The Estate of Maureen O'hara
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Presents THE ESTATE OF MAUREEN O’HARA NOVEMBER 29, 2016 TURNER CLASSIC MOVIES AND BONHAMS: THE DEFINITIVE PARTNERSHIP FOR CLASSIC MOVIE MEMORABILIA TCM PRESENTS … THE ESTATE OF MAUREEN O’HARA Tuesday November 29, 2016 at 12pm New York BONHAMS BIDS INQUIRIES Automated Results Service 580 Madison Avenue +1 323 436 5552 Catherine Williamson, Ph.D. +1 (800) 223 2854 New York, New York 10022 +1 323 850 6090 fax Vice President, Director bonhams.com [email protected] Fine Books & Manuscripts/ ILLUSTRATIONS Entertainment Memorabilia Front cover: lot 54 To bid via the internet please visit +1 323 436 5442 Session page 1: lot 51 PREVIEW www.bonhams.com/23810 +1 323 850 5843 fax Session page 2: lot 54 Los Angeles catherine.williamson Session page 3: lot 71 Friday, November 11 Please note that telephone bids @bonhams.com Session page 4: lot 128 12pm - 5pm must be submitted no later Session page 5: lot 192 Saturday, November 12 than 4pm on the day prior to Dana Hawkes Session page 6: lot 211 12pm - 5pm the auction. New bidders must Consultant Back cover: lot 197 Sunday, November 13 also provide proof of identity +1 978 283 1518 12pm - 5pm and address when submitting [email protected] bids. Telephone bidding is only available for lots with a low Caren Roberts-Frenzel New York Saturday, November 26 estimate in excess of $1000. Administrator +1 323 436 5409 12pm - 5pm Please contact client services [email protected] Sunday, November 27 with any bidding inquiries. 12pm - 5pm Justin Humphries Monday, November 28 Please see pages 2 to 6 for Consulting Cataloguer 12pm - 5pm bidder information including Conditions of Sale, after-sale collection and shipment. SALE NUMBER: 23810 CATALOG: $35 Bonhams 220 San Bruno Avenue San Francisco, California 94103 © 2016, Bonhams & Butterfields Auctioneers Corp.; All rights reserved. Bond No. 57BSBGL0808 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction by Robert Osborne p 3 Director’s Foreword by Catherine Williamson p 4 The Early Years in Ireland and Hollywood p 6 The Quiet Man p 24 The 1950s p 38 The 1960s p 52 Herself at Home p 70 The Later Years p 87 Image courtesy of Turner Classic Movies What a treat it was for us to have Maureen O’Hara make an appearance at the TCM Classic Film Festival in 2014. At the time she hadn’t been seen in public in many years, so festival passholders—and staffers alike—were all very excited about the possibility of meeting this great star of films such as The Quiet Man (1952), How Green Was My Valley (1941), Miracle on 34th Street (1947), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), Rio Grande (1950) and numerous others, and getting a glimpse of O’Hara’s world famous red hair while spending a few moments with her. And she didn’t disappoint. She looked amazing, and was as warm and feisty with us as when she was putting leading men like John Wayne, Anthony Quinn and Tyrone Power in their place on the big screen. I have no proof, but I like to think that having her come to our Festival was the final push that was needed—and at exactly the right moment—for Hollywood’s Motion Picture Academy to vote her a much deserved honorary Oscar®. We’ll never see the likes of Maureen O’Hara again, but thankfully we’ll be able to enjoy the O’Hara beauty and the work she did on film for generations to come. Viva, Maureen! Robert Osborne Director’s Foreword For many fans, Maureen O’Hara is the most beautiful star in all of Hollywood. Her classic features, green eyes, and red hair light up the screen like no other— or is it her strong, Irish temperament that makes her so compelling? In either case, it has been a pleasure and a privilege to put together this auction of property from the estate of the great Irish-American actress. In a cold warehouse in Idaho, my colleague and I dug through stacks and stacks of boxes like Hollywood archeologists, piecing together the story of her life from the tangible property she left behind. We found echoes of her childhood: an elocution award bestowed on young Maureen FitzSimons as a teenager and her well-worn copies of Irish poetry and Shakespeare. We found her earliest contracts, and a veritable treasure trove of photographs taken upon her arrival in Hollywood. We found scripts of course, and posters, but also costumes worn onscreen and in publicity photos-such beautiful clothing, so expertly cared for. And her shoes! And gloves! And hats! This was a woman who knew how to dress. As we worked, we kept an eye out for items relating As we worked, we began to fill in the other years of to Maureen’s most famous film, the 1952 John Ford Maureen’s life and career. We found a large archive classic, The Quiet Man. The first piece we saw (how relating to her first and only Broadway appearance in could we miss it?) was the jaunting cart used to carry the Pearl S. Buck musical, Christine; we found her cast and crew members from their lodgings in the scripts to the beloved 1960s family comedies, The village of Cong to the set. It is nearly identical to the Parent Trap, Spencer’s Mountain and Mr. Hobbs screen used carts, except for the very modern tire Takes a Vacation. We learned that she ran her own treads it sports. Next, we found the tweed jacket she Beverly Hills boutique beginning in the 1940s, selling wears as Mary Kate Danaher. Then, we uncovered fine china and decorative items, some of which were John Ford’s working script which he gave to still in her collection. She also seriously collected Maureen during filming, and which she herself heavily Meissen porcelain from the 1950s on, and we have annotated. And finally, we (or rather me, Catherine, some excellent examples in this sale as well. From and no one else) saw the secret love letters John her gracious, well-appointed homes in Los Angeles, Ford wrote her during the months leading up to Ireland and the Virgin Islands, we have art, fine filming, so intimate and intense that O’Hara herself furniture and decorative items, some of which, like planned to destroy them upon her death, but in later her bedroom set, she had owned for 70 years. years changed her mind. Of course we found trophies and honorariums for Maureen, particularly from her later years, but we found even more material relating to Maureen’s efforts to lobby Congress to award her dear friend John Wayne a Congressional Medal of Honor, bringing home to us what a generous spirit she was. Both Bonhams and Turner Classic Movies hope that Maureen’s many fans will find something that speaks to them in the following pages. We hope that all of you are able to attend the previews in either Los Angeles or New York, but if not, please reach out to the department for more information about the auction or any lot in it. Catherine Williamson, Ph.D. Director, Entertainment Memorabilia 4 | BONHAMS THE EARLY YEARS IN IRELAND AND HOLLYWOOD 1 A GROUP OF BOOKS FROM MAUREEN O’HARA’S EARLY YEARS IN IRELAND AND AMERICA Comprising 13 hardbound books, some with dust jackets and ownership signatures to front matter and pages’ edges, many annotated, most related to Ireland including Songs of the Gael, 3rd Edition, with O’Hara’s ownership signature and her Irish and American addresses; Spirit of the Nation, with O’Hara’s ownership signatures and Irish addresses in the 1930s and in 1995 in pen to front matter; Before the Dawn, signed and inscribed to O’Hara by author J. K. Lyons; and books of Irish literature and poetry; also with two illustrated editions of Shakespeare. $200 - 300 2 A GROUP OF MAUREEN O’HARA BOOKS ON IRISH MUSIC Comprising 26 books, mostly cloth covers 1 lacking dust jackets, circa 1840-1969, many with ownership signatures, some annotated; also 16 booklets of songs, mostly in the Irish Fireside Songs series. O’Hara’s copy of Irish Country Songs by Herbert Hughes has lyrics from the Gaelic song “Siuil a Ruin” to front cover in pencil and other lyrics to endpapers in pencil; Lovely is the Lee by Robert Gibbings signed several times with note under one signature, “1986 / and many years before,”; 1 booklet note in pen regarding a Rossini aria folded in. Maureen O’Hara seldom sang onscreen, but singing became central to her television career from the 1950s to the 1970s. O’Hara often performed the songs of her native Ireland, including recording the 1961 album 2 Maureen O’Hara Sings Her Favorite Irish Songs. These books are mainly of Irish songs, some in Gaelic, along with other musical genres including an annotated copy of The Trapp Family Book of Christmas Songs which O’Hara also signed. $200 - 300 3¤ A MAUREEN O’HARA ADDRESS BOOK, LATE 1930S, AND A BRASS POSTAL SCALE Address book bound in red calf gilt, annotated in pen and pencil in O’Hara’s hand and signed (“Maureen FitzSimons”) and her Dublin address written in pencil to the front matter. WITH: a small brass postal scale with brass clip attached, housed in a small calf gilt porfolio. Among the addresses are actor Charles Laughton’s in London and that of Mayflower Pictures Corporation, Laughton’s production company. Mayflower was where O’Hara’s career truly began in Alfred Hitchcock’s Jamaica Inn (1939) starring Laughton. Also listed is the Irish convent address of O’Hara’s sister Peggy 3 FitzSimons, a nun.