Beaulieu Floor Plans

The recently found ground floor plan of 'Beaulieu' cottage

in Newport, RI. 'Beaulieu' was originally the estate of 

William Waldorf Astor. After the infamous feud with his

New York Society queen aunt Caroline Astor ~ who 

spent her summers in nearby 'Beechwood' ~ he sold the estate.

The property ended up being rented by Cornelius and Grace

Vanderbilt. 'Beaulieu' was Mr Vanderbilt's favorite home, where

he spent his time away from his yacht. The Vanderbilts purchased 

the home outright and Grace summered there every season. After

Mrs Vanderbilt's death in 1954, he son sold the estate.

Mrs Grace Vanderbilt ~ The Queenly Kingfisher

The estate then fell into complete and awful despair. The estate was 

rotting all over and was completely unrecognized. Then one day

Wiley T Buchanan, Chief of Protocol for President Eisenhower, 

and his wife Ruth were walking along the Cliff Walk with a friend

who lived at 'Clarendon Court' and they came upon the ruined

beauty. Buchanan, after touring the house the next day, told his wife

"We must buy this house". They purchased the home and resorted

the beauty; Summering at the estate every season. Today, Mrs 

Buchanan ~ now remarried ~ Ruth Buchanan Wheeler ~ still

lives at the estate, 

Gilded Age Era on Facebook!

Guests in white powdered wigs and tuxedos at a 1950's 'Breakers' Ball.

Guess what everybody! ..... Gilded Age Era is now on Facebook!

Come and friend me or join my group: "Newport ~ Queen of Resorts"

or follow the extremely informative and great group "Mansions

of The Gilded Age". Looking forward to seeing there!

The John Rockefeller Estate

Here is a wonderful postcard of the John D Rockefeller Jr estate in 

Tarrytown, New York, located on the grounds of 'Kykuit'. Still owned by 

the Rockefeller family today. 

Photo: GAE Collection. 

Age of Innocence, The Beaufort Ball

Guests at The Beaufort Bash 

In the movie "The Age of Innocence", a fabulous movie based on the book by Edith Wharton, after attending the opera, Newland Archer and his fiancée May attend the usual annual opera ball of Mrs Julius Beaufort at the Beafort brownstone, said to be one of the first homes in the city to have a ballroom. Mrs Beaufort had come from an respectable old South Carolina family; her husband, Julius, however, was a shady socialite know for his numerous affairs and lovers (secretly he was dead broke). It was said that Edith Wharton had gotten her inspiration for Mrs Beaufort from Caroline Astor (who was one of her relatives). Mrs Astor was known for her annual opera balls, known as the "Patriarch's Ball". She had had a brownstone on 34th Street that which possessed one of the first private ballrooms in the city. Julius, it was said, had been inspired by August Belmont Sr., another shady socialite who was secretly a Jew.

Newland Archer and May Wellend at The Beaufort Ball

Click HERE To See The Trailer For The Movie

Happy Birthday Gilded Age Era!

Happy 1st first birthday Gilded Age Era! This past year there have been 150 posts, featuring a wide range of topics and subjects; including a fabulous tale of the largest private mansion ever built in New York City; to one of history's wealthiest families; to an enthralling tale about a murder for money. We have also seen GAE being viewed over 100,000 times! I just want to say thanks to the 31 people who follow GAE; Here's to another great year!

Sophia Sherman 146th Birthday

Happy 146th Birthday Sophia! Today, 146 years ago, Sophia Brown was born to John

Carter Brown and his wife Sophia Browne. This outspoken woman, later to marry 

William Watts Sherman, though small in stature, weighed a whopping 270 pounds! 

So heavy was the weight of her flesh that she had to have a special water balanced-elevator

installed in her Newport mansion, known as the William Watts Sherman House, to help

her get to the second and third floors, what a lady!

Socialite and Heiress. Daughter of John Carter Brown (1797-1874) and Sophia Browne Brown (1825-1909); favorite granddaughter of Nicholas Brown II, founder of Brown University and Head of The Brown Family Dynasty for three generations. Last wife and longtime widow of William Watts Sherman (1942-1912), a New York City businessman who for fifty years served as treasurer of the Newport Casino. Known for her commanding and brashly outspoken personality; she could instantly be unusually kind and caring. Weighing an enormous 270 pounds ~ she had a special water lift of equal size designed and built for her beloved Newport residence to help her get up the three flights of floors. The fiery duster of enormous physical weight disdained the press and photographers, applying on a heavy thick veil and hat whenever she left her mansion. Raised in a strict Episcopalian family, she was an intense Bible basher ~ insisting that music, alcohol, tobacco, divorce, shouting and flirtation were all sins. Naturally eccentric since her early days, she never drank anything but mineral water. Like many of the gothic victorian homes she lived in as a girl, she filled her home to the brink with over-gilded furniture and antiques. Being helped everywhere by a large gilded cane and two burly attendants; she rarely left her Newport home, if ever going to her townhouse at the corner of 838 Fifth Avenue. Her Newport home, known as 'Sherman Villa', designed and built by H. H. Richardson, encompassed over thirty rooms and fifteen guest bedrooms. In the 1930's, with dancing becoming the new fashion, she hired Newport architect Dudley Newton to design and construct a heavily-gilded ballroom wing onto the side of her mansion. Living another seventeen years at her Newport villa, she died of a three-year illness at her beloved Newport home, being buried next to her elderly husband at Island Cemetery in Newport, Rhode Island.

What a lady! 

Biography, Courtesy of FindAGrave;

Written and Complied by Tyler Y. Hughes.

George Vanderbilt Portrait

After spending the past week in Washington DC, I have come back

with hundreds of wonderful photos which I plan on sharing with all of you! 

Here is the George W. Vanderbilt portrait by James Whistler, located in

the National Gallery. 

Click HERE to read more about the painting