Alice F. Mason, the pearl-wearing doyenne of Manhattan real-estate agents, who entertained President Jimmy Carter and a cavalcade of high achievers at bi-monthly black-tie dinner parties on the Upper East Side, had a secret she guarded assiduously for nearly half a century.
Even quick-witted friends such as Henry Kissinger, Barbara Walters, Mike Wallace, and Gloria Vanderbilt were unaware that Alice was Black.
