Gary interviewed for two podcasts
OKLAHOMA CITY — For two decades, Oklahoma’s most enigmatic figure wrote letters to a Philadelphia-area childhood confidante. The 50 little-known letters were purchased 20 years ago and have been archived at the University of Oklahoma’s Western History Collection.
In the Roaring Twenties, Lydie Marland was one of the world’s most talked about women. As a teenager from the Philadelphia suburb of Flourtown, she was adopted in 1916 by a childless aunt, Virginia, and her husband, the world’s most successful independent oilman of the Roaring Twenties.
However, Virginia died (probably of cancer) in 1926; less than two years later E.W. stunned the world by proposing to his adopted daughter. Their marriage details were featured in the international press, in the same fashion as Woody Allen and Soon-Yi Previn.
Gary Robert Pinnell was interviewed about the Marland Mansion by Rachel Hopkin for KGOU, and How Curious was podcast three weeks ago. Two weeks ago, Don McCauley interviewed the author about his ebook for a national podcast, The Authors Show, about Lydie Marland’s Letters to Grace Murray 1926 to 1945: Marriage, Infidelity, Poverty and Caring for an Ill Husband. Pinnell’s podcast with The Authors Show will be available October 22 on Channel 7 at https://wnbnetworkwest.com/.
Listen to the KGOU How Curious podcast:
Listen to The Authors Show:
The ebook was published in February. Both Lydie Marland’s Letters and Pinnell’s fictional autobiography, To Daddy Who I Never Loved, are available on Amazon. Pinnell is currently finishing a third manuscript, Lydie Marland: An Adopted Daughter’s Marriage to Her Oil Tycoon Father, and Their Mad Decisions in the Roaring Twenties..
In Lydie Marland’s Letters to Grace Murray 1926 to 1945: Marriage, Infidelity, Poverty and Caring for an Ill Husband, Lydie reveals her discontent with being Oklahoma’s tenth first lady (1935 to 1939), robbing piggy banks, hocking jewelry, and moving in 1931 from the Marland Mansion to the artist cottage. The Marland Mansion cost twenty-five-hundred dollars to operate every month. After three years in the $5.5-million-dollar mansion, E.W. couldn’t pay the electric bill for 861 light bulbs.
Most revealing, however, was a 1931 letter in which Lydie wrote: “The less I say about my arrival here the better – except my husband won’t live with me as a wife any more & thinks I had numerous men while away. Does it pay to play straight? My heart beats so fast – even milk gives me indigestion – but mums the word. I love him and admire him, but can I live with him & survive? Sorry to bother you with this painful subject. . .”
Notice Lydie did not deny E.W.’s accusation.
Lydie Marland’s Letters to Grace Murray 1926 to 1945: Marriage, Infidelity, Poverty and Caring for an Ill Husband published photographs of Lydie’s letters, along with their postmarked envelopes. The author also pointed out facts relevant to Lydie’s subjects, like her bouts with melancholy and other mental illnesses, the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, and Governor Marland’s struggles with the Legislature in passing bills that created the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, old age pension, and homestead exemption.