South porch.
The grounds were enlarged in October 1905 when Vanderbilt purchased the estate of the late Samuel B. Sexton. This property of 64 acres, known as Torham, adjoined the Vanderbilt estate on the north and was considered a handsome addition. Sexton’s mansion had been destroyed by fire several years before, but there remained some cottages, conservatories, a carriage house, a boathouse, barns, and other outbuildings. All of these, except the boathouse, were demolished in 1906 as part of a program to match the new property with the rest of the estate in what was called “the park plan.” The present north gate and stone walls were added to the new section at this time.
In the same year, final alteration of the mansion took place. Architect Whitney Warren of New York directed changes in the drawing room, main hall, and second floor hall. The Mowbray mural in the drawing room, which the Vanderbilts did not like, was removed.
With these changes, the mansion and estate began to look approximately as they do today.
A Way of Life
In the 1890’s approximately nine-tenths of the wealth of the country was controlled by one-tenth of the population. It was an era of triumphant business enterprise when men of ambition and talent concentrated their energies on gathering the abundant fruits of America’s burgeoning industrial might. It was a time when the income tax had been ruled unconstitutional; a time when the captains of industry and commerce could use their millions for pursuits and pastimes that made even the wonders of Aladdin pale.
The great mansion was typical of these amazing enterprises. And typically, the owners ransacked Europe for art treasures and furnishings with which to fill them. The Vanderbilt family alone built four of these “baronial halls.” Frederick Vanderbilt’s Hyde Park mansion was matched in elegance by those of his three brothers: George Washington Vanderbilt’s Biltmore, near Asheville, N.C., was reputed to have cost $3 million; Cornelius Vanderbilt II built the elaborately decorated Breakers at Newport, R.I.; William K. Vanderbilt’s Spanish-Moorish mansion, Eagle’s Nest, is at Centerport, Long Island. Today, all are open to the public—museums of art, memorials to an age.
A favorite pastime of wealthy sportsmen was yachting—and in the Vanderbilt family, this was almost as fixed a tradition as railroading. From 1889 to 1938, Frederick Vanderbilt kept that tradition alive with a series of four large seagoing luxury craft. During World War I, he donated the third of these, Vedette I, to the United States Government, and it was used by the Navy for submarine patrol in the Atlantic. The fourth ship, Vedette II, was built at Copenhagen in 1924. This twin-screw diesel craft—158 feet long with a 23-man crew—was used by Vanderbilt until his death.
Vedette II, Vanderbilt’s last yacht.