Aggie Grey was born in Western Samoa in 1897 and died in 1988.
Aggie Grey is the subject of two biographies by Nelson Eustis[3] and Fay Alailima,[4] was on several postage stamps of Western Samoa,[5] and was a pioneering figure of the Samoan hotel industry.
[2] She hosted many notable actors, including Dorothy Lamour, Marlon Brando, Gary Cooper, William Holden, Raymond Burr and Robert Morley who stayed at her hotel.
The book was adapted into Broadway's musical blockbuster South Pacific (1949) by Rodgers and Hammerstein (collectively known as Rodgers and Hammerstein), and subsequently the 1958 film South Pacific.
Aggie Gray's sister Mary Croudace ran "The Casino" a boarding-house in Apia, and was reputed to have been the lover of a Marine general in the war.