Caroline Schermerhorn Astor

{{Further|Livingston family}}

File:Caroline Webster Schermerhorn.jpg

Caroline Webster Schermerhorn, called "Lina", was born on September 22, 1830, into a wealthy family who were part of New York City's Dutch aristocracy, descendants of the city's original settlers. Her father, Abraham Schermerhorn (1783–1850),{{cite web|title=Astor, Caroline Schermerhorn (1830–1908) - Dictionary definition of Astor, Caroline Schermerhorn (1830–1908)|url=http://www.encyclopedia.com/women/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/astor-caroline-schermerhorn-1830-1908|publisher=Encyclopedia.com|access-date=25 January 2017}} and the extended Schermerhorn family were engaged in shipping. At the time of Lina's birth, Abraham was worth half a million dollars{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=13jwkUPvYGcC&pg=PA258|title=Mrs. Astor's New York: Money and Social Power in a Gilded Age|last=Homberger|first=Eric|date=1 September 2004|publisher=Yale University Press|isbn=0300105150}} (equivalent to ${{Inflation|US|0.5|1830|r=2}} million in {{Inflation-year|US}}).{{inflation-fn|US}} Her mother was Helen Van Cortlandt (née White) Schermerhorn (1792–1881). Lina was the couple's ninth child. Her older sister Elizabeth married General James I. Jones, who owned a vast farm in upper Manhattan called Jones's Wood.{{cite news|title=DIED. Jones|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1874/08/23/79228649.pdf|access-date=January 14, 2018|newspaper=The New York Times|date=August 23, 1874}}

Her maternal grandparents were Henry White and Anne (née Van Cortlandt) White while her paternal grandparents were Peter Schermerhorn and Elizabeth (née Bussing) Schermerhorn.{{cite book|last1=Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York|title=The Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York: History, Customs, Record of Events, Constitution, Certain Genealogies, and Other Matters of Interest. V. 1-|date=1905|page=[https://archive.org/details/saintnicholassoc01sain/page/n143 138]|url=https://archive.org/details/saintnicholassoc01sain|access-date=January 14, 2018}} Among her extended Schermerhorn family was first cousin William Colford Schermerhorn,{{cite news |title=W.C. SCHERMERHORN DEAD; Passes Away in This City After a Few Hours' Illness. Was a Member of One of New York's Oldest Families, and a Patron of Letters, Science, and Art. |url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1903/01/02/101963538.pdf |access-date=April 19, 2019 |newspaper=The New York Times |date=January 2, 1903}} the father of Annie Schermerhorn Kane, wife of John Innes Kane (a great-grandson of John Jacob Astor).{{cite news |title=WILL OF MRS. KANE LEAVES $4,000,000 TO CITY CHARITIES -- $1,000,000 Each Goes to Home for Incurables and Columbia University |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/30762779/the_brooklyn_daily_eagle/ |access-date=April 19, 2019 |newspaper=Brooklyn Eagle |date=September 9, 1926 |page=5}}

At the time of her birth, her family lived at 1 Greenwich Street, near the Bowling Green, but the population growth and increasing urbanization of lower Manhattan in the 1830s led her family to move farther north to 36 Bond Street, near the ultra-fashionable "Lafayette Place," which had been developed by her future husband's paternal grandfather, fur-trader John Jacob Astor.

Young Lina was educated at a school run by Mrs. Bensee, a French emigrée. There, she learned to speak French fluently.

{{main|Astor family}}

File:Ferncliff, Rhinebeck, New York.jpg, the Astor family's country estate in Rhinebeck, New York]]

File:Astors Beechwood Mansion (2966829057).jpg, the Astors' summer home in Newport, Rhode Island]]

File:Mrs. Astor mansion 1895.jpg in Manhattan in 1895]]

On September 23, 1853, she married William Backhouse Astor Jr. (1829–1892) at Trinity Church. Her husband was the middle son of real estate businessman William Backhouse Astor Sr. and Margaret Alida Rebecca Armstrong. His paternal grandfather was John Jacob Astor and his maternal grandparents were Senator John Armstrong Jr. and Alida (née Livingston) Armstrong, daughter of Robert Livingston of the Livingston family.Gavan, Terrence. "The Barons of Newport: A Guide to the Gilded Age". Newport: Pineapple Publications, 1998. pp. 25-8. {{ISBN|0-929249-06-2}}

Her husband's family, the Astors, had made a fortune initially through the fur trade, and later through investing in New York City real estate.{{cite encyclopedia |encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Astor-family |title=Astor family |access-date=September 19, 2018}} Despite the wealth of the Astor family, Lina had the superior pedigree as a member of an old Knickerbocker (original 1600s Dutch settlers of Manhattan) family.{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/notableamericanw02jame_0|url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/notableamericanw02jame_0/page/62 62]|quote=Caroline Astor.|title=Notable American Women, 1607–1950: A Biographical Dictionary|last1=James|first1=Edward T.|last2=James|first2=Janet Wilson|last3=Boyer|first3=Paul S.|date=January 1, 1971|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=9780674627345}}

Together, they had five children:

• Emily Astor (1854–1881), who married James John Van Alen (1848–1923), a sportsman/politician, and had three children.
• Helen Schermerhorn Astor (1855–1893), who married James Roosevelt "Rosy" Roosevelt (1854–1927), a diplomat and the elder half-brother of future President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and had two children.
• Charlotte Augusta Astor (1858–1920), who married James Coleman Drayton and had four children. She later married George Ogilvy Haig.
• Caroline Schermerhorn "Carrie" Astor (1861–1948), who married Marshall Orme Wilson,{{cite news|title=A WEDDING AMID FLOWERS; THE MARRIAGE OF MISS ASTOR AND MR. WILSON. {{!}} MANY PRINCELY PRESENTS {{!}} A NECKLACE THAT COST $75,000 {{!}} BEAUTIFUL EXAMPLES OF WORTH'S ART.|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1884/11/19/archives/a-wedding-amid-flowers-the-marriage-of-miss-astor-and-mr-wilson.html|access-date=25 January 2017|newspaper=The New York Times|date=November 19, 1884}} the brother of banker Richard Thornton Wilson, Jr. and socialite Grace Graham Wilson, in 1884 and had two sons.
• John Jacob "Jack" Astor IV (1864–1912), who married Ava Lowle Willing (1868–1958), a socialite, and had two children, later married socialite Madeleine Talmage Force (1893–1940), sister of real estate businesswoman/socialite Katherine Emmons Force, and had one son, John Jacob Astor VI, born after John Jacob Astor IV died in the Titanic sinking.

Although popularly imagined as wholly preoccupied with "high society", for the first several decades of her married life, Lina Astor was principally occupied with raising her five children and running her household, as was typical of women of her class in mid-19th-century New York City. Due to an inheritance from her parents, Lina had her own money, thus she was far less dependent on her husband than most American women of the time.

In 1862, she and her husband built a four-bay townhouse in the newly fashionable brownstone style at 350 Fifth Avenue,{{cite web |url=https://househistree.com/houses/mrs-astor-s-house |title=The House of "The" Mrs Astor |work=HouseHistree |access-date=September 13, 2020}} the present site of the Empire State Building. The home was next door to her husband's elder brother, John Jacob Astor III; the two families were next-door neighbors for 28 years, although the Astor brothers' wives did not get along. The Astors also maintained a grand "summer cottage" in Newport, Rhode Island, called Beechwood, which had a ballroom large enough to fit "The 400" – the most fashionable New York socialites of the day.Vanderbilt II, Arthur T. Fortune's Children. Wm. Morrow and Co.: 1989. 143.{{cite news|title=The Leader of Society|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1908/11/01/archives/the-leader-of-society.html|access-date=14 January 2018|work=The New York Times|date=1 November 1908}} It also neighbored his brother's family, who lived at Beaulieu.

File:Carolus-Duran 001.jpg, 1890, painted in Paris and now held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art.[https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/110000282 Mrs. William Astor (Caroline Webster Schermerhorn, 1831–1908)], Metropolitan Museum of Art This painting was placed prominently in Mrs. Astor's house; she would stand in front of it when receiving guests for receptions.{{citation needed|date=September 2018}}]]

In the decades following the Civil War the population of New York City grew almost exponentially, and immigrants and wealthy arrivistes from the Midwest began challenging the dominance of the old New York Establishment.{{cite web|url=https://blog.mcny.org/2013/08/06/vanderbilt-ball-how-a-costume-ball-changed-new-york-elite-society/|title=Vanderbilt Ball – how a costume ball changed New York elite society|date=August 6, 2013|agency=Museum of the City of New York|access-date=November 12, 2016}} Aided by the social arbiter Ward McAllister, whose first cousin, Samuel Cutler Ward, had married into the Astor family, Lina attempted to codify proper behavior and etiquette, as well as determine who was acceptable among the arrivistes for an increasingly heterogeneous city.Gavan, Terrence. 'The Barons of Newport: A Guide to the Gilded Age'. Newport: Pineapple Publications, 1998. p. 27. {{ISBN|0-929249-06-2}} They were the champions of old money and tradition.

McAllister once stated that, amongst the vastly rich families of Gilded Age New York, there were only 400 people who could be counted as members of Fashionable Society. He did not, as is commonly written, arrive at this number based on the limitations of Mrs. Astor's New York City ballroom. (McAllister referred to her as the "Mystic Rose.") Her husband's lack of interest in the social whirl did not stop but instead fueled her burgeoning social activities, which increased in intensity as her children grew older.Vanderbilt II, Arthur T. Fortune's Children. Wm. Morrow and Co., 1989: 92-97. {{ISBN|0-688-07279-8}}

Lina was the foremost authority on the "Aristocracy" of New York in the late nineteenth century.{{cite book|last1=Nicholls|first1=Charles Wilbur de Lyon|title=The Ultra-fashionable Peerage of America: An Official List of Those People who Can Properly be Called Ultra-fashionable in the United States|date=1904|publisher=George Harjes, Publisher|location=New York|pages=7–8|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=spcIAQAAMAAJ&q=ogden+goelet&pg=PA93|access-date=November 29, 2016}} She held ornate and elaborate parties for herself and other members of the elite New York socialite crowd. None was permitted to attend these gatherings without an official calling card from her. Lina's social groups were dominated by strong-willed "aristocratic" women. These social gatherings were dependent on overly conspicuous luxury and publicity. More so than the gatherings themselves, importance was highly placed upon the group as the upper-crust of New York's elite. She and her ladies therefore represented the "Aristocratic," or the Old Money, whereas the newly wealthy Vanderbilt family would establish a new wave of New Money.Frederic Cople Jaher. "Nineteenth-Century Elites in Boston and New York". Journal of Social History, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Autumn, 1972), pp. 32-77.

File:Caroline Astor and her guest, New York 1902.jpg ball in 1902]]

The Vanderbilts, as members of socialite New York through the copious amounts of money that the family had earned rather than inherited, represented a type of wealth that was abhorrent to Astor and her group. Lina Astor found railroad money distasteful.Vanderbilt. 98. For this reason, she was reluctant to call upon the Vanderbilt girls. In 1883, however, Astor was forced to formally acknowledge the wealthy socialite Alva Erskine Smith, first wife of horse breeder/railroad manager William Kissam Vanderbilt, thereby providing the Vanderbilts, the greatest "new" fortune in New York, entrance into the highest rungs of society.

An oft-repeated New York legend has it that Alva Vanderbilt had planned an elaborate costume ball for her housewarming, with entertainments given by young society figures, but at the last minute notified young Caroline Astor (Lina's youngest daughter) that she could not participate, because Astor had never formally called on Vanderbilt. Also likely, Astor had noted the rising social profile of the Vanderbilt family, led by Alva and Willie and, viewing them as useful allies in her efforts to keep New York society exclusive, had called formally on the Vanderbilts prior to Alva's lavish ball which Astor herself attended. The Vanderbilts were subsequently invited to Astor's annual ball, a formal acknowledgement of their full acceptance into the upper echelon of New York society.Vanderbilt, 104-6.

Until 1887, Lina Astor had been formally known as "Mrs. William Astor", but with Charlotte Augusta Gibbes's death that year, she shortened her formal title to "Mrs. Astor", as she was then the senior Mrs. Astor, the only remaining one in her generation. Charlotte's son, William Waldorf Astor, felt that his own wife, Mary "Mamie" Dahlgren Paul, should be "the Mrs. Astor." With the death of John Jacob Astor III in 1890, William Waldorf Astor had inherited his father's share of the Astor holdings and, titularly, became the head of the Astor family. In his mind, this made Mamie "the Mrs. Astor." However, Mamie was eighteen years younger than Lina and lacked Lina's social power.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7ZJvFoNntzIC&q=caroline+astor&pg=PA277|title=John Jacob Astor: America's First Multimillionaire|last=Madsen|first=Axel|date=March 14, 2002|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=9780471009351}}

His further attempts at challenging Lina's preeminence in New York society, however, were thwarted, and he soon moved with his family to England, where he later became a viscount.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rr7MRSed7h8C&q=caroline+astor|title=To Marry an English Lord: Tales of Wealth and Marriage, Sex and Snobbery|last1=MacColl|first1=Gail|last2=Wallace|first2=Carol McD|date=March 15, 2012|publisher=Workman Publishing|isbn=9780761171980}}

{{see|Waldorf–Astoria (1893–1929)}}

File:The Waldorf and The Astoria Hotels, New York City c1915.jpg

File:Astor Cenotaph 9446.JPG

In retaliation for his aunt's intransigence, William Waldorf Astor had his father's house torn down and replaced by the first Waldorf Hotel. The hotel was specifically designed to overshadow Mrs. Astor's mansion, which was right next door, in an attempt to overshadow her status with it. The Waldorf Hotel was thirteen stories tall and was built in the form of a German Renaissance chateau: it thus not only overshadowed Lina, but all other structures in the neighborhood as well. Mrs. Astor famously stated about the hotel, "There's a glorified tavern next door."

Until the opulence of the Waldorf Hotel revolutionized how New York socialized publicly, polite society did not gather in public places, especially hotels. Unwilling to live next door to New York's latest sensation and public draw, Mrs. Astor and her son, Jack, first contemplated tearing down her house and replacing it with livery stables. Eventually she and Jack tore down their house and erected another hotel at its site, the Astoria, and soon the two hotels merged and became the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. Astor consequently built a double mansion, one of the largest ever built in New York, for her and her son, with Mrs. Astor occupying the northern residence, 841 Fifth Avenue and her son occupying the southern half, 840 Fifth Avenue.{{cite news |title=MRS. WILLIAM ASTOR'S DANCE {{!}} A LARGE BALL IN HER NEW FIFTH AVENUE HOME {{!}} The House Decorated with Roses and Violets--The Cotillion Led by Elisha Dyer, Jr., and Mrs. J. J. Astor |url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1896/02/04/104109791.pdf |access-date=17 September 2018 |work=The New York Times |date=February 4, 1896}}

The Astors' Fifth Avenue home and the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel were both eventually torn down in 1927 and 1928 to make way for Temple Emanu-El and the Empire State Building, respectively.{{cite news |title=TEMPLE EMANU-EL WILL OPEN TODAY; Jewish New Year's Eve Service to Be Held in $8,000,000 Edifice in Fifth AvMANY VAINLY SEEK SEATSExterior Is Austerely Proportionedand Spacious AuditoriumRich in Color. Exterior Austerely Proportioned. Auditorium Richly Colored. Seats for 2,600 Worshipers. |url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1929/10/04/95999360.pdf |access-date=17 September 2018 |newspaper=The New York Times |date=October 4, 1929}}Annabel Wharton. "Two Waldorf-Astorias: Spatial Economies as Totem and Fetish". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 85, No. 3 (Sep., 2003), pp. 523-543.

By the time she moved into her new house facing Central Park, at the corner of 65th Street, Mrs. Astor's husband had died, and she lived with her son and his family. Spending her last several years suffering from periodic dementia, she died at age 78 on October 30, 1908, and was interred in the Trinity Church Cemetery in upper Manhattan.{{cite news|title=MRS. ASTOR DIES AT HER CITY HOME; Only Her Daughter, Mrs. M. Orme Wilson, with Her When the End Came Early Last Night. HEART TROUBLE KILLED HER Col. Astor and His Wife Had Left His Mother When the Last Sinking Spell Set In -- Her Notable Career.|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1908/10/31/archives/mrs-astor-dies-at-her-city-home-only-her-daughter-mrs-m-orme-wilson.html|access-date=14 January 2018|work=The New York Times|date=31 October 1908}}

Her youngest daughter, Carrie, erected a commemorative 39-foot-tall (11.9 m) cenotaph in her memory, in addition to her uptown burial plot. The inscription is dated A.D. MCMXIV and the cenotaph is located within the small churchyard cemetery at the intersection of Broadway and Wall Street, in which many prominent early Americans are buried.[https://www.nycgo.com/articles/womens-history-nyc NYC Go][http://www.audubonparkny.com/AudubonParkTrinityCemeteryTour.html Audubon Park Alliance]{{cite book|last1=Keister|first1=Douglas|title=Stories in Stone New York: A Field Guide to New York City Area Cemeteries and Their Residents|date=2011|publisher=Gibbs Smith|location=Layton, Utah|isbn=9781423621027|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AkNldfGIyCcC&q=astor+cenotaph+trinity&pg=PA128|access-date=January 25, 2017}}

Following Mrs. Astor's death, it reportedly took three women to fill her role in New York Society: Marion Graves Anthon Fish, the wife of Stuyvesant Fish, Theresa Fair Oelrichs, the wife of Hermann Oelrichs, and Alva Belmont, by then the wife of Oliver Belmont.

Mrs. Astor has been portrayed by Donna Murphy in the HBO drama The Gilded Age.

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