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36-463: Maxwell is credited with the introduction of the scavenger hunt and treasure hunt for use as party games in the modern era. Her radio program, Elsa Maxwell's Party Line , began in 1942; she also wrote a syndicated gossip column. She appeared as herself in the films Stage Door Canteen (1943) and Rhapsody in Blue (1945), as well as co-starring in the film Hotel for Women (1939), for which she wrote

72-492: A charity event the previous January, although reports from that event suggest they were friendly. Over the next few years the feud was much detailed in US gossip columns. In April 1957, Cholly Knickerbocker announced there had been a "peace treaty" between them. It followed a reconciling letter from Elsa after newspapers accused her of deliberately trying to upstage Wallis by inviting her to a party and then getting Marilyn Monroe to make

108-666: A grand late entrance, driving all attention away from Wallis. Maxwell took credit for introducing Rita Hayworth to Prince Aly Khan in the summer of 1948. In 1953, Maxwell published a single issue of her magazine, Elsa Maxwell's Café Society , which had a portrait of Zsa Zsa Gabor on the cover. Anne Edwards 's biography of Maria Callas ( Callas , 2001) and Peter Evans's biography of Aristotle Onassis both claim that Maxwell introduced Callas to Onassis. Edwards also claims that Maxwell fell obsessively in love with Callas, 40 years Maxwell's junior. Callas biographer Stelios Galatopoulos produced love letters from Maxwell written to Callas, who

144-455: A living devising treasure-hunt parties, come-as-your-opposite parties and other sorts, including a scavenger hunt in Paris in 1927 that inadvertently created disturbances all over the city. In Venice in the early 1920s, Maxwell attracted stars like Cole Porter , Tallulah Bankhead , Noël Coward and Fanny Brice to Venice's Lido shoreline to enjoy its daytime amenities and nightly parties. Later,

180-454: A minor video game genre ; for example Colossal Cave Adventure , Zork and Pimania involve treasure hunts. With the explosion of mobile apps, there has also been an explosion of how Scavenger Hunts can be used within an app. Beyond the typical find and return method of a scavenger hunt, apps now allow for participants to snap photos, take videos, answer questions, GPS check-ins, scan QR codes and more directly in an app. Vastly expanding

216-632: A more slender woman out of the pool. Elsa Maxwell was the name of Higa Jiga's goat that was used to test the sweet potato brandy in the 1956 movie Teahouse of the August Moon , starring Marlon Brando and Glenn Ford. In an episode of I Love Lucy titled "Housewarming", which originally aired on April 1, 1957, Ethel Mertz ( Vivian Vance ) derisively refers to Betty Ramsey ( Mary Jane Croft ) as "the Elsa Maxwell of Westport". In The Spy Went Dancing by Aline, Countess of Romanones (1991), Elsa Maxwell

252-621: A partygoer comments "Elsa Maxwell has nothing on Blakely when it comes to throwing a novel party". Lyricist Tom Adair referenced Maxwell in the song "Will You Still Be Mine" (first recorded by Tommy Dorsey in 1941). The song's fourth chorus has the following lines: "When Elsa's parties are no fun / When FDR declines to run / When Eleanor of 'My Day' is done / Will you still be mine?" In The Second Confession by Rex Stout , published in September 1949, Nero Wolfe's assistant Archie Goodwin references Elsa Maxwell after being congratulated for helping

288-443: A rubber stamp. Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a global positioning system (GPS) receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers (called "geocaches" or "caches"). An armchair treasure hunt is an activity that requires solving puzzles or riddles in some easily portable and widely reproduced format (often an illustrated book ), and then using clues hidden either in

324-528: A skyrunner in a helicopter looking for an object. Internet scavenger hunts invite participants to visit different websites to find clues and solve puzzles, occasionally for a prize. Participants can win prizes for correctly solving puzzles to win treasure hunts. The first internet hunt was developed in 1992 by Rick Gates to encourage people to explore the resources available online. Several feature films and television series have used online scavenger hunts as viral marketing , including The Da Vinci Code and

360-410: A variation for television, also known as Treasure Hunt . This US game show featured a pair of contestants answering questions to qualify to go on a treasure hunt that involved choosing from among thirty treasure chests that included anything from gag prizes to valuable merchandise and/or cash. The show also offered home viewers a chance of a treasure hunt, when a postcard was chosen from a large drum by

396-460: A young guest who revolved the drum several times to randomise the entries. The show aired daily in the morning and once a week in the evening until 1959, when the networks began canceling game shows in the wake of the quiz show scandal . In the United Kingdom , a show title Treasure Hunt was aired between 1982 and 1989, featuring two contestants solving a series of clues in a studio to direct

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432-403: Is an outdoor treasure hunt activity that combines elements of orienteering , art and problem-solving, and dates back to the 1850s. Letterboxers hide small, weatherproof boxes in publicly accessible places (such as parks or open moorland) and distribute clues to finding the box in printed catalogs, on one of several web sites, or by word of mouth. Individual letterboxes usually contain a logbook and

468-493: Is depicted in Laurie R. King 's novel Island of the Mad . In Sunset Boulevard (1950), Jack Webb ’s character refers to himself as the “Elsa Maxwell of assistant directors .” Elsa Maxwell is an integral part of the book Diva by Daisy Goodwin, showing her friendship with Maria Callas. St. Martin's Press. January 2024 Scavenger hunt A scavenger hunt is a game in which

504-442: Is mentioned as being a society hostess who held "fabulous parties" in 1947 New York. Elsa Maxwell was also referred to by JFK impersonator Vaughn Meader on The First Family LP (1962). On track 15, "Saturday Night, Sunday Morning", Maxwell calls President Kennedy (Meader) to see if he and Jackie (Naomi Brossart) would be interested in going to a party she was hosting that evening. The President, however, politely declines because he

540-634: Is too embarrassed to admit that he and the First Lady have not already made Saturday night plans themselves. In Season 6 Episode 31 of Leave It to Beaver ("The Poor Loser"), June jokingly refers to herself as "a regular Elsa Maxwell." In Season 1 Episode 31 of The Beverly Hillbillies ("The Clampetts Entertain") which originally aired on April 24, 1963, the character Martin Van Ransohoff mentions Perle Mesta and Elsa Maxwell. Elsa Maxwell in Venice in 1925

576-469: The New York Dramatic Mirror . Maxwell never completed grammar school because her father did not believe in formal education; as a result, he tutored his daughter at home. Her interest in parties began when she was 12 years old and was told she would not be invited to a party because her family was poor. She developed a gift for staging games and diversions at parties for the rich, and began making

612-592: The Sci-Fi Channel 's series The Lost Room . Actor Misha Collins currently holds the Guinness World Record for organizing GISHWHES , the world's largest media scavenger hunt which included 14,580 participants in 972 teams from 90 countries as participants. A 2012 hunt organized by eBay had prizes totaling $ 200,000. Many online hunts are subject to internet gaming laws that vary between jurisdictions. Simulated treasure hunting might also be considered

648-766: The Duchess in 1946 when they were all living at the Waldorf Astoria Apartments in New York. They became friends the following year, in France. The Duke and Duchess frequently entertained her and sometimes Fellowes-Gordon at their chateau on the Riviera and over the coming years they attended Elsa's parties in Paris, Monte Carlo, New York and elsewhere. A fall-out between Elsa and Wallis was first reported in May 1953, rumored to have started at

684-680: The Scottish singer Dorothy Fellowes-Gordon ("Dickie"). The two met in 1912 and remained together until Maxwell's death. In the 1950s, her friendship with the Duke of Windsor and Wallis Simpson , the Duchess of Windsor, attracted much publicity in the United States, as did her long running feud with the Duchess. She had encountered the Duke several times when he was the Prince of Wales, and became acquainted with him and

720-667: The Tune " from Too Many Girls , Irving Berlin 's "The Hostess With the Mostes' on the Ball" from Call Me Madam and in "Listen, Cosette!" from Sherry! Returning to the U.S., Maxwell worked on movie shorts during the Depression, unsuccessfully. "Her imprimatur of social acceptability carried so much weight that the Waldorf Astoria gave her a suite rent-free when it opened in New York in 1931 at

756-456: The World's Most Challenging Puzzle by Christopher Mason, with the publishers awarding a prize of $ 10,000 USD to the reader who deciphered and solved a riddle using clues in the book's illustrations. Ultimately the prize was split among the twelve readers who came closest to the solution. The contest is now void, though MAZE remains in publication. In 1956, comedian Jan Murray created and hosted

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792-586: The concept of what a scavenger hunt can consist of. Some companies, such as thesecret.city, have started to run scavenger hunts through popular messaging apps, like WhatsApp and Telegram. On top of this, a new genre of game (Alternate Reality Games or ARGs for short) has popularized a real-life/internet hybrid form of scavenger hunts. In these, users all over the world collaborate to solve puzzles based both on websites and in real world locations. The games unfold in real time and can run for multiple weeks or even months. Cholly Knickerbocker Cholly Knickerbocker

828-657: The course of the night's escapades anything could happen." A common game played on Easter is the egg hunt , where players search for concealed eggs. The custom is believed to have originated in Germany in the 16th century and brought to the US in the 18th century and England in the 19th century. The games is usually played outdoor but may also be played indoor. The eggs may be hard-boiled and decorated, chocolate eggs, or artificial eggs containing various items, and hidden for children to find. Halloween scavenger hunts have been moderately replacing trick-or-treating . Letterboxing

864-515: The early 1930s. The scavenger-hunt craze among New York's elite was satirized in the 1936 film My Man Godfrey , where one of the items socialite players are trying to collect is a "Forgotten Man", a homeless person . Scavenger hunts are regularly held at American universities, a notable modern example being the University of Chicago Scavenger Hunt , founded in 1987. Scavenger hunts have been held with increasingly large number of people around

900-640: The form of a spy mission game formed part of World Record London for 2012. A separate points competition was held with one team emerging the winner of the 'treasure'. An event organized by Escape Manor Inc. in Ottawa , Canada was held with 2,732 participants in 2017. In November 2023, a scavenger hunt was organized in South Korea and it currently holds the Guinness World Record for the world's largest scavenger hunt with 3,040 participants. A form of scavenger hunt organized by GISH , described by Guinness World Records as

936-487: The height of the Depression, hoping to attract rich clients because of her." Following World War II, she gained an audience of millions as a newspaper gossip columnist . Beginning in 1942 she also hosted a radio program, Elsa Maxwell's Party Line , for which Esther Bradford Aresty was a writer and producer. Maxwell was responsible for the success of ventriloquist Edgar Bergen . Bergen had been playing small theaters for 17 years; when he decided to ask for Maxwell's help, he

972-589: The late 1950s, Loretta Swit worked as Maxwell's personal secretary. She died of heart failure in a Manhattan hospital. Maxwell's last public appearance came a week before her death. She attended the annual April in Paris Ball , which she had helped found, in a wheelchair. Fellowes-Gordon was Maxwell's sole heir. She is buried at Ferncliff Cemetery , Hartsdale, New York. Elsa Maxwell appeared as herself in all of these films unless otherwise noted. In Action Comics , number 3 (1938) by Jerome Siegel and Joe Shuster

1008-472: The organizers prepare a list defining specific items that need to be found, which the participants seek to gather or complete all items on the list, usually without purchasing them. Usually participants work in small teams, although the rules may allow individuals to participate. The goal is to be the first to complete the list or to complete the most items on that list. In variations of the game, players take photographs of listed items or be challenged to complete

1044-542: The principality of Monaco employed Maxwell's services to put it on the map as a tourist destination as she had done for the Lido. Maxwell and Porter were lifelong friends, and he mentioned her in several of his songs, including "I'm Throwing a Ball Tonight" from Panama Hattie (sung by Ethel Merman ) and "I'm Dining with Elsa (and her ninety-nine most intimate friends)." She is also mentioned in Rodgers and Hart 's " I Like to Recognize

1080-551: The screenplay and a song. In spite of the persistent rumor that Elsa Maxwell was born in a theater in Keokuk, Iowa, during a performance of the opera Mignon , she actually admitted late in life that the outlandish story was a fabrication that she went along with, since she was actually born at her maternal grandmother's home in the same town. She was raised in San Francisco , where her father sold insurance and did freelance writing for

1116-522: The story or in the graphics of the book to find a real treasure somewhere in the physical world. This type of treasure hunt may take months to solve and often has large prizes to be won. An early example of the genre is Kit Williams ' 1979 book Masquerade while games still in play include The Secret and On the Trail of the Golden Owl . An unusual example of the armchair treasure hunt is the book MAZE: Solve

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1152-435: The tasks on the list in the most creative manner. A treasure hunt is another name for the game, but it may involve following a series of clues to find objects or a single prize in a particular order. According to game scholar Markus Montola, scavenger hunts evolved from ancient folk games. Gossip columnist Elsa Maxwell popularized scavenger hunts in the United States with a series of exclusive New York parties starting in

1188-465: The world's largest "media scavenger hunt", was held annually between 2011 and 2022. Tasks were posted on its website for participants to complete. It had 14,580 participants in 2013, and 55,000 in 2016. The treasure hunt as a party game is attributed to socialite Elsa Maxwell . In 1944, she wrote: "In the Treasure Hunt [...] intellectual men were paired off with great beauties, glamor with talent. In

1224-679: The world. In 2012, the Guinness World Records title for 'most participants in a treasure hunt game' was set by Team London Ambassadors, who broke the previous record (of 308 participants) in London . 466 Participants, all London Ambassadors for the Olympic and Paralympic Games , worked in 93 teams of five, each completing a set of twelve clues hidden on either side of the River Thames , starting and finishing at City Hall, London . The treasure hunt in

1260-425: Was less than receptive. Maxwell told interviewer Mike Wallace in 1957: I did not feel fit, to be only married. I belong to the world. I knew it instinctively when I was quite young. I belong to the world. Certainly I am the most shall we say immodestly, [among] the best-known people in the entire world today. Why, because I did not marry and I felt that I was not for marriage. It wasn't my ... thing to do. In

1296-492: Was persistent enough in his telephone calls that Maxwell agreed to meet with him. When Bergen arrived, Maxwell asked him if he was a singer; Bergen replied that he was a ventriloquist and told her he wanted her to meet Charlie McCarthy. Charlie's meeting with Maxwell was an instant success; Maxwell asked crooner Rudy Vallée to find him a place on his radio program. Maxwell was a closeted lesbian who publicly condemned same-sex love despite enjoying an almost 50-year partnership with

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