By way of a detour into personal details, it is worth mentioning that [Joseph] Davies’s second wife (from 1935 to 1955, i.e. in part during his tenure in Moscow) was Marjorie Merriweather Post (1887 1973), the wealthiest (and perhaps most attractive) heiress in all of the United States, proprietress of the Postum cereal firm and founder of General Foods, Inc. The couple spent some of their vacation time at Mar-a-Lago, Ms. Post’s soon famous summer residence in Palm Beach, Florida. The mansion, then comprising no fewer than 126 rooms, was later acquired by a multi-billionaire named Donald Trump, in 1985. It still has 118 rooms.

Tibor Frank, The Blind Eyewitness: Joseph E. Davies, U.S. Ambassador to Moscow (1936–1938), Transatlantic Elective Affinities: Traveling Ideas and Their Mediators

Related:

Joseph E. Davies document