Background
She was born in West Dean, West Sussex as Maxine Birley. She changed her first name to Maxime after her first marriage, to Alain R. Le Bailly de la Falaise, Ecuyer, in 1946. She was known as Maxime de la Falaise McKendry, for a while, after her second marriage to John McKendry, Curator of Prints and Drawings at the Metropolitan Museum.).
Maxine Birley was born into a family of successful artists, businesspeople, and academics. She grew up in Hampstead, and later at Charleston Manor in Sussex. Her father, Sir Oswald Birley, was a celebrated portrait painter known for his portraits of royalty and others. Her mother was Rhoda Vava Mary Lecky Pike of County Carlow, Ireland, a celebrated gardener and successful artist in her own right. Maxine's brother, Mark Birley (1930-2007), became an entrepreneur known for his investments in the hospitality industry.
During the Second World War, she worked as a minor codebreaker at Bletchley Park, before being invalided out after developing kleptomania.
Read more about this topic: Maxime De La Falaise
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“They were more than hostile. In the first place, I was a south Georgian and I was looked upon as a fiscal conservative, and the Atlanta newspapers quite erroneously, because they didn’t know anything about me or my background here in Plains, decided that I was also a racial conservative.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“... every experience in life enriches one’s background and should teach valuable lessons.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“I had many problems in my conduct of the office being contrasted with President Kennedy’s conduct in the office, with my manner of dealing with things and his manner, with my accent and his accent, with my background and his background. He was a great public hero, and anything I did that someone didn’t approve of, they would always feel that President Kennedy wouldn’t have done that.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)