The Lady and the Panda Page 31

  Specialists who weighed in on issues large and small include panda expert Devra Klein; Tibetologist Per Kvaerne; Port of Last Resort author Marcia Reynders Ristaino; and Asia chronicler Harry Rolnick.

  Thanks also to Washington Post Magazine editor David Rowell and Gourmet magazine editors John Willoughby and Barry Estabrook, for material used here that originally appeared in those publications. I am appreciative of their fine work.

  I will never be able to thank editor Jonathan Karp properly. His vision, spirit, and skill have been as singular as they are sure. I am most indebted for his ability to banish the reams of nonessential details and anecdotes that threatened to weigh down the vitality of this adventure story. It is through his stewardship that this galloping work came up to speed and stayed on track. He is also the kindest champion a writer could hope for.

  Working closely with Jon has been another remarkable editor— Jonathan Jao. Jonathan is as kind in his manner as he is exacting in his expectations. The pages have become lean and clean from Jonathan running them hard and taking a good stiff-bristled brush to them.

  None of this would even have come into existence without the drive of my extraordinary agent, Laura Blake Peterson. Laura understood Ruth Harkness from the start, and she believed in the story when not everyone did. This project has been elevated by Laura's own elegance and conviction.

  I thank my talented and resolute nephew John Biando for his help in researching archival material from Standard Oil's days in Shanghai, and for his Herculean effort to organize the unruly endnotes. I look forward to reading his first book, whenever that comes (and I only hope I won't have to help with his endnotes).

  My parents too, as usual, did all they could. In this case, that included loading me and their standard poodle, Portia, into the backseat of the Lincoln for a ten-hour drive up from Florida to meet Su-Lin Young.

  I am indebted to a cast of characters who have walked wolfhounds for me, made me laugh, been patient with my obsessions, or even been willing to leave me alone so I could keep working: Kathleen Shinnick, Amy Macdonald, Mary Crowley, Ellen Maggio, Michael and Marissa Barrile, Linda Carmichael, Brian Kilcommons, Sarah Wilson, Richard Buell, Boyd Estus, Edith McBean, Paula Abend, Alice Turner, and Jennifer Clifford.

  Although, as Ruth Harkness would say, this journey has been one grand thrill, sadly, three close friends, who all led large, joyful lives in the Harkness style, could not finish it with me. How I wish I were invoking the lives and not the memories of Dorothy Greelis, John Castagnetti, and Franklin Loew. Dorothy, my old pal, I will definitely drink one for you.

  Finally, with all my heart, too many thanks to count for my love, Scott Beckman.

  NOTES

  A NOTE ON SOURCES

  Dominating the citations in these endnotes are the hundreds of letters written from Ruth Harkness to her best friend, Hazel Perkins, mainly from 1936 to 1939, often typed out on Harkness's portable. Access to the correspondence was generously provided by the Perkins family—Bruce and Alice, and their daughter, Robin Perkins Ugurlu. In the text, I have cleaned up obvious typographical errors contained in the letters, which were often rushed and written under less-than-optimal field conditions, but I have not altered them in any other way.

  Some newspaper and magazine clippings taken from Ruth Harkness's family's archives, the files at the Brookfield Zoo, the papers of Floyd Tangier Smith from the Library of Congress, and some others contained no identification of the publication and/or the date. Occasionally, I could puzzle out the date or rough time period from information within the text or from the stories on the reverse. Sometimes I could identify the headline fonts as that of a particular paper. And often enough I found the articles themselves during microfilm research. But not always, and in those cases where clippings remain as orphans, endnotes appear with incomplete information.

  Along with the citations, I have also included some rather lengthy informational notes. There just wasn't enough room in the main story itself for background details on a number of topics (Ruth's relationship to Bill Harkness's family, for instance), but because so much of it has never been published anywhere else, I have provided it here in note form.

  PREFACE

  xv Something one newspaperman Ruth Harkness, travel club speech, 1939.

  xv No animal in history Field Museum News 9, no. 7 (July 1938), Field Museum archives.

  xvi “making the world panda conscious” Washington Post, 26 June 1938; Field Museum News 9, no. 7 (July 1938), Field Museum archives.

  xvii getting baby-panda formula right “Improved Nutrition and Infant Survival,” “Panda 2000 Conservation Priorities for the New Millennium,” workshop at the San Diego Zoo, Oct. 2000, www.sandiegozoo.org/conservation/fieldproject_panda2000.html.

  xvii “little was known” World Wildlife Fund website: www.wwfchina.org.

  xviii “a very important nail” Ramona and Desmond Morris, Men and Pandas (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 83.

  xix Su-Lin “was virtually changing” Ibid., p. 82.

  xix “In a few brief moments” Chris Catton, Pandas (New York: Facts on File, 1990), p. 17.

  xix “evoke universal sympathy” “Giant Pandas in the Wild,” World Wide Fund for Nature website, http://www.panda.org, printed 11 July 2001.

  xix “part in giving the animal world” Ruth Harkness to Hazel Perkins, likely 13 Sept. 1940.

  CHAPTER ONE: DEAT HINSHANGHAI

  3 It was a bitter winter night “Explorer Harkness Dies of a Cancer,” Shanghai Evening Post and Mercury, 20 Feb. 1936; “Harkness Dies of a Throat Cancer,” Shanghai Times, 21 Feb. 1936, p. 7; “W. H. Harkness Jr. Is Dead in Shanghai,” New York Times 20 Feb. 1936, which describes the Shanghai sanitarium as a “Seventh Day Adventist institution.”

  3 sunny notes Ruth Harkness, The Lady and the Panda: An Adventure (New York: Carrick & Evans, 1938), p. 20.

  3 But, finally Floyd Tangier Smith to Keith Spalding, 5 Mar. 1936, Field Museum archives.

  4 A world away “Cold to Continue Over Week-end,” New York Times, 1 Feb. 1936.

  4 Late in the afternoon Harkness, Lady and the Panda, p. 19.

  4 along icy sidewalks “Near-Zero Cold Returns to City; 33 on Ship Saved,” New York Times, 19 Feb. 1936, p. 1; letter to the editor, dated 13 Feb. 1936, from “taxpayer,” complains about snowy, icy sidewalks in New York City, New York Times, 15 Feb. 1936.

  4 “pretty little mulatto maid” Harkness, Lady and the Panda, p. 19.

  4 The devastation of that loss Siglinde Ash, conversation with author, interview, 12 Sept. 2002.

  4 “Do you have that” Harkness to Perkins, 20 May 1936.

  5 Handsome, short, and wiry Lawrence Griswold, Tombs, Trouble and Travel, Resnick's Library of Worldwide Adventure (1937; reprint, Alexander, N.C.: Alexander Books, 1999), p. 167.

  5 He was not a member Wall Street Journal, 10 Feb. 1915; “Mrs. Harkness Aids College,” giving $150,000 to Connecticut College for Women, 14 Dec. 1933.

  5 But Bill had graduated from Harvard “Harvard Graduates Its Largest Class,” New York Times, 20 June 1924. Bill Harkness listed under Bachelor of Arts (also in next year's list under “Bachelors of Law”). See also “Florence Rhein Picks Bridal Party,” 3 Oct. 1928.

  5 scion of a wealthy New York family Shanghai Times, 21 Feb. 1936, p. 7.

  5 The Harknesses were powerfully connected Bill Harkness's records from Harvard indicate connections to government officials and the FAO Schwarz family, as well as a sense of entitlement.

  5 Never arrogant Bill Harkness always let his companions do the talking to the press when he was on expedition; he didn't care about being given credit or seeing his name in print, as is clear from treks with Griswold and Smith.

  6 She could fill a room “Su Lin, Panda Baby, Checks in at Biltmore,” New York Herald Tribune, 24 Dec. 1936.

  6 She had, according Adelaide Hawley, editor of “The Woman's Page,” MGM Newsreels Chairman, Town Hall Round Table Luncheon Club, as quoted in Ruth Harkness lecture brochure from Willi
am B. Freakins, Inc.

  6 Born on September 21, 1900 “Mrs. Harkness Dies Suddenly in Pittsburgh,” Titusville (Penn.) Herald, 21 July 1947.

  7 temporary move to nearby Erie “Woman Explorer, Former Erieite, Is Found Dead,” Erie Daily Times, 21 July 1947.

  7 After a semester Greg Swenson, news office, University of Colorado, e-mail correspondence with author. Ruth McCombs is listed as a freshman in the College of Liberal Arts for the 1920–1921 academic year.

  7 twenty-five dollars as her war chest Ruth Harkness to family, Jan. 1939, from Bombay.

  7 Powdered and dressed up Jill Carey, professor of fashion history, LaSalle College, Newton, Mass., conversation with author.

  7 as quintessential a flapper “Appreciating the Flapper,” New York Times, 13 June 1999.

  8 her face was not her fortune Ruth Harkness to family, Jan. 1939, from Bombay.

  8 “had to work like the devil” Harkness to Perkins, 12 Aug. 1936.

  9 “a bare derriere” Harkness to Perkins, 12 July 1936.

  10 slugging back bootleg booze Mary Lobisco, conversation with author, 12 April 2003. Ruth Harkness's niece, Lobisco recalls a story of her mother's. When Harriet McCombs came to visit Ruth, she took up smoking just to keep her hands busy while socializing with Bill and Ruth and their friends, who were always drinking.

  10 Sitting together in the haze Harkness, Lady and the Panda, p. 56.

  10 “game trails in remote corners” Ruth Harkness, as told to Hans Christian Adamson, “How I Caught the Rare Giant Panda,” part 2, “Mrs. Harkness' Thrilling Story of Her Hunt in Asian Wilds,” New York American, 14 Feb. 1937.

  10 college-entrance examinations Undergraduate Registrar's Office, Harvard University.

  10 author U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1930, Washington, D.C.

  10 a man of letters Harvard College Class of 1924 Sexennial Report, 1930, p. 95.

  10 “Big Medicine” .405 rifle Griswold, Tombs, Travel, pp. 180, 194.

  10 at his family's estate in Connecticut William senior, a widower, thought his son was a bit reckless, but the two men were close, and soon enough Ruth was folded into the Harkness family. She and Bill served as bridesmaid and best man at William senior's wedding, to a much younger woman in 1928. From then on, weekends were a time for the foursome at the family estate in Danbury, a handsome manor enviably outfitted with an in-ground swimming pool (it would later be purchased by contralto Marian Anderson). Despite finding the country life of swimming and tennis a bit of a bore, Ruth went along with it all, even trying to befriend Bill's stepmother, Jane GreenPenfold, who was close to her own age but nothing like Ruth in outlook or philosophy. Jane always seemed to squelch Ruth's exuberance and naturalness, sometimes exploding in anger over petty matters such as the time Ruth arrived late to the farm. At least Ruth had a confidante and ally in Danbury— someone close to the family who felt the same exasperation over Jane's dampening ways. Hazel Perkins, an industrious and ambitious woman raising two boys alone, had worked in the real estate office handling matters for the Harkness estate. She would become Ruth's closest friend forever after.

  Throughout the years of Danbury visits, Jane and William senior eroded Ruth's confidence, always implying, she said, that she had no common sense and lacked good judgment. They had the same concerns about Bill, which was made clear in the patriarch's will. William senior had designated that upon his death, all his worldly goods and fortune would be left to his new wife to use as she pleased. Should she predecease him, the estate would go to Bill, but with the proviso that it would be managed by a trust, administered by overseers presumably with more sober perspectives.

  Even after the stock market crash of 1929, Bill's family-fed bank account proved Depression-proof, and he continued to live as he pleased. See “Jane Green-Penfold Weds W. H. Harkness,” New York Times, 27 June 1928, p. 25; Bill's New York Times obituary, 20 Feb. 1936; “William H. Harkness to Marry,” New York Times, 19 June 1928; Bruce Perkins, son of Hazel Perkins, conversation with; Ruth Harkness to Hazel Perkins, 22 Aug. 1936; Last Will and Testament of William H. Harkness, of Danbury, Fairfield County, Conn., 21 Dec. 1931, From files of Probate Court, District of Danbury, District no. 034.

  10 tropical romantic getaways Ruth Harkness to family, postcard from Virgin Islands, 1925.

  10 “A dash of absinthe” Harkness to Perkins, 28 May 1936.

  11 Each of them was haunted Griswold says this in Tombs, Travel, and Ruth's personal correspondence is filled with ruminations on loneliness.

  11 Her intuition Harkness to Perkins, 8 July 1936.

  11 “He had a divine faith” Harkness to Perkins, 8 July 1936.

  11 She felt in a fog Harkness to Perkins, 1 June 1936.

  12 She was to receive about $20,000 This is what she said she spent on the first expedition, and it had to have come from Bill.

  12 not enough to last much more than a year Paul A. Samuelson, Economics (1948; New York: McGraw-Hill, 1997), p. 64.

  12 She left it Harkness to Perkins, 16 June and 22 Aug. 1936.

  12 his mother's jewelry Harkness to Perkins, misdated 12 July 1936, should be 12 Aug. 1936.

  12 Over many chilly days “I was drinking because I felt that I needed it,” Harkness said in a letter to Perkins, 6 Aug. 1936.

  13 As she sent instructions Shanghai Times, 21 Feb. 1936, p. 7.

  13 “brown lean men” Theodore and Kermit Roosevelt, Trailing the Giant Panda, (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1929), p. 1.

  14 “Whenever one arrives” From the 1931 fifty-cent Popular Official Guide to the New York Zoological Park, by William T. Hornaday.

  14 Demand for animals was strong Arthur de Carle Sowerby, “The Lure of the Giant Panda,” China Journal, May 1938, p. 251.

  15 Adult elephants Vicki Constantine Croke, The Modern Ark: The Story of Zoos: Past, Present, and Future (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1997).

  15 Over the course of his career Ibid.

  15 Since Bill was the obvious Griswold, Tombs, Travel.

  15 “was fortunately furnished” Ibid.

  16 Ruth Harkness wasn't impressed Harkness to Perkins, 27 Aug. 1936. In another letter to Perkins, 17 Oct. 1936, Harkness calls assertions of Griswold's in an article he wrote, or was in, a “pack of lies,” and she wonders what he is doing, “besides being supported by his actress wife.”

  16 a scientific paper the decade before Mark Cheater, “Chasing the Magic Dragon,” National Wildlife Magazine, Aug./Sept. 2003.

  16 “Bill's own invention” Griswold, Tombs, Travel.

  17 “a yearning desire” Harkness, “How I Caught the Rare Giant Panda,” part 1, 14 Feb. 1937.

  17 It was a living mystery National Geographic devoted pages and pages to articles on China from the late 1920s throughout the '30s.

  17 When he noticed George Bishop, Travels in Imperial China: The Intrepid Explorations and Discoveries of Père Armand David (London: Cassell, 1996), pp. 158–59.

  18 He wrote in his diary George Schaller, The Last Panda (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994), p. 135.

  18 “easily the prettiest kind” Morris and Morris, Men and Pandas, pp. 37–46.

  18 “the most challenging animal trophy” Ibid.

  18 “This animal is not common” E. H. Wilson, A Naturalist in Western China, vol. 2 (New York: Doubleday, Page, 1914), p. 183.

  18 Wilson himself never Schaller, Last Panda, p. 46.

  18 There were natural calamities “Tibetan Guides Get Lost on ‘Roof of the World,’” Christian Science Monitor, 11 Jan. 1936, p. 2.

  19 Injured and shocked Schaller, Last Panda, p. 145.

  19 So elusive Journal of the West China Border Research Society 8 (1936).

  19 British military attaché Peter Hopkirk, Trespassers on the Roof of the World: The Secret Exploration of Tibet (Los Angeles: J. P. Tarcher, 1982), p. 231.

  19 J. Huston Edgar Arthur de Carle Sowerby, China Journal, p. 337. Sowerby in Dec. 1936 and May 1938 says the two men were together in 1914. Morris and Morris, Me
n and Pandas, says two separate incidents in 1916. Catton, Pandas, p. 10, says 1916; Catton spells Huston “Houston.”

  19 Spotting something Morris and Morris, Men and Pandas, p. 47.

  19 “Waiting for the Panda” Journal of the West China Border Research Society 8 (1936).

  19 Considering how many people Morris and Morris, Men and Pandas, p. 49.

  19 “like the unicorn” Hallett Abend, “Rare 4-Pound ‘Giant’ Panda to Arrive in New York Soon,” New York Times, 20 Dec. 1936.

  19 sea serpent Robert F. Whitney, “New Road to Riches and Fame: Be First to Catch Giant Panda,” Washington Post, 30 Mar. 1934, p. 10.

  19 By the time Teddy Roosevelt's China Journal, May 1938, p. 252.

  19 returning from a central Asian expedition Roosevelt and Roosevelt, Trailing the Giant Panda; and Karl E. Meyer and Shareen Blair Brysac, Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia (Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint, 1999), p. 492.

  19 Funded by a generous patron “Mrs. Harkness Kidnaps Panda,” San Francisco Examiner, 19 Dec. 1936; New York Times, 20 Dec. 1936, just says “more than $10,000.” See also “Two Live Pandas Captured,” North China Daily News, 7 July 1937.

  20 pine for their own pelts Morris and Morris, Men and Pandas, p. 54.

  20 “the imaginations of the younger generation” China Journal, May 1938, p. 252.

  20 “panda country along the Tibetan” Ibid., Dec. 1936, p. 336. American Brooke Dolan's effort was sponsored by the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. And in May 1931 a young German on his team, Ernst Schaefer, shot a baby giant panda in Weigold's “Wassu-land,” the region around the Qionglai Shan in Western Sichuan. It was the second giant panda to fall to a Western gun.

  20 Nab a giant panda Robert F. Whitney, “New Road to Riches and Fame,” The Washington Post, 30 March, 1934, p. 10.

  20 In a civil service Titusville (Penn.) Herald, 13 Sept. 1934.