page_title: Lance Reventlow
section_title: Early years
hierarchical_section_title: Lance Reventlow / Early years
caption_attribution_description: English: Lance is dressed for winter in a jacket, gloves, and a white hat. This photograph is part of a collage of world events of 1938.
context_page_description: Lance Graf von Haugwitz-Hardenberg-Reventlow, was a British-born American entrepreneur, racing driver and heir to the Woolworth fortune. Reventlow was the only child of heiress Barbara Hutton and her second husband Count Kurt Haugwitz-Hardenberg-Reventlow. His stepfathers included actor Cary Grant and Prince Igor Troubetzkoy.
context_section_description: Lance Haugwitz-Hardenberg-Reventlow was the only child of Danish nobleman Count Kurt Haugwitz-Hardenberg-Reventlow and American socialite Barbara Hutton. Hutton had inherited the Woolworth department store fortune and was then one of the wealthiest women in the world. Reventlow was born at Winfield House in London, restored by his mother and named for her grandfather Frank Winfield Woolworth. Reventlow's birth was difficult and his mother almost died during his delivery. As a child, he struggled with respiratory problems and was asthmatic.
  Reventlow's parents' marriage, Hutton's second of seven, was tumultuous and did not last; after the couple divorced in 1938, Reventlow became the subject of a bitter custody battle. In 1944, Reventlow's father was awarded custody until he reached school age, after which his mother would gain custody. Before his father was to relinquish custody, he sent Reventlow to Canada. Hutton regained custody of Reventlow in 1945. Reventlow was largely estranged from his father until the Count's death in 1969.
caption: Reventlow as a child circa 1938
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