(After Duke's death, the trustees of her estate became defendants in this lawsuit.). "Elvis made whites interested in black music," she once told me, "which was very important, because race is the biggest problem we have in America.". Donald Robinson then called and informed Heffner that Duke wanted Burns out of the house. He had been recommended by Ron Oldenburg, a Honolulu lawyer who handled immigration matters for the employees of both Doris Duke and Imelda Marcos, and hired as a bodyguard for Heffner when she was hospitalized for severe sinusitis in February 1989. [35], In 1966, Eduardo Tirella, curator of Duke's art holdings for the previous decade, decided to leave for a career in Hollywood as a production designer. I feel in danger.' . A day after returning home from this second surgery, she suffered a severe stroke. For instance, the foundation sponsors performing arts competitions that award cash prizes to each person who performs and provide food to all who attend. She also maintained two apartments in Manhattan: a nine-room penthouse with a 1,000-square-foot (93m2) veranda at 475 Park Avenue that was later owned by journalist Cindy Adams;[32] and another apartment near Times Square that she used exclusively as an office for the management of her financial affairs. After she returned to Newport later that month, Banks invited her to a concert, but she forgot the date. In the 17th Century, Sir William Petty began writing about the valuation of lives in terms of the productive skills of individuals - a precursor of human capital considerations. On Sunday he was feeling unwell, and on Monday Sally Blake found that he had died "peacefully in his sleep". Thats not much considering what shes worth. And she was so frail. He's a sweet human being, and he seemed to be honest and fiercely defensive of her.". I really don't know what the hell was going on, frankly. [15] She studied singing with Estelle Liebling, the voice teacher of Beverly Sills, in New York City. ", Almost every friend of Duke's I talked to, including her many homosexual friends, told me that she had always been an avid heterosexual. The next morning, the day after Valentine's Day, James Burns remembers, Duke told Heffner she had a dentist's appointment and left the house with Bernard Lafferty. Duke's Los Angeles decorator Tony Duquette adds, "He was just marvelous to Doris, and not at all sinister. [41][42][43] They divorced in 1943. With a love for all living things, Ms. Heffner maintains a U.S. ranch that takes in rescued horses, birds, donkeys, pigs, and many other animals. Heres a description of Chandi (seen in the picture here on the right, with Duke and Imelda Marcos) from her website. There was a little alcove under the stairs, and the food would be nice but ordinary. . Heffner spent almost six months on and off in two Honolulu hospitals, because she also developed a heart problem. They talked constantly, and Nelson and Claudia used to go to lunches quite often with Chandi and Doris. [59] Historic properties include Rough Point, Samuel Whitehorne House, Prescott Farm, the Buloid-Perry House, the King's Arms Tavern, the Baptist Meetinghouse, and the Cotton House. He died as he had lived in recent years, in flamboyant splendour, in his 8,000 sq ft Los Angeles home, a $2 million Bel Air fantasy, decorated with enormous silver urns, formal oil paintings and framed photographs of his old mistress, Doris Duke, lined up alongside long dead matinee idols. In 1992, at the age of 79, Duke had a facelift. But the same enemies were sad, embittered creatures to begin with. "We were sitting on the rocks, and she said, 'I will take care of you and all of your animals for the rest of your life. Steve comes about four, and he and I go up to Bernard's room. Chandi Heffner choked back tears as she talked about Doris Duke, the worldly and restless tobacco heiress who legally adopted her in 1988, when Heffner was 35 and Duke was 75, and cast her out less than three years later. That evening, I sent up dinner and Chandi came downstairs and said, 'Tom, Bernard just dropped the entire tray.' And then the wine was $1,000 a bottle; it came from her father's cellars. "Both of them greeted us at the door. "She told me she was bored silly, and the palace was so froufrou. Last year she gave $40,000 to help people in India, $45,000 to Bronx Veterans Medical Research, and $2000 to the Hawaii Saddle Club. Nanaline was a shrewd businesswoman, often compared to Hetty Green, and when she died in 1962, she left her daughter an estate then estimated to be worth $250 million.[52]. "We kept it to ourselves for months, until around July 1990. . Medical Center last summer. [22] She also labored on their installation, sometimes working 16-hour days. It will be wonderful.' In January 1995 they revealed their trump card, an affidavit from one of Duke's deathbed nurses, Tammy Payette, insisting that Duke was murdered. Woody Brock, who visited her with Oatsie Charles that summer, says, "It must have been 85 degrees outside, and she had on a white sweater and a roaring fire in every room. and I finally quit just before Labor Day. They didn't. The vehicle, she told police later, pinned Tirella against the still-opening gates, knocked them over and then struck a tree across. Here she created Duke Gardens, a 60,000-square-foot (5,600m2) public indoor botanical display that was among the largest in America. For reasons I don't understand, a curtain seemed to come down. She had several indiscreet affairs of her own, with Errol Flynn, Hawaiian swimming champion Duke Kahanamoku, and British M.P. English translation by Lszlo Vekerdi.] The adoption proceeding took place Thursday before state Judge Wilfred Diana and went into effect immediately. In 1868, the Dutch physiologist and ophthalmologist F. C. Donders suggested that such mental processes as sensory discrimination, perceptual identification, and motor selection might occur serially, each consuming a certain amount of time. [21] Each of the eleven interconnected gardens was a full-scale re-creation of a garden theme, country or period, inspired by DuPont's Longwood Gardens. His mother was a teacher, while his father fought as a pilot during WWII. "He was so attentive," Banks says. A few hours later, when Heffner returned from a show-jumping lesson, she was informed that Doris had flown to Los Angeles. Her Foundation intended that Duke Gardens "reveal the interests and philanthropic aspirations of the Duke family, as well as an appreciation for other cultures and a yearning for global understanding". When tobacco heiress Doris Duke died last October, she left a will that shocked even those who had known her best. The will provides Lafferty with an executor's fee of up to $5 million, a lifetime annuity of $500,000 a year, and commissions, which could run into the millions annually, as a trustee of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and of three other closely related new foundations: the Doris Duke Foundation for the Preservation of Endangered Wildlife, the Doris Duke Foundation for the Preservation of New Jersey Farmland and Farm Animals, and the Doris Duke Foundation of Islamic Art. When Doris died, there was a well publicized estate fight between Chandi and Doriss ex butler, Bernard Lafferty. . Ron Protas told me that in February or March of last year Duke agreed to guarantee a loan of $1 million for the Martha Graham Dance School. Briefly a news correspondent in the 1940s, she also played jazz piano and learned to surf competitively. In a settlement signed Thursday by Manhattan Surrogate Court Judge Renee Roth, Chandi Duke Heffner, 42, dropped claims to the $1.2-billion estate and dropped a breach-of-contract suit contending that Duke reneged on a promise to support her for life, said Heffners lawyer, David Keyko. In June 1985, Duke and Heffner traveled to Russia together. Marcos has said that she and Duke were friends of almost 20 years, but others say that they met in the late 1970s through Franco Rossellini. Duke was twice divorced and had no other children. In 1968, she established the Newport Restoration Foundation, with Jacqueline Onassis as vice president. Heffner almost broke down again. In the late 1980s, Duke donated $2 million to Duke University to be used for AIDS research. Suspicion reigned, of course, that he was trying to snatch a valuable work of art from the estate, but a Christie's valuation put a price tag of $450 on it. Even Imelda didn't see her.". And he called from a pay phone, and I felt so sorry for this guy, I said, 'Come to Somerville.' Also in Duke's collection were over 2,000 bottles of rare wine (worth over $5 million) and the extraordinary Duke collection of fine jewels. And all around him were all these liquor bottlesGrand Marnier and sherry. ", After Thanksgiving, as she had for five decades, Duke left for Hawaii. On Thursday, October 28, 1993, Duke died at Falcon's Lair. And the servants were absolutely bizarreponytailed, rings, sandals ". "He was doing a lot of embroidery work for Doris. ". A district attorney ruled that there was "no credible evidence" to support the allegation, however, and Payette was ultimately discredited and jailed, trailing a lengthy record of theft from wealthy patients. Charles became so concerned about Duke's condition that she called her and asked if Heffner had been "giving her something, I don't know what"even though Heffner had been out of the picture for a year and a half. He flew to Newport, where Duke was staying at Rough Point, on October 6, to collect his belongings and let Duke know that he was leaving her employ. He came over here, and she died. In an interview after Duke's death a few years ago, Lee was unstinting in her support for Lafferty: "Everything good I could say about Bernard, I do. She was even a buddy of Elvis Presley's. Her longest relationship was with Joey Castro, the Mexican-born jazz pianist at the Mocambo nightclub in Los Angeles, whom she met in 1950, when he was 23 and she was 38. On New Year's Day 1964, she ordered him out, and he retaliated by suing her, claiming that they had been secretly married. Learn how your comment data is processed. A Peltz-family friend told me that, contrary to reports in the press, "there was never any rivalry of any kind at any time between Claudia and Chandi. Chandi, which means "female energy personified" in Sanskrit, was born Charlene Heffner in Baltimore on August 26, 1953, the eldest of three daughters of William Heffner, a lawyer, and his wife, "Bunny," a nurse. Some questioned Reubens sexuality at the time until in 1989 when Reubens engaged in a "mock wedding" with Chandi Heffner, the adopted daughter of tobacco heiress Doris Duke. Duke died at age 80 in 1988, leaving a hotly contested $1.5 billion estate. The deep grooves left by the Polara's rear tires in the gravel suggested considerably more acceleration than what might have resulted from an accidental depression of the gas pedal. Duke last made news in 1988, when she posted the $5.3 million bail for her close friend Imelda Marcos, the former Philippines First Lady. We would be four, six, eightOatsie Charles, Nuala Pell, Minnie Cushing, Lita McBean and her husband, and Sunny and me. $473,000 in today's dollars[37] was divided among Tirella's eight siblings when Duke was found negligent after a trial five years later. She wasn't sure if she wanted to have a baby, but she said by the third month an incredible mother instinct took over. "I got a call from my sister's major-domo, Ferencz Soltesz," said Heffner, who had been living with Duke for two years at that point. At death, Duke's fortune was estimated at upwards of $1.2 billion. Peltz, a Michael Milken protg, was beginning his rise to the top of the junk-bond heap; he would soon take over Triangle Industries, then National Can and American Can, and be worth $400 million by 1989. . People get annoyed with their kids. They hired him on Ferencz Soltesz's recommendation. "There was a rumor that she did it deliberately. These are just some of the accusations, strange rumors, and conspiracy theories that I heard concerning the last years of Doris Duke's life: Her estate is really worth at least $2 billion. . Nicola has an eclectic family, worthy of a Robert Altman movie a la A Wedding. On the plus side, theres the money. The tough, highly intelligent Doris Duke (who lived by her father's dying dictum "Trust no one") had seen to that. In Newport, she loved going to the jazz festival, and then one would sometimes have dinner in that huge house with the ferocious dogs snarling behind the gates. She took daily tap lessons from Bill "Bojangles" Robinson at the Cotton Club, and for years studied ballet under Cyd Charisse's ex-husband, Nico. In court papers, Heffner -- a Baltimore native -- says the two women met in Hawaii in 1981. Lafferty's body was discovered on Monday by Sally Blake, a Donegal woman and former Duke employee whom he invited to California for a holiday with her 77 year old mother. She had episodes of pneumonia, she had clots in her veins, and some of those clots may have traveled to her lungs. Quite suddenly, early in 1991, Doris called me in distress from Hawaii and said that she was leaving in an urgent way for California and she had become fearful of Chandi. She clapped her hands in glee. Upon her father's death in 1925, the 13-year-old Doris Duke -- known as "The Richest Girl in the World" -- inherited several hundred million dollars. Medical services provided by Ms. Heffner's organization include tuberculosis . "He was obviously unhappy. and as we were leaving they exchanged telephone numbers. "He had done her hair in a pageboy, and she looked so pretty, though she was painfully thin." He named both his private Pullman car and his 80-foot yacht after her, and surrounded her with bodyguards. The couple lived together from 1990 until 1993. They sparkled in his earring, in his bracelet and his watch. A stingy southern belle, Nanaline Holt Inman was a widow with one son when she married Buck Duke in 1907. One of the first things she did was to caution Duke, on the advice of Nelson Peltz, against an investment proposed by her then business manager, Patrick Mahn. After a two-week rejuvenation cure in Romania with the controversial Dr. Anna Aslan, they stopped in London. Yet it is the underlying misconception of almost everything ever written about her, including Stephanie Mansfield's 1992 biography, The Richest Girl in the World. In order to do so she released the parking brake and shifted into drive, but instead of putting her foot on the brake pedal she hit the gas. [52] The best-known lawsuit[67] was initiated by Harry Demopoulos. We used to joke that she'd outlive me. Phyllis Saretta says, "Chandi told me that her sister had a butler and a chauffeur and the whole thing. Chandi has taken control of this Reputation Report to make themselves look good, check back for comments that they might have left on some sections. Lafferty can appoint the bank that will serve as the estate's co-executor, and three of the four other trustees of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. He was the legendary Latin lover Porfirio Rubirosa, the former son-in-law of the Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo. 'Doris Duke really was the last Chinese empress, the last of a type that doesn't exist anymore. I have come to the realization that her primary motive was financial gain. Heffner Duke, adopted in 1988 when she was 38 and the heiress was in her 70s, could not be reached for comment. The next day I got a phone call from Doris to thank me. While Lafferty was hospitalized, Rybak says, "Doris said to me, 'Tom, we are going to leave this up to you. The nonprofit now assists more than 80,000 patients and 50,000 . . The following February, Farrah repeated the seminar, and it was apparently then that Chandi Heffner entered Doris Duke's life. This month, Chandi Heffner's lawyers, Ben Michel of Riker, Danzig and David Keyko of Winthrop, Stimson, will file her objections to Duke's will in New York State Surrogate Court, accusing Bernard Lafferty of "undue influence and sequestering." Her mother was another story. In 1996, the year Lafferty died, the Los Angeles District Attorney's office ruled there was no firm evidence of foul play. This was the fifth time that Duke had rewritten or revised her will since Heffner's banishment 26 months earlier. In her will, Duke requested that no funeral or memorial service be held for her. Love. Farrah says that Duke had returned from her first visit to Manila, with Rossellini, about a week before meeting Heffner. Tirella was found trapped under the car on Bellevue Avenue and was pronounced dead of serious injuries soon after. At that point she proceeded to run the stricken man over resulting in his death. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. . The gate had obviously been left open. ", "Doris wanted the things money couldn't buy. That fall, she attended a tribute to Sophia Loren at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and a fancy party afterward at Tatou, with Imelda Marcos, Rossellini, Natale, and Lafferty, who wore a ski sweater. . Chandi has taken control of this Reputation Profile & made sections private. [33][additional citation(s) needed]. Her principal residence and official domicile[27] was Duke Farms, her father's 2,700 acre (11km2) estate in Hillsborough Township, New Jersey. Her total net worth, including all property, was valued at $5.3 billion. By using our site, you agree to our use of cookies. After giving the matter prolonged and serious consideration, I am convinced that I should not have adopted Chandi Heffner. Why is Frank McCourt really pushing this? Duke was a hands-on homeowner, climbing a ladder to a three-story scaffolding to clean tile murals in the courtyard of Shangri La,[34] and working side by side with her gardeners at Duke Farms. She wasn't Barbara Hutton," says Marina Cicogna, who was a friend of both heiresses. I do feel like I'm being drugged. [53] In 1958, she established the Duke Gardens Foundation to endow the public display gardens she started to create at Duke Farms. [36], Duke married twice, the first time in 1935 to James H. R. Cromwell, the son of Eva Stotesbury and stepson of wealthy financier Edward T. "I don't think you're supposed to use alcohol with steroids, and she was drinking sherry in the evenings." Then one day in June, Miss Duke called me and said, 'Thomas, have you seen Bernard? The balance is due Wednesday. "People always think that if you can have 200 people to dine at home without moving the chairs around and you don't, you must be very sad," says Claus von Blow. One of those servants was the future executor of Doris Duke's estate. Banks never saw her again. The power that this will gives Bernard Lafferty is "awesome," says one attorney. In Doris's case, she had done that. James Burns, now an aspiring actor in Los Angeles, says that he and Chandi "are giving each other space for a while.". He's a sweet human being, and he seemed to be honest and fiercely defensive of Doris. Because MyLife only collects this data and does not create it, we cannot fully guarantee its accuracy. The couple had a daughter, Arden, who was born prematurely on July 11, 1940, in Honolulu and died on the following day. . On rare occasions I got Bernard. Talent. . So did Imelda. Robinson described Miss Hefner, a native of Maryland, as an environmentalis t, preservationist and conservationist who spends her time doing things as a good citizen as Miss Duke does.. Contribution Totals: Download all contribution records for this person . He could barely speak.". In 1988, at the age of 75, Duke legally adopted a woman named Chandi Heffner, then a 35-year-old Hare Krishna devotee and sister of the third wife of billionaire Nelson Peltz. Heffner also claims she saved the heiress's life on more than one occasion: once when Duke collapsed at her Newport estate in a "pool of blood," and a second time when Heffner recalls diving into the freezing Atlantic to save Duke from drowning. Former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, with whom Duke was friends, was the vice president and publicly supported the foundation. ", Heffner was sitting in the Manhattan apartment of one of her lawyers on a Saturday afternoon late last December. "There were clear indications of a growing trust, affection, and devotion between them. She really considered herself a dancer. [66], However a number of lawsuits were filed against the will. That led to pneumonia and she couldn't eat and it was on and off, on and off, for months.". (We covered the story in Fame magazine in 1990, and New York magazine did it again in 1993.). "Io sono molto contento. Why doesn't she help you?' "Sometimes people are attracted to the thing they fear the most.". "She used to come and see me and just cry," says singer Peggy Lee, who was friendly with Tirellaand who would later employ Bernard Lafferty as a butler. They were initially awarded a larger sum that was subsequently reduced with the aid of Duke's lawyers. "There was such a myth about Doris being a solitary person and not going out, so when she showed up somewhere, it was an event. She also told me that Duke was much more taken with Ferdinand Marcos, who was gravely ill in Honolulu, than she was with his wife. ", "Doris Duke had it all -- and now her foundation is giving a lot back", "Doris Duke Leaves $1 billion to a New Charitable Foundation", "Doris Duke Biographical History and Archival Collections (Duke University Libraries)", "The Beatles' magical mystery tour of India", "The Myth & Mystique of Doris Duke's Inner Circle", "Inventory of the Doris Duke Foundation Records, 1934-2009 (Duke University Libraries)", "Sarandon to Play World's Richest Little Girl", "Top Three Inheritance Disputes LegalZoom.com", "Deal Reached over the Estate of Doris Duke", "Bernard Lafferty the Butler for Doris Dukes Dies at 51", "Famed Duke Gardens To Become Ambitious 'Green' Lab", "Sale of Rare Carpet to Benefit Newport Restoration Foundation Collections Fund", "The Darkness of Riches: Born Billionaires but Starved, Neglected and Locked in a Basement", "The Eccentric Heiress Who Lived Inside an Epic Monument To Islamic Art", Doris Duke Biographical History and Archival Collections (Duke University Libraries), James Cromwell, Doris Duke and Frank Murphy attending Jackson Day dinner, Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame Women Inductees, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doris_Duke&oldid=1150842887, Articles with dead external links from January 2017, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from October 2016, All articles needing additional references, Articles needing additional references from May 2021, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from March 2021, Articles with unsourced statements from May 2021, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Pony Duke, her disinherited nephew, and Jason Thomas published. And then eventually somebody else dropped back. "[72] Subsequently, the foundations have sold some assets[73] and have closed Duke Gardens. In fact, it was Chandi Heffner who hired Bernard Lafferty for Doris Duke, in 1987. She was taking so many pills at the end and, knowingly or not, killed herself. Brooklyn Beckham, whos 21, has announced hes marrying Nicola Peltz, 25. A section of woods there is dedicated to her and bears her name. Miss Hefner is not related to Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy Enterprises, a spokesman at the company told The Courier-News of Bridgewater. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. In 1933, when she turned 21, Doris Duke came into the first $10 million left by her father. The tobacco heiress fortune, one of the largest in U.S. history, has been the subject of complicated legal wrangling since she died at age 80 in 1993. There are many ways to date the development of the economics of education. [58][36][51] Duke was also friends with artist Andy Warhol. "I said, 'What's wrong?' In any case, their friendship ended in tragedy that October, when Duke ran him over as he was opening the gate of Rough Point. She was so distressed about losing the baby. There's no question that Bernard was more than just a butler. Id love to be a fly on the wall when David and Victoria Beckham meet their sons fiancees family. He has an alcohol problem, but he's a basically good person. Nicolas mother, Claudia, has a sister we havent forgotten about. Heffner, who lives on the Big Island of Hawaii on a ranch that Duke previously purchased for her, said in court papers that after their February 1991 breakup she learned that Duke had made changes in her will, and "the estate has not been left to Chandi as Doris had agreed." Duke died last October, leaving an estate reported to be between $750 million and $1.3 billion and lengthy obituaries which focused on her husbands and lovers, her houses in New Jersey, Rhode Island, California, and Hawaii, her collections of Oriental and Islamic art, her $5 million bailout of Imelda Marcos, and her perplexing relationship with Chandi Heffner. The legal challenges flooded in, in a queue headed by Chandi Heffner (a grown woman adopted, then disowned, by Duke), a doctor named as executor in a previous will and three former Duke servants. How do we get rid of her? For access to this information, contact Chandi. Menu. [5] The total value of the estate was estimated variously from $60 - $100 million (equivalent to $927 million to $1.545 billion in 2021),[6] the majority derived from J.B. Duke's holdings in the American Tobacco Company and the precursor of the Duke Power Company.[7]. But she got up again, and we did our steps. James Burns, 32, in a lawsuit filed Wednesday, claimed Chandi Gail Heffner Duke owes him half of the $66 million she was awarded after Duke die in 1988. John Warnecke was told by Johnny Gomez, Duke's elderly caretaker in Honolulu, that "she was so full of beans, she decided to have both knees done at one time, and one knee got infected and she had to have another operation. But he fought back and won on appeal. She was ahead of her time. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. The billionaire believed that Chandi was the reincarnation of her dead kid. Duke left most of her money to charity and named her butler, Bernard Lafferty, co-executor of the estate. Chandi Duke Heffner, the 39-year-old former belly dancer and Hare Krishna devotee who was legally adopted by American Tobacco Co. heiress Doris Duke in 1988, now claims the reclusive. I said, 'Doris, do it, I think it's a good thing.' 'I loved her so much. In May, a New York judge approved a plan to send the bulk of her estate to charity.