This is the first in a series about famous people who summered in Monmouth County at the shore. I hope you learn a little.
After posting every day for the first five months of the year to celebrate 150 years of Sea Girt, I took 60 days to refresh. I won’t hit you at the same pace, but hopefully a good balance.
100 Madison. The House where she lived.
Mary Higgins Clark purchased a summer home in Spring Lake in 1998 at 100 Madison for $1.185 million. By this time, she was one of the most successful authors in the country and the undisputed Queen of suspense. Shortly after moving into the house, her $65 million 5-book contract made her the highest-paid author in America. Not bad for a former struggling widow with 5 children.
Mary Higgins Clark and her daughter Carol authored several best sellers together. (Library of Congress)
Mary was impacted by her father's death before age 11, and then by her own husband’s death in 1964.
At Villa Maria HS in the Bronx, she learned to write, and the nuns encouraged her.
After a year as an airline stewardess, she married Warren Clark. Mary wrote short stories and submitted them to magazines, and learned not to worry about rejection. Some were successfully published, and she made a few hundred dollars as she raised her young children in Northern New Jersey.
Warren had a chronic heart condition, which disqualified him from obtaining life insurance. He died in 1964 when Mary was just 36 and had five school-age children. She needed to make money, so she got a radio script-writing job in New York.
Her book set in Spring Lake
Radio drama was on its way out, and a writing mentor encouraged Mary to publish books. Her first, a historical fiction romance about George and Martha Washington in 1968, was a dud, selling less than 1,000 copies. Perhaps the confusing title, “Aspire to the Heavens,” had something to do with the poor reception. She continued to get up before five to write before the kids got up for school at seven, and continued to have books rejected by publishers, one over 30 times.
In 1975, she broke through with her first suspense novel, the first of 50 Best Sellers. “Where are the Children?” was about a mother, wrongly accused of murdering her first two children. She is in sheer panic when her next two vanish while playing in the yard.
The story resonated with mothers of the era who were beginning to enter the work force in larger numbers, leaving “latchkey” kids behind. Her initial payment was just $3,000 for the book, but its success ensured the next one gave her $1.5 million.
Newfound wealth enabled Mary to go to college just as she was sending her oldest to college. She graduated from Fordham with a Bachelor's in Philosophy. Her first two kids became lawyers and then judges, whose feedback kept her novels sounding realistic. Her daughter Carol became a best-selling author herself, preferring comedic mysteries to her mother's tight suspense.
Mary's formula was drawn from her bookshelves. She liked to read suspense, Agatha Christie, and Nancy Drew. She tried to build tension at the end of each chapter to keep the reader turning pages.
Mary worked hard to publish at least two novels per year, and over 50 novels later, had sold over 100 million books. She avoided sexual situations and profanity and was celebrated with many writing awards. Over a dozen of her works were adapted for film and television.
Her success allowed her to enjoy homes in Saddle River, Manhattan, and Naples, Florida, before purchasing 100 Madison in Spring Lake. The family had enjoyed LBI for many years before her new husband introduced her to Spring Lake.
She married retired Merrill Lynch Futures Executive John Conheenny when they were in their late 60s and they shared the Spring Lake house with their 16 combined grandchildren.
Her time at the beach was well spent. Spring Lake became a character in The Street Where You Live,
“Following a nasty divorce and the trauma of being stalked, criminal defense attorney Emily Graham leaves Albany to work in Manhattan. Craving roots, she buys her ancestral home, a Victorian house in the seaside resort town of Spring Lake, New Jersey. Her family sold the house in 1892, after one of Emily's forebears, Madeline Shapley, then a young girl, disappeared.
As the house is renovated and a pool dug, a skeleton is found and identified as Martha Lawrence, a young Spring Lake woman who vanished several years ago. Within her hand is the finger bone of another woman, with a ring—a Shapley family heirloom—still on it. Determined to find the connection between the two murders, Emily becomes a threat to a seductive killer...who chooses her as the next victim.”
Mary was a strong advocate for the beauty of New Jersey, setting many of her stories here. She also gave generously of her time and money to promote young authors. Consistent with the history of the Irish Riviera, she gave generously to the Catholic Church.
“Money alone is a hollow achievement," said Clark. "Develop your talents and work to instill basic values in your life. Follow your dream, and don't put off what you hanker to do.”
In 2020, Mary Higgins Clark died at age 92. Her daughter and writing partner, Carol Higgins Clark, died in 2023. The family sold 100 Madison in 2020 for almost $6 million.