Arizona Republic du lieu suivant : Phoenix, Arizona • Page 25

B8 The Arizona Republic Sunday, March 28, 1993 Tovrea mystery: Socialite's killing unsolved after 5 years TOVREA, from page Bl Tovrea's, in exchange for escaping a death sentence. Still, no arrests. Ed Tovrea was a grandson of Edward Tovrea. who came to Arizona his side and nursed him night and day until his death in 1983. Court documents show he left the bulk of his multimillion-dollar estate to his wife and a trust fund for his three children, payable to them upon Jeanne's death.

Widowed and rich, Jeanne decided to blossom. She had extensive cosmetic surgery, bought new and fashionable clothing, became an art collector, and traveled wherever she wanted to go. She became even more philanthropic than when Ed was alive, spreading her funds generously among several charities. In December 1987, at a rodeo cowboys' reunion, Jeanne ran into a former rodeo rider whom she had met 30 years earlier during a heavy romance with a Texas rodeo cowboy named Danny Daniels. Daniels was also a gambler and came to an unfortunate end when he was shot in the head during an -argument over a card game.

Eddy Akridge, a top rodeo money winner from 1953 to 1961, was a casino host at the Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas when the two renewed their friendship. They also fell in love, and Jeanne's friends said they had never seen her so "delirious," "glowing," "madly in love." Jeanne visited Las Vegas. Akridge came to Mesa for a golf tournament two months before her death and couple said that they were gloriously happy and that Jeanne finally had realized her long-sought dreams of love and wealth. If there were problems other than Ed's health, they came from Ed's children. People in jvhom Jeanne confided said the relationship with them was far from amicable.

A woman who sold real estate with Jeanne and remained a close friend said the problems with Ed's children flared up to the end there was even a conflict about his ashes at the mortuary. Ed suffered from emphysema and was an invalid for the last two years of his life. Friends said Jeanne stayed by spent all his time with Jeanne. Unfortunately, said some Mesa residents who knew Akridge, he had a wife who would never, under any circumstances, let him go. Jeanne planned a gala party on April 18 and had sent out more than 200 invitations to the Western-theme affair.

She had told friends it was to be a very special event. When Akridge accompanied Jeanne's body to Arkansas for burial, he told family members they were to have been married in two weeks. That would have coincided with the date of her party. Apparently, problems with Ak-ridge's wife had been worked out. Jeanne had told several friends that she and Ed Jr.

had squabbled several times recently but that the disagreements seemed to have ceased. On that first weekend in April 1988, life's carousel dangled a gold ring in front of Jeanne's reaching hand. She planned to spend the weekend in Las Vegas. Departure was only a few hours away when she returned home from dinner with friends about 7 p.m., smiling to the guard at the gate. She went to bed, possibly dreaming of another chance at happiness that appeared to be within her grasp.

Someone made sure her last dream didn't come true. in 1883 and through grit, shrewdness and hard work became a millionaire cattle baron. At one time, the family j. was- the country's largest dealer in Mexican livestock, and Edward To-- vrea introduced individual meat pack-; aging to the industry. Before starting his cattle empire, he was general foreman during the construction of Gillespie Dam, once served as mayor of Jerome, and was a member of the Constitutional Convention of Arizona in 1910.

Establishing feedlots and the main packing plant at what is now Washington and 48th streets, he bought a wedding-cake-style house on a nearby hill from its bankrupt builder. The house still stands, a marvel of curiosity to tourists, but Tovrea lived in it only -six months before he died of pneumonia in 1932. His son, Phil built another mansion at 5041 E. Van Buren, which is still a Phoenix landmark. The family sold Tovrea Meatpacking Co.

in 1947 to Cudahy, another meatpacking concern. During World War II, young Ed Tovrea became a war hero when, as a prisoner of the Germans, he participated in construction of tunnels for the famed "Great Escape," in which 79 prisoners fled to freedom. But Ed was not among them. He was transferred to another prison before the escape. When liberated in spring 1945 after 33 months as a prisoner of ar, he weighed only 112 pounds.

His health was never robust after the experience. At the same time that Ed came home in broken health to Phoenix, Jean Gunter wa 14, living in Redmond, and only four years away from becoming a bride, then a mother. Born in Siloam, Jean's roots ran deep there as she was descended through both parents from founders of the town. Unlike the pioneer Tovrea, however, wealth didn't follow their footsteps. Jean's parents suffered through hard times, moving first to Oklahoma and then to Oregon in search of a better life.

Siloam became a haven for Jean in I I i I i sJVXnn I 1 i- hi tfr 1 1 t- rnnrniii I It 1 1 fV 4 1 Vj3 WIDE! Pim- loAa'A -TEAL I 1 LUXURIOUS VK-Llf -MAUVE 1 1 VELVET tsT Af BLUE QUALITY OAK DINING SETS I 1 TMl 0mm WITH LUSTROUS JiMWM jlpj LACQUER FINISH Sofas Now IPfi i BACK later years. She separated from her first husband, Dan Nolan, when her daughter Deborah was a toddler and returned to Arkansas to live with her grandparents. From then until her marriage to Tovrea, Jean wandered from Siloam to Tulsa to Dallas to Fayetteville, and finally to Phoenix, leaving her daughter with her grandparents while she worked at a variety of jobs, including hairdresser, secretary and waitress. Landing in Phoenix in 1961, Jean worked as a waitress at the Safari Hotel in Scottsdale. An illness forced her return to Arkansas, but after surgery, Jean again headed toward Phoenix and destiny.

This time, she studied for her real-estate license during the day and waitressed at night. In 1968, she went to work for Ed Post Realty. She also became Jeanne, not Jean. Through a friend, Jeanne met Ed Tovrea in 1970. He was coming out of his second marriage and had three children by his first marriage: Edward Tovrea Georgia and Priscilla.

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