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1 of 1- Richard Baker
- Super Fan
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- From: Kenilworth, Warwickshire, Engl
- Registered: 20/11/2010
- Posts: 1,542
Bing Crosby's Estate is worth crooning over
Bing's former home at Rancho Mirage is up for sale.
Report here
This seems to be the one in which President John F. Kennedy stayed, to the annoyance of Frank Sinatra. Malcolm Macfarlane, in his ''Day By Day'' has this to say under 1962 -
''March 23/25, Friday–Sunday. President Kennedy stays at Bing’s Palm Desert home for the weekend, and it is possible that Kennedy has an assignation with Marilyn Monroe while there. Frank Sinatra is very upset at the president’s decision not to stay at Sinatra’s home in Palm Springs.
I made a few calls, but in the end it was Chris Dunphy, a big Republican from Florida, who arranged everything at Bing Crosby’s house for him. The Secret Service stayed next door at Jimmy Van Heusen’s, and Frank didn’t speak to him for weeks over that one, but I was the one who really took the brunt of it. He felt that I was responsible for setting Jack up to stay at Bing’s—Bing Crosby, of all people—the other singer and a Republican to boot. Well, Frank never forgave me. He cut me off like that—just like that!
(Peter Lawford, as quoted in Kitty Kelley’s book His Way, page 329)
- Malcolm Macfarlane
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- From: Wilmslow, Cheshire, UK
- Registered: 22/11/2010
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Re: Bing Crosby's Estate is worth crooning over
It's not the one that JFK stayed in. It's an earlier house Bing owned.
- Richard Baker
- Super Fan
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- From: Kenilworth, Warwickshire, Engl
- Registered: 20/11/2010
- Posts: 1,542
Re: Bing Crosby's Estate is worth crooning over
So, unless the NBC report has got it wrong, the only possible explanation for the report seems to be that JFK stayed both at the Palm Desert property (while Bing Owned it) and at the Rancho Mirage address (when he didn't).
So both properties have the links to both Bing and JFK, but this is not the one that got Frank so peevish.
- •
Thread Starter- Malcolm Macfarlane
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- From: Wilmslow, Cheshire, UK
- Registered: 22/11/2010
- Posts: 865
Re: Bing Crosby's Estate is worth crooning over
The NBC report is wrong about JFK staying there. NBC says "Crosby only lived at the Rancho Mirage home for a few years, before he had another home built in nearby Palm Desert.". The Palm Desert house was built in 1957, long before JFK visited Bing.
Last edited by Malcolm Macfarlane (06/12/2012 6:52 am)