The Breakers

Summer “cottage” my foot. Yet that’s what the wealthy set of the Gilded Age called their mega-mansions in Newport.

The Breakers is the largest of these mansions and is used in the climax of my novel An Unlikely Suitor. Encompassing 65,000 square feet of living space (not to mention the cubic feet) it’s the size of thirty homes in one—and one family lived in it. A little about them: 

Cornelius Vanderbilt II
by John Singer Sargent

Cornelius Vanderbilt II was the grandson of the Commodore who ignited the Vanderbilt fortune decades earlier by getting into steamships and railroads. Cornelius was the favorite grandson and was bequeathed $5 million upon his grandfather’s death in 1877. When his father (William Henry) died in 1885, he received $70 million. Quite the nest egg. But C-2 didn’t sit around doing nothing. He took over the helm of the his family’s railroad legacy.


But backing up…C-2 met his wife Alice Gwynne while they were teaching Sunday school. They married in 1867 and had four sons and three daughters. Mrs. Vanderbilt was a leader in New York Society. Here’s a picture of her at one of her costume balls in 1883, dressed as "Electric Light".

This portion of the Vanderbilt family was very generous and gave to many charities including the YMCA, Salvation Army, Red Cross, their churches, as well as donating Vanderbilt Hall at Yale in memory of their son William, who died of typhus while in his junior year there in 1892. I think it's important to note that when C-2 died he had not added to his fortune, but had given away what he had made over his lifetime. We’re talking millions.

Breakers 1909



When they built the Breakers they had five living children, aged 9, 15,18, 20, and 22. The first Breakers burned to the ground in 1892. Its replacement was started a year later, and finished the year of my novel, 1895. But Mr. Vanderbilt suffered a bad stroke the following year, so this was the only year the Breakers was fully enjoyed by Alice and Cornelius. The 70-room mansion purportedly cost $7-12 million to build ($150-260 million in today’s dollars.)



Alice and daughter Gertrude

 Because the first house had burned down (as did many houses in the Gilded Age due to the use of open flame lighting and fireplaces) C-2 was determined the new house not suffer the same fate. And so he built the house without the use of wood. It used steel trusses, and C-2 even had the furnace placed away from the house, under the street. Set on 13 acres, commanding a view of the sea, the Breakers represents the epitome of Gilded Age extravagance with Italian and African marble.

Dining Room

The Music Room is decorated in real gold, and the Dining Room has columns of alabaster. Richard Morris Hunt was the architect. Looking at the detail…the artistry… I have a degree in architecture, but I can’t imagine envisioning such design, much less finding people with the talent to implement it. And once you have the house designed, you have to furnish it! All this done in two years? It’s astonishing. How could I resist having my own fictional ball in this massive hall? (below) 

Neily and Grace
Vanderbilt



When the Breakers was finished in 1895, the Vanderbilts were going through a bit of a personal crisis, as their son Cornelius III (Neily) had fallen in love with Grace Wilson, who had been secretly engaged to his older brother Bill, before Bill died of typhoid. In spite of his parents’ objections, Neily and Grace were married in 1896 and were cut out of the will. They were married their entire live. Neily’s mother didn’t reconcile with him until 1926.

  

Morning Room

Alfred, the third Vanderbilt son, died in the sinking of the Lusitania. Next son, Reginald, was the father of Gloria Vanderbilt—the grandmother of journalist Anderson Cooper. Daughter Gertrude married Harry Payne Whitney and became a patron of art and formed the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1931. She was also a sculptor and designed the Titanic monument in Washington, D.C., honoring the men who gave their lives so women and children could be saved. Their youngest daughter became a countess by marrying Hungarian Count László Széchenyi.

 

Gladys Vanderbilt
by John Singer Sargent

C-2 didn’t have long to enjoy the Breakers. He had his first stroke the year after it was finished, and died in 1899 from a cerebral hemorrhage from a second stroke at the young age of 55.

  

He left the home to his wife, who left it to Gladys—who always loved the estate. In 1942 she leased it to the Newport Preservation Society for $1, but in 1972, the Society purchased it from Gladys’ daughter Countess Sylvia Szapary for $365,000. The family still owns the furnishings. What a bargain! When Sylvia died in 1998, she left the estate to her two children, who continue to spend time there, up on the third floor, away from the tourists. Over 300,000 people visit the Breakers every year. You really should be one of them. Newport Mansions//Nancy

Treadle sewing

I wax nostalgic when the topic of treadle sewing machines comes up, because .... I learned to sew on one. At Clark Junior High School in East St. Louis, Illinois, we had an entire row of them in the Home Ec classroom, and that's what we used to create our fully lined black wool sheath dresses, and our two-piece wool pants suits. Pedal-pedal-pedal-pedal! In 1963-4. (And then of course we climbed aboard the covered wagon to go home. Uphill. Both ways. In the snow.)

For years my Grandmother's treadle sewing machine was part of our home decor. (Grandma Rose was Grandpa's sixth wife, but that's a topic for another blog. Or not.) I remember the drawers still housing all the attachments, and how I wish I had Grandma Rose's machine back...I'd probably use it!

As Nancy reminded us a few posts ago, the sewing machine changed women's lives forever. Reading her blog reminded me of some anecdotes I've come across in my studies of 19th Century Great Plains women.

In 1867, a Nebraska pioneer woman wrote, Didn’t this sewing machine help me long fast. I never mean to sew by hand any more if I can help it.

In 1878, Nebraskan Mattie Oblinger wrote about her Mother's sewing machine back home, "I wish I was near enough for awhile to do some sewin' on. I have so much to do I do not know where to commence." Later that same year she wrote, "I had to make some new clothes for the girls to wear to the fair, and I was very much hurried as I done it all by hand. Mother, I often wish I was close to your machine for three girls makes lots of sewin'."

Iowa farm wife Emily Gillespie was so thrilled to get a sewing machine, she wrote about it in her diary. I finished Henry’s clothes, took me just 49 hours to make coat, pants, and vest. "Just 49 hours" .... Oh my.

Nebraska sod house homemaker Luna Kellie wrote, J.T. had bought me a new Singer Machine and I made good use of it making all the clothes we all wore. I had done this before by hand only occasionally taking some long seams down to sew on Mrs. Strohls machine. Machines were not so high then I think we paid 30 or 35 dollars for it.

At least J.T. wasn't like one husband I read about who said that he thought that twenty or twenty-five dollars was a lot of money to pay for a machine that did "little more than lighten a woman's work load." Where do you suppose he's buried :-).

Ranch wife Grace Snyder had been married four years before she saved enough to buy a sewing machine by raising an orphaned calf. Imagine her joy when her husband returned from a supply run to town with that machine in the wagon ... and imagine her disappointment when they discovered he'd only brought the cabinet! The machine head, shipped in a separate crate, was still back at the train depot with the rest of the load. It would be a few days before the working part arrived!

For all the advances in women's sewing tools, I still think there's something to be said for the soothing monotony of hand stitching. I have a wonderful sewing machine and a Featherweight, but I still love to thread a needle (the thread spools perch on this antique thingy (what's it called?) and stitch by hand. And I honestly believe that our pioneer foremothers enjoyed it, too--in spite of all they had to accomplish. There is great satisfaction at looking at a bit of needlework and saying, 'I made that." Dinners get eaten, cookies disappear, laundry just has to be done again ... but stitching? Stitching often outlasts the hands that do it.

--Steph

Home on the Plains: Quilts and the Sod House Experience

Many years ago I had the privilege of being shown the Dowse Sod House in Custer County, Nebraska, by the gentleman who's father had build the soddy. When I asked him where he'd been born, Mr. Dowse

turned around and pointed at the bed pictured here and said, "Right there."

I looked at the quilt on the bed and wondered ... "What kinds of quilts did those women have?"

So I went on a search for quilts used in Sod Houses. Fellow author and textile

historian Kathy Moore joined the fray and together we combed museum collections and the Solomon Butcher photographic collection for evidence. And we found quilts and women's stories. We share some of them in the new book ... Home on the Plains: Quilts and the Sod House Experience   It's a true work of my heart and the result of years of research, miles spent driving gravel and dirt roads, untold hours in archives ... and at the sewing machine.

Co-author Kathy and I also MADE about a dozen quilts for the project, taking inspiration from

the antique quilts we discovered and creating a variety of reproductions and/or "new variations on the theme."

You'll note that the woman pictured on the book cover has spread a couple of her quilts on the fence in front of her sod house just before the photographer took her photo. What does that say about her? Did she make them? Or did the woman you can't see (seated in the wagon the mules are pulling) make them? We'll never know which member of the Comer family created these quilts, but we do know part of their story. As a woman, the most interesting "detail" to me is that Mrs. Comer had Sarah Ellen in 1872,Cora in 1875 (who died in 1876), Paschal in 1877, Minnie May in 1880, Hattie Bell in 1883, Georgie in 1885, Andrew in 1886, James in 1889, Melville in 1891, and Mary Elizabeth in 1903. Makes me tired just to tell you about it ... but that's the kind of "news" that keeps me writing stories.

In the case of this book, all the stories are true. I hope you'll enjoy meeting school-marm Susan Payne, young mother Luna Kellie, grandmother Maria Newton, and the other women featured in this book intended to be a tribute to our pioneer foremothers. The book also includes patterns for how to make some of the featured quilts. There's a sneak peek of sample pages at More info "Home on the Plains" (and a way to order an autographed copy.

P.S. I made the blue quilt on the cover (and several others featured in the book) ... but I had a lot of help with the quilting. //Steph

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I also want you to know about a re-release of The Story Jar by author friends Robin Lee Hatcher and Deborah Bedford.



The Story Jar…

The jar itself is most unusual—not utilized in the ordinary way for canning or storing food, but as a collection point for memories. Some mementos in the jar—hair ribbons, a ring, a medallion--are sorrowful, others tender, some bittersweet. But all those memories eventually bring their owners to a place of hope and redemption in spite of circumstances that seemingly have no solution.


Isn't the idea of a jar of stories appealing? Hope you like it!

Robin got the story idea while speaking in Nebraska ... she shares the "story behind the story" ....


In September 1998, I received a story jar as a thank you gift after speaking at a writers’ conference in Nebraska. The small mason jar, the lid covered with a pretty handkerchief, was filled with many odds and ends – a Gerber baby spoon, an empty thread spindle, a colorful pen, several buttons, a tiny American flag, an earring, and more.

The idea behind this gift was a simple one. When a writer can’t think of anything to write, she stares at one of the objects in the jar and lets her imagination play. Who did that belong to? How hold was he? What sort of person was he? What does the object represent in his life? Writers love to play the “what if” game. It’s how most stories come into being. Something piques their interest, they start asking questions, and a book is born.


A week after receiving my story jar, I attended a retreat with several writer friends of mine, Deborah Bedford included. On the flight home, I told Deborah about the jar. The next thing you know (after all, what better thing is there for writers to do on a plane than play “what if”?), we began brainstorming what would ultimately become The Story Jar. We decided very quickly that we wanted this to be a book that celebrates motherhood, that encourages mothers, that recognizes how much they should be loved and honored.

The Story Jar was first published by Multnomah in 2000, but eventually went out of print. Thus Deborah and I are delighted that Hendrickson wanted to bring it out in a new, revised version because we believe these stories can inspire others, just as it did this reader back in 2001:

"I am an avid book reader and have read thousands of books––maybe more––since the age of 5. I can honestly say that [The Story Jar] has touched me more than any other I have read. I cried, I laughed, and I relearned things that I had forgotten long ago as well as realizing things I never knew. Thank you for sharing your stories with your readers. They are truly inspiring. I plan on giving it to all the ‘mothers’ in my life for Mother's Day."


You don’t have to be a writer to want a story jar. It can be a family’s way of preserving memories. Consider having a family get-together where everybody brings an item to go into the jar, and as it drops in, they tell what it means to them, what it symbolizes. We can learn something new about our loved ones when we hear their memories in their own words. Or do what my church did a number of years ago to create a memory for a retiring pastor. Inspired by The Story Jar, members of the congregation brought items to the retirement dinner to put into a story jar or they simply wrote their memories on a piece of paper to go into the jar. It was our way of saying thanks to a man and wife for all of the years they’d given in God’s service.

A story jar can be a tool for remembering all the wonderful things God has done in our own lives. As Mrs. Halley said, not all of God’s miracles are in the Bible. He is still performing them today in countless ways today, changing lives, healing hearts.


ABOUT THE AUTHORS:

Robin Lee Hatcher is known for her heartwarming and emotionally charged stories of  faith, courage, and love. She makes her home in Idaho where she enjoys spending time with her family, her high-maintenance Papillon, Poppet, and Princess Pinky, the kitten who currently terrorizes the household.

When Deborah Bedford isn't writing, she spends her time fly-fishing, cheering at American Legion baseball games, shopping with her daughter, singing praise songs while she walks along the banks of Flat Creek, and taking her dachshund Annie for hikes in the Tetons where they live.

Order your copy here:

The Story Jar

Visit Robin and Deborah at: http://www.robinleehatcher.com/  and  http://www.deborahbedfordbooks.com/

Have a fabulous week! Spring's coming!