The richest woman almost did not marry a chosen man because of her parents’ prejudices

Liliane and André Bettencourt dreamed of a Prince Charming for their only daughter, Françoise. They were looking for a rich and preferably Catholic boy. Fate had a joke in store for the couple.

The young heiress fell in love with Jean-Pierre Meyers, Jewish nephew of Rabbi Robert Meyers, murdered by the Nazis in the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1943. Before being captured, he helped hundreds of other Jews escape from Hitler’s troops.

Françoise’s courtship shed light on the dark side of her grandfather, Eugène Schueller, founder of L’Oréal. According to historians, the chemist financed fascist groups and was openly anti-Semitic.

He is said to have helped support “La Cagoule”, a group responsible for the persecution and deaths of Jews and refugees. André Bettencourt, who would become Liliane’s husband and Françoise’s father, was part of this criminal organization.

The couple tried to convince the heiress to give up Jean-Pierre. Therefore, the relationship dragged on for years until the young woman, overcoming fatigue, obtained permission for marriage, which took place in 1984.

In the biographies, reports and documentary series “The Billionaire, the Butler and the Fiance”, on Netflix, prejudices in the family are evident. At one point, Liliane asks the lawyer if one of her grandchildren “looks Jewish.”

Despite the influence of the nuns at the school where she studied and under the pressure of her Christian parents, Françoise preferred to raise her two sons, Jean-Victor and Nicolas, in Judaism. She herself developed an interest in religion and wrote a book about it.

Having graduated in Economics, Jean-Pierre ended up being invited to take on important roles in L’Oréal’s control group. Today he is one of the vice presidents. He and Françoise live in an ordinary building in a quiet suburb of Paris. They lead a life without luxury, despite the fact that the majority shareholder of the largest cosmetics company on the planet has assets equivalent to R$520 billion.

Source: Terra