Paul Cushing Child: Facts About Julia Child’s Husband

Paul Cushing Child was an American civil servant, diplomat, and artist. He is also known as the wife of the late Julia Child, an American cooking teacher, author, and television personality. She earned much fame for bringing French cuisine to the American public with her debut cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

Julia Child is most notable for The French Chef, which premiered in 1963. She had a large impact on American households and housewives. Paul Cushing Child and Julia Child were married and stayed together until death separated them. I’m sure you are one of the many who look up to Paul and Julia’s union as a fairytale.

Paul Cushing Child: Bio Summary

Who Is Paul Cushing Child?

Paul Cushing Child was born on January 15, 1902, in Montclair, New Jersey, U.S. His parents are Bertha Cushing and Charles Tripler Child. He had a twin brother named Charles Jesse Child and a sister named Mary Franklin Child Aubert.

Paul Cushing Child’s father passed away when he and his twin were six months old. After his father’s death, his mother moved them with her to her family’s home in Boston. Paul was a student of Boston Latin School.

Paul Cushing Child took an extension course at Columbia University and later became a teacher in France, Italy, and the United States. He was teaching subjects including photography, English, and French.

Somewhere in 1941, while Paul Cushing Child was at Avon Old Farms School, he became a teacher and mentor to John Gillespie Magee Jr, who later became a World War II Anglo-American Royal Canadian Air Force fighter pilot and war poet, who wrote the sonnet “High Flight”.

Paul Cushing Child was also a fourth-degree black belt in judo as well as a judo instructor. Paul later joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and that was during World War II. He also joined the United States Foreign Service.

Paul Cushing Child was appointed by the U.S. State Department in 1948 to become an exhibits officer with the United States Information Agency. Paul was in Paris for five years and was reassigned to Marseille, Bonn, and Oslo. He was summoned from Bonn to undergo interrogation in Washington, D.C.

Paul Cushing Child was accused of practicing “homosexual tendencies” and told by agents that “male homosexuals often have wives and children”. He felt his privacy was violated as he was interrogated. In 1961, he decided to retire from government service.

How Did Paul Cushing Child & Julia Child Meet?

Paul Cushing Child met his wife Julia Child while he joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and was stationed in Kandy, Ceylon, now Sri Lanka. At that time, Julia was also working for the OSS as head of the Registry of the OSS Secretariat. The two got connected and began a relationship.

After dating for a while, Paul Cushing Child got married to Julia Child who was born Julia Carolyn McWilliams. They officially got married on September 1, 1946, in Lumberville, Pennsylvania, and relocated to Washington, D.C. Paul was ten years older than his wife, Julia but that didn’t prevent them from enjoying each other’s affection and company.

Paul Cushing Child was a lover of world cuisine and was known for his sophisticated palate and he introduced his wife to fine cuisine. Paul and his wife Julia Child were married until Paul’s death. The couple however did not have any children.

Paul Cushing Child & Julia Child

Paul Cushing Child was a loving and supportive husband to Julia Child. In Paris, Julia took up cooking and became a student at the famed Paris cooking school, Le Cordon Bleu. After Paul retired, he relocated with his wife Julia to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Paul later became a poet and often wrote about his wife.

His prose was celebrated in an authorized biography of her. In Appetite for Life, parts of the letters he wrote to his twin brother were added as an illustration of his love and admiration for his wife as well as her cooking skills and talent. Julia Child also wrote cookbooks which Paul took photographs of to give illustrations for them.

Paul Cushing Child was the designer of Julia Child’s kitchen which was the setting for three of her television shows. Currently, it is exhibited at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.

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Paul’s photographs and paintings were highlighted and exhibited at the Southern California Culinary Guild by Barbara Hansen, for the Los Angeles Times in 1989.

Barbara Hansen highlighted a 1954 photograph as “the most arresting, perhaps,” in the exhibit; the photograph features “a sensitive study of Julia in a cowl-necked blue dress holding an amber cat”. Paul Cushing Child has often remained in his wife’s shadow.

Paul Cushing Child’s Death

At the age of 92 years, Paul Cushing Child passed away. He died on May 12, 1994, in Lexington, Massachusetts, the U.S. He died after living in a nursing home for five years following a series of strokes. He left his wife Julia Child widowed. Julia Child also died ten years later, on August 13, 2004. She died two days before her 92nd birthday.

A collection of papers held at the Schlesinger Library includes a selection of both Paul and Julia Child’s journals, notes, and personal and professional correspondence, along with a selection of Paul Child’s artwork (photographs, prose, and poetry).