Father Struck It Rich

Evalyn Walsh McLean was the daughter of a Colorado gold-mining millionaire and the wife of the heir to the Washington Post. Her autobiography tells the story of a Gilded Age childhood, a marriage into the Washington establishment, and a life lived with spectacular extravagance. The book is written with disarming candour about both the pleasures and the costs of great wealth.

From a jewellery perspective, the central episode is McLean's account of purchasing the Hope Diamond from Pierre Cartier. She describes the negotiations at length, including Pierre's salesmanship and his shrewd understanding of her psychology. Her account is one of the few first-hand descriptions of a major Cartier transaction from the client's point of view.

Relevance to The Cartiers

McLean's memoir provides the client's perspective on the Hope Diamond sale and on the social world that sustained Cartier's American business. Her friendship with Maisie Plant (whose husband sold Pierre the Fifth Avenue mansion that became Cartier New York) further connects the memoir to the Cartier story.