Alsop, Susan Mary (d. 2004)
Alsop, Susan Mary (d. 2004)
American political hostess and writer. Name variations: Susan Mary Patten. Born Susan Mary Jay, c. 1918, in Rome; grew up in South America and Europe; died Aug 18, 2004, at her home in Georgetown, Washington, DC; dau. of a diplomat; descendant of John Jay (1st chief justice of US); attended Foxcroft boarding school in Middleburg, VA, and Barnard College; m. William S. "Bill" Patten (member of the Foreign Service), Oct 1939 (died Mar 1960); m. Joseph Alsop (newspaper columnist), 1961 (div. 1973, died 1989); children: (1st m.) Bill Patten and Anne Milliken.
Grand dame of Washington society, dined with presidents and prime ministers, including Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy, and the world's elite; began career giving well-known parties in Paris while 1st husband was an embassy official stationed there (1945–60); wrote Lady Sackville: A Biography (1978), Yankees at the Court: The First Americans in Paris (1982) and The Congress Dances: Vienna 1814–1815 (1984); was a contributing editor to Architectural Digest.
See also her collection of letters to her friend Marietta Tree, To Marietta from Paris: 1945–1960 (1975).