Peggy Hopkins Joyce

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

Peggy Hopkins Joyce was born Marguerite Upton in 1893 in Berkley, Virginia. She left home at age 15 with a vaudeville bicyclist, but en route to Denver met millionaire Everett Archer Jr., whom she married in 1910. Archer had the marriage annulled after six months when he discovered Joyce was underage. Using the settlement money, she attended the private Chevy Chase School for Girls in Washington D.C., where she met lawyer Sherburne Hopkins. They married on September 1, 1913. Joyce left Hopkins in 1917 to pursue show business in New York City, and they divorced in January 1920. Joyce made her Broadway debut in 1917 in the Ziegfeld Follies, followed by an appearance in the Shuberts' A Sleepless Night. In 1920 she married millionaire lumberman J. Stanley Joyce, taking his name, and drew attention for a $1 million shopping spree over a week. By 1922, her romantic escapades made her one of the most written-about women in the American press. She granted any interview, sometimes receiving reporters in her bedroom while wearing a sheer negligee, sans undergarments. Cole Porter and Irving Berlin used her name in lyrics, The New Yorker ran cartoons mentioning her, and comedians like Will Rogers, Eddie Cantor and Frank Fay could get a laugh by invoking her reputation. She appeared in the 1923 installment of Earl Carroll's Vanities and the film The Skyrocket (1926), which provoked the Wisconsin state legislature into introducing a bill to allow censorship of all movies entering the state. In 1930 she published a ghostwritten book, Men, Marriage and Me. She owned the Portuguese Diamond, one of the most expensive in the world, which she sold to Harry Winston; it is displayed at the Smithsonian Institution. Joyce married six times and claimed to be engaged around fifty times. Her third husband, J. Stanley Joyce, gave her a reported $1.4 million in jewelry during their marriage; she was awarded $600,000 in their 1921 divorce settlement, plus all jewelry and stock providing $1,500 monthly for life. She later had affairs with wealthy men including W. Averell Harriman, Prince Christopher of Greece and Denmark, Charlie Chaplin (who based part of A Woman of Paris on stories she told him), and Irving Thalberg. In 1922, her affair with Chilean attaché Guillermo Errázuriz ended when he shot himself in her Paris hotel room and died the following day. She married Swedish Count Gösta Mörner on June 3, 1924, but left him by the end of July 1924; they divorced in February 1926. She married for the fifth time on December 3, 1945, to consulting engineer Anthony Easton, refusing to include the word 'obey' in the vows. In 1953 she married for the sixth and final time to Andrew C. Meyer, a retired bank teller. She died of throat cancer on June 12, 1957, and is buried at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, New York.

Reader's Guide

Peggy Hopkins Joyce's significance lies in her role as a precursor to modern celebrity culture, leveraging scandal and personal drama for public attention. Her six marriages, numerous affairs, and lavish spending made her a staple of American press in the 1920s and 1930s, referenced by comedians like Will Rogers and lyricists like Cole Porter. Her life exemplified the intersection of wealth, show business, and notoriety, influencing how public figures managed their images. The Wisconsin censorship bill prompted by her film The Skyrocket highlights her impact on media regulation. Her ownership of the Portuguese Diamond and her ghostwritten book Men, Marriage and Me further cemented her legacy as a symbol of excess and independence. Despite claims of illiteracy by Harpo Marx, she was credited with writing a gossip column in the early 1930s for the New York publication Varieties. Her legacy endures as a study in the power of personal branding before the modern era.

Did You Know?

• Joyce's third husband, J. Stanley Joyce, gave her a reported $1.4 million in jewelry during their marriage; she was awarded $600,000 in their 1921 divorce settlement.
• In 1922, her affair with Chilean attaché Guillermo Errázuriz ended when he shot himself in her Paris hotel room and died the following day.
• She owned the Portuguese Diamond, one of the most expensive in the world, which she later sold to Harry Winston; it is now displayed at the Smithsonian Institution.
• Harpo Marx claimed Joyce was illiterate, but she was credited with writing a gossip column in the early 1930s for the New York publication Varieties.
• Joyce's 1926 film The Skyrocket provoked the Wisconsin state legislature into introducing a bill to allow censorship of all movies entering the state.