Wikipedia

Draft:Ellen Stevenson

Ellen Stevenson, nee Borden (1907 – July 28, 1972),[1] born to parents John Borden and Ellen Wallace Walker in 1907, went on to become the wife of the 5th United States Ambassador to the United Nations and Governor of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson II, giving birth to his three children, Adlai Stevenson III, John Fell Stevenson and Borden Stevenson. She had one grandchild, followed by a great grandchild, those being Adlai Stevenson IV and Adlai Stevenson V. She divorced her husband in 1949, and was noted for thereafter occasionally commenting on his political activities.

Biography

edit

Borden "attended the exclusive University School for Girls in Chicago and St. Timothy's Board School in Maryland".[1] Although she did not go to college, she did spend a year in Italy, studying art.[1]

On December 1, 1928, Borden married Adlai Stevenson II. The young couple soon became popular and familiar figures on the Chicago social scene; they especially enjoyed attending and hosting costume parties.[2] They had three sons: Adlai Stevenson III, who would become a U.S. Senator; Borden Stevenson, and John Fell Stevenson. In 1935, Adlai and Ellen purchased a 70-acre (28 ha) tract of land along the Des Plaines River near Libertyville, Illinois, a wealthy suburb of Chicago. They built a home on the property and it served as Adlai Stevenson's official residence for the rest of his life.

On December 12, 1949, Adlai and Ellen were divorced; their son Adlai III later recalled that "There hadn't been a good relationship for a long time. I remember her [Ellen] as the unreasonable one, not only with Dad, but with us and the servants. I was embarrassed by her peremptory way with servants".[3] Several of Stevenson's biographers have written that his wife suffered from mental illness: "Incidents that went from petulant to bizarre to nasty generally have been described without placing them in the context of the progression of [her] increasingly serious mental illness. It was an illness that those closest to her – including Adlai for long after the divorce – were slow and reluctant to recognize. Hindsight, legal proceedings, and psychiatric testimony now make understandable the behavior that baffled and saddened her family".[4] Her happiest times were in Chicago, where "she used to to write sonnets, was considered a better than average poetess, and had a fairly good play in verse produced by a college theater".[5] Stevenson "complained that Adlai's friends always talked politics or economics. They didn't understand art. In fact, they didn't even know the difference between a sonnet and a canto".[5]

Stevenson "rose to national prominence when she labeled her former husband a 'Hamlet who can't make up his mind' about running for president".[1]

References

edit
  1. ^ a b c d "Ellen Stevenson, 64, Adlai's Ex-Wife, Dies", Camden Courier-Post (July 29, 1972), p. 30.
  2. ^ (Martin, pp. 154–155)
  3. ^ (McKeever, p. 141)
  4. ^ (McKeever, pp. 65–66)
  5. ^ a b "Drew Pearson, "Stevenson's Wife Preferred Poetry", Salt Lake Telegram (June 20, 1952), p. 10.

Sources

edit
  • Martin, John Bartlow . Adlai Stevenson of Illinois: The Life of Adlai E. Stevenson (1976) and Adlai Stevenson and the World: The Life of Adlai E. Stevenson (1977), the standard scholarly biography
  • McKeever, Porter (1989). Adlai Stevenson: His Life and Legacy. New York: William Morrow and Company. ISBN 978-0-688-06661-1.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Draft:Ellen_Stevenson&oldid=1224162717"