Augustus C. Gurnee
Portrait of Gurnee by Carolus-Duran, 1910, Petit Palais
Born
Augustus Coe Gurnee

(1855-03-11)March 11, 1855
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
DiedJuly 6, 1926(1926-07-06) (aged 71)
Baden-Baden, Germany
Alma materHarvard University
Parent(s)Walter S. Gurnee
Mary Coe Gurnee
RelativesFrantz Hunt Coe (cousin)
AwardsLégion d’Honneur

Augustus Coe Gurnee (March 11, 1855 – July 6, 1926) was an American socialite and art patron during the Gilded Age.[1]

Early life

Gurnee was born on March 11, 1855, in Chicago, Illinois. He was the son of Mary (née Coe) Gurnee (1820–1893) and capitalist Walter Smith Gurnee (1813–1903), who served as Mayor Chicago from 1851 to 1853 and was the namesake of Gurnee, Illinois.[2] Gurnee attended Harvard University and graduated with the class of 1878.[3] Through his maternal uncle, Dr. Matthew Daniel Coe, he was a first cousin of Frantz Hunt Coe, the physician, public official and educator. Among his siblings was Delia E. Gurnee, Mary Evelyn Gurnee, Frances Medora Gurnee, Walter Scott Gurnee, Grace Gurnee, and Isabel Gurnee.[4][5]

In 1863, the family moved to New York where his father engaged in banking and other businesses, serving as the treasurer and director of the Shelby Iron Company, the American Smelting and Refining Company, and the American Surety Company, among others.[2]

Society life

After graduating from Harvard, where he was a member of the Hasty Pudding Club,[6] he briefly worked as a banker in New York.[7] Gurnee was "free from the necessity of engaging in business" and, instead, spent his time "engrossed in the cultivation of the arts and spent much time in travel, living at intervals in Italy and France."[1][8]

In 1892, Gurnee was included in Ward McAllister's "Four Hundred", purported to be an index of New York's best families, published in The New York Times.[9][10] Conveniently, 400 was the number of people that could fit into Mrs. Astor's ballroom.[11]

Personal life

Gurnee had a home in Bar Harbor, Maine, Paris, and Nice, France. His home in Maine, known as Beaudesert, was originally designed by William Ralph Emerson in 1881, but was renovated for Gurnee in 1900 by architect Fred L. Savage, who also designed the nearby Breakwater, Reverie Cove, Raventhorp, and the Philler Cottage.[12] In 1925, he donated his home in Nice, for the benefit of wounded soldiers, and a number of valuable works of art to the city of Paris,[13] including twelve tapestries of Aubusson, Flanders, and Paris before the time of Gobelin.[14] He was honored by France with the ribbon of the Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur.[1]

Gurnee, who did not marry, died on July 6, 1926, in Baden-Baden, Germany,[1] and was interred at the Gurnee Mausoleum at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery.[15] In his will,[16] Gurnee left many large bequeaths to charity, including the Presbyterian Hospital, St. Luke's Hospital, the Nursery and Child's Hospital, and the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, many trust funds for his relatives, and then left his residuary estate to Harvard.[16][17] His secretary, Gustave Frederick Dutschke, who lived at 17 Avenue d'Iéna in Paris, received $300,000 in three and a half per cent Liberty bonds and $20,000 a year from the residuary estate.[16]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "AUGUSTUS C. GURNEE DIES IN BADEN BADEN; Was a Son of Chicago's First Mayor -- Acquired a Fine Art Collection" (PDF). The New York Times. July 7, 1926. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  2. 1 2 "WALTER S. GURNEE DEAD" (PDF). The New York Times. April 18, 1903. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  3. ↑ The Harvard Index for ... Welch, Bigelow. 1876. p. 40. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  4. ↑ Bartlett, Joseph Gardner (1911). Robert Coe, Puritan: His Ancestors and Descendants, 1340-1910, with Notices of Other Coe Families. private circulation. p. 121. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  5. ↑ "A DAY'S WEDDINGS. Thorndike — Gurnee" (PDF). The New York Times. July 30, 1903. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  6. ↑ Club, Hasty Pudding (1891). Eleventh Catalogue of the Officers and Members of the Hasty-Pudding Club in Harvard College. W. H. Wheeler. p. 87. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  7. ↑ Epsilon, Delta Kappa (1900). Catalogue of the Delta Kappa Epsilon Fraternity ... Council publishing Company. p. 135. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  8. ↑ Social Register, Summer. Social Register Association. 1907. p. 104. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  9. ↑ McAllister, Ward (16 February 1892). "THE ONLY FOUR HUNDRED | WARD M'ALLISTER GIVES OUT THE OFFICIAL LIST. HERE ARE THE NAMES, DON'T YOU KNOW, ON THE AUTHORITY OF THEIR GREAT LEADER, YOU UNDER- STAND, AND THEREFORE GENUINE, YOU SEE" (PDF). The New York Times. Retrieved 26 March 2017.
  10. ↑ Patterson, Jerry E. (2000). The First Four Hundred: Mrs. Astor's New York in the Gilded Age. Random House Incorporated. p. 217. ISBN 9780847822089. Retrieved 13 June 2018.
  11. ↑ Keister, Lisa A. (2005). Getting Rich: America's New Rich and How They Got That Way. Cambridge University Press. p. 36. ISBN 9780521536677. Retrieved 20 October 2017.
  12. ↑ Bryan, John M. (2007). Maine Cottages: Fred L. Savage and the Architecture of Mount Desert. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 280. ISBN 9781568986494. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  13. ↑ "Augustus C. Gurnee, Art Patron, Dies". The San Francisco Examiner. July 7, 1926. p. 1. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  14. ↑ "Ancient Tapestries Given to Paris" (PDF). The New York Times. November 26, 1925. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  15. ↑ Princeton Alumni Weekly, Vol. XXVII, No. 6. Princeton Alumni Weekly. 1926. p. 156. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  16. 1 2 3 "A.C. GURNEE'S WILL BENEFITS HARVARD; University to Get Residuary Estate -- $300,000 and $20,000 Annuity for Secretary" (PDF). The New York Times. July 31, 1926. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
  17. ↑ "Gifts Surpass $2,700,000 in Quarter Year". The Harvard Crimson. March 31, 1950. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
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