On a November morning in 1958, a postman in Washington, D.C. delivered a plain brown package to the Smithsonian Institution. The postage was $145.29. Inside, wrapped in paper, was the most famous blue diamond in the world.
The sender was Harry Winston, the New York jeweler who had owned it for nearly a decade. He trusted the United States Postal Service with a stone that had outlived a king, crossed an ocean and gathered a legend as deep as its color.
A king’s blue
The story begins in the seventeenth century with Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, a French gem merchant who brought a large, rough-cut blue diamond back from India. In 1668 he sold it to Louis XIV. The Sun King had it recut into a dazzling stone that became known as the French Blue, and it passed down through the royal treasury.
Then came the Revolution. In 1792, the Crown Jewels were taken from the royal storehouse in Paris. The French Blue vanished.
It outlived a king, crossed an ocean, and ended its journey in the mail.
A new name in London
Two decades later, a deep blue diamond surfaced in London, smaller than the French Blue and cut in a new shape. Most historians now agree it was the same stone, recut to hide its past. It came into the collection of the Hope banking family, and it has carried their name ever since.
The legend, and the woman who wore it anyway
By the early twentieth century, the Hope had a reputation. Sellers and newspapers spun tales of misfortune following its owners, and the legend of ill fortune proved irresistible. In 1911, Pierre Cartier sold it to the Washington heiress Evalyn Walsh McLean, reportedly leaning on the legend as part of his pitch.
McLean wore it constantly, at parties, at home, sometimes even on her dog’s collar. Her life held real tragedies, and they only fed the myth. After her death, Harry Winston bought her entire jewelry collection in 1949, Hope Diamond included, and spent years showing it to the public before sending it to the Smithsonian.
A stone that glows
Today the Hope weighs 45.52 carats. Its blue comes from traces of boron in the crystal, which makes it a rare Type IIb diamond. And it holds one more secret: under ultraviolet light, it glows a fiery red-orange for several seconds after the light is switched off.
It remains one of the most visited objects at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. A king’s treasure, a vanished jewel, a socialite’s talisman and, finally, a gift to the public, delivered by the mail.
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