Click here for a profile about Helen's mother-in-law that will bowl you over! The photo in this link was taken in 1939, two years before Cornelius and Helen divorced.
February 22, 1942
Nearly 1,000 persons crowded into rooms frequented by three generations of New York Society at the Red Cross Ball given by Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt. Uniforms added a war-like note to the socially historic mansion at 640 Fifth Avenue. Mrs. Vanderbilt is shown at the left above receiving with Major General Irving J. Phillipson, commanding the Second Corps Area, and her son Major Cornelius Vanderbilt Jr. Other Photos: Also in attendance were Mr. and Mrs. Fritz Kreisler, Merle Oberon and the Prince Serge Obolensky.
Fifth Avenue Mansion Opened to Public for the First Time for Brilliant Military Ball
AIDS UNITED SERVICE DRIVE
Throng of 1,500 Leaders in Society, Army, Navy circles received in Marble Hall
June 5, 1941
This last of the famous Vanderbilt mansions of Fifth Avenue-the imposing three-story brownstone residence of Brig. Gen. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt on the northwest corner at 51st Street was open to the public last night for the first time in its long and celebrated history for a brilliant military ball arranged to advance the newly instituted campaign of the United Service Organizations for National Defense Incorporated.
Society subscribed en masse to the event and the assemblage in the historic mansion and mid-town landmark, which bears the number Six-forty, evoked to some degree the by-gone days when private balls were given there, those entertainments having sometimes been occasions of state when visiting royalty was being honored. The many men and women of prominence who attended last night's ball, a throng estimated at nearly 1,500 persons, included leaders in society and diplomatic circles, high ranking officers of the various branches of military service and other eminent figures in the governmental, State, civic and business affairs.
Few Decorative Changes
When the great bronze doors, which came from the palace of the Prince of San Donato, were opened to admit the throng last night, the guests found few interior or decorative changes made for the occasion. The entire lower floor of the mansion was given over to the event and to accommodate the throng. To facilitate the dancing in certain rooms several pieces of the larger pieces of furniture were moved elsewhere. No attempts were made at elaborate decorations; only the casual arrangements of flowers which Mrs. Vanderbilt uses for intimate entertainments at home were in evidence. This was as Mrs. Vanderbilt wished, and as those associated with her in plans for the ball whole-heartedly agreeded, for the mansion with its superb decor and fabulous art treasures need no elaboration or adornment.
The guests were received in the great marble-hall known to those familiar with Six-forty simply as "The Hall"- by Mrs. Vanderbilt. Mrs. Vanderbilt's son: Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr. in the uniform of a Major of the United States Army; her daughter: Mrs. Robert Livingston Stevens; Major General Irving J. Phillipson, commander of the Second Corps Area, and Mrs. Phillipson; Rear Admiral Adolphus Andrews, Commandant of The Third Naval District, and Mrs. Andrews; Lieut. General Hugh A. Drum and Representative Joseph Clark Baldwin, executive chairman of the ball committee, General Vanderbilt was not present, owing to ill health that has kept him away from such festivities for a long time.
House Built in 1881
There were many men and women of society at the ball who recalled when Cornelius Vanderbilt inherited the mansion in 1914. He made many structural changes in it after he moved in, but the basic interior and exterior architecture has remained to this day as it was when the General's grandfather, the first William H. Vanderbilt, built the house in 1881 along with a twin structure which was torn down ten years ago to be replaced by the De Pinna Building. The "Twin Vanderbilt Mansions" as they were known in the era when trade was far from the neighborhood, were regarded by some of the older residents as the outstanding Fifth Avenue residences of the time. The home adjoining Six-forty was occupied for many years by General Vanderbilt's aunt, the present Mrs. Henry White and her sister, the late Mrs. Elliott F. Shepard.
As the last "affair of state" in the old mansion, last night's ball will be remembered also as the first distinctive formal entertainment given in the national campaign of the United Service Organizations to raise $10,765,000 to finance the operation of more than 360 service hubs near Army camps, Navy bases, and Defense industries for the recreation of men now in military service. The New York City Women's Division of USO, headed by Mrs. Winthrop W. Aldrich, many executives and committee members of which were at the ball, opened its particular drive Tuesday night, this subsidiary group seeking to raise $1,000,000 of the grand total.
Assisting Representative Baldwin as honorary chairman for the event, were Thomas J. Watson and Walter Hoving. Many young women of society assisted in preparations as members of a junior committee headed by Miss Jane Gilbert and of a debutant committee led by Miss Margaret White. William de Rham was chairman of the floor committee.
There were many dinners in advance of the ball, some in private homes and others in hotels. One of the largest was given by Dr. Alexander Hamilton Rice at his home, 901 Fifth Avenue and at which Mrs. Vanderbilt was a guest.
Leader of New York, Newport Society for Many Years was Hostess to Royal Figures
January 8, 1953
Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, still recognized as the leader of New York and Newport although inactive in recent years, died of pneumonia last night at her home 1048 Fifth Avenue. She was believed to have been in her eighty-third year.
Mrs. Vanderbilt whose fame as a hostess was known over two continents for a half a century, was one of the last remaining links between the regal pre-World War I American Society with a capital "S" and the larger, more Democratic post World War II society.
She entertained and was entertained by more members of European royalty houses than any other woman in America. Among those that enjoyed the famous Vanderbilt hospitality were the late German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, and the Crown Prince Henry of Prussia, before the first World War; Grand Duke Boris of Czarist Russia, all the British monarchs since Queen Victoria; the late King Albert and Queen Elizabeth of the Belgians, the Crown Prince of Norway, Queen Marie of Romania and Prince Abdor-Riza Pahlevi of Iran.
Mrs. Vanderbilt was the widow of Brig. Gen. Cornelius Vanderbilt a great-grandson and namesake of Commodore Vanderbilt, founder of one of America's biggest railroad empires, the keystone of which was the New York Central. The general, who failed to share his wife's fondness for society in his later years, died on March 1, 1942, aboard his yacht off Miami Beach, Florida.
At their marriage in 1896, which took place over the strong objections of the general's parents, Mrs. Vanderbilt was the reigning beauty in the New York social world. The marriage brought a substantial reduction in the general's inheritance and estranged him for a time from his parents. It was credited in after years with the responsibility for a strong social rivalry between the general's wife and his mother.
(the mother-in-law was the wealthy Mrs. Alice Gwynne Vanderbilt)
Mrs. Vanderbilt was the former Grace Wilson. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Richard T. Wilson, had come to New York from the South after the Civil War.
Mr. Orme Wilson, a brother to Mrs. Vanderbilt, married Miss Caroline S. Astor, a sister to the late Col. John Jacob Astor, who perished on the Titanic. A sister Miss Belle Wilson, was married to the Hon Michael Herbert, a British diplomat.
After the general's father died in 1899, his will revealed that he had left him only 500,000 and the income for life from a $1,000,000.00 trust fund. Each of the other children received $7,500,000.00, and the bulk of the fortune, later set at about $37,000,000.00 went to Cornelius' brother, the late Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, (who was lost on the Lusitania Ocean Liner.) Alfred subsequently gave Cornelius $6,000,000.00 to make the share equal to that of the other children.
Entertained for Royalty
Besides the Kaiser, they entertained Edward VII and George V of England aboard their yacht during frequent visits abroad before the first World War. Afterwards they entertained Edward VII, who later became the Duke of Windsor, and King George the VI of England, then the Duke of York.
The scene of many of Mrs. Vanderbilt's triumphs was the old fifty-eight-room Vanderbilt Mansion at 640 Fifth Avenue, at the corner of Fifty-first Street , since torn down to make room for a nineteen-story skyscraper to house Colliers Magazine. For many years it was an outstanding New York landmark. Other landmarks were scored at her famous Newport villa, Beaulieu, where she entertained the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in 1943.
In 1940, the 640 Fifth Avenue home was sold to the William Waldorf Astor estate, but the Vanderbilts continued to make their home there until after the General's death. In 1944, Mrs. Vanderbilt bought as a residence the twenty-eight-room mansion at 1048 Fifth Avenue, corner of Eighty-sixth Street.
During the depression in the Nineteen Thirties she was active in raising funds for the relief of distress in New York. In the second War she assisted the United States Organizations, even opening the 640 Fifth Avenue Mansion to visitors and sponsoring events and entertainments there. She was a regular patron of the opera and for many years occupied Box 3.
Mrs. Vanderbilt was the mother of Mrs. Robert L. Stevens, the former Miss Grace Vanderbilt, and Cornelius Vanderbilt Jr., writer, publisher and traveler.
Surviving also are two grandchildren, Mrs. Charles McCain Jr. of Shreveport, LA. and Miss Grace Stevens, daughter of Mrs. Stevens, and two great-grandchildren, Charles S. McCain 3rd, and Henry Davis McCain of Shreveport.
Society, Civic Leaders Attend St Thomas' Service Here-Burial in Staten Island
January 11, 1953
Leaders of society, civic and international affairs were among the 400 persons who attended the funeral service yesterday at St. Thomas Protestant Episcopal Church, Fifth Avenue and Fifty-third Street, for Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, widow of Brig. Gen Vanderbilt, who died on Wednesday.
The Rev. Dr. Roelif H. Brooks, rector of St Thomas', officiated at the service. After the processional "Hark, Hark, My Soul," sung by the robed male choir, Dr. Brooks read the scriptural sentences that begin, " I am the Resurrection and the life."
The choir then sang the Twenty-third Psalm, before the rector read the lesson from the fourteenth chapter of the Gospel according to St John.
Leaving the pulpit to face the alter, Dr. Brooks then recited the Creed, in which the congregation joined, and continued with the prescribed prayers of the service.
Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt was among the mourners, who included also Mr. and Mrs. Myron C. Taylor, Vincent Astor, Mr. and Mrs. John Jacob Astor, Serge Obolensky, Robert Goelet, Mrs. Ogden Reid, Mr. and Mrs. James A. Farley and Walter Hoven.
Henry S. Hooker, legal advisor to Mrs. Vanderbilt, led the ushers at the service. They included William Wickham Hoffman, Austen Gray, J. Henry Alexandre, Morin S. Hare, Henry Fletcher, Dudley P. Gilbert, A. Algars, Joseph Clark Baldwin, and William Goadby Loew.
Members of the family included Mrs. Robert Livingston Stevens, Cornelius Vanderbilt Jr., Mrs. Charles McCain Jr. of Shreveport, LA., Countess Laszio Szechenyi, sister of General Vanderbilt, Miss. Grace Stevens, Charles S. McCain 3d, and Henry Davis McCain.
The members of the family and other mourners left in ten cars to be present at the burial in the Vanderbilt family mausoleum in the Moravian Cemetery in New Dorp, S.I.
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Sedona Legend Helen Frye