[Music] American Lifestyle the Vanderbilts take one Once Upon a Time of simpler Summers and harder etiquettes and no income taxes there was an unlikely place where the rich people went and a unique American Family Once upon a time when men were not ashamed to flaunt their fortunes and the women in games of deadly Earnest to play at queen and princess Once Upon a Time the place in Rhode Island is Newport and the family who reigned there even without a crown called itself Vanderbilt American Lifestyle the Vanderbilts and Newport brought to you by Basset Furniture Industries the world's largest manufacturer of Fine Furniture for every room in your home and starring as your host Mr EG Marshall they read his will on January 8 1877 the day after Commodore vanderville died Sophia his first wife and first cousin Who Bore all the children and much unhappiness stayed married to him over 50 years and had preceded him in death so to his second wife whom he had married when he was 74 and she was 30 he left $500,000 in government bonds their townhouse in New York for her lifetime two carriages and two Trotters to his daughters Phoebe Jane Emily Marie Louise Sophia and Mary Alicia $250,000 each in Railway bonds he gave daughter ethelinda the income from a $400,000 trust and daughters Eliza and Katherine were given trust funds of 300 and 500,000 respectively his son Cornelius Jeremiah a bitter disappointment to his father received 200,000 in trust four grandsons from his oldest son got in their own right 11.5 million in voting Railway stock friends and loyal Associates got smaller amounts from 4 to 50,000 but wait there's one more bequest to his oldest son William Henry the Commodore had no sure Faith or affection about William Henry but merely considered him the best of the possible after he had been outsmarted once in a business deal by this son so because the commer meant to keep the name the fortune the family and his railroad Empire intact to William Henry whom he counted on for dynasty $15 million at the time almost exactly the sum the United States government had in the treasury this is Marvel house the for William kissum Vanderbilt William Henry's Second Son the Marvel house is opulent Beyond imagining if it weren't for the fact that it exists it was built in 1892 and designed by architect Richard Morris hunt it and another house hunt designed this one called The Breakers built for William K's older brother Cornelius II are the living memorials to the vision energy and Herculean hard work of a single man who went from Staten Island dirt farmer to the ABS abolute Pinnacle of riches their grandfather Cornelius Vanderbilt known as The Commodore he's buried in Staten Island but these houses are his unforeseen melum the breakers is fashioned after North Italian Villas of the Renaissance I'll take you inside later but meanwhile back at Marble House this Palace is modeled it is said on the petite Tron at versil look at the staircase there's no finer setting for an entrance for an ays or an actor for that matter the Kings and customs of European courts were a constant inspiration to The commodore's Heirs look around you you'll see what I mean these tapestries in the entrance hall for instance they authentic goala which was and is the French estate tapestry works and they were woven in the late 18th century to my left a gold room or Ballroom the most richly ornamented room in Marble House here William K's daughter Consuelo Vanderbilt made her debut in 1895 Canelo Who Loved Someone Else became against her will the first important link between American money and European royalty when she married the ninth Duke of maror her mother Ela a Mobile Alabama lady who took a sharp interest in such matters engineered the alliance it was ala Vanderbilt's second major coup she had already shaken the Throne of Mrs Aster as Queen of American society this is ela's bedroom it is said Ela Vanderbilt sealed the transatlantic nuptials when she contrived to have the Duke who was here as a house guest take tea to Consuelo in her bedroom then ala immediately burst in on this innocuous scene innocent as it seems in our time it was in those days enough to compromise a couple and force the marriage but not withstanding the Duke never was Consuelo's cup of tea and the marriage finally ended incidentally so did her mother several years earlier she divorced William kissim Vanderbilt which was another first in her Social Circle and caused quite a scandal she remarried a Belmont down the road the husband eventually remarried also a Harman and moved to France Roco the style in this room that is the walls here are covered with pale Peach damask in an Arabesque pattern the bronze clock on the flirt of PES marble mantlepiece is 18th century French speaking of clocks I wanted you to see this one in the ballroom it's a glass globe of the world encircling the Sun and as it revolves around the ball once every 24 hours it tells the time of the hour the day and the month there's a lot of Vanderbilt time to be told between the Commodore and Consuelo and much left out so let's go back for some of the story to the Commodore he was a fifth generation member of American farmers in a line that began with Jan sson who came from Holland in 1640 more specifically from the town of built thus janer built or Jan of built till finally the one word Vanderbilt for 150 years the family just sort of plowed along as Farmers but when his turn came the Commodore decided he hated farming and preferred the sea he coaxed his mother mother to lend him $100 to buy a boat that was in 1811 she did and he started a fing business in New York Harbor from his $100 scow to sailing vessels to domestic steamboats and oceangoing liners he made a fortune and in his 60s turned to railroads he built and acquired them until he owned and controlled an iron Kingdom that stretched from New York to Chicago and Beyond it made him the richest and most powerful man in America this is called a spider ftin proper Livery for a gentleman going for a drive along bellw Avenue newport's Golden Road the Commodore loved horses almost as much as he loved making money but increasingly towards the end of his life control of power mattered more than [Music] money a man really only needed a million or two in life and said once I'm sure you'd agree certain the friend he said it to did and offered to help him spend the Surplus no the Commodore replied what you've got ain't worth anything unless you got the power if you give away the Surplus you give away control these are the Stables of Cornelius Vanderbilt II there are 33 various kinds of horsedrawn vehicles here one suitable for every occasion I began with the reading of the commodor will because his money and power are what are important about the Vanderbilts the accumulation and the loss as you might imagine the commodore's other children didn't take kindly to his vision of the future and some of them sued nobody saw it at the time but those early legal battles which seemed more appropriate to the carnival grounds than the courtroom set the pattern of dissolution they marked the end of the beginning and the beginning of the end I'll tell you about it soon right after this announcement imagine everyone referred to these palaces as summer cottages it is reported that the breakers Vanderbilt Cornelius thei was a man of simple tastes can you picture it if you had been extravagant In fairness it does seem that this grandson of the commodor was less anxious to build on such a scale than his wife Alice Gwyn who was called Alice of the breakers Alice of the breakers felt upstaged by Alba of the marble house and felt that she as the wife of the oldest and richest living Vanderbilt Heir which Cornelius II was by that time should have the biggest and most bited house and should be known as the Mrs Vanderbilt this Renaissance Palace was her $5 million step in that direction this is the Great Hall of the breakers I think it's fair to say that the Renaissance which began in 15th century Italy ended in this room on this bit of land in nagan Bay at the opposite end of the Great Hall is this enormous carstone hooded Italian fireplace the room Rises 45 ft through two floors the walls are faced with car Stone imported from France this superb tapestry is over 300 years old and is the work of a Flemish master named amander it measures 24 by 18 ft to light it properly during the day there's a skylight above in stained glass as you can see if it's in the will there's a way the will this time was their father's William Henry if William Henry had not been the genius and the Builder that the Commodore had been at least William Henry in his lifetime had been true to his father's faith in him as a caretaker of the Legacy he had run the railroads actively and well and he had doubled the fortune but being a gentler and less daring Soul than the old man he let control loosen never lit the fire of the commodore's burning Vision in his own children and perhaps remembering the earlier sorted courtroom entanglements William Henry Beed his money thusly Cornelius II got 67 million William kissum got 65 two other sons and four daughters got 10 million each control was divided and what had been an almost unbreachable Kingdom got parcel into more vulnerable baronies I'll tell you what happened right after this announcement Cornelius Vanderbilt II is reported to have been a somber man who rarely smiled even so he did his duty to the family railroads by serving as an able chairman of the board of New York Central though he devoted himself more zealously to charity and was the first Vanderbilt to do so in a size commensurate with his fortune he was an Earnest churchgoer also and met his wife Alice at Sunday school in the class he taught there they had seven children four sons and three daughters and when his time came they heard the reading of his will in this room the library the walls are panel in circassian Walnut embossed in gold and ornamented with bar Leaf carvings the books are mostly handbound volumes of all the great 19th Century authors the upper walls are decorated in framed panels of green Spanish Leather also gold embossed and the ceiling is dark wood and coffered one of the three daughters Gertrude who married a Whitney gained a reputation as a sculptress this small bronze statue was made by her this antique fireplace in the library was brought here from The Chateau Dar luk in France and dates from the 16th century at the top inscribed in the base of the columns is an old French saying roughly translated it means little do I care for riches and do not miss them since only cleverness prevails in the [Music] end this is a music room it was built twice it was designed and built once in France then disassembled there and brought here piece by piece for reconstruction with it came the same French workmen who built it there the furnishings and Hardware were all originally designed for this room these freestanding ionic columns support the ceiling the crystal chandeliers are piped for gas and wired for electricity why not in those days electric lights were not entirely Dependable in the midst of the silver and gold leaf coffered ceiling is the classical style painting of allegorical fig figures they represent music harmony song and Melody this room is also called the ballroom and was used for dancing lavish balls and costume parties were commonplace here and more than likely a lady's dance card would be filled with names right out of Fortune Magazine's list of the top 500 corporations in this house and in this room one thinks twice about scoffing at ghosts voices and laughter a measure of Music are always present with just Out Of Reach but Shadows become substance for certain once in a while when the ghosts of Newport past are revoked by Newport present when the high society which continues on here turns out for an occasional Breakers ball these people are representative the breakers is maintained by the preservation Society of Newport County which also maintains Marvel house and keeps them open to the public I know but I'm still not certain that some turn of Century duke or princess isn't about to make a grand entrance may I have this [Music] stance one historian has recorded that when the Vanderbilts first came to Newport children of some of the so-called older families were not allowed to play with the Vanderbilt children one blue-blooded mother advised her Offspring you may be nice to them but don't get involved we're in the dining room where anyone one who was anybody in those days in Newport and other social Summits of the world lay awake nights dreaming of having dinner and getting involved of all the 70 rooms in the breakers this one is the most magnificent it measures 42x 58 ft the table is made of carved Oak inlaid with Lemonwood stretched out it seats 34 the hooded fireplace is made of chipolino marble there are 12 of these immense and solid Columns of red Alabaster in the dining room each is topped with a gilded bronze Corinthian Capital which supports the Gilded cornice the figures in the arches of the ceiling are life siiz the two huge crystal chandeliers and 12 crystal wall scones which light the room are also arranged for gas and or electricity the ceiling painting which is two full stories above the floor is a depiction of the Greek mythological figure Aurora at dawn but it's Vanderbilts at Twilight that we're heading towards and though I can't tell it all there is still much to tell that is mythological and even more that is Fact one fact is gladus Vanderbilt the seventh and youngest child of Cornelius II who built the breakers she was described by one social historian as the least publicized and the most aristocratic gentle and signified she married a count of the austr Hungarian Empire and her daughters are the present owners of the breakers they lease it to the preservation Society for a dollar a year one time the CST said I guess when it's all said and done the people who should have set the standard didn't vadis Vanderbilt was a granddaughter of a man who once was reported to have said the public be damned in her time she was discovered taking a Dale Carnegie horse on to Win Friends and Influence [Music] People the Vanderbilts inherited at least one tradition from the old commodor his love of speed the later generations turned to fast Motorcars just as he and his son had raced Champion Trotters William kum's grandson Willie K III was killed in a racing car his father though willly K II loved automobiles his brother Harold a quieter sort and the last bander to have any connection with the family railroads invented the game of contract Bridge Harold and Willie Kay also loved Yachts like my outfit well when in Newport anyway One yacht cost him $2.5 million which wasn't so bad compared to what his divorce settlement cost him by Willie Kay's generation Vanderbilt family divorces which were always costly and scandalous had become nearly as frequent and popular a public entertainment as I Love Lucy marital storms behind him Willie Kay continued to steam all over the world on expensive Oceanic expeditions to collect rare fish even so when he died Willie Kay left $36 million but the times were changing until then no matter how hard they worked at it the Vanderbilts just couldn't seem to spend all the money but by now there was a new way to part with it taxes income taxes property taxes inheritance taxes of the 36 million Willie Kay left taxes took 30 million from then on Uncle Sam was The Uninvited relative at every reading of the will and it was happening all over Newport still other family fortunes stayed intact even under this new pressure the Fords and the Rockefellers established foundations and traditions and stayed close-knit in family and business the Vanderbilts couldn't manage to do either they were caught in an endless downward spiral of family feuds and expensive diversions by 1947 they had lost the last shred of control in their railroad Empire when Harold Vanderbilt was forced out as a director of the New York Central and thus fell through their hands the source of all their wealth and power William kissim vanderville who built marble house as a summer Cottage may have explained the family's fatal philosophy when he said if a man makes money no matter how much he finds a certain happiness in its possession but the man who inherits his has none of this the first satisfaction and the greatest that of building a fortune is denied him he must labor if he does labor simply to add to an overs sufficiency I'll be back right after this announcement The Tide is Shifting down there with special meaning when you're here at Newport and there's so much I haven't told you yet about Florence vanderville who drove from Newport to California disguised as her own maid she rode all the way in the front seat with her chauffeur and had her maid dressed up like herself in the back Florence was afraid hostile Indians or the Dolan gang might kidnap her for ransom they might have in their time that she made the trip to 1935 I didn't tell you about Vanderbilt University or the Vanderbilt founded Metropolitan Opera that was established because older Blue Bloods wouldn't let vanderbelt into their opera house then there's the fifth generation Cornelius Vanderbilt the fourth for instance who set the record by having seven wives and going back I should have mentioned George Washington vilt who built the most lavish home on the North American continent it's called builtmore and it's near Asheville North Carolina it cost nearly $10 million and he only lived there 3 years before moving on to Paris George was a serious and important conservationist though and one of the first men in America to be concerned about ecology one hears echoes in Newport and in those rooms of marble house and the breakers of a time and style of living that are lost forever and if you say to that amen think twice for we all have a right to be judged according to our season these rooms were built at the end of an American Century in which a demanding continent had been conquered a unified Nation extended and preserved and slavery abolished at the end of an American Century when men whose recent ancestors have been peasants in Europe could prove by hard work and the free exercise of their talents they were as worthy as any aristocracy of the old order so if the children of these children of peasants decided finally that it was time to consolidate these accomplishments and celebrate by building a few monuments it's Small Wonder Being Human they were proud and most Americans shared that pride no masses ever stormed these palaces they stood as symbols in that time to Proclaim that it could happen even to an illiterate farmer and that their turn might be next it's only in the 20th century that we lost that vain innocence and saw that human truth was more terrible and complex few today would argue for going back but these pyramids with a view are worth preserving to see where we've been and to help us determine in the lessons to be learned here where it is we want to go in Tennyson who shared their time there's something suitable to say about the Vanderbilts for Good Ye are and bad and like two coins some true some light but every one of you stamped with the image of the king or if you will the Commodore once upon the time American Lifestyle the Vanderbilts and Newport brought to you by Basset Furniture Industries and the more than 20,000 Basset dealers throughout the country and starring as your host Mr EG [Music] Marshall [Music] oh n
