The inner life of man-eating granny “Big Kathy” Paris Hilton

In Paris Hilton’s recent “Paris: The Memoir,” an early-2000s bad girl paints a radiant, sanctified portrait of her late maternal grandmother , she had a major impact on her life.

But Catherine Dugan Vanzino Richards Katan Fenton is more of a sinner than a saint.

A 16-year-old high school dropout, Kathleen grew up in a rowdy, wealthy Irish-Catholic family in Manhasset, Long Island, before gaining fame as a hunter and wife from hell, in Best of Me – 2006 Best-selling biography, “The Hilton House.”

Dugan was her maiden name; four others came from men she married — including a well-connected mobster who was hunted by the FBI and a handsome man who impregnated 20-year-old Dugan in the backseat of a Chevrolet convertible. drunkard.

That’s how Kathy Hilton was born — mother of Paris and star of Desperate Housewives of Beverly Hills. She was known at home as “Little Kathy” and her mother was “Big Kathy.”

Big Casey went on to have two more daughters with her second husband, actresses Kyle and Kim Richards, who also star on “RHOBH.” She became a determined and obsessed stage mother who quickly launched her daughters into show business—in the case of little Kathy, who was just two years old at the time.

The three daughters were taught to marry rich men and have many children. Their strict adherence to those lessons later prompted Big Casey to boast, “My daughters are married to men with a combined net worth of $13 billion.”

But in Paris Big Kathy’s story, she’s just “a single mother of three amazing daughters.”

Neither Big Kathy’s marriage nor her often eccentric lifestyle appear in Paris’s book.

When Paris was 14, her parents, Rick and Kathy Hilton, sent her to Palm Springs to live with her grandmother in hopes that big Kathy would get wild child Performance. In this year, the two got married.

Nicknamed “Gram Cracker” by Paris, Big Kathy teaches the girl fashion, style, and more importantly, men, and how to approach them.

When Paris complains about a boy in her class being mean to her, Big Kathy flies into a rage and calls his house. “Listen, you ugly acne-prone face, don’t mess with my granddaughter. If you talk to her again, I’ll come and destroy you.

This is a threat that needs to be taken seriously.

Big Casey is an alcoholic, known for his violence.

She once turned a screw on someone’s cheeseburger in an apparent attempt to strangle or break her teeth. According to my book, she even tried to push one of her husbands down the stairs, into the basement.

The first person Kathleen Dugan seduced into marriage was Laurence K. Avanzino, a handsome blond football player for the CW Post at Long Island University who was said to be Steve A cross between Steve McQueen and Paul Newman.

But, like his girlfriend, Vanzino is wild, drunk, and has no interest in scientists. In the fall of 1957, they fell in love.

They had sex for the first time in the spring of 1958, and the future Big Casey — “she was a champion of getting what she wanted,” according to one source — became pregnant.

The young couple soon married and moved into his parents’ house to await the birth of their child. The best job Avanzino could find was at Esso Station in Wantagh, Long Island. This is a tumultuous relationship that is coming to an end.

Living day-to-day, raising a toddler, and working a cosmetics store for pennies, Catherine Duggan Vanzino desperately needed security and a better way to live.

This is Kenneth Edwin Richards, the sophisticated and married son of a Methodist minister in Wallistrim, New York.

Richards, a retired lieutenant colonel under the Army’s chief surgeon during World War II, found success in developing and selling women’s clothing.

On a royal salary, he owns a luxury home in Garden City, a beautiful apartment in Manhattan and a family farm up north.

That is to say, he was the main prey of Catherine’s hunters.

She met the father of three at a party, and they quickly developed a close relationship, meeting at the Long Island bar where she played chess.

One night, Big Kathy and Richards’ wife, Evelyn, got into an argument at a bar – Big Kathy was accused by a witness of putting sleeping pills in Evelyn’s drink.

Evelyn’s daughter later claimed that Big Casey drugged her mother, followed her to the parking lot, and then slammed her ankle on the door of the heavy Lincoln Continental Richards, leaving the woman in a cast for weeks.

Big Casey then showed up at Richards’ house, along with her mystery boyfriend’s two older children, and began berating his wife.

While Richards was eager to divorce and marry Big Casey, she became pregnant in January 1964, as she had with Vanzino. Richards divorced Mexican and married Big Casey.

During this time, the new wife began a feud with Richards’ mother, Money.

One afternoon, Richards’ daughter found Big Casey laughing hysterically in the kitchen. “I just had Maunie dog food for lunch,” she said.

Richards allegedly later claimed Big Casey “tried to kill his mother.”

On September 19, 1964, Big Casey gave birth to her second daughter at Mineola Hospital. They named her Kimberly, who was later shortened to Kim on stage and on television.

She was only a few months old when Kathleen hired her to shoot a TV rug commercial.

Shortly thereafter, Richards was allegedly physically attacked by Big Casey.

Richards’ daughter said she came home from a fight to find Big Casey “literally trying to push my dad down the stairs, into the basement. He grabbed for his life.”

Still, the couple stayed together and eventually moved to Los Angeles, where Richards found a job at a discount chain while Big Casey continued her daughters’ acting careers.

In La La Land, Catherine starts demanding diamonds, furs, and expensive shoes. Her close friend described her as “like Imelda Marcos”.

Her violence reappears.

Jealous of her step-daughter befriending the family’s young maid, Big Kathy once served a cheeseburger with a tiny screwdriver on top, and presented it to Richards’ daughter.

“She was always telling me my teeth were fine and I think she wanted me to break them,” recalls Richards’ daughter.

In April 1968, Big Casey became pregnant again. Her marriage was almost over when her daughter Kyle was born.

No girl will have a traditional childhood with her mother working. For example, King Kong gets to read books when the great Kathy teaches her to memorize dialogue.

After six tumultuous years, Big Casey hit Richards hard, leading to a nine-year battle over their kids’ money and TV careers.

Richards is mild-mannered and beaten by Big Kathy, while her third husband is a curmudgeonly rogue who, it is said, has the authority to order blows. She may have married him twice.

In 1969, a United States Senate investigation into organized crime determined that Jack Catin was a member of the Mafia. Another investigation linked him to Philadelphia godfather Angelo Bruno.

The same year Big Casey and Katyn got married, Bruno was murdered.

After Kattan divorced Big Casey in 1987, he was convicted of participating in the forgery of $3.3 million.

Next up is Robert C. Fenton Jr., dubbed “The Silver Fox” because the 70-year-old is in good health. But as husband No. 4 to Big Casey, his body was falling apart.

She made his life a mess.

Big Casey catches a new widower at a dance club in Palm Desert, California.

They moved in together in 1998, and shortly after meeting, he quickly gave Big Casey a massive emerald ring studded with diamonds.

After marrying the following year, Big Kathy convinced Fenton to cut off financial support for his daughter and sell his house—and use all the proceeds, a reported $250,000, to renovate hers.

When he did, Big Casey stopped sleeping with him and started treating him like trash.

Fenton’s daughters say Big Kathy fell for the glamour, because she was “blinded” by the Hilton family’s fame and wealth, which she continually capitalized on.

Kathleen Dugan Avanzino Richards died on March 2, 2002, about six weeks after her 64th birthday, following treatment for breast cancer.

Paris Hilton recalled this time in her memoir.

“Say goodbye to Gram Cracker and I’m so devastated,” Hilton wrote. “She’s indestructible. Or maybe I just see her that way because I can’t bear the thought of losing her.