Thomas Franklyn Manville Jr. (April 9, 1894 – October 8, 1967) was an American socialite and heir to the Johns-Manville asbestos fortune. He was a celebrity in mid 20th-century Manhattan due to both his inherited wealth and his record-breaking 13 marriages to 11 women, which won him an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records. The termination of his marriages usually resulted in gossip, widespread publicity, and huge cash settlements.
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Early life and first wives
Born April 9, 1894, Thomas Franklyn Manville Jr. was the son and namesake of the founder and chairman of the Johns-Manville Corporation. His grandfather was Charles B. Manville. Manville stated that he and his father did not get along and that his father repeatedly disinherited him. However, Manville’s father always relented, and Manville received an inheritance after his father’s death. Among other accomplishments, his father became a director of Consolidated National Bank in 1904.
Determined to wed due to marital conditions in his trust, Manville was 17 years old in 1911 when he met Florence Huber (sometimes given as Hubert), a chorus girl, under a Broadway marquee. They were married five days later. Manville's father, who was traveling from Europe to the United States, said he would have the match annulled when he reached New York. Manville arranged a second wedding ceremony in New Jersey, tried to have another in Maryland, and said that he would, if necessary, remarry his bride in most of the then-46 states. When his father shut the family treasury against him, Manville took a $15-a-week job in the family's Pittsburgh factory in order to get by. Florence left him in 1917 after his repeated adultery, and their divorce was finalized in New York on April 25, 1922. In 1930 Florence, having divorced Robert P. Reid in 1926, sued Manville for $45,000 in unpaid settlement. She alleged that her husband and his father had agreed to pay her $15,000 per year to live apart from her husband. She dropped the suit in 1931.