Growing up getty, p.21
Growing Up Getty, page 21
Together, the business and its nonprofit arm have provided a model in Africa for how to restore abused lands, and how to run wildlife and community projects side by side.
“If you want to take care of the wildlife, you have to take care of the people,” said Tara. “There’s no point in preserving rhinos if you don’t care for the people who surround them. There’ll be poaching and all sorts of problems. But if there’s harmony and employment, and people can see the benefit of game to them, they’ll protect it.”
The Phinda Private Game Reserve—&Beyond’s flagship property—employs some eighty full-time field rangers, as well as an arsenal of advanced technology, including artificial intelligence and big data. It’s a smart camp: drones conduct twenty-four-hour surveillance over the reserve’s acreage, picking up signals from ultrahigh-frequency ear tags that have been attached to the creatures. By tracking them in real time, the reserve hopes to keep them safe from poachers.
Protecting the reserve’s crashes of extremely rare black rhinos is particularly challenging. Thanks to a seemingly insatiable black market for rhino horn, poaching of these animals has risen exponentially. The species is nearly decimated. But at Phinda, their numbers have actually been on the increase. A program to dehorn the animals has largely stopped the poaching. Dehorning a black rhino is a major production, involving helicopters and an array of vets, experts, rangers, and immobilizing drugs. The horns grow back every two to two and a half years, so these missions operate frequently.
* * *
Since ancient times, the bluebird has been a symbol of happiness, a reminder that joy is often just under our noses—but it can flutter away when one tries to grasp it.
One day in March 2004, Tara received a phone call letting him know that a bluebird of sorts was available, though half the world away. From the bushveld of KwaZulu-Natal, he scrambled to get on a plane. After landing in Amsterdam, he drove straight to a small Dutch port, where the object of his quest came into view.
“Blue Bird was in a very bad way and it was apparent that she was near the end of her days, but underneath the rust and ungainly add-ons one could make out the unmistakably sweet lines of a true classic. Clearly, she needed someone to rescue her,” Tara recalled afterward in a book he commissioned, Blue Bird: Seven Decades at Sea.
This once-magnificent one-hundred-foot motor yacht had been launched in 1938 by Sir Malcolm Campbell, a British racing hero known as “the fastest man on earth.” He had it built for a specific purpose—a voyage to Cocos, a remote, minuscule Pacific Island, where he hoped to dig up a legendary hoard of gold stolen in 1820 by pirates in Peru, which was the template for Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island. War thwarted Campbell’s plans. Requisitioned by the Admiralty, Blue Bird instead performed valiant service for king and country, most notably as one of the Little Ships that chugged from Southeast England in 1940 to evacuate soldiers trapped in Dunkirk—the “miracle of deliverance” without which Hitler would have surely prevailed.
She was considerably worse for wear when Campbell, himself in failing health, got her back after the war. He died in 1948, before he could undertake his intended voyage. Over the next decades, Blue Bird passed between various owners, under new names—Sterope, Janick, and then Rescator. In the 1980s, dilapidation set in, along with unpaid bills. By court order, she was chained to a quay on the Riviera, leading to a fire sale. When the US consul in Nice sealed the transfer of ownership to an American purchaser, a California trucking executive, perhaps titleship of the vessel seemed murky; in any event, the consul’s document stated that the vessel “is henceforth to be known as Blue Bird.”
By the time she ended up in the Dutch boatyard, she was on the verge of being sold for scrap. Tara Getty bought her on the spot. “I always liked older things. I quite like restoring things versus building from scratch,” he explained. “That probably comes from my father, who was a great collector and also a restorer in his own way.” (“It’s a big driver for Tara,” said Jessica of his urge to restore. “It’s a strong thread in our lives, whether it’s boats, houses, or land.”)
When Tara bought Blue Bird, he was not lacking for nautical equipment. Getty had a collection of smaller motor- and sailboats, in addition to Talitha, which he and Mark, along with their siblings, inherited (when they did, they streamlined her name—dropping the G). Their sisters later opted to allocate their shares in the vessel to their brothers. But members of the entire family continue to pile aboard Talitha as she plies the seas—the Mediterranean and Caribbean, most commonly.
Gorgeous as the superyacht is, sometimes big is not better. Making it into some of the family’s favorite bays was often a struggle. Tara wanted something that would suit his young family. Blue Bird was just right: a pocket superyacht.
The dream team that he assembled to restore her included the storied Scottish firm that built her, G. L. Watson, which was still in possession of the Blue Bird’s original plans. For the interiors, he went to Dickie Bannenberg, who’d taken over the family firm when his father died in 2002, a year before Sir Paul Getty. (In September 2003, Tara read the lesson at the bravura memorial mass for his father at Westminster Cathedral.)
Another Getty-Bannenberg collaboration was gratifying for both sons. “I’m sure this was in the back of Tara’s mind when he came to us as a continuation,” Dickie commented.
Bannenberg Senior had often been asked to name his favorite boat. His stock answer was always “the next one.” His true favorite was Talitha G: “She was the benchmark in the family for a classic yacht,” said Dickie.
Yet with Blue Bird, there were “different vibes,” the designer added. “She carried a 1930s DNA… but it was all underpinned by a contemporary level of detailing.… It’s a combination of things… for a young family with three kids, in that barefoot, easy-living way, but at the same time looking tailored, crisp, and rich in detail. It’s a magnetic combination.”
The saloon is outfitted with walnut paneling that reflects the ship’s original interiors, while white-painted paneling strikes a modern note. On a table, there is a framed print of Lichfield’s seminal 1969 portrait of Tara’s parents in Marrakech. “It’s a beautiful picture, and it sort of represents the wild sixties,” Tara said of it.
The décor, however, was a breeze compared to the challenges of giving her a totally new superstructure from the main deck up, incorporating the latest engineering and technology into a 1930s vessel of this size, and, furthermore, meeting the exacting standards required for class certification by Lloyd’s. Nobody had managed a similar feat before; Blue Bird pulled it off.
After more than three years of painstaking labor, Tara’s new boat was christened amid much fanfare from family and friends in Saint-Tropez on May 30, 2007, his thirty-ninth birthday.
Tara and Jessica, whose third child, Talitha Leonora Pol, was born in 2008, spend some of the warm months in Ramatuelle in Tara’s childhood house. “I consider myself very lucky that I came from here.… It’s an amazing place to be brought up,” he said.
They also pass time in England, where Tara, an Irish passport holder (as are several of his cousins), owns an estate adjacent to Wormsley. Their schedule is often dictated by the yachting calendar. In May 2010, Blue Bird joined some fifty of the other surviving Little Ships for the crossing from Ramsgate to Dunkirk, in commemoration of the seventieth anniversary of Operation Dynamo. Prince Michael of Kent, who was a passenger aboard Blue Bird with Tara and a group of friends, reflected on this unique flotilla in the foreword he wrote for Blue Bird: “Enemy action, obscurity, and even the relentless march of time have failed to dim their light. They all have stories to tell, but not many bring us such a varied and dramatic tale as Blue Bird.” His Royal Highness also commended the quality of the boat’s restoration: “Tara Getty and his team have brooked no compromise.”
In 2011, Getty, now with a short, sea captain–worthy beard, took possession, following an eight-year-long restoration, of Skylark, a deliriously beautiful fifty-three-foot inboard yawl designed in 1937 by the storied Newport, Rhode Island, naval architects Sparkman & Stephens and built in Wiscasset, Maine.
He takes part in about eight regattas a year, including the two most elegant: the Corsica Classic and Les Voiles de Saint-Tropez. “The best part is when you’re out at sea racing a steady ten knots on a beam reach with all sails set,” he said.
When the magnificently restored Skylark made her debut in Mediterranean waters, at the 2011 Les Voiles, Getty hatched the idea to sponsor a new perpetual cup on the Thursday, a day that had traditionally been without an official race. Filling the void, he announced a challenge between Skylark and any one boat brave enough to race her. “Let’s call it the Blue Bird Cup,” he said. “Let’s just have a fun day with a race and lunch.”
Tara got his lunch handed to him that inaugural matchup. While Skylark led most of the way around the course, actor Griff Rhys Jones, in his Sparkman & Stephens yacht Argyll, picked his shifts well as breezes turned fickle. Overtaking Getty, Jones thus took possession of the silver Blue Bird Cup (made by Garrard of London in 1937 and presented to Malcolm Campbell).
The following year, Tara triumphed. After getting off to a commanding lead, Skylark sailed well ahead for the entire race, even with seven-year-old Caspar helming for a time. With every passing year (except for becalmed 2020), the Blue Bird Cup has gained momentum and cachet. “It’s supercompetitive. Dog-eat-dog. Brutal. And everybody wants to be in it,” said Jessica.
Tara also belongs to Pugs, self-described (by its founder, Taki Theodoracopulos) as “the most exclusive club in the world.” There is no clubhouse or rulebook per se, just the proviso that no more than twenty-one gentlemen can belong. Owning a big boat seems to be prerequisite too.
Tara was elected to its ranks in 2014, joining Mark Getty; the maharaja of Jodhpur; Heinrich, Prince of Fürstenberg; Greek shipowner George Livanos; Sir Bob Geldof; Roger Taylor (the drummer of Queen); Crown Prince Pavlos of Greece; and Pavlos’s father-in-law, tycoon Robert Miller, among others.
Each year the Pugs hold their own regatta, the location of which rotates between the Med’s salubrious coasts. The Talitha and Blue Bird often serve as their “committee” boats. “These are by far the two best boats around. They have nothing to do with that modern shit—those refrigerators on steroids out there,” Taki told me. “The Getty boats have all the modern things, but they’ve kept their original lines and classic style.”
He added, speaking about the Gettys themselves: “They’re quiet—they don’t show off. A good-looking family. Nice. They don’t bother anybody.”
In 2015, Blue Bird fulfilled its destiny. That March, Tara and Jessica set off from Antigua on a three-month odyssey with Talitha, Caspar, and Orlando, who had just graduated from high school in South Africa and was about to move to England to attend Wellington College. The family’s ultimate destination was Cocos. The five-mile-long island remains uninhabited and arduous to reach, owing to fierce seas and limited shelter. Even for an experienced sailor like Tara, it was a daunting voyage. He admits to having been “a bit concerned” about the eighty-year-old ship’s prospects. “A hundred feet sounds big, but it’s not really, when you are out so far in the Pacific.”
When at last they reached Cocos, they found majestic waterfalls and mountains and primeval jungle—a scene straight out of Jurassic Park, they thought. Alas, no gold was unearthed. But the Gettys got their reward. “We pulled it off,” said Tara. “It kind of closed the circle. The circle that hadn’t been closed because the war came along.”
“I have an adventurous and unconventional husband,” commented Jessica.
Blue Bird had barely steamed back into its home port when Tara embarked on another major project. This time it was in a Los Angeles boatyard that he spotted his next rescue: the seventy-two-foot Baruna, another Sparkman & Stephens–designed yawl. “She was just languishing,” said Getty morosely. “She had won all sorts of races, she was a part of American history. Somebody needed to restore this boat.”
Five years later, in July 2021, he offered a progress report: “It’s a really tricky one. It’s going to be incredible when she launches—which was supposed to be two years ago.”
Tara was speaking over Zoom, with Jessica alongside him. Both appeared relaxed, tanned, and a bit wet, which was to be expected, as they were aboard Talitha, cruising through the Dodecanese in the southeastern Aegean.
Jessica’s holiday was particularly well-earned. She had just finished writing a detailed history of the family’s endeavors in Africa and designing a new website, Zuka.earth, on which it can be read. “Zuka is twenty years old this year,” she said. “I decided it was time to tell the story.”
Inspired by the anniversary, the couple also founded a new study center and reseach laboratory on the property, the Getty Asterism. They repurposed a collection of thatched-roof and stone cabins to serve as a hub for scientists and conservationists investigating ecology, geology, and marine biology. Even as these scientists plumb the depths of the seas and the earth, the name of the center (an asterism is a prominent pattern or group of stars) hearkened back to the galactic dimensions envisioned by Tara’s parents when they christened him.
Over Zoom, he graciously fielded questions pertaining to conservation and sailing. And one of a personal nature: Is he, in fact, the “normal” Getty?
“I don’t know whether there is such a thing as a normal one,” he deadpanned.
“Am I normal?” he repeated the question, with a trace of a grin. “Possibly I haven’t gone off the rails as much as some members of the family have.
“It’s a pretty eclectic family. It’s got all sorts of branches to it. I would say I’m more on the English side.
“There’s not a lot of in-house fighting in any form. I have a very good relationship with my siblings. The whole family tries to get together once a year. A lot of families don’t get together for years.”
Summing up the state of the Getty clan, he concluded, “It’s pretty strong. I don’t think it’s as dysfunctional as everyone makes out!”
As Tara reflected on his father’s life, he touched on an uncanny ability possessed by some Gettys—the ones who’ve survived—to restore themselves: “After having had that gap, the bad years, he had a great last fifteen years. He managed to put the sad part of his life behind him. He got closer to all his children. It all ended up being really good.”
IV. THE GORDONS
11 Pacific Heights
Gordon Peter Getty’s absent-minded, floppy-haired head, hovering well above six feet, often seemed to be lost in the clouds. At the University of San Francisco, a twenty-minute walk from his mother’s house on Clay Street where he had grown up with his older brother, Paul Jr., he studied philosophy and literature. Emily Dickinson was his favorite poet. On visits overseas to see his father at Sutton Place, he could be found sitting at one of the two grand pianos in the Long Gallery, playing Schubert or one of his own compositions.
In 1956, with diploma in hand, Gordon entered the real world. J. Paul Getty got his fourth-born son started in the oil business, at the bottom. Gordon pumped gas and changed oil at a Tidewater station near his house. A few months later, thanks to President Eisenhower’s Reserve Forces Act, he reported for active duty at Fort Lee, Virginia.
Gordon’s next post, once again under his father’s orders, was on more punishing ground: the Neutral Zone, the wasteland between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, where the family fortune was being extracted from the earth. In 1959, after several months, it became apparent that Gordon wasn’t cut out to be a line officer—somebody responsible for running things day-to-day. After one blunder—principally, a failure to understand the nuances of the Middle East’s culture of baksheesh (bribery)—Gordon had to take the fall for a Getty Oil underling who had accidentally rammed a pipeline with his truck. The local emir sentenced Gordon to two weeks’ house arrest, during which he read Shakespeare and Keats.
Upon his return to San Francisco, Gordon dared to pursue his real passion, music. In 1961, he enrolled at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he studied harmony and counterpoint. According to Robina Lund, his father was “understandably disappointed” when Gordon left the family business, but he was nonetheless happy for him to aspire to a musical career. “Paul was immensely proud of Gordon’s ability as a pianist and composer.… When Gordon came to stay, Paul would look forward all day to hearing him play.”
During his time at the conservatory, Gordon succeeded in composing and publishing five short piano pieces. Just after, writer’s block halted his creativity for nearly twenty years.
Despite San Francisco’s small-town nature, it took a few years for him to meet Ann Gilbert, a striking five-foot-ten redhead who had arrived in 1958 at the age of seventeen. A native of California’s Central Valley, she had picked peaches, packed walnuts, and driven tractors alongside her two brothers on their father’s ranch; after graduating from East Nicolaus High School, she moved from her hometown of Wheatland to the Bay Area, where she studied anthropology and biology at UC Berkeley and worked at the cosmetics counter of Joseph Magnin, the fashionable department store near Union Square.
Gordon’s and Ann’s paths crossed one evening in 1964 at La Rocca’s Corner, a popular North Beach tavern. She matched him in a blind beer-tasting game. A few months later, on Christmas Day 1964, they eloped to Las Vegas.
Ann’s combination of practicality and charm helped propel the Getty fortune. In 1971, as Gordon’s lawsuit over the terms of the Sarah C. Getty Trust dragged into its seventh year, Ann played an instrumental role in brokering a settlement. “See here, Mr. Getty, let’s have an end to this,” she said to her father-in-law, in a tone that was at once beguiling and assertive.
Even as she became one of the most extravagant women of her time, Ann kept her feet planted on the ground. Notwithstanding the couture wardrobe, private jets, and other accoutrements of wealth that she acquired, she liked to say she was still at heart a farmer.
