By Robert Lerner
VALLEY CENTER, California –There is no shortage of world-class leaders who have visited and left their mark on Valley Center, among them a future king of England (Edward, Prince of Wales); a president of the United States (Dwight Eisenhower), and a widowed First Lady (Eleanor Roosevelt). But there also was a prince — not a fairytale prince, but a legendary blue-blood better known as a playboy, socialite, racehorse jockey, and husband of one of the world’s most famous movie stars. He was also a diplomat and United Nations official, and it was in that role that he came to Valley Center in 1959.
His name was Aly Khan, at the time the vice-president of the United Nations General Assembly. He visited Rancho Lilac, the historic home of Irving Salomon, a U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Khan was one of many diplomats, dignitaries and celebrities who found their way to the Jewish diplomat’s ranch on Lilac Road.
Prince Aly Khan was known at the time for his love of fast cars, high society, and celebrity women as much as he was for his country, Pakistan (formerly part of British India), for which he served as U.N. Ambassador from 1958 until 1960. His wife until a divorce in 1953 was the popular movie star Rita Hayworth. At the age of 49, he was killed in a car crash near Paris.
The prince was the son of Aga Khan III, a member of the League of Nations from 1934 to 1937, and who served as president in 1937 and 1938. The League was succeeded by the United Nations in 1945.
In 1969, Ambassador Salomon and his wife Cecile hosted Begum Aga Khan for dinner. (Begum is an honorific for women of high social status, as in Dame.) Born Yvonne Labrousse, she was the widow of Aga Khan III. She had come to San Diego from her villa in Cannes. A photo her and the Salomons is at the Valley Center Historical Society in an archive that includes multiple documents and photos of the Salomon family and their many house guests.
For more information, contact the History Museum by mail, email at museum@vchistory.org or by telephone at (760) 749-2993. The museum is temporarily closed due to the pandemic, but a volunteer responds to all inquiries.
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Robert Lerner is the historian of the Valley Center Museum.
The person on the left with Ambassador Irving Salomon is NOT Prince Aly Khan. There has been a misidentification and the veracity of the article needs to be reviewed.
Robert Lerner, the museum’s curator, responded: “the man ID’d on this and others photos in our file are all marked Aly Khan and were given to us by Abbe (Salomon Wolfsheimer Stutz, the late daughter of Irving and Cecile Salomon) I would consider that a valid source. And he resembles other images on line.