Mary Landon Baker (b. August 15,[1] 1901; died 1961) was a rich American socialite and heiress famous for her romantic life.[2] [3] Newspapers worldwide covered her love life with Allister McCormick, whom she repeatedly left at the altar in the early 1920s.[3]
In 1926 she was briefly engaged to Bojidar Pouritch, who worked as a Yugoslav diplomat; a New York Times correspondent stated their engagement caused, "the greatest excitement since the European war".[4]
Among those she rejected as possible husbands were also an English Lord, a rich Spaniard, and an Irish prince. She reportedly had received 65 marriage proposals by the time she died, but never married.[5] The New York Times reported that the theater actor Barry Baxter died of a heart attack on the day that Baker broke up with him.[6]
Baker was apparently enamoured for most of her life with the British politician and writer Henry "Chips" Channon who refers to her repeatedly in his published diaries.[7]
Baker's parents were Chicago lawyer and financier Alfred L. Baker and Mary Corwith. She had an older sister, Isabelle,[8] whose married name in 1926 was Mrs. Robert M. Curtis[9] and in 1934, Mrs. Isabelle Baker Curtis Welch, and two nieces Isabelle and Priscilla.[10]
Baker lived most of her life in Chicago, and when her father passed away in 1927 she inherited a large inheritance which allowed her to remain single and live on her own, unlike many women at the time who lacked money of their own.