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PO Box 7
273 Lakeview Avenue
Valhalla, NY 10595 |
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| AYN RAND & FRANK O'CONNOR |
| To the left of Dorsey, set back beneath a maple tree, are the memorials to Ayn Rand and her husband Frank O'Connor. Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1905 as Alice Rosenbaum. She was a passionate capitalist who hated her country's communist government. After graduating from the University of Petrograd, she accepted an invitation to visit relatives in Chicago and happily left her homeland, never to return. In 1926, the young immigrant changed her name to Ayn Rand, taking her new last name from her Remington Rand typewriter. With several screenplays tucked beneath her arm, she headed to Hollywood. After a series of rejections, Rand finally sold her first story, Red Pawn, to Universal Pictures in 1932. Although the movie was never produced, the sale enabled Rand to quit her job as an extra at the Cecil B. DeMille studios and pursue her writing career full-time. Rand's first novel, We the Living, was published in 1936 followed by Anthem in 1938 and two best-sellers, The Fountainhead in 1943 and Atlas Shrugged in 1957. Rand's books reflected her deep political philosophy of objectivism which embraced the pursuit of self-interest without regard to common good. She promoted her controversial views through lectures and newsletters. When she died in 1982, Rand was laid out in a coffin next to a six-foot dollar sign, her favorite symbol. She is buried beside her husband, Frank O'Connor, an aspiring actor whom she had married during her early years in Hollywood. |
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