Festive Twelfth Night Party Commemorates a Pair of Anniversaries

Fractures, aches and pains, mostly from ski accidents and icy mishaps, didn’t keep Carol and Warner Henry’s flock of more than 100 friends from celebrating Twelfth Night.

The host was bruised from a ski accident at Park City, Utah. Marina Day and Paul Livadary were bruised from an accident in Snowmass, Colo., where their car skidded into a bridge. Norman Terry’s arm was in a sling from a fall on a wet Southland sidewalk.

But the mood was festive, particularly because Carol (in red lace) and Warner (in black tie) were celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary and the 35th anniversary of the Twelfth Night party originated by Warner’s parents, the late Warner and Frances Henry of Hancock Park.

Twelfth Night king Geoffrey Beaumont was drinking champagne and eating chocolate cake, even though, he noted, it was his fourth meal in recent hours because he had just flown in from Kenya via Paris.

Queen Lanie Techentin, wearing her red velvet, ermine-trimmed crown, was inspired to read the poem she had created for the night.

When he found the lima bean in his dessert--revealing he’ll reign as the next king--Byron Capps, with great flair, polished it with a napkin and put it in his pocket.

In the crowd: Chris and Lois Madison, Phil and Mary Hawley, Bob and Janice Carpenter, Don and Suzanne Crowell, David and Margaret Barry, Michael and Susy Niven, Wayne and Cynnie Griffin (who flew in from Sun Valley), John and Mary Ann Sturgeon and Joe and Phoebe Vaccaro.

HOST ACHIEVER: “What do you get when you mix champagne with oranges?” asked Les Dames de Champagne, International Hostesses founder Wanda Henderson.

She answered: “Henry T. Segerstrom, the ultimate Host Achiever of the Year.” With that, the Orange County master planner, orange and lima bean grower and philanthropist accepted a silver flagon accented with Les Dames’ gold cherub emblem at the group’s 28th annual Twelfth Night Bal Masque at the Beverly Wilshire. By Segerstrom’s side was his wife, Renee.

It was the Segerstrom family’s $5-million gift in land plus $6 million that sparked the Orange County Performing Arts Center.

In 1898, Segerstrom’s grandfather, Charles John Segerstrom, settled his family of 12 from Sweden on 20 acres. The enterprise resulted in the Segerstroms becoming the nation’s largest lima bean producers in the 1940s. From some of those fields rose South Coast Plaza.

Celebrating, too, were Ed and Nadine Carson, William Holzhauser (Wanda Henderson’s husband), Bob Ray and Kathy Offenhauser and the event chairmen, Olive and Dr. Alexander Varga.

ASPEN: The hot ticket in Aspen last week was the one for Power Woman’s Luncheon, benefiting the Aspen Art Museum at Aspen’s Little Nell Hotel. Anna Bulgari, Anne Bass and Ann Nitze were honorary co-hostesses.

NEW YEAR PAST: The Los Angeles Philharmonic’s New Year’s Eve party at the Music Center Pavilion raised more than $100,000 for the musicians’ pension fund.

After Zubin Mehta, music director for the Israel Philharmonic, conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the “A Night in Old Vienna” concert, some of the crowd of 2,900 moved to the Grand Hall for a lavish Viennese buffet and dancing to the Big Band sounds of Pat Longo.

The $300 donors were entitled to the private dinner with Mehta and his wife, Nancy, in the Pavilion Restaurant. Among those: Dr. Eliot and Marian Corday, Sue Cummings, and Diane Ingels and Arthur Spitzer . . . .

Fred Gibbons, Doris Finley and Kathy Finley took over Jimmy’s Restaurant in Beverly Hills for their New Year’s Eve dance.

SAN MARINO DEBS: Debutante ball chairwoman Janie DeCastro was particularly sentimental about heading San Marino Area Chapter, National Charity League’s debutante ball at the Ritz-Carlton, Huntington Hotel in Pasadena. That’s because she made her debut at the league’s first ball in 1963.

A highlight of the recent event came when Charles Murray escorted his twin daughters--Catherine and Jane--around the dance floor.

Other presentees: Hilari Andrews, Victoria Boegh, McCall Cameron, Amy Condon, Katharine Custer, Mary Drez, Allison Fletcher, Katherine French, Deborah Gardner, Christine Gunnell, Marianne Harwell, Holly Houston, Suzanne Knaphurst, Joanne Lewis, Kimberly Mortimer, Sarah Pillsbury, Sarah Rogers, Cara Rullman, Wendy Schnee, Stacey Sechrest and Emily Smith.