Huntington Hartford II, the eccentric one-time millionaire and toast of the high society set, has died at age 97. Hartford was a larger-than-life figure who was once considered to be one of the world's richest men. However, by the 1970s, much of his fortune had been squandered or lost in ill-fated business deals. He had inherited a fortune as heir to the A&P chain of American grocery stores, but Hartford had aspirations to move in high society with a glitzier crowd than the people involved in the running of grocery chains. He founded a major museum in New York City in 1964, but it was denounced by one critic as resembling “a die-cut Venetian palazzo on lollipopsâ€. Hartford was the person credited with seeing the potential in developing Paradise Island in the Bahamas (when it was known as Hog Island). Ironically, he ended up losing a fortune in an area where seemingly everyone else made millions. Hartford was a resident of the island and during the filming of the James Bond movie Thunderball in 1965, he donated use of his mansion and land as key locations. Among the scenes shot for the film is the sequence in which James Bond emerges from the surf by a concrete jetty and disguises himself as a SPECTRE frogman. (Although Hartford's estate was demolished to make room for The Atlantis resort, this jetty still remains on the property.) In another sequence, the SPECTRE frogmen dive into a canal from a nearby wall. In reality, the canal led to a lagoon on Hartford's estate. (Hartford was not paid for his contributions, but his wife was given a role as an extra in the film.)
Hartford, a restless spirit who could never stay focused on any particular project, was married four times. He was a self-described "Horatio Alger in reverse" who lost several fortunes on dubious ventures such as his Broadway adapatation of Jane Eyre starring Errol Flynn near the end of his career. A critical and box-office disaster, Hartford continued to subsidize the play at great cost just to spite his critics.
For the New York Times obituary of Hartford, click here