When Bertie and Elizabeth begins, George V is King... Born Prince George Frederick Ernest Albert in 1865, the man who became King George V of England was not expected to succeed to the throne as he was a second son. His older brother Prince Albert Victor, known as 'Eddy,' was the heir apparent. George joined the British Royal Navy in 1877 and in January of 1892, when Eddy died of pneumonia at the age of 26, he was a gunboat commander. Eddy had been engaged to marry the delicate and intelligent Princess Victoria Mary of Teck (who was called "May"). Rather than lose a potentially valuable contribution to the family, Queen Victoria, George's grandmother, arranged for him to marry the genteel May instead, which he did, in 1893. Rather than failing, this orchestrated marriage turned out to be a great success. When George ascended to the throne in 1910 upon the death of his father, Edward VII, he was 45 years old and had six children. He was a simple man with a passion for stamp collecting and a love of shooting and yachting. He ruled during a turbulent time in history beginning with the start of World War I in 1914. Because George worried that the British people might extend their loathing for their German enemy to the British royal family (who were then called Saxe-Coburg-Gotha from Queen Victoria's marriage to Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the Prince Consort), the family name was changed to Windsor. The British people heartily approved of this switch to a purely English name. After the war ended in 1918, the monarchy entered a golden age for the duration of George's reign to his death in 1936. During this time, Ireland split into two countries with the southern half independent and the north remaining a part of Great Britain. In 1928, women over the age of 21 won the right to vote but George V's major concern was the flighty and irresponsible behavior of his oldest son Edward, the Prince of Wales, known to the family as "David."