Fall Asleep to the ENTIRE Story of the Onassis Family — The Most Tragic Fortune of the 20th Century

Fall asleep to the story of the Onassis family, the Greek refugees who rose from the ashes of a burning city to command the seas, and who lived like royalty for half a century, until fortune could no longer protect them. It begins in 1922, on the waterfront of Smyrna, as the Greek quarter of the city burns and a sixteen-year-old boy named Aristotle Onassis helps his family escape. A year later he lands in Buenos Aires with about two hundred and fifty dollars and a refugee's passport. He works the night shift at a telephone exchange, builds a fortune in tobacco, and buys his first ships in the depths of the Great Depression, naming them after his mother and father. Within a generation he owns one of the greatest tanker fleets on earth, the casino of Monte Carlo, the national airline of Greece, and the most famous yacht in the world. But no fortune on earth could protect them from love, betrayal, and ruin. Tonight we follow Tina Livanos, the seventeen-year-old shipping heiress who married him, and Stavros Niarchos, the rival who became his brother-in-law; Maria Callas, the voice of the century, who fell in love with him on a summer cruise with Winston Churchill aboard; and Jacqueline Kennedy, the most famous widow in the world, who married him in the rain on his private island of Skorpios. We watch five years of mourning take the family apart, from the plane crash that killed his only son to his own death in Paris in 1975. We follow Christina, the loneliest heiress, from Monte Carlo to Moscow and back to Argentina, where her father's story began. And we end with Athina, the granddaughter who chose a quiet life, and with the gifts that outlived them all. Told slowly and gently, with the snow falling softly outside, this is a calm historical documentary made for sleep, rest, and quiet listening. Where the record is uncertain, or where legend and history part ways, we tell you so. Splendid Nights tells the stories of the great families who lived beside the thrones and behind the fortunes of history: their power, their palaces, and their sorrows. If you enjoy drifting off to history, subscribe and join the family. We will gather again soon for another long, quiet night. Images and illustrations in this video are artistic recreations and should not be taken as historical photographs. SOURCES & FURTHER READING Giles Milton, Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922 (2008) Willi Frischauer, Onassis (1968) Frank Brady, Onassis: An Extravagant Life (1977) Peter Evans, Ari: The Life and Times of Aristotle Socrates Onassis (1986) Gelina Harlaftis, Creating Global Shipping: Aristotle Onassis, the Vagliano Brothers, and the Business of Shipping (2019) Nicholas Gage, Greek Fire: The Story of Maria Callas and Aristotle Onassis (2000) Arianna Stassinopoulos, Maria Callas: The Woman Behind the Legend (1981) Kiki Feroudi Moutsatsos, The Onassis Women: An Eyewitness Account (1998) William Wright, All the Pain That Money Can Buy: The Life of Christina Onassis (1991) Barbara Leaming, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis: The Untold Story (2014) Alexander S. Onassis Foundation: onassis.org #FallAsleep #HistoryForSleep #Onassis #MariaCallas #SplendidNights