Claire Adams

Beryl Vere Nassau Adams was born on 24 September 1898, in Winnipeg, Manitoba,[1] the daughter of Stanley Wells Adams, a Welsh-born accountant, and his Canadian wife, Lillian Adams (née Kennedy).[2] Educated in Canada and England,[1] her parents divorced when Adams was a child, but the family was reunited two decades later when Adams and her mother went to live with Adams' father and her stepmother.[2]

Adams worked briefly as a nurse with the Red Cross during World War I. The Salina Evening Journal reported 25 December 1920 that: "During the war she became a nurse in a Detroit hospital, training for the Red Cross, but at the end of a year her health was broken down and she was sent home."[3]

In 1920, Adams signed a five-year contract with Benjamin Bowles Hampton, a Hollywood producer and her future husband. She later moved to California where she acted in more than 40 silent films, including melodramas, comedies and westerns.

Described as "patricianly beautiful," Adams worked with many of Hollywood's leading actors, including Adolphe Menjou, Tom Mix, Wallace Beery, and Lon Chaney. In 1923 she was Rin Tin Tin's leading lady in Where the North Begins, which was a huge success and is often credited with saving Warner Bros. from bankruptcy. She later maintained that Rin Tin Tin was her "favourite leading man".[4]

Her best-known film was The Big Parade, the second-highest-grossing silent film in cinematic history. It was directed by King Vidor, and Adams had a major role, alongside John Gilbert and Renée Adorée. Perhaps her most memorable role was in the 1920 film The Penalty, in which she played Barbara, the artist who helps humanise the crippled crime boss played by Lon Chaney .

Adams married Hampton, 21 years her senior, in Hollywood on 18 September 1924. They had no children. He died in 1932 leaving her very wealthy. In 1937, Adams met Donald John Scobie Mackinnon (always known as Scobie), the second son of wealthy Australian newspaper manager, grazier and racehorse owner, Lauchlan ("L.K.S.") Mackinnon, at a party in London, and three weeks later, on 1 April, they married in Mayfair.[5]

After a protracted honeymoon, Mackinnon brought Adams to Victoria, Australia in March 1938. The couple divided their time between Mooramong, their Western District grazing property, and their Melbourne townhouse at 220 Domain Road South Yarra. They entertained often at Mooramong, which they transformed from a staid Victorian homestead into a Jazz Age showpiece. On their frequent trips to Melbourne to attend the races and innumerable cocktail parties, they travelled in their Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost. Adorned in smart hats and chic outfits, and often graced with diamonds, Adams was an exotic figure at Government House functions and at the racecourse.[5]

On his death in 1974, Scobie Mackinnon's estate, worth A$2,111,729, was left entirely to Adams. The marriage was childless.[5]

Adams died on 25 September 1978, in Windsor, Victoria, aged 80, and was cremated.[1] After generous bequests to family, friends, and animal welfare bodies, she left the remainder of her estate to the National Trust of Victoria for the creation of a wildlife sanctuary and fauna and flora park at Mooramong.[5]

She was a life governor of Skipton Hospital and vice president of Lort Smith Hospital for sick animals.

• Photoplay Dec,1924
• Film Index, No 3, 1970, p. 12
• Social History Report on Morramong, Skipton by D. Hellier (1989). National Trust of Australia, Victoria branch.