This card first appears in our original British Trade Index part three, where it is described as measuring 142 x 91 m/m and as being a "coloured postcard, 27-8-1926. Rudolph Valentino". And the text is not much different in our updated version, except it oddly says "postcard back", surely the term more usually used for a divided back, which this does not have.
Now this is not a great description for this card, for it omits the most important reason for its issue. And that is a very sad story for on August 23rd 1926, four days before it was issued, Rudolph Valentino had died, aged just 31 years old. So surely some wording as to its being a memoriam card is needed?
There had been Hollywood stars die before, but this was caused a mass outpouring of grief, and several female fans committed suicide because they could not live without him, or maybe because they thought that somehow their souls would intermingle in the after life. Worst of all his death was seen to have been avoidable. He was young, and fit and in good health. But on August 15, 1926, he had collapsed whilst in New York and was taken to hospital. He was found to have gastric ulcers and his appendix was slightly inflamed. He had surgery, almost immediately, and he was told three days later that everything would be fine. However the appendix was not really the problem, and the gastric ulcers were worse than believed. Three days later, on August 21, his lungs started failing due to sepsis and the doctors knew he would not survive - however they chose not to tell him. He was able to chat with his doctors for a couple of days, but then he lapsed into a coma from which he never woke.
He had been married twice, but neither were very successful. And he never had children.
His first wife had been Jean Acker, or more correctly Harriet Acker, though she was also known as Jean Mendoza, She was two years older than him. Her lover, Alla Nazimova, had brought her to Hollywood in 1919, and she met Valentino at a party a few months later. They were instantly friends, and married in November of the same year. However they were only ever friends, there was no romance. He even spent their wedding night locked out of her room. Some even say that the marriage was over from that point on.
Some time later, he met another girl. She had been born Winifred Kimball Shaughnessy but had changed her name when her mother married Edgar de Wolfe, the brother of the famous French designer Elsie de Wolfe. This did not last very long and she married a millionaire perfumier called Richard Hudnut. Strangely Winifred`s mother was also called Winifred, so either to stop any confusion, or because Winifred Hudnut was not a very glamorous name, our Winifred started to call herself Natascha Rambova. She met Valentino in 1921 and they married in 1923. Unfortunately Hollywood retained this strange law that you had to be divorced for a year before you could remarry. It caught out several stars. But technically that meant that when he got married to Natascha Rambova he was still married to Jean Acker. Then she got involved and sued him, not especially over bigamy, but more for the right to continue to be called "Mrs Rudolph Valentino". So he made out he had separated from his new wife and had a second marriage ceremony in May 1922, once the divorce was made legal.
This was again not a romantic marriage, and she openly said that she did not intend to marry him and turn into a housewife, but they were good friends, at least at the start. They divorced in 1925. However they did become friends again towards the end of his life, and she did request that he be buried where she would eventually lie, but this was refused. She died in 1966 - whilst Jean Acker lived until 1978.
Valentino had almost a state funeral, and his body was available for viewing beforehand. Millions passed by, but none of them knew that for fear of souvenir hunters, especially of his body parts, the open coffin contained a wax effigy. After the New York funeral his body was taken to California for a second funeral. However there was no place arranged for it to be buried (despite the offer from his second wife). In the end, June Mathis, who had "discovered" him, written several of his films, become a good friend, and was looked on almost as a mother by Rudolph Valentino, said that he was welcome to use the crypt she had bought for her husband because now they were divorced. This was done, with the intention of moving him when she got remarried. Sadly she died within the year and he was never moved. They still remain together, and I like to imagine that she is still looking after him in a motherly way when it seems that nobody else really cared.
Which is a very sad thing, considering what a hearthrob he was..