Edward Townsend Stotesbury

(February 26, 1849 - May 16, 1938

Edward Townsend Stotesbury was an American financier, industrialist, and society figure whose immense wealth and legendary estates epitomized the extravagance of the Gilded Age. He was born in Philadelphia on February 26, 1849, into a middle-class Quaker family and was educated at Friends' Central School.

At seventeen he entered Drexel & Company as a clerk and quickly distinguished himself in the banking world. Rising through the ranks, he became a partner of the firm and later a senior partner of Drexel, Morgan & Company, working in close collaboration with J. P. Morgan. Morgan himself declared that Stotesbury "knew more about the banking business than any man in America." For decades he was one of the most powerful figures in finance, guiding the firm through vast mergers, industrial investments, and the consolidation of American railroads and corporations.

Stotesbury married Frances Berman Butcher in the 1870s. Their first daughter, Helen Lewis Stotesbury, died in infancy in 1874. Frances died in childbirth on November 7, 1881, leaving him a widower with two young daughters. He did not remarry until more than thirty years later.

Eva Roberts Cromwell Stotesbury

On January 18, 1912, he wed Eva Roberts Cromwell, the widowed mother of Oliver Eaton Cromwell Jr., diplomat James H. R. Cromwell, and Louise Cromwell Brooks. Through this marriage he became stepfather to one of the most prominent families in American society. With Eva, he began a period of extraordinary building and display. Together they redecorated his Philadelphia townhouses and then commissioned three palatial estates that became symbols of their wealth and taste.

Whitemarsh hall

The most celebrated was Whitemarsh Hall, outside Philadelphia, designed by Horace Trumbauer and completed between 1916 and 1921. Often called the "Versailles of America," the Georgian Revival mansion contained 147 rooms, 45 bathrooms, a theater, a barber shop, billiards room, nine elevators, and some of the finest collections of tapestries, porcelains, rugs, and paintings in the country. It cost over $8 million to build and furnish and required a staff of seventy, though it was only used for half the year.

Architect Addison Mizner’s El Mirasol was built in 1919 and destroyed in 1959

In Palm Beach, they built El Mirasol, a villa of vast scale, where they entertained hundreds of guests at a time. The 42-acre estate was entered off North County Road, which ran through the entire property. The eastern part was for the residence on the ocean and across the road to the west for gardens and pavilions. Another sprawling fantasy villa, it was always being expanded according to the Stotesburys’ whims. It also was the scene of magical parties and galas. The Stotesburys had El Mirasol as their winter residence

Wingwood House

In Bar Harbor they commissioned Wingwood House, completed in 1927, another monumental summer residence.

By 1927 Stotesbury's fortune was estimated at $100,000,000, making him one of the wealthiest men in America. But the Depression and his own prodigious spending drained his resources. Between 1933 and his death he withdrew over $55,000,000 from his Morgan accounts. At the time of his death in 1938, his estate was valued at only $4,000,000. Much of his fortune had been consumed by the enormous expense of maintaining his three palaces.

Edward T. Stotesbury died at his home, Whitemarsh Hall, in Wyndmoor, Pennsylvania, on May 21, 1938, at the age of eighty-nine. He was buried in The Woodlands Cemetery in Philadelphia.

His name remains associated with the grandeur and decline of the Gilded Age, a symbol of both the power of American finance and the transience of its fortunes.

Whitemarsh hall was demolished in 1980.

Below you will find a gallery on Whitemarsh Hall