When I was a kid growing up in Hawai’i, my Mom would often mention Doris Duke. I kind of knew something about her, but not much. I knew she had a plush home on the beach in Kahala, on the other side of Diamond Head. So when in Newport this time, we decided to visit the Duke’s “summer home” along the Cliff Walk where all the NYC hoi-polloi from the turn of the last century built their vacation or weekend retreats. Her home, Rough Point , was where she spent most summers as a youth, and again starting in the 1950s. Upon her death in 1993, Doris Duke bequeathed the estate to the Newport Restoration Foundation with the directive that it be opened to the public as a museum. Doris at the Mermaid Pool at the Family Farm in New Jersey Doris Duke (1912 – 1993) was an American heiress, socialite, horticulturalist, art collector, and philanthropist. The daughter of a wealthy tobacco tycoon, Duke was able to fund a life of global travel and wide-ranging interests. These e...