Marion duPont Scott

Marion duPont Scott (1894 – September 4, 1983) was an American philanthropist, thoroughbred horsebreeder, and the last private owner of Montpelier, the mansion and land estate of former United States President James Madison. At the time of her death, Montpelier was bequeathed to the National Trust for Historic Preservation as a national landmark. As part of its renovation of the property, the National Trust reduced the house from the 55-room structure expanded by the du Pont family to its original 22-room state.

While the Du Pont family usually spell the family name as "du Pont," Marion and her brother, William duPont, Jr., spelled it conjoined.

Biography

She was born in 1894 to William duPont and his second wife, Annie Rogers, the former wife of George Zinn Sr. She had one sibling, William Jr., and a half-brother, George Zinn Jr. She spent her childhood at Binfield, Berkshire, England. She was a great-granddaughter of Eluthere Irenee duPont.^[1]

She was married to:

• Thomas Hugh Somerville (1895 – after 1942?)), an inspector with E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co.^[2] He was a son of Samuel Wilson Somerville of Culpeper, Virginia. They married on 28 December 1925 and divorced in 1935. They had no children.
• Randolph Scott, an American movie actor, who had been best man at her first wedding. They wed in 1936 and divorced in 1939; no children resulted from the marriage.

Montpelier Stable

Marion Scott owned Thoroughbred racehorses that competed under her nom de course, Montpelier Stable, in both Flat racing and Steeplechase. In 1934, she and her brother, William duPont, Jr., founded the Montpelier Steeplechase Hunt Races, which are held at the Montpelier horse racing steeplechase course the first Saturday in November each year. It is a National Steeplechase Association event). The graves and tombstones of three of her racehorses lie off to the left of the Montpelier mansion. Two were sons of Man o' War, Battleship and Annapolis. Battleship is the only horse in history to win both the American Grand National and the English Grand National steeplechase races.

Awards

Scott's horse Mongo was voted the 1963 American Champion Male Turf Horse. Following the creation of the Eclipse Awards in 1971, Mrs. Scott's horse Soothsayer was voted the 1972 American Champion Steeplechase Horse and in 1976 Proud Delta was voted American Champion Older Female Horse. Marion Scott was the recipient of the Thoroughbred Breeders of Kentucky Award in 1973, and in 1981 was voted the National Turf Writers Association Joe Palmer Award for meritorious service and outstanding achievement in racing.

Equine Medical Center

Virginia Tech's Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center in Leesburg, Virginia, was created in 1984 through a gift from Mrs. Scott. The center is a full-service equine hospital that offers advanced specialty care, 24 hour emergency treatment and diagnostic services for all ages and breeds of horses. The hospital sees approximately three thousand patients annually, and employs one hundred twenty equine healthcare professionals.

Legacy

Mrs. Scott's important collection of books and periodicals on the history and practice of equestrian and related sports was donated to the University of Virginia's Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library with an endowment fund to maintain and expand the collection. Her famous 'red room' with decorations and furniture at Montpelier, although removed permanently from the house during restoration, was moved to Montpelier's visitor center where it is open for viewing by the general public. The visitor center also displays several walls of photographs from Mrs. Scott's distinguished Thoroughbred horse racing career. She was married briefly to Hollywood actor Randolph Scott.

References

1. ^ "Marion duPont Scott". Virginia Tech. http://www.vetmed.vt.edu/emc/welcome/mds.asp. Retrieved 2009-08-20. 
2. ^ Employment information cited in 1920 U. S. Federal Census for Orange Country, Virginia, accessed on ancestry.com. The 1930 U. S. Federal Census states that Somerville had no occupation at the time and was living at Montpelier with his wife.

External links

• Profile of Marion duPont Scott at the University of Virginia Library
• Montpelier Hunt Races history
• Profile of Marion duPont Scott at Virginia Tech

Persondata
Name	Scott, Marion Du Pont
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1894
Place of birth
Date of death	September 4, 1983
Place of death