Ludlow Ogden Smith
Ludlow Ogden Smith (February 6 1899, Pennsylvania – July 13 1979, New Canaan, Connecticut) was a Philadelphia businessman.
He married Katharine Hepburn in 1928; she was 21 and he was 29. They met while she
was in her senior year at Bryn Mawr College, through a mutual friend who lived next to
campus. They separated in 1934 and Kate traveled to Mexico to gain a divorce. After the divorce and his purging from the
Philadelphia Social Register, he changed his name to Ogden Smith Ludlow to gain back his anonymity. A rumor persists that
the change was made at Hepburn's request so that she would not be known as "Kate Smith" (Kate
Smith was a popular singer of the time) but this appears to be one of many Hepburn legends. Fearing that the Mexican
divorce may not have been legal, Ludlow secured a divorce in
For many years Hepburn would deny that she had married Smith. [citation needed]
Despite their divorce, they remained on good terms, with Ludlow even financing the stage play of The Philadelphia Story in 1939 to help restart Hepburn's then-flagging career. She later wrote about him and their marriage in her memoir Me.
Ludlow was president of Ogden Ludlow Inc. and the creator of the "Ludlow Formula", a precursor to computerized systems in financial institutions.
After his divorce, Ludlow married Elisabeth Albers and they had two children, a son Lewis Gouverneur Ludlow and a daughter Katharine Ramsey Ludlow. He died of cancer, aged 80.
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