Whitley Heights 101

6680 Whitley Terrace

6680 Whitley Terrace was built in 1924 by architects Lee & Scott for owner and real estate developer Louis H. Kreke. The two story Mediterranean home sits on a downslope on Whitley Terrace, which consists of 3,600 square feet with 4 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms. The main level consists of a common area in an open floor plan: kitchen, den, living and dining room, while 3 bedrooms and 2 baths, including the master suite, complete the upper level. The lower level houses a guest suite, with a living and dining room, full kitchen, a bedroom suite, and private patio. The lower suite has its own separate entrance. Below is the rear of the property with a stairway which leads to the entrance of the lower floor.

The original address of this property was listed as 6678 Whitley Terrace and was changed to 6680 Whitley by 1929. Louis and Lillian Kreke had two children: Carolyn and Jeffrey. Carolyn married John Ferrar Anderson in 1925 and they moved into the lower floor. John, who was in the Air Force during WWI, ran for city counsel in 1927. There were several times that the family attempted to exchange the property and put it up for sale in the 1920s, but nothing transpired. After Mr. and Mrs. Kreke died, the Andersons continued to live in the house and it was sold after Carolyn died in the 1980s.

French singer and actor Maurice Chevalier was contracted to come to the United States in 1928 via Paramount Pictures. According to a 1930 Federal Census, he had lived here in 1930, although was known to stay at different hotels. Chevalier was born in the poor section of Paris in 1888 and his father died when he was 11 years old. His mother thought he was burden to the younger nine children so Maurice tried work at many trades, but always got fired. He then went into the circus as an acrobat, but had an accident which ended his career. He then joined a musical group at a cafe and then a chance encounter with nightclub singer Mistinguett helped his success as the two became a popular act in the Folies-Bergere, as pictured below. She was 36 and he was 23 as they had a very public romantic affair. Actually, Chevalier was known to be a “ladies man”-in 1909, he became the partner of the biggest female star in France, Fréhel. However, due to her alcoholism and drug addiction, their relationship ended in 1911.

In 1914, Maurice Chevalier joined the French Army, was wounded and captured. During his two years in a German prisoner of war camp, he learned English from a British prisoner of war. He had been wounded by a piece of shrapnel in his lung. His partner, Mistinguette, went to Madrid, and was introduced to King Alfonso, to persuade him to get Chevalier released with no luck. However, Chevalier was able to convince the Germans that he was a Red Cross worker to get released. In 1916, the Austro-Germans released him on parole and went back to the stage with Mistinguette. In 1921, he split with his dance partner due to jealousy. It is rumored that he was taking cocaine to enhance his dancing and singing acts.

In 1923, the highest paid French actor went into an asylum to treat depression; he was supposed to appear in New York on stage, but the contract was cancelled. After he failed suicide attempt, Chevalier met actress Yvonne Vallee (both pictured above) and after dating a few years, they were married. When Chevalier got the contract with Paramount, it was considered a big deal and when he and is wife arrived in New York, they were greeted with a crowd as they got off the ship, led by a party at the Ritz-Carlton. The Chevaliers then made their way out to Hollywood where Maurice’s first movie was being written. “An Innocent in Paris” was made into production by 1929; at first, Chevalier was given English lessons but they stopped as Paramount quickly discovered his French accent and singing voice was to be capitalized on. Chevalier was credited for 58 movies including Gigi, starring Leslie Caron, in 1958.

Chevalier was busy with acting and was even hired for a month to star in a Ziegfeld production in New York. Yvonne was known as a “microphone widow” because they never saw each other and ultimately their relationship grew apart. His wife went back to Paris in 1932 and he sued her for divorce that year and both agreed to get the divorce due. to incompatibility. During this time, Chevalier was linked to actress Marlene Dietrich as the two were often spotted together at Paramount. He was then linked to 19 year old actress Nita Raya (he was 39 at the time) and they dated for over a decade before his death in 1972.

Between 1933-1935 Ruth D’Aragon rented part of or the entire home. Born Ruth Morgan Walters, the daughter of head of Ambassador of a chain of hotels in the east, Ruth met and eloped with a Spanish Italian nobleman named Prince Ludovic Pignatelli d’Aragon in May of 1915. The prince was 37 years old and Ruth was only 22 years old, obviously impressed with marrying royalty. Ruth may have been oblivious to the fact that the prince never held a job and came to the United States in 1911 to hunt game and also hunt for a rich wife. Although d’Aragon was the distant cousin of the King of Spain during that time, he was not involved in the politics of the family. The prince was dubbed the nickname, “Prince Pig” when he moved to the United States and was known to socialize throughout the art district of New York city. Actually Ruth was first introduced to D’Aragon when she was visiting her half-sister, Baroness de Meyronne de Marc, at her estate in France.

In 1912, d’Aragon met and was engaged to Mary L. Duke, pictured below, heir to the tobacco king, Benjamin Newton Duke. D’Aragon met at her house by her brother, Angier Duke, and when d’Aragon found out she was worth a fortune, he set his sights to marry into the family. However, her father did not approve, especially since they came from different religions. D’Aragon had to go back to Europe and ask permission from the Pope and King Alfonso to get married but was denied. Perhaps heartbroken or just upset he would lose a fortune, d’Aragon went back to Paris, where he allegedly tried to commit suicide by shooting himself.

However, this highly publicized incident only brought attention to the French authorities that D’Aragon was wanted by law enforcement for some gaming infringement law violations prior to his moving to the states. D’Aragon jumped ship and went back to New York to avoid any legal proceedings. However, he was detained at Ellis Island, not because of the gaming violation, but because of the failed suicide attempt. However, he was released because the US authorities could not find that he was in violation of a US law. This did not stop D’Aragon’s reckless ways, especially on the the road. He had gotten into several major car accidents and on 1914, he was driving on wrong side of the road with excessive speed, hit another car and killed a man. He was eventually sued and ordered. topay $15,000 to the family.

At the beginning, young Ruth was happily living with the prince; her father bought them a house on Long Island. However, Mr. Walters was not happy the prince did not have a job and had him work at one of his hotels in New Jersey. That only lasted one week before the prince walked off the job. Two years later, Ruth’s father died from a horse accident so Ruth and the prince moved to France to the French Riviera. They did have one daughter, but Ruth grew tired of the prince’s behavior. One evening, while at the Biarritz Casino in 1924, Ruth is with her husband eating in the restaurant when Andrew Reid of Baltimore walked in and Ruth immediately went over to talk to him. It turns out that Ruth and Andrew were old school mates and were rumored to be having an affair. This angered the prince who challenged Andrew to a sword duel in the casino. The authorities came and it was Andrew who got arrested as the prince tipped them off that he had some outstanding warrants. While Andrew is in jail, Ruth is going to visit him and finally filed for divorce.

After a failed reconciliation, the prince counter-sued and was able to strip Ruth of her princess title and gain custody of their 9 year old daughter, Princess Marie Isabelle. Ruth decided to move to California and rented 6680 Whitley Terrace upon her arrival. Now stripped. of her title and no longer an American citizen, Ruth got her citizenship restored by 1933. She also met and married James Brazell in 1935, but that marriage did not last long because he found love letters from a Naval officer and filed for divorce in 1941. During the divorce, Ruth claimed that Brazell had beat her twice and that the letters were not romantic in nature. She also claimed that Brazell had used her for her money and had not worked since they had gotten married. Ruth never married again and died quietly in 1972.

As for the prince, he continued to involve himself in scandals. In 1941, he was indicted in a blackmail plot. Ludovic Pignatelli d’Aragon was accused by his cousin’s wife of a $500,000 extortion attempt and schemed to cast doubt on the title of Prince Guido Pignatelli. D’Aragon did not want his cousin or his wife to hold any prince or princess title. Although, he went to prison, he was pardoned by President Harry Truman in 1946. Their daughter remained in France, never married, and lived away from all of her parent’s drama.

An elderly woman named Mildred Thanhouser resided at 6680 Whitley Terrace circa 1935. Her daughter, Marian, married Milman Parry, who eventually became a Harvard Professor and an author who focused on the works of Homer. Parry was born in 1902 in Oakland, California to a house of books. After graduating from University of California Berkeley, he studied in Paris where he became interested in the works of Homer. His wife came from a German Jewish family and endured some Anti-Semitic comments from her husband’s colleagues when he worked at Harvard between 1933-1935.

During the time he worked at Harvard, Mildred’s mother’s health was starting to deteriorate and they would have to fly out to California to move her out of the Whitley Heights home into an apartment building in Hob Hill. Milman was bit of a nervous man and decided to pack his pistol in the suitcase, worried of some trouble that they may endure. On the afternoon of December 3, 1935, the Parrys, having just arrived in Los Angeles from San Francisco by plane, rented a suite in the Palms Hotel at 626 South Alvarado Street, a 10 minute walk from the Nob Hill Towers, where Mildred’s mother would be moving. Before attending to the move, they had planned to visit Mildred’s older sister in San Diego the following day.

They checked into the suite and Marian remained in the main room while Milman went into the bedroom to unpack and change his clothes. Very shortly thereafter, Marian heard the muffled report of a gunshot from the bedroom and rushed in to find Parry wounded and bleeding on the floor. Milman had apparently gotten into the habit of carrying a handgun in response to the dangerous conditions he encountered during his travels through rural areas of the world. Marian called the paramedics, but Milman had died in the hotel room. After his death, rumors circulated that Milman killed himself because he did not get a tenure at Harvard, although the death was ruled an accident. Milman was only 33 years old and the Parry’s had left two small children back in Boston while they were out in California.

The Parry’s son, Adam, followed in his father’s footsteps and became a professor at Yale University with his wife, Anne Amory. However, both endured their own tragedy in 1971. On June 10, while in Paris, they were killed in a motorcycle accident. They were returning to France from Germany on a motorcycle they had just purchased. While turning into a highway near Colmar, they collided with a bus and were killed. Professor Parry was 43 years old and his wife was 39. His mother and sister where both living in Cambridge, Massachusetts.