Up for auction "Hilton Hotels" Prince Serge Obolensky Hand Signed 3X5 Card. 

ES-3212

Prince Sergei

Platonovich Obolensky Neledinsky-Meletzky (November 3, 1890 in Tsarskoye Selo, Russia – September 29, 1978 in Grosse Pointe, Wayne County, Michigan, USA) — known as Serge Obolensky —

was a Russian-American aristocrat, U.S. Army paratrooper, socialite and publicist. He served

as vice chairman of

the board of directors of

the Hilton Hotels Corporation.

Obolensky's parents were Prince Platon Sergeyevich Obolensky-Neledinsky-Meletzky (1850–1913) and Maria

Konstantinovna Naryshkina (1861–1929). He had a younger brother, Vladimir

(1896–1968), who died unmarried and childless. He was an enthusiastic polo

player and played for his University Team 1914

in Oxford.

 Obolensky was a soldier in two World Wars and in the Russian Civil War and fled his native country after

battling Bolsheviks as a guerrilla fighter. He was a lieutenant colonel in

the U.S. paratroopers and a member of

the Office of Strategic

Services (OSS), forerunner of the CIA,

and made his first five jumps in 1943 at the age of 53.

After

his second marriage, he settled in the U.S., working with his new

brother-in-law, the real estate entrepreneur Vincent Astor.[6] He also started a business, Parfums

Chevalier Garde, with fellow emigre, Aleksandre Tarsaidze (1901–1978).

Tarsaidze was president until 1940 when they were cut off from their French

suppliers during World War II. When

Obolensky was president of the Sherry-Netherland Hotel,

Tarsaidze became his assistant. Tarsaidze later wrote a novel about the parents

of Obolensky's first wife, Alexander II and Catherine Dolgorukov.

 n 1949, he started his

own public relations firm in New York City, Serge Obolensky Associates, Inc., handling

accounts like Piper-Heidsieck champagne. "Serge", a friend once remarked,

"could be successful selling umbrellas in the middle of the Sahara". In

1958, Obolensky was made vice chairman of the board of Hilton Hotels Corporation. In

the same year, he released his autobiography, One Man In His Time. The

Memoirs of Serge Obolensky. He maintained a substantial art collection.