Billionaire Rupert Murdoch, 92, engaged to Ann Lesley Smith, 66, after fourth divorce
billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch has revealed he is engaged to new girlfriend Ann Lesley Smith, just six months after they first met and less than a year after his divorce from fourth wife Jerry Hall was finalized.
The 92-year-old shared the news in an interview with one of his own publications – the New York Post – this morning, March 20.
He revealed he popped the question to Smith, 66, with an Asscher-cut diamond solitaire ring, which he personally chose.
Murdoch, who has been married four times before, admitted he was “nervous” to ask the question again. He added that he had “dreaded falling in love”, but said he was convinced his marriage to Smith would be his “last”.
“I was very nervous,” he shared, while revealing that the couple were planning to tie the knot this year, at the end of the summer. “I dreaded falling in love, but I knew it would be my last. It better be. I’m happy.”
The newly engaged billionaire – whose worth is estimated at $17 billion – popped the question in New York on St. Patrick’s Day, joking in the interview: “I’m Irish for a quarter”.
The businessman revealed he and Smith met last September at his Moraga vineyard in Bel Air, California, explaining that he called her two weeks after meeting her at an event of 200 people.
Meanwhile, Smith, a former police chaplain and the widow of late country music star Chester Smith, described the relationship as “a gift from God”, revealing that the couple “share the same beliefs” and ” speak the same language”.
She said: “I have been a widow for 14 years. Like Rupert, my husband was a businessman. Worked for local newspapers, developed radio and television stations, and helped promote Univision. So I speak Rupert’s language. We share the same beliefs.
The wedding will mark the fifth time that Murdoch has been married.
He has six children from his previous marriages: his daughter Prudence MacLeod, now 64, with his first wife Patricia Booker, his daughter Elisabeth, now 53, and his sons Lachlan, now aged 50, and James, now 49, with second wife Anna Mann, and daughter Grace, now 21, and Chloe, now 19, whom he shares with his third wife Wendi Deng.
Murdoch and his fourth wife, former model Hall, had no children together during their six-year marriage, which ended last year.
Murdoch married his first wife, former flight attendant Patricia, in 1956, but the couple separated in 1967, nine years after the birth of their only child, Prudence.
That same year, he married his second wife, Anna, a Glasgow-born journalist to whom he was married for 32 years, before their divorce in 1999.
Murdoch married Wendi just 17 days after divorcing his second wife Anna. At the time of their marriage, Murdoch was 68, while Wendi was just 30.
This marriage lasted 14 years, before it was announced that the couple were divorcing.
