68 Years Ago In Time

News of the impending nuptials of Charles and Camilla pales next to the scandalous announcement in 1936 that England's King Edward VIII would abdicate to marry soon-to-be-divorced American WALLIS WARFIELD SIMPSON, TIME's 1936 Woman of the Year.

She was born in one of those typical Southern families who all more or less descend from William the Conqueror ... She resolved early to make men her career, and in 40 years reached the top--or almost. No man she careered is known to have ever said a word not in her praise. Apart from her first husband Commander Earl Winfield Spencer, U.S.N., and her second (present) husband Ernest Aldrich Simpson, a London shipbroker, probably her best friend, next to the Duke of Windsor, remains the Argentine Ambassador in Washington, Felipe Espil ... "My, my!" sighed Ambassador Espil to swank U.S. friends last summer, "who would ever have dreamed that our little Wallis would ever be where she is now!" --TIME, Jan. 4, 1937

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