Pilar Pallete

María del Pilar Pallette Alvarado (born 3 September 1928), known professionally as Pilar Pallette, is a Peruvian-born American painter and occasional actress. She became well-known through her marriage to the actor John Wayne.

Early life María del Pilar Pallete Alvarado was born in Paita, Piura, Peru on 3 September 1928, She has three siblings: an elder sister, Josefina Rosario "Josephine" Stinson (née Pallete Alvarado), and two younger siblings, Marcela Lina de la Torre (née Pallete Alvarado) and Miguel Angel Pallete.

Pallete worked in the offices of Pan American-Grace Airways in the Limatambo International Airport from the age of 14, having lied about her age. She worked as a passenger greeter for Braniff International Airways from the age of 15, having lied about her age again. She also worked as a stewardess for Peruvian International Airways.

Career Pallete made her debut in Peru in 1950, after participating in the English-speaking theatre club, Lima Theatre Workshop. She made an uncredited appearance in The Alamo (1960).

Pallete rented a studio inside the Fernleaf Courtyard in Corona Del Mar, California, during the 1960s. She would entertain her clients outdoors with coffee and finger sandwiches, and found herself, a year later, with a full-time restaurant. She is now a full-time restaurateur, who, in more recent years, owned Pilar's.

Pallete authored Pilar Wayne's Favorite and Fabulous Recipes , a cook book, which was published by PAX Pub Co. in 1983. She authored John Wayne: My Life With the Duke , a memoir, which was co-written with the Irvine-based freelance journalist, Alex Thorleifson, and published by McGraw-Hill in 1987.

Pallete devotes up to six hours a day to her paintings. Her work is featured on her website, pilarwayneart.com, and has been exhibited all over the world.

Personal life Pallete married her first husband, Richard Junior Weldy, an Irish executive at Pan American-Grace Airways who was seven years her senior, in Lima on 8 July 1950. She was known as Pilar Weldy. The couple separated in 1952, when she discovered that Weldy had not finalized his January 1950 divorce from his first wife, Ida Katherine Weldy. She obtained an annulment on 28 October 1953 in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Pallete met her second husband, John Wayne, an American actor 21 years her senior, in Tingo María in 1952, while she was still married to her first husband. Wayne was in Peru scouting locations for The Alamo (1960). She ran into Wayne for a second time upon her move to Los Angeles, California, in 1953. The couple were married in the garden of the Keauhou, Hawaii, home of Senator William Henry Hill on 1 November 1954, the same day as Wayne's divorce from Esperanza "Chata" Baur was finalized. Pallete underwent an abortion in the months leading up to their wedding. Aissa Maria Wayne (born 31 March 1956), John Ethan Wayne (born 22 February 1962) and Marisa Carmela Wayne (born 22 February 1966). Upon her marriage to Wayne, she gained four stepchildren: Michael Wayne (1934–2003), Mary Antonia "Toni" Wayne LaCava (1936–2000), Patrick Wayne (born 1939), and Melinda Ann Wayne Munoz (1940–2022), from her husband's first marriage to Josephine Alicia Saenz. The couple traveled extensively during the next ten years of their marriage, usually on location for Wayne's many films. She became a U.S. citizen on 16 November 1962. In 1965 the Wayne family moved to Newport Beach, Wayne left an estate worth US$6.85M, which she was excluded from, having been provided for in the separation agreement. She has five grandchildren, including Jennifer Wayne, from the country music group Runaway June. In 2023, she said that she keeps Wayne's memory alive through painting. who was five years her junior, an American municipal court judge, in Orange, California, on 6 October 1984, five years after Wayne's death. Upon her marriage to Stewart, she gained two stepchildren. She was known as Pilar Wayne Stewart. She later described their brief marriage as a "two-week mistake". The couple divorced in 1997, after 12 years of marriage.

Pallete married her fourth husband, Jesse Lloyd Upchurch, who was four years her senior, an American travel company executive, in Johnson, Texas, on 22 May 1998. Upon her marriage to Upchurch, she gained four stepchildren. She was known as Pilar Wayne Upchurch. They split their time between their homes on the Back Bay in Newport Beach and Dallas. The couple divorced in Tarrant on 10 March 2010, after 11 years of marriage.

Pallete is a registered Republican, although not as politically active as Wayne. In 1990, she said: "Duke and I have always supported the Republican Party, like most of Orange County, I guess." On 25 January 1990, she let the party of Orange County use her home for a US$1,000 per-couple, fundraising cocktail reception for Senator Pete Wilson in his campaign for governor. She was friends with Donald Trump, and his second wife, Marla Maples, during their six-year-marriage. She vacationed at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida.

Pallete was previously diagnosed with cancer. She underwent surgery at the John Wayne Cancer Institute in Santa Monica, California on 24 May 2006 and revealed that she was cancer-free that August. The shooter, Weldy, variously described as a "jungle trapper and guide" or "a big game hunter," purportedly harbored a grudge over a Confidential story about Pallete. The nonexistent Confidential article depicted Pallete as having an affair with John Wayne while married to Weldy. According to newspaper accounts, Weldy fled the scene, leaving Harrison to die alone in the jungle with his blonde girlfriend; the two were eventually rescued by either the Dominican Army or local police and boy scouts. Newspapers reported that Weldy was later arrested by police. But Harrison refused to press charges against Weldy and the two publicly reconciled. Later the whole story was revealed to be a hoax—the shooting never took place. Photos of a wounded Harrison in a hospital were staged, complete with an actor playing a physician. Even the "girlfriend" was an actress that Harrison hired for the publicity stunt. Samuel Bernstein's volume on Harrison is one of the few sources to note that no Confidential Pallete article was on the newsstands at the time of the "shooting" incident. The Confidential article that did eventually appear admitted that Pallete was already divorced from Weldy when she met Wayne.

Filmography