Welcome to Litsy!

"One being (I thought) forever denied me, I concentrated all my forces and efforts on the other." But what had been denied--the secret passion that she hid for twenty years for Alfred I. duPont, a family acquaintance--was alive in her fantasies. In 1919, while duPont was still married to his second wife, their infrequent--and proper--correspondence changed into romance. Overnight, she was describing to him the moonlight, a sight that convinced her more than ever that "such a night was never meant for sleep." Their fourteen years of marriage centered around the duPont estates in Delaware and Florida where Jessie, Alfred, and her brother Ed Ball invested in timberland, real estate, banks, and commercial property. After Alfred's death in 1935, Jessie and Ed settled into the loyal, but ambivalent, relationship that prevailed throughout their lives: Ed made money and she found ways to give it away.