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Monday, June 10, 2019
Texas History Minute Texas-sized soap opera. His nine- a year marriage to the mother his three young sons ended in divorce in 1934, at a time when divorce was still considered scandalous. Hilton became notorious for his string of young girlfriends and drinking. In 1942, he married actress Zsa Zsa Gabor. It was Hilton’s second of three marriages. It was the second of nine marriages for Gabor. The marriage was a storm of trouble from the beginning. The marriage produced a daughter, the longtroubled Francesca Hilton, Conrad Hilton was born in what was then the New Mexico Territory Gabor’s only child. The bitter divorce came in 1946. Hilton on Christmas Day, 1887. He was would not marry again for thirty one of eight children. His father years. Gabor alleged years later was a Norwegian immigrant and that Hilton assaulted her during businessman who taught his son the marriage and even had an how to run a business. His father affair with his eldest son. ran a small general store and eventually converted it into a small However, she made these allegations years after both men hotel. had died and were unable to He was very ambitious as a young respond to the charges. man. He briefly attended two small New Mexico colleges. When New In the meantime, his son Nicky Mexico became a state in 1912, he Hilton developed a reputation of his own. He married actress was elected to the first session of Elizabeth Taylor in 1950, but the the new state’s House of Representatives. He served in the marriage collapsed within a matter of months. His drinking army during World War I and and gambling destroyed his returned determined to be a successful banker, seeking a small marriages and his health before bank to buy outright. He located a his death in 1969. bank in Cisco, Texas, not far from Hilton moved onward and bought Abilene. The bank purchase fell through, so Hilton bought the local the Stevens Hotel in Chicago at hotel instead. With oilfield workers the end of World War II, then the streaming into the small town, the largest hotel in the world. He hotel was an overwhelming success. created the Hilton Hotels Corporation in 1946 as a holding Hilton started buying more hotels. company for his properties. In 1949, he bought New York’s By 1924, he built a new hotel in famed Waldorf Astoria Hotel, a Dallas, the fourteen-story Dallas hotel that had long since become a Hilton, which he completed for landmark and become more than $1.3 million (or $19.4 million in 2019 dollars). In Dallas, synonymous with luxury. By this point, his holdings were worth an he also settled down and married Mary Barron, with whom he would estimated $100 million (more than $1.06 billion in 2019 dollars). have three sons. He continued to “Successful men keep moving,” expand, building new hotels in Abilene and Waco in the late 1920s. he said in an interview. “They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” However, the road to success was not smooth. In 1929, Hilton built By the 1950s, he brought his son his next hotel, the San Angelo Hilton. It was built at a cost of $1 Barron on board as vicemillion (nearly $15 million in 2019 president. The father-son team managed to keep expanding the dollars). However, the stock Hilton Hotel chain around the market crash and the onset of the Great Depression caused business globe. By 1955, they guaranteed that each room would have its travel to evaporate, and the hotel own air conditioning, an unheardalmost became a victim of the of luxury at the time. In the midst Depression. of his rise, he established the Conrad Hilton Foundation, Hilton had taken out a loan for dedicated to alleviating suffering $385,000 from American Life Insurance Company of Galveston. around the world. When Hilton was unable to pay the mortgage, the company foreclosed Hilton died in 1979 at age 91 and and forced Hilton into a partnership was buried in Dallas. Even in with them. The shotgun marriage death, one more scandal erupted dissolved by 1934 amidst a series of surrounding his will. Though son lawsuits, and he lost the hotel. The Barron had been left in charge of experience nearly ruined Hilton just the company, he did not receive as his hotel empire was beginning. any money. He sued and His former partners later renamed it eventually was given a large amount of stock in the hotel the Cactus Hotel and ran it for chain. Years later, he announced another thirty years before it was he would be leaving the bulk of donated to a local hospital and his fortune to the Hilton converted to a nursing home. Hilton rebounded and kept adding Foundation, much as his father had done. Today, Hilton properties. Worldwide Holdings boasts 5,500 properties in 109 countries and is In spite of Hilton's success in the hotel business, his private life was a worth $14 billion. Texas has been known for producing colorful, larger-than-life business figures. That has been found in a variety of industries. Dr. Ken Perhaps one of the Bridges most unusual was hotel magnate Conrad Hilton, whose multi-billion dollar hotel chain began in Texas by accident.
Dr. Bridges is a Texas native, writer, and history professor. He
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