King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson (Duke and Duchess of Windsor)

[Eric_Lowe]

I actually think that Wallis's jewelry were very tasteful and chic. I have a friend who saw Wallis's clothes that was in exhibition for awhile in the Chateau where they were married. They were very elegant and well made. People do pay a lot of money on party planners, interior designers (society girls like Lee Radziwill got into that) and good taste has a price tag too. I think Wallis would have made a good model, dress designer or party planner had she been born later.

[Kalafrana]

I agree Wallis was spoilt! As she was an only child and her father had died within months of her birth, it would have been rather surprising if her mother hadn't spoiled her, reduced circumstances or not. I re-read the early chapters of Greg King's book last night, and, yes, Wallis always got what she wanted - good school, summer camps, coming out season, good clothes (even if her mother had to make them). The words 'We can't afford it' never seem to have been used to her. And her mentality throughout her life was that someone else would provide. Even when her fortunes were at their lowest, she never seems to have thought about looking for a job, or asking Uncle Sol to finance a course in shorthand and typing.

Ann

[Eric_Lowe]

As said before, she grew up in an age when only poor women worked. Wallis fully intend to be a wife. She was a military wife for awhile, but not hitched with an alcoholic who beat her. The fact that she was a battered wife and thus victim of domestic violence never seem to factor into any sympathy for the woman. No she should go to a factory and live a miserable life. No I think Wallis was smart and took the better options and opportunities. Why should she be a secretary when she could be a hostess entertaining interesting people and go to parties. Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis never worked until her later years as well. Was she spoilt too ? 

[Alixz]

Jackie Kennedy was a photographer:

Occupation before Marriage:
At an early age, Jacqueline Kennedy wrote essays and poems which were sometimes published in local newspapers. In her high school newspaper Salmagundi, she penned a cartoon series and won the graduating award for literature. In 1951, she submitted an entry to Vogue magazine's Prix de Paris contest, the prize for which was to spend half a year in New York, and the other half in Paris as a junior editor for the magazine. The submission was rigorous, requiring an original theme for an entire issue, illustrations, articles, layout and design, an advertising campaign that could be tied into the issue's content. In the requisite essay, "People I Wish I Had Known," she listed playwright Oscar Wilde, poet Charles Baudelaire and ballet impresario Serge Diaghilev. Named one of the twelve finalists, she was then interviewed by the magazine editors and out of 1,280 entries she won the contest. Her mother, however, did not want her to leave the U.S. and made her turn down the prize. After college, she worked for the Washington Times-Herald as its Inquiring Camera Girl, earning $42.50 a week.  Her job was to both photograph and interview local citizens with one question each day; her first interview was with Pat Nixon and others included Vice President Nixon and Senator John F. Kennedy whom she later married. The questions became increasingly political, including topics like the Soviet Union, the Korean War, and the U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia. One of her last assignments was to cover Queen Elizabeth's 1953 coronation.

Jackie Kennedy was not Wallis Warfield or in any way like her.  No comparison and no competition.

Face it Eric.  Waliis was a user.  She was lazy and had no intention of getting things for herself if she could get someone else to give them to her.  Even her marriage to Spencer was a willful stupid bid to "get away from Baltimore".   Well she got away and she also got more that she expected and less than she wanted in an abusive husband.

[Kalafrana]

Eric

I don't see Wallis Simpson as 'smart' (in the American sense of the word). She became an expert at persuading people (mostly men) to come to her rescue when she didn't really need rescuing. That to me indicates, at best, an unpleasant calculating streak. No doubt she could be good company when she felt like it, but her dinner parties seem mainly to have been an exercise in 'Aren't I wonderful?'. Everything was so darn perfect that I would not have dared to set foot in the Windsor house with my shoes on, still less sat on any of the chairs, and as for daring to eat anything.....

Ann

[Alixz]

Going into a factory and living a miserable life?  Poor baby Wallis.  Forbid that she should have to take responsibility for her actions and actually do something gainful.

Being a perfect party planner for the ex-King of England is not, to me, a valuable profession.  Why should she be a secretary when she could be a hostess?  Because being a secretary is a respectable and gainful occupation.

Being a lazy, much married, lay about is so much better - isn't it?

Even Eleanor Roosevelt, who lost her father at an early age and lost her mother also, and was raised by an out of touch grandmother did not lay about and expect some man to take care of her.  

There are just far too many examples of women who were born or raised in similar circumstances to that of Bessie Waliis Warfield Spencer Simpson Windsor who took control of their own lives and their own futures and did something with their lives that made a difference.  

Some, like Anna Eleanor Roosevelt Roosevelt made a big difference in the world!

[Eric_Lowe]

It was Jackie's mother Janet Lee (who was in the same age bracket) who discouraged her to peruse marriage instead. She did turn down the opportunity to go to Paris for her job. And yes, she did say yes to Onassis millions too. I began to see people here just want to trash Wallis without being fair and giving her the benefit of the doubt. If you think it is easy to plan a party then be my guest, it is HARD work and no detailed is left to chance. The right glasses, the right China and the right food of course. Which is why even hard working women like Marjorie Merriweather Post appreciates the Duchess of Windsor as a person of style and a good friend. I don't think one can say that Mrs. Post was a lazy person.

[Kalafrana]

Eric

As I am an uninformed Brit, you will have to tell me who Marjorie Merriweather Post was.

Organising a 'perfect' party may be hard work, but after she married the Duke of Windsor Wallis Simpson had quite a large staff with nothing else to do all day but look after them and organise their parties. When my parents held dinner parties (very much part of my father's role as an officer in the RAF) my mother did the cooking. And the shopping and the clearing-up afterwards. All Wallis had to do was tell the butler, 'We are going to have X number of people to dinner on Y night' and decide on the menu.

Ann

[Alixz]

And you will defend her no matter what.

I just don't know how you can defend empty party planning as a worthy occupation for anyone, let alone the wife of the ex-King of England.

The next time I throw a banquet for hundreds, I will make sure to check to be sure that my china and glassware match.  The world will be so much better off if I do.  I wouldn't want to offend the memory of Wallis.

Good grief!

So now, as a proper moderator, I will step back.  I have to regulate my own posting was well as that of others and I am getting too annoyed to continue.

[Robert_Hall]

 Other than her notorious  Baltimore fried chicken, I do not see that she had such good taste.  And even at that, it is a messy dish to serve at a formal dinner, no matter who cooked it.  BTW, I tried the recipe a couple of times and did not think it all that special.
 Her jewelry, although fabulous, was a gaudy display of indulgence. Most of the time she was wearing some of this stuff, she looked like a drag queen [not that there is any thing wrong with drag quuens, she was just not a good looking one, as I see her].'
 Ms Post was an heiress and a very large contributor to worthy causes.  She was an excellent hostess and collected cheques from her guests for those cause whilst doing it. She also left a legacy that anyone can see.
  The Windsor woman left what ?  The jewelry went to an AIDS research foundation and the rest ? an Al Fayed auction.
 I have  the auction catalogues, all 3 of them,  and everything in it is branded with the their or her cypher.  So self absorbed was she I think her toilette paper might have been printed with it.
 And to compare he tor Jackqueline Kennedy, what an insult.  MS. Kennedy  actually worked, as has been pointed out, and even after she married Onassis so her children would be secure, she worked as an editor.  Also her  book In the Russian Style was considered a groundbreaker at the time.  Not because of her name,  but because she was able to open doors. Even her relatively brief tenure as First Lady was productive.  Remember the  ptrcedent stting White House Tour ?
 I do not begrudged Wallis for getting away with what she did,  but  to me, she was a valueless, self indulgent,  absorbed woman.  What did it get her? A lonely, isolated  long and weary death.
 The only famous thing she did was just being famous with questionable style. It is not stylish to steal a king,  she ranks with Lupescu.
 History is not very kind on the Windsor woman, , IMO deservedly so.

[Eddie_uk]

I couldn't agree more Robert.

The jewellery was hideous IMO, so OTT & vulgar, not a patch on the quality & beauty of the Royal Familys jewels....

**CORRECTION* Excluding the beautiful pearl necklace, & that was a gift from Queen Mary!

[Kalafrana]

I have googled on Marjorie Merriweather Post, and established that not only was she an heiress, she actually ran General Foods for a long period after her father's death. Very different from Wallis Simpson.

Apart from a period of being involved in worthy causes during World War 2, Mrs Simpson did absolutely nothing contructive during her life. If she had found her wartime charitable activities worthwhile, then surely she would have continued with something similar after the war. Bu she didn't, and I'm not sure that Greg King isn't overr-egging the pudding when he praises her wartime role.

Ann

[Eddie_uk]

They could easily have channelled there energies into doing something worth while but IMO they where too selfish to do anything for anyone else's benefit.

Following WWII and beyond they could easily have helped people that where suffering, the floods of Russian Emigres in Paris for example, but you never hear of the Duke & Duchess using there contacts & influence to have done anything to help & make a difference to people less fortunate than themselves, at least I haven't....

[Robert_Hall]

Sorry for that sloppy post of mine, previously.  I still mean what I said, but the typing should have been  better. Think I had not awoken yet from a restless night.
 In any case, despite the "praise" Wallis gets from hr Red Cross work in the Carib.  I feel that was was more for PR than anything. I doubt she ever got he french manicured hands dirty.
  If I were to compare her with anyone, it might Leona Helmsley.  Pretty much the same mold, IMO. Wallis does not even show favourably against Imelda Marcos, one "Queen of Bling" if there ever was one. At least that woman  actually  DID something- right or wrong.
  And, if I am not mistaken, I think  MS Post also ran the Washington [D.C.] Post. I could very well be wrong here, but I think she was the one who gave the go ahead to break the  Watergate story.
 We can write mountains of anti-Wallis posts and still she comes out the same. A vulgar American. People were only friendly to her to get near a used up ex-king who, for some illusionary reason, thought he was still important.
 That silly  argument over her "HRH' was nonsense. The monarch is "Font of all Honour" If he did not give it, live without it.
 Petty, vacuous and trite people. Rich but a waste.

[Eric_Lowe]

Robert. I think you are confusing Mrs. Post with Katherine Graham, who did ran the Washington Post. Mrs. Post ran Post cereals and the first to invest in frozen food for the fridge. I live in DC now and so visited Hillwood, her house which is now a museum to the public filled with Romanov treasures. Mrs. Post was a friend of Wallis and her daughter wrote of her great kindness towards her. So I guess she wasn't that friendless after all. I think there is too much judgement on Wallis. too much "I think" or "I believe" on her as a worthless woman. "Judge and you will be judged too" is one of my favorite teachings from the Bible.