Turn back time to a gallery of
Society Brides

Tobacco heiress, Mary Lillian Duke, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Newton Duke, married Anthony J. Drexel Biddle, Jr., of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 16, 1915. The bride's cousin, Doris Duke, was the flower girl. A wedding reception was held at the home of the bride's aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. James Buchanan Duke, in Sommerville, New Jersey.

Eleanor Lowthian Clay, the daughter of the late William Clay, and Eliza Hudson Clay, became the bride of Edsel Bryant Ford, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Ford of Dearborn, Michigan, on November 1, 1916. The ceremony was held at the home of the bride's uncle and guardian, Joseph L. Hudson, on Boston Boulevard in Detroit, Michigan.

Miss Ailsa Mellon, the daughter of Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Andrew Mellon, and Mrs. Nora McMullen Mellon, was married in the Bethlehem Chapel of the National Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Paul, on May 29, 1926, to Mr. David Kirkpatrick Este Bruce, the son of Mr. and Mrs.Cabell Bruce of Baltimore, Maryland. President and Mrs. Calvin Collidge were among the dignitaries attending the wedding. The above photo shows the bride and her father (partially hidden) departing their home at the McCormick Apartments on Massachusetts Avenue for the ceremony.

Miss Daisiana Smith, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Franklin Pratt Smith of Lake Forest, Illinois, was married to John T. Pirie, Jr., a grandson of the founder of Carson Pirie Scott, on October 6, 1928. The bride is the grandaughter of Henry C. Durand, a founder of Lake Forest. The wedding was held at the home of the bride's parents, on the southwest corner of Deerpath and Mayflower Road.

Miss Betsey Cushing, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Harvey Cushing of Boston, Massachusetts was married to James Roosevelt, the son of New York Governor and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Boston, Massachusetts, on June 4, 1930.

Texas oil-and ranching heiress, Electra Waggoner, married New York attorney, John Biggs in July 1933, at St. Bartholomew's Church on Park Avenue. Miss Waggoner's grandfather was Texas cattleman and horseman W.T. "Pappy" Waggoner, who inhereted the Waggoner Ranch from his father, cattle baron Dan Waggoner. The Waggoner holdings consist of more than 520,000 acres of ranch, farm, and oil properties in six counties surrounding Vernon, Texas. It remains today the largest ranch in Texas contained by one fence.

Miss Ethel duPont, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Eugene I. duPont of Greenville, Delaware, became the bride of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr., the son of the President and Mrs. Roosevelt, at Christ Episcopal Church, Owl's Nest, Delaware, on June 30, 1937. Some 1,3000 guests attended the reception at the duPont's family home in Greenville. In 1949, Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt separated and formally divorced. Ethel du Pont was forty-nine years old when she committed suicide by hanging herself in the locked bathroom of her home in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, May 25, 1965. She had been separated from her second husband, prominent Detroit attorney, Benjamin S. Warren, Jr. Photo by Jay Te Winburn.

Miss Anne McDonnell, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James McDonnell, of New York City, and Southampton, New York, wed Henry Ford II, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Edsel Ford of Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan, at the Church of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, Southampton, New York, July 13, 1940. Photo by Jay Te Winburn.

Miss Barbara Cushing, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Harvey Cushing of Boston, Massachusetts, was married to Standard Oil heir Stanley Grafton Mortimer, Jr., at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in East Hampton, New York, on September 21, 1940. Photo by Horst P. Horst.

On January 2, 1943, at Christ Episcopal Church, Grosse Pointe, Michigan, Josephine Clay Ford, the daughter of Mrs. Edsel Ford of Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan, and the late Mr. Ford, was married to Walter Buhl Ford II, scion of a socially prominent Grosse Pointe family. The Reverend Francis Creamer performed the ceremony. Photo by Jay Te Winburn.

Martha Parke Firestone, granddaughter of the founder of the Firestone Tire Company, Harvey Firestone, married William Clay Ford, the son of Mrs. Edsel Ford, of Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan, and the late Mr. Ford, on June 17, 1947, in Akron, Ohio.

Miss Amanda Jay Mortimer, the daughter of Mrs. William S. Paley, and Stanley G. Mortimer, Jr. was married to Shirley Carter Burden, Jr., a great-great-great-grandson of Cornelius "Commodore" Vanderbilt, on June 14, 1964 at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church in Roslyn, New York. The bride's wedding dress was designed by Mainbocher. The reception, held at the Paley's Manhasset estate, took place under a pistachio green tent filled with pink and white flowers.