Nellie Simmons Meier, Palm Reader to the Stars

(November 10, 1862-March 24, 1944)

In the 1930s, you could address a letter to “Tuckaway” from America or Europe, and it would find its way to the cottage on North Pennsylvania Street where Nellie lived with her husband George, a famous designer of expensive dresses. 

Nellie began her study of palmistry as a science in 1895, reading and taking impressions of palms for over 40 years. She developed a system that was based, she said, “on ancient Egyptian principles that assessed personality and character based upon the lines on one’s palm.” She had the reputation of being a “palm reader to the stars.” Leading actors, actresses and famous people like Leslie Howard, Helen Hayes, Mary Pickford, Walt Disney, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, Susan B. Anthony, Joan Crawford, Carol Lombard, James Whitcomb Riley, Amelia Earhart, and many others, had their palms read by Nellie. Many of the palm prints she made were later donated to the Library of Congress. 

Location: Section 39, Lot 470; GPS (39.8191210,-86.1645454)