Sigourney Thayer

Sigourney Thayer (March 24, 1896 – November 2, 1944) was an American theatrical producer, World War I aviator, and poet.

Thayer was born in Southborough, Massachusetts, the son of Rev. William Greenough Thayer, headmaster of St. Mark's School from 1894–1930, and Violet Otis. He was the brother of Robert H. Thayer, a lawyer, naval officer and diplomat.

Thayer enlisted in June 1916 and first served on the American-Mexican border. He became a 1st Lieutenant and pilot in the 1st Operations Group, and afterwards graduated from Amherst College in 1918. He wrote regular poetry for the Atlantic Monthly, and his poem, "The Dead" has appeared in numerous World War I anthologies.

In later life, Thayer became an executive at Vultee Aircraft. He died in 1944 in an automobile accident in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and is buried at Southborough Rural Cemetery, Southborough, Massachusetts.

Theatrical producer

Personal life

In December 1928, he married Emily O'Neill Davies Vanderbilt of Manhattan (who had divorced William Henry Vanderbilt III earlier the same year). Their marriage lasted less than a year. After her divorce from Thayer in 1929, she married writer Raoul Whitfield (1896-1945) on July 19, 1933, filed for divorce in February 1935, and killed herself at the Dead Horse Ranch near Las Vegas, New Mexico, on May 24, 1935.

In April 1931, Thayer married Mary "Molly" Van Rensselaer Cogswell (June 16, 1902 – December 12, 1983), daughter of Cullen Van Rensselaer Cogswell, a Manhattan socialite, and great granddaughter of General John Cullen Van Rensselaer. She was a society columnist for the New York Journal, and wrote under the house pseudonym "Madame Flutterby", covering the Lindbergh kidnapping. She wrote the first biography of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, published by Doubleday in 1961.

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