After she was widowed, Mrs. Harkness renovated her Rhode Island house; she installed 8 kitchens and 21 baths. . And when she discovered one of her Joffrey dancers didnt own a suit, she sent all the Joffrey men to Saks and all the women to Bergdorfs for formalwear. Were always looking for your input! Not long after Rebekahs passing, her daughter Edith finally managed to succeed in her attempts. Let the little creature die!'' He received a prison sentence of 15 years, but didnt bother to get in touch with his mother. Rebekah and Bill Harkness had one daughter, Edith. The Harknesses were married for a brief periodjust seven years. ''We were the favorites,'' says a dancer. 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. In addition to the three kids she has with Jamie, Rebekah has two children, Megan and Taylor, from previous relationships. Oh my God, the question here is: What didnt she do? When publicizing her ballet, Harkness became notorious for refusing to showcase any of her talented dancers in the promotional photographs. The dancers, choreographers, composers and designers were pioneers and experimenters. ''You see,'' she said. She began to cut back and look for public funding. Putting mineral oil in the punch at her sisters debutante ball. The lovely pair only made it four years before divorcing. Following her death, a memorial was held at the family home before Harkness was cremated, and her ashes were placed in a $250,000 spinning urn designed by Salvador Dal, then placed in the Harkness Mausoleum in Woodlawn Cemetery. Though Harkness didnt seem to care that he was using her, she probably should have. 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 Harkness took up dancing and ice skating to lose weight and was highly disciplined in both endeavors. They performed a strip tease at a social event and put mineral oil into the punch bowl at a coming-out party. [2][4] During her final days, Harkness began to reconcile with her children. ''Oh, my God,'' said a witness. 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. Harkness started acting out early in her adolescence, and her antics would put any other mean girl to shame. She loved to pour Dom Perignon into her pool and let guests swim around in the bubbly. Harkness had no problem dropping Joffrey like a hot potato when he wouldnt support her dismal vanity projects. She filled her fish tank with goldfish and Scotch. But according to An American Ballet Story. 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. It would be interesting to see what a social historian, someone familiar with the hierarchies of caste and class in America - or, better yet, a novelist with a theological bent - would make of the raw material Mr. Unger has gathered. 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 Harkness Theater opened in 1974, but by then Rebekah had started to run out of money. The Harkness family had a reputation for its philanthropy. P.O. In 1956, Harkness burst onto the high society scene after. Thanks for your time! Swift gave all her friends matching red-white-and-blue onesies. The critics, especially the New York Times Clive Barnes, savaged Rebekah. Obviously, Rebekah was completely out touch with realityso her next move makes sense. Aerial view the former Holiday House. Her son Allen says the years he spent in prison were the happiest of his life. Soon Clive Barnes was writing that the Harkness Ballet had ''descended beyond the necessity of serious consideration,'' and in 1975 it folded. Rebekah Harkness Rebekah Harkness (1915-1982) Rebekah Harkness, born Rebekah Semple West, was one of the foremost American patrons of dance. 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.) [1] Before their divorce in 1946, they had two children; Allen Pierce (b. Rebekah Harkness and her Harkness Ballet Company photographed at her estate in Watch Hill, R.I., 1964. The children were visiting Bill's family and Alfonso had left . Family Members. He. Then in 1947, she married Standard Oil heir William Hale Harkness, who brought her into the serious money class. Thanks for your help! Rebekah Harkness's Net Worth: $1-5 Million Age, Height & Body Measurements Rebekah Harkness has been died on 17 June 1982. Hey, all publicity is good publicityand Rebekahs need to be in the spotlight soon grew to disturbing proportions. Salvador Dali put one touchingand classically narcissisticdetail into The Chalice of Life. The urn spun on its base so that Harkness could always be dancing, even beyond the grave. ''Costumes, sets, musical scores,'' Mr. Unger writes, ''many of the best dancers, the entire repertory - even the works choreographed by Joffrey himself - were owned by her foundation.''. She shoved $5 million into building the Harkness Theater, a lavish studio complete with marble staircases and a chandelier, and it was all for nothing: The company collapsed in 1975. The gargantuan house itself was partially demolished, then sold to a family that remodeled it and renamed it High Watch. She had a newfound freedom to do whatever she wanted with the piles of money in her bank account. This is where Rebekah really started getting a tarnished reputation, and things got so bad that no amount of money could fix her downfall. We were in heaven, said Danish ballerina Lone Isaksen. 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. Her children, not so much. Rebekah was previously married to Niels H. Lauersen, Benjamin Harrison Kean, William Hale Harkness and Dickson W. Pierce. The parties continued when she brought the entire Joffrey to Watch Hill in 1962 and 1963. She hired Salvador Dali to design sets. Without any real studio space, her dancers often practiced on her front lawn. He had a daughter and a granddaughter who became the actress Elizabeth Montgomery. Join thousands of others and start your morning with our Fact Of The Day newsletter. Harkness had to do everything in styleeven when it came to moving on to the next life. Rebekah died that same year after a long bout with cancer. One could almost feel sorry for her. Pierce was the descendant of Franklin Pierce, the 14th President of the United States, and seemed like a good match for the ambitious girlexcept really, he was just a starter husband. He likes to talk about blowing people away. [1] Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company. 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. (No such record could be found, but the famous Surrealist artist did design the $250,000 jewel-studded urn that held herashes. She dyed a cat green. Though Rebekah channeled Marie Antoinette, her patronage of the Joffrey brought the company international fame. One critic denounced it as the worst mural ever made. Uh, how sweet? 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. Catherine of Aragon is now infamous as King Henry VIIIs rejected queenbut few people know her even darker history. She attended finishing school at the Fermata School for Girls in Aiken, South Carolina, whose other alums included Roosevelts and Auchinclosses. The only problem was that the urn was too small. 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. Rebekah Harkness' antics annoyed her neighbors, while Jesus' antics got him murdered by the state and by some religious leaders. Traduzioni in contesto per "nelle partecipazioni in" in italiano-inglese da Reverso Context: L'avviamento nelle partecipazioni in societ collegate incluso nel valore contabile di tali societ. In her obituary, shes credited with supporting the Joffrey and Jerome Robbins ballet companies. 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. . 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. 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. She went to Fermata, a South Carolina finishing school that had sheltered Roosevelts, Biddles and Auchinclosses. As the most commanding mistress in the French court, she bettered the lives of many and became a beloved figure. ''The others, they just know how to bite.'') People called it the Taylor Swift Tax, though it never became law. Want to tell us to write facts on a topic? She filled a pool with Champagne. The latest fashion news, beauty coverage, celebrity style, fashion week updates, culture reviews, and videos on Vogue.com. Rebekah Harkness and her Harkness Ballet in 1966. ''Is there a chic way to go?''. 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. William Hale Harkness All rights reserved. Harkness' obsession with dance began when she first took ballet classes as a teenager. She and her friends called themselves the Bitch Pack and disrupted debutante parties. While Bill Harkness was alive, he and Rebekah threw raucous parties every weekend. How should she do it? She wondered. She supported the arts in general, ballet in particular, and she had the wealth with which to do it. [4] Harkness also surrounded herself with other well-known creatives, like yogi B.K.S. It donated Harkness Tower at Yale, Harkness Commons at Harvard and Harkness Pavilion at New York Hospital. 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. Her grandfather founded the St. Louis Union Trust Company, ensuring she grew up comfortably. Still, when you marry for money, you earn every penny. [16], In 1961, Harkness married Ben Kean (c.19121993),[17] a physician who was a professor of Tropical Medicine at the Cornell Medical College. Who Is Rebekah Harkness? Marina Eglevsky - A Legacy of Dance, Part 1. . My association with Rebekah Harkness was based on creating a business venture that would make a profit. She once dressed as a waitress at one of them so she could eavesdrop on the guests. Extravagant Facts About Barbara Hutton, The Poor Little Rich Girl, Tragic Facts About Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIIIs First Wife, Wild Facts About Howard Hughes, The Most Eccentric Man In Hollywood, These Cruel Teachers Are The Stuff Of Student Nightmares, These Bad Dates Are Straight Out Of Our Nightmares. Like this story? Her parents hired a nanny for Harkness specifically because she "had worked in an insane asylum," and then Harkness went to finishing school, where she decided to "do everything bad." Yet while there, Harkness gave new meaning to the word prima donna. The socialite, fancying herself a dance expert, started writing her own ballets. It was shaping up to be a white-picket fence brooduntil, that is, Rebekah proved herself to be an utterly horrific mother. Rebekah Vardy has five children in total. Not just going to performances, but sponsoring entire ballet companies, buying up real estate for them and sending them on world tours. Wade, teaches a dance school for children and directs 2 dance companies, one providing performing opportunities for children and one for adults. Sadly, the socialites seemingly bottomless cruelty would soon hit even greater lows. In 2020, Swift then penned the song the last great american dynasty, which tells Harknesss twisted story for the world. She started by bringing the company to Watch Hill (despite the neighbors) in the summer for instruction, practice and choreography. Bobby Scevers, Mr. Unger writes, ''had no sympathy'' for the child. . Near the end of her life, one friend noted that she walked like Frankenstein.. Suddenly, Rebekah was a rich widowone of the wealthiest women in America, in fact. Not only did her ballet collapse, her whole family did as well. [5] Through the Rebekah Harkness Foundation, Harkness sponsored Jerome Robbins and the Joffrey Ballet. Styling herself as the life of the party, Harkness did things like throw plates at the ships Filipino orchestra, swim in her birthday suit in full view of other passengers, and send out strings of swears so loudly that the ocean liner eventually had no choice but to send the beautiful, foul-mouthed socialite off the boat. $ 12.19. But Rebekah made the most of it. Shop for Rebekah Harkness at Walmart.com. He was in prison. Their wedding took place at 730 Park Avenue, which was Williams apartment. Aw, how sweet. [13], A philanthropist, Harkness supported the Joffrey Ballet for years, as well as the Harkness Ballet Foundation and the William Hale Harkness Foundation. The Joffrey had a price to pay for Rebekah Harknesss support. Taylor Swift bought the former Holiday House in 2013 for a reported $17.75 million in cash. And then there were herthree children. Rebekah divorced Pierce in 1946 after an excruciating seven-year marriage, and it wasnt long before she set her sights on William Hale Harkness, the heir to the Standard Oil fortune. To zero peoples surprise, the Harkness family was utterly dysfunctional. Rebekah Harkness was born in 1915 to a rich, emotionally frigid St. Louis family. Harkness pulled this prank at her own sisters debutante ball. Besides despising Rebekahs children, Scevers also hated her disabled granddaughter Angel. They bought Eolia from Mary's sister and her brother-in-law, Jessie Stillman and William Taylor in 1907. She also studied orchestration with Lee Hoiby and received a Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the Franklin Pierce College in Rindge, New Hampshire, in 1968.[12]. Born in 1915 in St. Louis, Missouri, her father Allen Tarwater was a powerful stockbroker, while her mother, also named Rebekah, was a perfectly turned out trophy wife. Eolia was one of their seven homes and reputed . When she was still desperately clinging to her ballet dreams, Harkness decided to install an enormous, blue plastic Geodesic dome right smack dab in the middle of her front lawn as a formal practice space for her failing dancers. Full body measurements, dress & shoe size will be updated soon. See, Rebekah thought that notoriously reclusive writer J.D. Rebekah also loaded up on art and real estate. 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 Wealthy, elegant, and beautiful, Harkness seemed to have it allfrom her oil baron husband to her notoriously raucous parties. rebekah harkness children. 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. She didnt help herself with her capriciousness. By signing up you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement. Our editors are instructed to fact check thoroughly, including finding at least three references for each fact. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. The Robert Joffrey Company summer workshop at Rebekah Harkness' Watch Hill estate in Rhode Island, July 1962. Immediate Needs: $1,500. Donning a black chiffon Mainbocher dress with a white silk back-tied apron, she flashed a wry smile at the camera. 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. Allen Pierce, Rebekah's son by the first of her four husbands, was unable to be present. Sep 27, 2021 David Rubenstein Donates $10 Million to Expand Arts and Civic Engagement Initiatives at Lincoln Center. As the saying goes, well-behaved women seldom make history. After that, Rebekah really let it all hang out. When she was 10 years old, she did. She lived on champagne and injections - Vitamin B, testosterone, painkillers - as a result of which her bathrooms were splattered with blood and her muscles calcified. [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. Upon her death in 1982, Rebekah Harkness was called many things in her New York Times obituary. Rebekah had already had two children with her first husband, Allen and Anne "Terry" Pierce, and she then had one more child with William, a daughter named Edith. So, how much is Rebekah Harkness worth at the age of 67 years old? I just hit the ceiling. The socialite was born in 1915 to a wealthy family in St. Louis, Missouri. With her help, the Joffrey won international renownsomething she wanted for herself. Our credibility is the turbo-charged engine of our success. [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. Little Betty had a horrific childhood. Then she stole most of the Joffrey dancers for her own ballet company the Harkness. Why? Being a patron of the ballet was Rebekahs passion. On June 10, 1939, Harkness married Dickson W. Pierce, the son of Thomas M. Pierce. . She poured money into Harkness House, a dance studio meant to mimic the grandeur of European ballet schools, outfitting it with a marble staircase, silk shades, and a crystal chandelier. '', This post-mortem mischief was going on at Harkness House, the East 75th Street town house headquarters of the Harkness Ballet Foundation, which Mrs. Harkness had modeled on the St. Petersburg Ballet School. Rebekah and Bill Harkness had one daughter, Edith. Everyone advised her to get her affairs in order, but as well soon see, things didnt work out so neatly for Rebekah Harkness in the end. I don't want this screaming baby over my room! She would also fill her lavish fish tanks with Scotch, even as living goldfish swam in them. [4], On June 10, 1939, Harkness married Dickson W. Pierce, the son of Thomas M. (You can see a video clip of Salvador Dali and Rebekah Harkness here.). West co-founded G.H. Clark Gable, Douglas Fairbanks and Andrew Mellon owned homes there. Harkness only left death in her wake wherever she went. ''So absurd,'' Mr. Scevers pronounced. Several hours later, the top of the urn - called the Chalice of Life - was somehow, by unknown agencies, uncovered. In a matter of years, her life would go from classy to just plain messy. BOX 191606 OthersJerome Robbins and George Balanchine flatly refused to choreograph her musical compositions. Shutterstock Advertisement 17. And the dysfunction didnt end there. For all her money, Harkness did not have good taste. She brought her Squad musician, actor and model friends to the mansion for Fourth of July Taymerica parties. She blew through her fortune on the boys and the ballet. (Harkness was an avid patron of the arts and founded her own company, Harkness Ballet. And how in the world did she get that way? Yet this came with great tragedy: The baby, named Angel, was severely brain-damaged. 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. We are meant to take comfort and a measure of relief from our difference - though, as we know but do not frequently wish to remember, the grave awaits us all. 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. They dubbed themselves the [W]itch Pack and, after graduating in 1932, set about trying to wreak havoc on the socialite scene, one gala at a time. They called her ballets worthless, her music crap. Though Rebekah grew up in a wealthy St. Louis family, her social status was elevated when, after her first divorce, she married William. Reportedly, the rest of her remains were placed in a Gristedes bag. In 1961, Harkness decided she wanted to become the next great ballet master, so she sponsored actual master Robert Joffreys artisanal ballet troupe. Doctors told Harkness that she had one ailment that no amount of money could cure: She was dying of stomach cancer. Rebekah Harkness patronage allowed the Joffrey to perform in Iran. She soon became the owner of a vast number of properties, and indulged in many luxuries. (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. They featured fireworks, boat rides and a giant inflatable water slide. From . She attended the Rossman School and John Burroughs School in St. Louis, and then the Fermata School for Girls in Aiken, South Carolina, which she graduated from in 1932. Harkness was jealous to an absolute fault, and even to her own detriment. In December 1956, she even appeared in the pages of Vogue. At the very end, according to Bobby Scevers, as she lay dying of cancer, ''It was complete chaos. As yet another troubled member of the family, Allen had gotten into a fight, slain a man, and was eventually sentenced with manslaughter. As well see, Rebekahs love only devolved from there. [19] They divorced in 1977. No clan is left untouched, and even families that seem happy and normal on. No matter what she did or who she tried to pay off, the great American heiress had a terrifyingly short time to live. 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. She had a marvelous time ruining everything, Swift crooned. Yet like so much of Harknesss life, what seemed beautiful on the outside was rotting on the inside. Years later, I was using her phone when I made an utterly chilling discovery. Oh, but they had more tricks up their perfectly-tailored sleeves. Harkness was surprisingly generous when it suited her, but also unpredictably bizarre. All rights reserved. Copyright 2022 SLM Media Group. Rebekah Harkness. (Allegedly, it was a cat if it matters.). The two purchased a mansion in Watch Hill, Rhode Island, which they nicknamed Holiday House. In the art world, the shade International Klein Blue is famous, and was custom-mixed by renowned artist Yves Klein in 1960. 2023 Cond Nast. TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. If Harknesss lovers are anything to go by, she was a wildcat in the bedroom. And when the time came to put Harkness into the Chalice of Life, the plot thickened. [3] Harkness would also continue to study dance and piano, and studied ballet with Victoria Cassau, who was a student of Anna Pavlova. Dancy Mason is the Editor-in-Chief at Factinate. "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. When Harkness was 24 years old, she decided it was high time to marry, and she chose Dickson W. Pierce, an upper-class photographer, as her first husband. Rebekah Harkness, as seen in the December 1956 issue of. Mother of Private. Please reach out to us to let us know what youre interested in reading. 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. Harkness drew glares for her parties at Holiday House, as did Swift: Who could forget the frenzy over her celeb-studded Fourth of July bash? Although Catherine's successor Queen Anne Boleyn suffered an infamously dark fate, Aragon's own life was somehow even more tragic. A terrible story is told here. In 1939 she married Dickson Pierce because, she said, she didnt have anything better to do. . https://www.nytimes.com/1988/05/22/books/is-there-a-chic-way-to-go.html. By James Crowley On 7/24/20 at 12:22 PM EDT. Its here where Rebekah catapulted into high society. ''Kiss me,'' she commanded. Though her children Edith and Terry rushed to her bedside along with her lover Bobby Scevers, the scene was anything but heart-warming. Meanwhile, the booze and the pills caught up with her. While at her fancy finishing school, Harkness didnt seem to care that her classmates were people with last names like Roosevelt. Instead, she scrawled in her scrapbook that she wanted to do everything bad. Well, she certainly achieved her goal. In 1974, Harkness married again, this time to another doctor named Niels H. Lauersen. When I first saw someone bring up Blue Blood (The story of Rebekah Harkness and how one of the richest families in America descended into drugs, madness, suicide and violence), I was lurking in a Taylor Swift Facebook group. Unfortunately for Rebekah, the endeavour ended in national embarrassment and disaster. This arrangement effectively kept her from having to see her three children on anything like a regular basis, theNew York Timescommented. (Actually, it was a private My Favorite Murder crossover group, if you care.) 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. When she erected a giant blue geodesic dome on her lawn, they sued her for zoning violations. She believed in reincarnation. Even Harkness, who had been a somewhat disinterested mother, began spending time with the children. (Harkness reportedly cleaned her pool with Dom Prignon.) It was the second marriage for both of them. While a kinder critic likened it to a lavish ladies powder room, less-generous experts compared it to a Staten Island beauty parlor. Ouch. Themes of sexual repression, homoerotic love, tribalism and even the aftermath of rape were explored by some of the most famous choreographers of the time. The music video featured the beach and the waves from the house, just as Rebekah Harkness would have seen it. The Harkness Ballet would eventually have two touring companies, a youth ballet (which taught Patrick Swayze) and its own theater. Taylor Swift has once . An artist (a descriptor she bestowed upon herself). Franklin Pierces three children died before reaching adulthood. And then in 2020, the houses owner, Taylor Swift, wrote a song about Rebekah Harkness, called The Last Great American Dynasty. Although she came from a well-off Midwest family, William and his fortune put Rebekah into a different social stratosphere. 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. Harkness' passions for dance and music followed her into adulthood. She maintains an online podcast that is available on iTunes or online at http://playerplaza.podbean.com . But behind her perfect faade lies a chilling history. Her 1955 tone poem, Safari Suite, was performed at Carnegie Hall, and in 1957 she released an album titled Music With a Heartbeat. She thirsted for acclaim as a composer, a dancer and an arts patron, but her thirst for booze and pills undid her. She was 67.) 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? Rocky Finds His Heart. A New York Times article described Harkness's unusual upbringing.