The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1917-09-25
A WIDOW AND HER WEALTH
The Odd Fate of Fortunes When Their Builders
Die Illustrated by Two Carolina Mysteries
Permit to Exhune Body of Flag
ler's Widow Closely Follows
King Mystery in Same State.

AAuS MysIeIy Ill :ccsAuC 'SI"Vo'
Wilmington, N. c., Sept 25-Wealthy
widows, beware of North Carolina!
Such a warning to relicts OF mill
ionaires may follow if the state adds
to it's collection of death mysteries.
The secrecy shrouding the issuing
of permit to eXhume the body of
Mrs. Lila Flagler Bingham. whose first
husband, H. NJ. Flagler Standard Oil
magnate, left her millions, follows
closely the mysterious death of Mrs.
Maude A. King, wealthy Chicago
widow
Both women had originally married
millionaires we'll along in years. Mrs
F.lagler Bingham by second marriage
was the wife of an old girlhOOd sweet
heart, Judge Robert w. Bingham,
when she died.
Mrs. King had not remarked, but
there was a man in the case just the
same-Gaston Means, who had been
her secretary, and who was member
of the auto party which Mrs. King is
said to have left just before her body
was found in a lonesome spot near
Blackwelder Spring.
Both women, while widows spent
much time travelling and enjoying life.
That. it seems, is what most wealthy
widows do. And in many instances
the widow and her wealth are rapidly
parted.
This, however, does not hold good in
the case of the wealthiest, as wit
ness Mrs. J. P. Morgan, Sr., Mrs. Mary
Hartman. Mrs. Russell Sage, Mrs.
Phoebe Hearst, Mrs. Potter Palmer
and Mrs. ]. ]. Hill.
They, of course, were past middle
age when they acquired wealth and
lost their husbands.
The younger ones marry. 1t seems
that Dan Cupid hasn't much else to
do but sit around and shoot arrows at
widowed hearts.
Just the other day news floated
across the Atlantic that Mrs. w. B.
Leeds, widow of Americas "tinplate
king" was engaged to a Greek prince.
She has been WOOed by half the
worlds bachelor noblemen. ]. j. AS
tors Titanic widow, Madelaine Force
Aston, is now Mrs. William K. Dick,
and living happily, Mrs. Leila Post,
widow of the Battle Creek cereal food
millionaire. married the manager OF
the hotel she inherited from her hus
band.
Years ago Mrs. Marshall Field, Jr.,
married Baldwin Drummond, a Bril-
fisher, and carried s50.O0O,00O Ameri-
can money across with her Mrs.
Philip Van Valkenburgh left immense
fortunes by her first two husbands,
now announces her engagement to the
duke Of Oporto. 4 .1s
The widow Of Tom Shevlin, million
aire football player, gave her husband
and the care Of the Shevlin millions
to Marshall H. Russell, year or 50
after her husband died.
Then there was the widow of James
"Silent" Smith, who gave her some
what aged heart and a barrel of money
into the keeping Of youthful Jean Fl.
e.. St. Cyr. who posed as a scion of
an old family, but who really had Dor
rOWed that claim as well as the name
he wore. @.f.
When Charles r. Yerkes, Chicago
traction king, died he left art CALLER
les, palaces and much gold for his
widow, who, after a brief matrimonial
venture with Wilson Miner, had little
left.
With few exceptions millionaire wild
ows 'lived happily ever after" their
second marriages. Those who seemed
to have made the failures were the
ones who picked husbands much
younger than they.
Seldom does death mystery follow
a wealthy widows second venture in
the sea of matrimony.
And more rare is it for death mys-
terry to follow wealthy widow who
does not remarry.
In North Carolina both have hap.
pened-and in month!
Ware Of North Carolina, We widows
of wealth!