Jean Harris | |
---|---|
Born |
Jean Struven April 27, 1923 Cleveland, Ohio |
Died | December 23, 2012 New Haven, Connecticut |
(aged 89)
Occupation | Educator |
Children | 2 |
Jean Struven Harris (April 27, 1923 – December 23, 2012) was the headmistress of The Madeira School for girls in McLean, Virginia, who made national news in the early 1980s as she was tried and convicted of the murder of her ex-lover, Herman Tarnower, a well-known cardiologist and author of the best-selling book The Complete Scarsdale Medical Diet.
Born Jean Struven, April 27, 1923, in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S., to Albert and Mildred Struven, Harris was the second of four children. She went to Laurel School in Shaker Heights, Ohio before attending Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. In 1945, she graduated magna cum laude from Smith with a degree in economics. After college, she married Jim Harris and they had two sons by 1952. In 1965, Harris divorced her husband who later died in 1977.
Harris met Tarnower, a cardiologist (later known, due to a popular diet book he published, as the "Scarsdale Diet Doctor"), in December 1966, the year after her divorce. They then began a 14-year relationship. Though Tarnower showered Harris with gifts and exotic vacations, he had multiple relationships with other women during these years.
Harris worked as the headmistress of the Madeira School for girls in McLean, Virginia, while continuing her long-distance relationship with Tarnower. Tarnower also had relationships with other women and Harris was aware of these, as he did not hide them from Harris. Tarnower prescribed Harris multiple medications over the course of several years. In the 1970s, Tarnower hired Lynne Tryforos, a divorcee more than thirty years his junior, to work as a secretary-receptionist at the Scarsdale Medical Center. Tarnower then began an affair with Tryforos.