Barbara Sears Rockefeller

Barbara Sears Rockefeller, a Pennsylvania coal miner’s daughter who married one of the richest men in America and, after their divorce six years later, won a settlement regarded as a record in its day, died in May 2008t her home in Little Rock, Ark. She was 91 and had lived in Arkansas for the last few years. Familiarly known as Bobo, Mrs. Rockefeller was the former wife of a governor of Arkansas and the mother of a lieutenant governor. From 1948 to 1954, she had a highly public marriage to Winthrop Rockefeller, who went on to serve two terms as governor, from 1967 to 1971. He was a grandson of John D. Rockefeller, a founder of Standard Oil. The couple’s only child, Winthrop Paul Rockefeller, was lieutenant governor of Arkansas from 1996 until his death from a blood disorder in 2006. Mrs. Rockefeller is survived by eight grandchildren and a great-grandchild. Her father was a coal miner and a railroad worker and divorced when she was a child. She spent her later girlhood with her mother and stepfather in the stockyard district of Chicago. The family later moved to Indiana. She studied briefly at Northwestern University before becoming a model and actress. Under her first stage name, Eva Paul, she appeared in a production of “Tobacco Road” in Boston. There, she met Richard Sears Jr., the son of a prominent Boston family. They were married in 1941, and afterward she changed her name to Barbara Paul Sears. As Barbara Sears, she had small roles in a few Hollywood films, including “That Night With You” (1945), starring Franchot Tone. After World War II, Mr. Sears was named third secretary at the American embassy in Paris, and the couple became fixtures in the Parisian social whirl. They divorced in 1947. Mrs. Sears met Winthrop Rockefeller at a dinner party in 1946. They were married in 1948. They separated less than two years into their marriage. Very public divorce proceedings ensued. Mr. Rockefeller offered his wife a settlement of $5.5 million. Mrs. Rockefeller requested $10 million instead. She eventually took the $5.5 million. For many years after her divorce, Mrs. Rockefeller lived on the Upper East Side in a six-story neoclassical townhouse that included a full-size, wood-lined squash court with an 18-foot ceiling. She also kept a home in Paris.