THE HOPE DIAMOND

I am sure you have heard about the Hope Diamond. It is, after all, one of the most famous jewels in the world— one with its own curse that reaches back four centuries. But you may not have heard of its connection to Asheville before this magnificent blue gem found its way to the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History. As the story goes, it was once the plaything of a little girl, Mamie Reynolds. Mamie was born in 1942 and was the granddaughter of Evalyn Walsh McLean, the last private owner of the Hope Diamond. As an Asheville toddler Mamie reportedly buried the diamond in her sandbox or attached it to the collar of her grandmother’s Great Dane as it ran through the house and grounds. The grandmother had willed the diamond to Mamie; nevertheless, upon Evalyn Walsh’s death in 1947, all her jewelry including the Hope Diamond was sold to a New York jeweler to discharge the Estate's debts including taxes. In 1958, the jeweler donated the diamond to the Smithsonian. Today, the diamond is estimated to be worth something in the neighborhood of three hundred million dollars ($300,000,000).Evalyn Walsh McLean was quite wealthy as a young woman. Her father, Thomas Walsh, struck it rich in the Camp Bird Gold Mine in Colorado. Then in 1908, she married the heir to The Washington Post and The Cincinnati Enquirer publishing fortune, Edward "Ned" Beale McLean. Ned Mclean, disregarding the unsavory reputation of the gemstone, purchased the Hope Diamond for Evalyn in 1911 from Pierre Cartier of Cartier Jewelers in New York. Friends of Evalyn, including her mother-in-law concerned about the legends of the stone’s curse, pleaded with her to get rid of the gem. Mrs. McLean was concerned enough to have the stone blessed by a priest. After doing so, she seemed to no longer worry about the claims of the stone’s powerful curse. Looking back on her life after acquiring the stone, one must wonder if her belief that she was impervious to the curse was misguided considering the misfortunes which beset her. Her first-born child was hit by a car and died at age nine. The son was named Vincent for her brother who was also killed in a car accident at age seventeen. In another tragedy, she found her daughter,Evie McLean Reynolds (Mamie’s mother and the wife of North Carolina’s U. S. Senator), dead of a drug overdose at twenty-four. The final blow was the explosive end to her marriage. Her husband, charged with adultery, eventually died in a mental institution, his fortune depleted.As for Mamie Reynolds, she grew up on a north Asheville estate atop Reynolds Mountain surrounded by 250 acres with majestic mountain views. It was a rustic-modern home of hand-hewn logs and native fieldstone. Most of the time her companions were just her governess, Mimi Palmer, Louise the cook, the caretakers (Mr. and Mrs. Frank Bien) and the stable and farm foreman, Oscar Reese. Although she was known in the press as the world’s richest little girl, according to the author, Marla Hardee Milling, Mamie Reynolds had no idea that at 18 she would inherit a tremendous fortune. What happened to her? Surprisingly, Mamie Reynolds grew up to become the first woman to qualify for the Daytona 500. While her first marriage was short-lived, she had two children by her second husband, Joseph E. Gregory. The Gregorys were dubbed the “magic couple” by the press and shared a common love for living on a farm, racing cars, dog shows, and basketball. Mamie was the first owner of the American Basketball Association's Kentucky Colonels. She died in 2014 at age 72.