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“It’s just a plain piece of rock as far as I’m concerned. I do know that it’s very beautiful, but who on earth wants a great big rock like that. It’s right where it belongs, in a museum.” ~Mamie Reynolds, speaking in 1962 about the Hope Diamond
A couple of years ago my son and I had a free afternoon in Washington, D.C., so we made a beeline to one of the things I most wanted to see: the famed Hope Diamond.
The exquisite blue gem—a whopping 45.52 carats—draws constant attention from a steady stream of onlookers at the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History. The famed stone is surrounded by 16 white diamonds and hangs on a chain of 45 diamonds.
Little did I know at the time that an Asheville, North Carolina toddler once buried that very gem in a sandbox. It also was attached to the collar of her grandmother’s dog.
The little girl who played with the Hope Diamond (currently valued at $250 million) was Mamie Reynolds, and her grandmother was Evalyn Walsh McLean. Mamie was the only daughter of U.S. Senator Bob Reynolds and his fifth wife, Evalyn McLean Reynolds, who reportedly ended her life with an overdose of sleeping pills on September 20, 1946, a little less than a month before Mamie turned 4 years old.
Could her death have been part of the rumored curse that’s supposedly attached to ownership of the Hope Diamond? Mamie’s son, Joseph Charles McLean Gregory, says his great-grandmother did not believe in a curse even though she suffered through many tragedies.
From an article in the Asheville Times on May 1, 1947: “Tragedy struck early at Mrs. McLean. Years before she acquired the Hope Diamond she was injured seriously in an automobile crash which took the life of her brother, Vinson Walsh. Then, a few years after her marriage to Edward Beale McLean, son of the multi-millionaire publisher of The Cincinnati Enquirer, their firstborn—called Vincent for her brother—was killed beneath the wheels of a car. By this time Mrs. McLean was the owner of the Hope Diamond. Friends, mindful of the legends of the stone’s curse, pleaded with her to get rid of the gem. But she refused. She fretted for a time about the legend of the curse. Then she took the gem to a priest and had it blessed. From that day on Mrs. McLean appeared impervious to the claims of the stone’s fateful power, despite the misfortunes which subsequently beset her. But her own marriage broke up in tragedy worthy of Hope Diamond lore. Mrs. McLean charged her husband with adultery and he eventually died in a mental institution, his fortune depleted.”
Evalyn Walsh McLean’s father, Thomas Walsh, struck it rich in the Camp Bird Gold Mine in Colorado and then she also married into great wealth. Her closest friends ranged from presidents to movie stars. She threw lavish parties, was very generous to others, and even turned over $100,000 for ransom in the Lindbergh baby kidnapping.
I reached out to Joseph after learning about Asheville’s connection to the Hope Diamond. He very graciously offered information about his family and even got a bit choked up saying, “As long as I can touch people’s lives with a story as to what kind of a lady Evalyn was, I did my job.”
Even though Evalyn Walsh McLean died before he was born, Joseph knows her very well. He’s immersed himself in family history and has penned “The Hope Diamond” and wrote the foreword for “Queen of Diamonds: The Fabled Legacy of Evalyn Walsh McLean.” He also created Fable Fragrances, inspired by the Hope Diamond.
Evalyn enjoyed wearing the Hope Diamond (she even wore it on her death bed), but she also freely allowed others the pleasure of experiencing it. Joseph said she would loan it out for charity events or to brides so they would have “something borrowed, something blue.”
He also said, “She allowed people to wear it so they’d know what it felt like—glamorous, beautiful, exquisite. She allowed people to touch it and wasn’t afraid to let people put it on or use it. She let a little girl like my mother teethe on it and play with it in the sandbox, and would let her Great Dane, Mike, wear it around the house. She knew she was going to get it back.”
