Ava Alice Muriel Astor

Ava Alice Muriel Astor (July 7, 1902 – July 19, 1956) was an American heiress, socialite, and member of the prominent Astor family.

After her parents divorced in 1909, Ava was placed into the custody of her mother while Vincent was placed into the custody of their father. In September 1911, Ava and her mother moved to England. They lived in a townhouse on Grosvenor Square in Mayfair, London from October to April, and at their country estate, Sutton Place in Guildford, Surrey, from May to September. She was educated at Notting Hill High School. In 1920, Ava was one of the few American heiresses presented to Queen Mary.

When she turned 21, Ava received at least $5 million from a trust fund established by her father . Due to the immensity of her wealth and rumors that multiple noblemen were seeking her hand in marriage, Ava was called a "dollar princess."

Personal life On July 4, 1924 the engagement of Ava Astor and Prince Serge Obolensky, a recently divorced Russian aristocrat over ten years her senior, was publicly announced. This was a surprise for many, as Jack Astor had been opposed to international marriages and Ava had previously been rumored to be engaged to several different men, including Lord Dalmeny, son of the Earl of Rosebery, and the Marquis of Blandford, elder son of the Duchess of Marlborough. The pair were married in London on July 24, 1924 in three ceremonies: one was a private civil ceremony, one privately took place at Savoy Chapel, and one was a public ceremony at St. Philip's Church. The marriage was considered the event of the season in England that year.

The couple had two children together: Prince Ivan Sergeyevich Obolensky, born in 1925, and Princess Sylvia Sergeyevna Obolensky, born in 1931. Throughout their marriage, the pair were rumored to be unhappy. In December 1932, Ava moved to Reno, Nevada and filed for divorce.

On January 21, 1933, she remarried to Raimund von Hofmannsthal, a member of the noble Hofmannsthal family and son of Hugo von Hofmannsthal and his wife, Gertrud Schlesinger. The couple was married in the city court of Newark, New Jersey. The couple had a daughter: Romana von Hofmannsthal, but Raimund was also rumored to be the father of Sylvia, her daughter from her first marriage. Ava and Raimund eventually divorced in 1939, and he later married to Lady Elizabeth Paget.

On March 27, 1940, she married Philip John Ryves Harding, a journalist, in Faversham, England. At the time of their wedding, Harding, a cousin of Maxwell Eley, was serving with an anti-aircraft battery in the British Army. Pleydell-Bouverie was an architect who studied at Charterhouse School in England. They divorced in 1952. Ava named it "Marienruh" and retained it throughout her life.

Death

Astor died of a stroke in her 219 East Sixty-first Street apartment, Manhattan, New York City, on July 19, 1956, at age 54. She predeceased her mother by two years. At her mother's death in 1958, her children received an additional $2,500,000 (equivalent to approximately $ in ).