Hello, I'm Carl Raymond, the host of the Gilda Gentleman History podcast. To continue our theme of Summer on the Riviera, we are revisiting one of the Gilda Gentleman's classic episodes just to give you even more to the story. So perhaps enjoy a glass of absinthe or champagne.

Put on your sunglasses for a trip back to Monaco.

Many people today think that Grace Kelly, the glamorous Hollywood icon of the early 1950s, became the first American princess of Monaco when she married the dashing Prince Renier III in the 1956 wedding that captured the attention of the world.

But such is not the case. Princess Grace had a predecessor, American-born Alice Hina, who wed the then-Prince of Monaco, Albert I, nearly 70 years

before Grace ever set foot on the rock of Monaco. Well, just who was this first American princess?

And what lasting effect did she have on the principality? And just what were some of the striking and curious similarities

between her and her royal sister Grace?

Hello, I'm Carl Raymond, host of the Gilded Gentleman History podcast, and as I do, every two weeks I'm joining you for a look into all the corners light and dark of America's Gilded Age, Francis Belepuck, and the world of late Victorian and Edwardian London.

And as I do, I'm joining you at Tea Time, my favorite time of day.

I've just poured myself a cup of Earl Grey tea, which is really my favorite afternoon tea.

And as usual, I'm using my very favorite cup,

a piece of 19th century blue and white canton. So I hope you're enjoying your own cuppa, too, for our tale for today,

to Catch a Prince, the story of Alice Hina,

Monaco's first American princess.

Today, I'm going to take you to Monaco for a look at this storybook principality jutting

out into the Mediterranean from the coast of France, and we'll be spending some time here in

the 1890s, and we'll make a visit with the royal family,

and they may not be exactly what you would have thought.

But before we go all the way back, I want to begin our story much closer to our own time,

on an April day, to be exact, April 19, 1956.

There was a tremendous sense of excitement and glamour in the principality that day,

and the excitement rippled really around the world.

...