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Article: Forget about rubies - she wanted cycads; A former opera singer used her wealth to create a dramatic, one-of-a-kind garden.(FEATURES)(TRAVEL)
- Article from:
- The Christian Science Monitor
- Article date:
- December 3, 2003
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 The Christian Science Publishing Society. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: Jennifer Wolcott Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
MONTECITO, CALIF. -- Some people might sell diamonds or rubies to pay for a mortgage, a child's college tuition, or a spiffy new set of wheels. But rare is the woman who hawks $1 million worth of jewels for a cycad garden.
Ganna Walska was a rare woman indeed. An opera singer in New York and Paris during the1920s, Madame Walska, as she was called, had a collector's eye and acquired such treasures as Chagall paintings, Steuben and Tiffany glass, and those gems. But she was especially passionate about plants, the more exotic the better.
Walskawas married six times, mostly to ...