FIRST OF A SERIES ON THE CONTENDERS FOR '64
The Women in Nelson
NELSON rockefeller's marriage
last May to vivacious Margaretta
(Happy) Murphy raises two questions:
Has the Governor followed in the foot
steps of the Duke of Windsor and for
feited a "kingdom" for the woman he
loves? And why, when caught in a con
flict of strong desires, did he choose
as he did?
Only the future can settle the first question.
But the answer to the second lies in understand
ing the Governor as a man and seeing him
within his own family, particularly with the
women who have influenced and shaped his life.
The second Mrs. Rockefeller means so much
to him that he apparently is prepared to trade
the possibility of the Presidency itself for happi
ness with her. The magnitude of this decision
is obvious, for many of his friends believe
the ultimate target of his political ambition
always has been the Presidency.
John C. McClintock, consultant to the Inter
American Development Bank and a very close
friend of the Governor, told me recently: "The
mainspring of Nelson's conduct has always been
competition with his grandfather, John D. Rocke
feller. The grandfather was a great man ; Nelson
has always wanted to be an even greater man.
His target, therefore: the Presidency."
Margaretta, too, arrived at the decision to
marry only after great inner turmoil. Few per
sons know of the long tightrope she had to walk
before deciding to end her marriage to Dr. James
Murphy and wed the Governor.
Rockefeller's position as one of the wealthiest
men ever to hold public office did not lure her.
She herself is a multimillionaire and is descend
ed from a distinguished family whose members
include a founder of Princeton University, the
Union commander at Gettysburg, and a 19th
century mayor of Philadelphia. Nor was Happy
(as her friends call her because of her bubbling
personality) lured by the desire to be First Lady
of New York and possibly of the United States.
"Political razzle-dazzle is not for her," said
Wallace Harrison, the famous architect and one
of the Governor's closest friends. "Essentially,
Happy is quite simple and unspoiled; she's a home
person more than anything else. She has no
interest in world affairs, although she's a bright,
serious person. She is happy, as her name indi
cates, but not rah-rah."
What did draw her into the marriage was
genuine love for Rockefeller, the man. It was a
love which she tried to fight but couldn't.
The months preceding their marriage last
spring were lonely ones for Nelson Rockefeller.
"Throwing his energies into his work as gov
ernor and into his political future," says a close
friend, "could not fill the void left by the estrange
ment from his wife and the separation and di
vorce that later followed. And he felt the death
of his son Michael more intensely than he
wanted us to know. He turned to his brother
Laurance, the strongest friendship he has known
within his own family. But apart from that tie,
his private life remained a lonely existence."
Loneliness was no way of life for a man with
Rockefeller's boundless energy, a restlessness
that makes him a man constantly in motion. He
even makes walking a challenge. "If you're going
to walk," he told a friend, "you might as well
get some good out of it." Arriving at his Monte
Sacro cattle ranch in Venezuela at the end of a
strenuous gubernatorial campaign, he mounted a
horse and climbed a 5,000-foot mountain to visit
a rain forest at the top. Returning from the five
hour trip, he went for a Bwim!
Rockefeller's loneliness also was in sharp con
trast to the patterns of a lifetime. He always
had enjoyed warm relationships. For instance,
with his mother, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, there
had been a frank, open camaraderie.
Reared in a Close-Knit Family
No committee meeting or other outside interest
and she had many could keep her from see
ing Nelson, his sister, and his four brothers off
to school. When they returned, she was waiting.
To help them with their morning prayers, which
they took turns in saying, she copied Bible verses
on bits of cardboard. Prayer time, which was at
7:45 a.m., also became the occasion for the chil
dren to air their personal grievances and for
the family to weigh each case.
From 5 to 6 in the afternoon, the mother read
aloud to the children. After supper, she super
vised their homework. Nelson had difficulty with
multiplication, so every night she made a special
point of hearing him recite his tables.
Nelson's parents knew the hazards of bringing
up children in the rarefied atmosphere of su
preme wealth. They knew that while most per
sons come of age in families concerned, even
worried, about earning money, their children
would grow up in a home concerned chiefly with
spending it wisely.
Abby and her husband, John D. Rockefeller,
Jr., were determined that their sons should not
be effete creatures of wealth, but "regular guys."
As a boy, Nelson's allowance was only 30 cents
a week. He could earn an additional 10 cents by
hoeing the garden or by catching 100 flies. More
over, he was taught to keep a record of his ex
penses in a ledger, which his father examined
each week. For good books he received a nickel;
for bad ones, a nickel penalty.
The Rockefellers did not send their sons to
upper-crust private schools. Instead, all the boys
except John III attended Lincoln School, a co
educational institution where they mingled with
students from every walk of life some with
scholarships endowed by the Rockefellers.
Self-Confidence Was a Way of Life
Abby always strived to instill self-confidence
in her children. At Lincoln, learning to play
tunes on a harp and enacting the role of a beg
gar in a school play, Nelson first began to show
this self-confidence, which is now famous. In his
senior year he greeted a new teacher by saying,
"You're new here. I've been around for quite a
while. If you need any help, let me know."
The summer after Nelson was graduated from
Lincoln, he and his family were at their place
in Seal Harbor, Maine. Abby noted that he found
every possible excuse to visit the Clarks of
Philadelphia, who were summering at nearby
Northeast Harbor. His interest was in the tall,
lean tomboy of the Clark clan Mary Todhunter
Clark, whom everyone called Tod. He danced with
her more than with any of the other girls of the
summer colony. No one laughed more lustily than
he at her splendid mimicry at charity shows.
But there was a temporary parting of the
ways. Tod went back to Foxcroft at fashionable
Middleburg, Va., but served notice that she would
not go to Wellesley as her parents wished. She
wanted social work, not Society. At her family's
behest, however, she did take a year at the Sor
bonne in Paris.
Nelson went to Dartmouth. He strode the
campus in corduroy pants and sweat shirts, rel-
COVER:
There's no telling where a pret
ty girl in a parka in headed for
these days but we bet it's the
ski slopes! Photo by Jim Pond.
See new ski fashions on page 10.
Family WexUcly
December S , 1963
LEONARD t. OAVIOOW Preeident end PMUker
waiter, c. Drnn Atndaie rMMer
PATRICK E. OIOURKE Eremtit Vice Preeident and Advertiting Director
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