Afonseca de Sampayo Garrido, Portuguese ambassador to Hungary — Gabor's daughter Magda reportedly was either his aide or his mistress — who provided safe passage to many Hungarian Jews in 1944. [3][28][29] As an article in Vanity Fair stated in 2007, "[It] was under [Sampayo's] auspices that the family, which was partly Jewish, had been spirited out of the country. (The girls' grandparents and other family members were killed by the Nazis.)" [4] Her brother, Sebastian, also a jeweler, spent part of the war in labor camps, beginning in 1942, until he and their mother, Franceska, were killed in an Allied bombing raid during World War II.[30]

Gabor arrived in the United States on December 30, 1945.[31][32][33]

Gabor opened successful another costume-jewelry business, Jolie Gabor, in New York City in 1946, with $7,200 borrowed from her daughters.[23][5][34] It later moved to 699 Madison Avenue.[35] Gabor also established a branch of the firm in Palm Springs, California. Among the company's designers were Elsa Beck, and Stephen Kelen d'Oxylion, as well as her own daughter, Magda.[32][36][37] One of the saleswomen was Evangelia Callas, mother of Maria Callas.[38] In 1953 the store introduced ornamental metal fingernails studded with rhinestones.[39]

In 1975, Gabor signed with the Keene Lecture Bureau as an inspirational speaker on the subjects of beauty and personal empowerment.[40]

The jewelry stores were sold by Gabor in the late 1980s to Madeleine Herling (née Magdalena Steingisser), a Hungarian-born businesswoman and philanthropist.[41][42]

[edit] Publications

Gabor lent her name to two books:

  • Jolie Gabor (Mason Charton, 1975), an as-told-to memoir co-authored by Cindy Adams, a newspaper columnist and family friend. Gabor approached Adams to write the book in 1972, even though Gabor fretted that her daughters would dislike the publication. "I am sure it will be a Hungarian tragedy when they read what I have said," she told Adams. "My husband will throw me out and my daughters won't speak to me."[43] Regarding the book, Gabor told another reporter, "Always [a woman] can do something. She makes a new hairdo, she makes a new make-up. If the nose isn't good, she fixes it. That is why I write the book. It's never too late for a new look, a new business, a new husband or lover. When we think life is over, it's always ready to begin".[44]
  • Jolie Gabor's Family Cookbook (Thomas Y. Crowell, 1962), which was written with Jean and Ted Kaufman and contains more than 300 traditional Eastern European recipes.

[edit] Television appearence

In 1957, Gabor appeared as a mystery guest on the show What's My Line?.

[edit] Marriages

She was married three times:

  • Vilmos Gábor (1881–1962), a Hungarian army officer, who achieved the rank of colonel; they married in 1914 and divorced in 1939. He later became a real-estate investor in Budapest and married, as his second wife, a woman named Magda.[35]
  • Howard Peter Christman (aka Peter Howard Christman; born May 22, 1894 – died 19??), a New York City restaurant manager; they married in 1947 and divorced in 1948.[34][45]
  • Odon Szigethy (July 12, 1912 – September 30, 1989), a Hungarian refugee, also known as Odon Szigethi and Edmond de Szigethy; they married in New York City, New York, on March 3, 1957. The bride wore a gown by Rumanian-American fashion designer Livia Sylva.[46][47][48] "He's a moneymaker", she said of Szigethy in a 1976 interview. "He takes care of me, he takes care of my business, my three homes in Florida, New York, and Connecticut. When I marry him, darling, he looks younger than me, but now, he looks older".[44]

[edit] Death

Jolie Gabor was preceded in death by her youngest daughter, Eva, although she reportedly was never informed of Eva's death. She died less than two years later, in Palm Springs, California on April 1, 1997. Two months after Jolie's death, her eldest daughter, Magda, died. She had one grandchild, Zsa Zsa's daughter, Francesca Hilton.

Jolie Gabor de Szigethy is buried in Desert Memorial Park[2] in Cathedral City, California.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] References

  1. ^ Date of 1894 birth cited in Dictionary of Women Worldwide. 25,000 women through the ages. Three volumes. Edited by Anne Commire. Waterford, CT: Yorkin Publications, 2007.
  2. ^ a b Palm Springs Cemetery District, "Interments of Interest"
  3. ^ The family's Jewish parentage cited by surgeon Dr. Lazslo N. Tauber, also Jewish, a family friend and neighbor of the Gabors in Budapest, in Forbes, vol 134, October 1984, p. 40. Gabor's friend and co-author has said, recalling one of Eva Gabor's weddings, at which the bride wore a cross, "The Gabors were Jewish, so I said to Jolie, 'What's with the goddamn cross?' Jolie said, 'Eva's new about-to-be-husband hates the Jews, so in this book [Jolie's memoir] you make us Catholic.' They have always lived with no reality; there was never any truth to anything." (Leslie Bennetts, "It's a Mad, Mad, Zsa Zsa World", Vanity Fair, September 6, 2007, http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2007/10/zsazsa200710
  4. ^ Jolie Gabor, by Jolie Gabor as told to Cindy Adams, Mason Charter, 1975, p. 3
  5. ^ Jolie Gabor's name on a ship manifest in 1945 en route to the United States lists her as "Johanna Gabor".
  6. ^ Elder sisters cited in Jolie Gabor as told to Cindy Adams, Mason Charter, 1975, p. 3
  7. ^ Younger sister cited in Jolie Gabor, p. 12
  8. ^ Jolie's brother referenced in Zsa Zsa Gábor: my story, written for me by Gerold Frank (World Publishing Co., 1960)
  9. ^ Lantos the master storyteller, communicator
  10. ^ The Jews of Capitol Hill by Kurt F. Stone (Scarecrow Press, 2010, p. 371) states that Annette Lantos was a first cousin of the Gabor sisters, which would make her Jolie Gabor's niece; her mother was the former Mary Seidner and her father was Jolie Gabor's only brother, Sebastian Tilleman. Mary Seidner Tilleman's name is cited in Congressional Staff Directory (Congressional Staff Directory, 1990), p. 898
  11. ^ Stepfather's name and correct spelling of surname cited in Em lékkönyv a Királyi magyar természettudományi társulat (Magyar Természettudományi Társulat, 1892), p. 792
  12. ^ Jolie Gabor gives Tilleman as her maiden name in her autobiography, co-authored by Cindy Adams, using it as a chapter heading on page 23; she gives her mother's maiden name as Reinherz. And Publisher Weekly's review of the memoirs says, "Jolie Gabor, nee Jancsi Tilleman, fills every page of this zany life story with her Hungarian ebullience."
  13. ^ Social Security Death Index entry under the name JOLIE DESZIGETHY
  14. ^ New York Times Archives, "Jolie Gabor, Eva and Zsa Zsa's Mother, 97", [sic], April 3, 1997. Accessed July 31, 2011
  15. ^ According to a ship's manifest dated December 3, 1945, and accessed on ancestry.co (December 30, 2011), Jolie (Johanna) Gabor arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from Estoril, Portugal.
  16. ^ Dominick Dunne, "The Two Faces of O.J." Vanity Fair, November 1995, pp. 124-.
  17. ^ Biography Almanac (Gale Research, 1987), p. 2366
  18. ^ Cleveland Amory, International Celebrity Register (Celebrity Register, 1959), p. 277
  19. ^ Jolie Gabor, by Jolie Gabor as told to Cindy Adams, Mason Charter, 1975, p. 4
  20. ^ "The Mother of the Gabor Girls", San Antonio Light, 26 February 1950, p. 16
  21. ^ Zsa Zsa Gabor uses the spelling Franceska in her memoirs.
  22. ^ Zsa Zsa Gábor: my story, written for me by Gerold Frank (World Publishing Co., 1960), pp. 25, 126
  23. ^ a b Art Buchwald, Art Buchwald's Paris (Little, Brown, 1954), page 148
  24. ^ Sen Sahir Silan, I Do Not Regret (Vantage Press, 2005), page 62
  25. ^ Jolie Gabor as told to Cindy Adams, Mason Charter, 1975, p. 126
  26. ^ Jolie Gabor as told to Cindy Adams, Mason Charter, 1975, p. 216
  27. ^ Zsa Zsa Gábor: my story, written for me by Gerold Frank (World Publishing Co., 1960), p. 160
  28. ^ Girlfriend/fiancee cited in
  29. ^ Magda as aide cited in Zsa Zsa Gábor:my story, written for me by Gerold Frank (World Publishing Co., 1960), p. 161
  30. ^ Information about Sebastian Tilleman cited by his daughter, Annette Tilleman Lantos, in Mark Seliger, Leora Kahn, and Rachel Hager's When They Came to Take My Father: Voices of the Holocaust (Arcade Publishing, 1996), page 96
  31. ^ Jolie Gabor biodata
  32. ^ a b "The Mother of the Gabor Girls", San Antonio Light, February 26, 1950, p. 16
  33. ^ According to a ship's manifest dated December 30, 1945, and accessed on ancestry.com (December 30, 2011), Jolie Gabor (using a Portuguese passport with the name Johanna Gabor and giving her birthplace as Budapest), arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from Estoril, Portugal. Use of the name Johanna on a passenger manifest or passport does not indicate accuracy, however. Given the turmoil of wartime Hungary and Portugal, it is possible that another name was used for the sake of camouflage or expediency.
  34. ^ a b "The Mother of the Gabor Girls", San Antonio Light, February 26, 1950, p. 17
  35. ^ a b "Vilmos Gabor Dead", The New York Times, July 11, 1962
  36. ^ Stephen Kelen d'Oxylion's name is properly spelled, per various published sources (including several books about Zora Neale Hurston), although Gabor spelled it as "d'Oxylian" in her autobiography.
  37. ^ Beck cited in "Obituary: Elsa Beck", The New York Times", 15 February 2009
  38. ^ Gael Greene, Don't Come Back Without It (Simon & Schuster, 1960), p. 15
  39. ^ "Metal Fingernails Offered", The New York Times, 13 March 1953
  40. ^ Marian Christy, "Mama Gabor: Ageless Mother of 3", Newport Daily News, 17 February 1975
  41. ^ "Madeleine Herling, Philanthropist, 75", The New York Times, 13 April 1995
  42. ^ Herling's maiden name and former married name cited in Diário Oficial da União, 7 December 1968. Born in 1919 in Budapest and later a resident of São Paulo, Brazil, she was a daughter of Sigismund Steingisser and his wife, the former Frederica Pollachek. See [1]
  43. ^ Cindy Adams, "My Jolie Gabor", The Lowell Sun, 5 October 1975
  44. ^ a b Ellie Grossman, "Accent on People: Jolie Gabor", The Times-Standard, 11 March 1976
  45. ^ Christman's 1917 draft card gives his birth name as Howard Peter Christman" and his birthdate.
  46. ^ "Mama Gabor Altar-Bound", The Miami Daily News, 27 February 1957, page 15A
  47. ^ Szigethy is sometimes referred to as Count Edmond de Szigethy but his title cannot be established. His "first" name was spelled EDMOND, according to the signature on his naturalization form, accessed on ancestry.com on December 30, 2011, as well as his grave marker, accessed on Find-A-Grave online.
  48. ^ "Mrs. Gabor To Rewed; She Will Be Married to Odon Szigethy Here on Sunday", The New York Times, February 27, 1957. According to the same newspaper report, Szigethy was previously married to Katalin Ronay.

[edit] External links

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