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Jeanne-Marie’s Triumph (1922) by Clara E. Laughlin ⭐⭐
Jeanne-Marie’s Triumph was published by Fleming H. Revell Company. There are no inscriptions in my copy of this book, but it was dedicated by the author “To Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones, Ever-Living, Who Gave His Utmost.” In researching this name, I learned that he had died the year that this book was published. I could not find his relation to Clara, so I assume he was a colleague and friend in her high social circle.
There is so much to be learned about the man to whom Ms. Laughlin dedicated her book. He came from a family with a high social status, and he was a prominent figure in the War Risk insurance industry. He and his family were mentioned many times in the newspapers as a result of their fame. Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones was born on October 8th, 1884. He had a twin brother named Roynan, and four other brothers. His father was Edward Cholmeley-Jones and his mother was Almirea (or Elmira and shortened to Myra) Gambault, who died in September 1886 when Richard was not yet two years old. His uncle was Richard Watson Gilder (poet and editor), and his aunt was Jeanette L. Gilder (a famous literary critic).
Mr. Cholmeley Jones began his lifelong insurance career with Mutual, but soon became business manager of the monthly journal Review of Reviews. He was a Lieutenant Colonel in the army and helped organize War Risk insurance in France, but was honorably discharged due to a heart condition. He subsequently secured the job of Director of the Bureau of War Risk Insurance on May 19, 1919. In 1921 he switched jobs to become the Vice President of the Finance and Trading Corporation of New York. In addition, Cholmeley Jones wrote a book called School-day Philosophy, which was published in 1917.
Due to his heart disease, Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones died on February 21, 1922 at the Presbyterian Hospital in New York. He was 38.
As for the author of this book, Clara E. Laughlin (August 3, 1873 – March 3, 1941) wrote over 35 books ranging from biographies to novels to travelogues. She had a famous travel book series called So You’re Going To…, and she even hosted her own travelogue series that aired on Chicago radio. She also founded Clara Laughlin Travel Services, which had agencies in Chicago, New York, Paris, and London.
One of her books, The Penny Philanthropist (1912), was adapted into a film in 1917 starring Peggy O’Neill and Ralph Morgan.
Now let’s talk about today’s book!
Jeanne Marie’s father is a successful souvenir shop owner in Paris, and, as the youngest, she has grown up very close to him, learning the trade and becoming best friends with him. The family is very happy until the father makes a bad investment and they lose their money. Jeanne-Marie has lost her dot as they keep calling it (I had an idea as to what it meant, but I looked it up to confirm, and, yes, this means she has lost her dowry). After a time, they reopened the shop. Soon, her father was called to the Great War. He was killed at the battle of Verdun in France.
All this time she had been running the little souvenir shop that her father so loved. After the war was over, Jeanne-Marie had really started to notice a downward change in her people. With every person who was come to her stall, she would try to spread positivity, light, and patriotism, and everyone would leave feeling inspired.
Her boyfriend, Lucien, begs her to go to a meeting that he’d been attending lately, and finally she relents. It is a lecture preaching radical anti-patriotic values, and she notices a German man that she and her mother had known before the war. He had changed his name and was now claiming to be French. This is when she causes a scene and calls him out as an impostor, and the whole party who is giving the lecture is arrested, and Lucien amongst them.
Lucien has no clue that these ideas are blasphemous to the French community, and is confused and angry at Jeanne-Marie (who speaks at his trial and subsequently gets him out of jail) and swears he never wants to see her again.
This whole situation really gets Jeanne-Marie on a crusade for conservatism, and she becomes a sort of private mentor for many people. One night, she is lured into a least-populated area to speak to a widow about her sad situation. Under cover of this ruse, the woman performs an attempt on Jeanne-Marie’s life by stabbing. The woman gets away.
Upon hearing of Jeanne-Marie in the hospital, Lucien has meanwhile come to his senses and realizes that his ‘allies’ are his enemies. He then goes underground as if nothing has ever happened, hob-knobbing with his old friends in order to find the culprit of the heinous act. Of course, this is successful, and they ‘get their man’, so to speak.
Jeanne-Marie recovers after a long time in the hospital, and everything looks bright. This is her triumph. The end.
At first, Jeanne-Marie’s Triumph was lost on me. It took quite a while for me to recognize the point of the book, as very much of it reads as if she is laying the grounds for a story the whole time. Since I was distracted by waiting for the story to start, I almost missed the point entirely. When I finally got it, everything fell into place. I just felt like it took too long to get to the action. That whole dramatic part that I just described happened at basically the end of the book. It is basically a manifesto against anti-patriotism and radical reform hidden under a neat little blanket of fictional cardboard characters. I feel like Jeanne-Marie is a symbol instead of an actual person; she is a Jane Everybody character with the power to cultivate peace in a world of turmoil.
Early on, when they talked about the end of the war and the Tomb of the Unknown soldier at Arc de Triomphe, it put something in perspective for me. Yes, it was put there to symbolize all the fallen soldiers of the war, but Jeanne-Marie believes with her whole heart that it was her father who lay there in that tomb. I’m sure that there were real people who felt that, too, in their own heart, that it was their own loved one. How very sad and sobering a thought!
I’m giving Jeanne-Marie’s Triumph two stars. It was tough to plow through, because it was written quite dryly. It could have been my approach to the book that made me feel that way, but it is what it is.
Sources:
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83020847/1886-09-10/ed-1/seq-8 Springfield Weekly Republican September 10, 1886, Page 8, Image 8 (Richard Gilder Cholmeley Jones’ mother’s obituary is on bottom right in this image)
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045211/1918-12-19/ed-1/seq-3 Evening Public Ledger December 19, 1918, Image 3 (Under FOUR SONS AT FRONT it states the names of all Richard Cholmeley-Jones’ brothers’ names.)
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030214/1922-02-22/ed-1/seq-15 New-York tribune February 22, 1922, Page 15, Image 15 (Here you can see Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones’ obituary under Deaths/Cholmeley-Jones.)
https://digital.janeaddams.ramapo.edu/items/show/6213 A Picture of Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones and a brief description of his work history
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-new-york-times/6611740 Richard Gilder Cholmeley-Jones’ in depth New York Times obituary
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_E._Laughlin
