Obituary: Cornelius Vanderbilt DeForest

From the November 10, 1887 issue of the New York Times

Cornelius V. DeForest died yesterday morning from paresis, at his residence, 17 East Forty-seventh-street.  He was born 70 years ago in this city, and from the time he reached manhood was for many years prominent in New York’s business community.  For a long period he was engaged in the oil trade, and upon giving it up became purchasing agent of the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, an office he held for many years.  For the last three years he had been a special partner in the Stock Exchange firm of Colbron, Chauncye & Co.  Ill-health, however, had kept him out of active business for many months.  Mr. De Forest leaves a widow, a daughter, Mrs. William T. Colbron, and a son, C. Eugene De Forest.   Funeral services will be held tomorrow afternoon at 2 o’clock.  The burial will be in Greenwood.

Kissam Hall Is Dedicated

From the New York Tribune newspaper, 14 Oct 1900

A Vanderbilt Memorial — Handsome Building Given to the University at Nashville.   Kissam Hall, the gift of William K. Vanderbilt as a memorial to his mother, Maria Louisa Kissam Vanderbilt, will be formerly presented to Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tenn., on October 23. 

The building stands on a prominent site within the campus, not far from University Hall.  In material and architectural style it is like the other building, but it is superior to them all in beauty.  It is built in the form of a hollow square, after plans by Richard H. Hunt.  The basement is of cut stone.  Above it rise three full stories of repressed brick, white pencilled, with Bedford stone trimmings.  The fourth floor is built with a dormer window effect.  In the middle front wall is a memorial tablet of Tennessee marble, bearing the name of the donor’s mother in gilt letters. 

The first floor contains a reception room to the right of the left hand entrance.  This room is 14 by 28 feet.   A small hospital is located on this floor.   Five walls divide the building into four compartment.  There are a few single rooms, 14 by 14 feet in size, but most of the building is arranged in suites.  A space 14 by 28 feet, with four windows, is cut up into a central study and two single bedrooms with three closets.  Handsome fireplaces perfect ventillation, electric ligt, steam heat, double floors with a “deadening” substance between and finished in hard pine, plate glass windows and a commanding view of the hills that surround Nashville are among the features of the memorial building, which was erected at a cost of over $130,000.

Source: Library of Congress Chronicling America website

Wordless Wednesday: Seabiscuit

A not so worless post:  image from the Life Images Collection @ Google, Seabiscuit the racehorse.

Seabiscuit was owned by Charles S. Howard, uncle to Manuela Hudson, 1st wife of Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt Jr.   The famous race between Seabiscuit & War Admiral was held at AGV Jr.’s racetrack in Baltimore, Maryland. 

Picture Perfect

Today I discovered a resource from the Museum of the City of New York. They have images from their Byron Collection available online.  A little search on Vanderbilt reveals many photos, one of which includes this one of Catherine NIelsen, 1st wife of Reginald Claypoole Vanderbilt (1880- 1925).  She is being painted by Richard Hall. 

Feature Friday – A Railroad Report

Feature Friday posts will feature relevant information from a chosen online resource. This month, the database is Google Books.

As I was browsing Google Books for Vanderbilt-related content, I found the 27th Annual Report of the Board of Directors of the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company.  Even back then in 1896 companies generated reports for their stockholders.

At the time, the Board of Directors consisted of names we are quite familiar with:

• Cornelius Vanderbilt
• Chauncey M. Depew
• Charles C. Clarke
• Horace J. Hayden
• William K. Vanderbilt
• Frederick W. Vanderbilt
• Samuel F. Barger
• J. Pierpont Morgan
• Samuel D. Babcock
• William Bliss
• Sherman S. Jewett
• Erastus Corning
• George C. Buell

At the time of this report, there were over 12,000 stockholders in the company, with the accounts at more than $158 million dollars.  The report contains all kinds of financial figures, statistics, and numbers of the railroad operations.  Probably not something I’d read from beginning to end, but it’s an interesting glimpse into the Vanderbilts’ operations.

Vanderbilt Homes: Florham

I know that there are lists out there of all the homes that the Vanderbilt’s have had (the Vanderbilt Museum has a great timeline), but I am making an effort to get more personally familiar with them, so I’ll be doing various blog posts.

In my last post, I mentioned a book by Shirley Burden, a 2nd great-grandson of the Commodore.  His grandmother, Florence Vanderbilt Twombly,  had an estate called Florham, in New Jersey.  The name, Florham, was a combination of the first syllable of her name and her husband, Hamilton.

This picture of the home is from NewYorkSocialDiary.com. The home is in Convent, New Jersy and is a building on the Fairleigh Dickinson University’s campus. The home was sold in 1955 by Florence’s daughter Ruth and is now used by the school.

The house was completed in 1897. You can read more about the home at the college’s website.

Vanderbilt’s In My Life

I recently checked out a few books about the Vanderbilt family, one being The Vanderbilt’s In My Life: a Personal Memoir.  This book was written by Shirley Burden, who was a 2nd great-grandson of the Commodore.Shirley was the son of Florence Twombly Burden, daughter of Florence Adele Vanderbilt Twombly, daughter of William Henry Vanderbilt, eldest son of the Commodore.

This is mostly a pictoral book, with excerpts by Shirly to narrate the pictures. It is a very touching and humrous read, even though it is not a long book. By reading it, I was able to add to this branch of the family, as up until now, I’d only had that documentation of his grandmother’s marriage to Twombly and no other information.  So, now I have several more details to follow up on.  I learned from his obituary in the New York Times that he was a photographer by trade, so no surprise his book is a pictoral.

I’m still in the process of adding to the tree, but if you can find this book in a library near you and  you’re interested in the Vanderbilt’s, it is worth looking at.

Extra-Illustrated Wedding Details

In my last post, I shared a wedding announcement of Gertrude Vanderbilt to Harry Payne Whitney. One of the followers of this blog, Dennis, took that announcement and did the coolest thing – he added pictures to the article and additional information that really gives the story more context – it’s great! He’s kindly given me permission to share online, so you may find it here.

Great job Dennis!

Whitney-Vanderbilt Wedding

Upon browsing the digitized newspaper collection of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, I found this announcement of the marriage of Gertrude Vanderbilt to Harry Payne Whitney.  They were married August 25, 1896 in Newport, Rhode Island at the “Vanderbilt summer villa,” The Breakers.

As seems to be typical of the articles about the Vanderbilt weddings, the article is full of detail about the affair:

“..the bride’s costume was of white satin trimmed with old lace, which had been in the family for years.  She wore her mother’s bridal veil.  She carreid a bouquet of stephanotic and gardenia.  The bridesmaids wore mousselin de soie over white silk, fluffy ruffles of Queen Valencienne lace beaded with insertion of the same.   The waists were of valencienne inserting, with puffings of the same material and Van Dyke collars.   The sleeves were full lenght, with cuffs of valencienne insertings and small puffs at the shoulders.  Shaded rose colored belts lent a pleasing touch of colors to the costumes.”

The bridal party consisted of:

• Maid of Honor – Miss Gladys Vanderbilt, sister to the bride
• Maid of Honor – Miss Dorothy Whitney, sister to the groom
• Bridesmaid – Miss Sloane
• Bridesmaid – Miss Shepard
• Bridesmaid – Miss Gerry
• Bridesmaid – Miss Taylor
• Best Man – Payne Whitney
• Usher – Mr. Frank Polk
• Usher – Mr. Columbus Baldwin
• Usher – Mr. Ralwins L. Connenet
• Usher – Mr. Alfred Vanderbilt, brother of the bride

The couple were married legally by Rev. George F. Magill, D.D., pastor of Trinity church where Mr. Vanderbilt was a member (in NY).  But, it seemed Rhode Island law prohibited another clergyman from coming into the state to perform the ceremony, so the wedding in Rhode Island was ritualistic and Bishop Potter officiated.

You can read the entire article online courtesy of the Brooklyn Public Library by going here.

Feature Friday – July 11, 2008

Feature Friday posts will feature relevant information from a chosen online resource. This month, the database is Footnote.

Footnote.com offers a variety of historical documents online categorized in several collections. One such collection is the Records of the Department of State Relating to Internal Affairs of France, 1930-1939 as obtained from the National Archives.  This collection has all kinds of items reporting American interests in France and her colonies.

While browsing Footnote for items of relevance to the Vanderbilt family, I located this newspaper article mentioning that Consuelo Vanderbilt, a great-granddaughter of the Commodore, may have been interested in the purchase of an island along with some others:

“The colonization of a small island in the Mediterranean, where American money would be the only currency in circulation, is being planned by a group of wealthy Americans in France headed by Bruce Bundy, Los Angeles millionaire, who have been hit by the fall of the dollar, according to reports here today.

It is possible that the Americans may buy the historic St. Marguerite Island, three miles off Cannes, which is celebrated for its prison that held the Man in the Mask.  Among those reported to have been asked to participate in the plan are Mme. Jacques Balsan, formerly Consuelo Vanderbilt; G.P. Butler,  Commodore Louis D. Beaumont, Mrs. Dorothy Erskine-Bolst, and other wealthy Riveria residents who suffer huge losses through the exchange of the dollar into francs.”

The clipping is from the August 9, 1933 issue of the Chicago Tribune and in one of the cover letters prefacing the actual clipping the following sentence can be read: “Americans, or at all events certain Americans are really cocksure of themselves. They evidently believe that on the strength of their dollar, even though depreciated, they are in a position to buy any and everything.”   Certainly sounds like it huh!

Well, I haven’t researched to see what came of this, but how interesting.  Using Footnote’s neat Spotlight feature, I made a Spotlight page for it that you can see here.