In its heyday, it was the epitome of an era that haunts us still as a fleeting moment of America on the cusp of something it never quite duplicated or achieved — money with style, sin that seemed innocent, human-scale pleasures, a jazz-inflected version of the American dream minus today’s cynicism and rust.
“Shakespeare-spouting poets and, when it came to that, Shakespeare-spouting pugilists might be seen there, milling and churning among senators, polo players, professional gamblers, Supreme Court justices, and horsy debutantes; the house was like a decompression chamber between social extremes,” one of Herbert Bayard Swope’s biographers wrote of the scene at Swope’s Sands Point mansion on the North Shore of Long Island.
There was croquet on the 13 acres of lawn, illumined by car headlights and parties at all hours for what Swope’s wife, Margaret, described as “an absolutely seething bordello of interesting people.” They included Bernard Baruch, George Gershwin, Robert Moses, the Marx Brothers, Irving Berlin, Vanderbilts, Whitneys and Harrimans. It’s the world F. Scott Fitzgerald captured in “The Great Gatsby,”which still seems fresh and urgent almost — remarkably — a century later.
So it’s no surprise that the world’s Fitzgerald-ologists and experts on Long Island’s faded luxe life are being besieged with queries about a 25-room, 20,000-square-foot Colonial Revival mansion called Lands End that is said, in part, to have inspired “Gatsby,” and is now facing demolition so the property can be subdivided for five more modest houses, at $10 million or so each.
In truth, many homes in both Sands Point and Kings Point — the first Fitzgerald’s old-money East Egg, the second his nouveau riche West Egg — inspired “Gatsby” during the period from 1922 to 1924, when Fitzgerald lived in what his wife, Zelda, described as “our nifty little Babbitt-home at Great Neck.” Fitzgerald spent the time drinking himself blind, spending money he didn’t have, and oh, yes, writing much of what is still the prime contender for the Great American Novel.
But few houses defined the era as much as the home built in 1902 and later owned by Swope, editor of The New York World and, in parts, the Tina Brown or Rupert Murdoch of his day.
According to Ruth Prigozy, an English professor at Hofstra University and executive director of the F. Scott Fitzgerald Society, Fitzgerald and his friend Ring Lardner used to gaze across Manhasset Bay at the property, much as Gatsby did, pining for Daisy. So the house was at once the inspiration for Daisy’s old-money preserve in East Egg and the Swope parties a model for the revels at Gatsby’s house in West Egg.
Perhaps 500 of the grandest mansions have already been knocked down, said Monica Randall, who has chronicled the era and its architectural heritage. So the demolition of Lands End is just one last domino falling from a long-gone era. And yet, the gravitational pull of Gatsby’s world endures, undimmed.
Dan McCall, a professor emeritus at Cornell University, taught the book for 40 years. He marvels at the hold Gatsby still has on students. On the one hand, he said, with its hypnotic prose, its layers of longing for money, status, reinvention and love, it’s still channeling the American experience. “It’s not an antique to them, it’s never gone out of style the way some books I teach.” On the other hand, he said, Gatsby’s evocation of the American dream has an innocence and passion that are impossibly distant, like astral material from a lost galaxy. “Gatsby’s dream, the way he’s so devoted to it, that’s not something you find much in this economy, at this time. I think it’s breathtaking for kids in college. It’s an America they haven’t heard about from their parents.”
Of course, Gatsby’s dream was built on deceit and illusion. The Roaring ‘20s ended in the Great Depression. Fitzgerald burned out and died at 44.
Still, like the old ruined mansion, he did capture something epic and elusive in American life. So there’s yet another Gatsby film coming — starring Leonardo DiCaprio — in 3D! If Gatsby were around today, maybe he’d be Bernie Madoff or one of the other swindlers of Wall Street fallen to earth. Maybe there’s something of him in Mark Zuckerberg, concocting his virtual social network with no need for the grand mansion or the seething bordello.
Maybe someone will write today’s “Gatsby.” Or maybe it would just be an epic tweet: “Yo, Gatz. Blue lawn, green light, so close, but too far. Ahh, Daisy. We beat on, boats vs. the current, borne back, lol, into the past.”
..........................................................................................................
The once-grand white house watches over Long Island Sound from the tip of Sands Point, its days numbered.
Lands End, the 25-room Colonial Revival mansion that local lore says was F. Scott Fitzgerald's inspiration for Daisy Buchanan's home in "The Great Gatsby" faces demolition this month.
In the 1920s and '30s, Winston Churchill, the Marx Brothers and Ethel Barrymore attended parties there. Fitzgerald was perched on the back deck, drinking in the view. Rooms featured marble, parquet and wide wood-planked floors, Palladian windows and hand-painted wallpaper.
Now, the front door is off its hinges, wood floors have been torn up for salvage, windows are missing and the two-story Doric columns are unsteady.
Sands Point Village in January approved plans to raze the house and divide the site into lots for five custom homes starting at $10 million each.
Lands End is the latest Gold Coast estate to fall. With each demolition, the North Shore loses more of its gilded past, when sea breezes and social events attracted the rich and famous. Historians say hundreds of the mansions have been lost in the past 50 years as owners faced increasing taxes and high maintenance costs.
"The cost to renovate these things is just so overwhelming that people aren't interested in it," said Clifford Fetner, president of Jaco Builders in Hauppauge and Lands End project construction manager. "The value of the property is the land."
Morgan, Tiffany gone
Among the estates already lost are the former homes of financier J.P. Morgan on East Island and glassmaker Louis C. Tiffany in Laurel Hollow.
From about 1890 to 1950, business titans, politicians and old-money families built as many as 1,400 opulent homes on the North Shore. The Gold Coast stretched from Great Neck to Eatons Neck and down to Old Westbury, said Paul Mateyunas, a historian and real estate agent at Daniel Gale Sotheby's International Realty.
The homes often were designed by noted architects like Stanford White and echoed European grandeur. They belonged to Vanderbilts, Woolworths, Morgans and Astors.
"The No. 1 priority is drawing attention to these mansions, saving what we can," said Oyster Bay author and historian Monica Randall.
Sands Point Village Trustee Katharine Ullman, who lives near Lands End, at first opposed the subdivision, saying it would increase traffic, disturb a creek and tear down a navigation landmark for sailors. But now, "I understand the problem," she said. "It was costly to make the repairs to make it livable."
Taxes, insurance and maintenance of the 24,000-square-foot house and 13-acre grounds total as much as $4,500 a day, said David Brodsky of 4B's Realty, which is redeveloping the site. His father, health care entrepreneur Bert Brodsky, bought Lands End for $17.5 million in 2004 from Virginia Kraft Payson, the late wife of former Mets owner Charles Shipman Payson.
"In its heyday, it had 20 in help," David Brodsky said. "It was a true Gold Coast estate."
The state Offices of Parks and Historic Preservation acknowledged that the costs of rehabilitation were prohibitive, but required the family to provide historical documentation and photos about the property.
"You can't save everything," Ullman said, adding that some historic homes "are being restored. Maybe that's the best we can do."
Some of the grand houses became part of parks or were used by religious groups, schools, hotels or nonprofits, said William Conklin, 49, who grew up on the Peacock Point estate in Locust Valley, where his father was caretaker.
The 40-room Ormston House in Lattingtown is now a monastery, Sefton Manor in Mill Neck is a school for the deaf and the Chrysler estate in Kings Point is part of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.
But about 500 historic North Shore homes were knocked down in the 1950s and '60s, Randall said. More have fallen in the past 30 years.
"It's becoming more and more of an epidemic," said Alexandra Wolfe, director of preservation services at the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities.
Once for sale at $30 million
The senior Brodsky has said he bought Lands End with plans to live there, but his family objected. He put it up for sale in 2006 for $30 million.
The subdivision plan wasn't the Gold Coast's first. After serving for decades as a home to steel magnate Henry Phipps' family, the Knole estate in Old Westbury was divided and developed several years ago.
La Selva, a 40-room Italian Renaissance villa in Upper Brookville, also was targeted for subdivision. Sylvia Kumar, wife of imprisoned former Computer Associates chief Sanjay Kumar, bought the 24-acre estate in 2001. It has been for sale for more than three years, now at $9.9 million. Kumar filed subdivision plans last year, but withdrew them, village Building Department clerk Linda Giani said.
Also for sale are a $15-million estate in Mill Neck and a $39.5-million estate in Kings Point called The Point.
"There are many of these in all degrees of condition and all degrees of pricing," said Barbara Candee, vice president of Daniel Gale Sotheby's. "The stories are wonderful and it's very sad if these are taken down."
...................................................................................................
The once-grand white house watches over Long Island Sound from the tip of Sands Point, its days numbered.
Lands End, the 25-room Colonial Revival mansion that local lore says was F. Scott Fitzgerald's inspiration for Daisy Buchanan's home in "The Great Gatsby" faces demolition this month.
In the 1920s and '30s, Winston Churchill, the Marx Brothers and Ethel Barrymore attended parties there. Fitzgerald was perched on the back deck, drinking in the view. Rooms featured marble, parquet and wide wood-planked floors, Palladian windows and hand-painted wallpaper.
Now, the front door is off its hinges, wood floors have been torn up for salvage, windows are missing and the two-story Doric columns are unsteady.
Sands Point Village in January approved plans to raze the house and divide the site into lots for five custom homes starting at $10 million each.
Lands End is the latest Gold Coast estate to fall. With each demolition, the North Shore loses more of its gilded past, when sea breezes and social events attracted the rich and famous. Historians say hundreds of the mansions have been lost in the past 50 years as owners faced increasing taxes and high maintenance costs.
"The cost to renovate these things is just so overwhelming that people aren't interested in it," said Clifford Fetner, president of Jaco Builders in Hauppauge, N.Y., and Lands End project construction manager. "The value of the property is the land."
Among the estates already lost are the former homes of financier J.P. Morgan on East Island and glassmaker Louis C. Tiffany in Laurel Hollow.
From about 1890 to 1950, business titans, politicians and old-money families built as many as 1,400 opulent homes on the North Shore. The Gold Coast stretched from Great Neck to Eatons Neck and down to Old Westbury, said Paul Mateyunas, a historian and real estate agent at Daniel Gale Sotheby's International Realty.
The homes often were designed by noted architects like Stanford White and echoed European grandeur. They belonged to Vanderbilts, Woolworths, Morgans and Astors.
"The No. 1 priority is drawing attention to these mansions, saving what we can," said Oyster Bay author and historian Monica Randall.
Sands Point Village Trustee Katharine Ullman, who lives near Lands End, at first opposed the subdivision, saying it would increase traffic, disturb a creek and tear down a navigation landmark for sailors. But now, "I understand the problem," she said. "It was costly to make the repairs to make it livable."
Taxes, insurance and maintenance of the 24,000-square-foot house and 13-acre grounds total as much as $4,500 a day, said David Brodsky of 4B's Realty, which is redeveloping the site. His father, health care entrepreneur Bert Brodsky, bought Lands End for $17.5 million in 2004 from Virginia Kraft Payson, the late wife of former Mets owner Charles Shipman Payson.
"In its heyday, it had 20 in help," David Brodsky said. "It was a true Gold Coast estate."
The state Offices of Parks and Historic Preservation acknowledged that the costs of rehabilitation were prohibitive, but required the family to provide historical documentation and photos about the property.
"You can't save everything," Ullman said, adding that some historic homes "are being restored. Maybe that's the best we can do."
Some of the grand houses became part of parks or were used by religious groups, schools, hotels or nonprofits, said William Conklin, 49, who grew up on the Peacock Point estate in Locust Valley, where his father was caretaker.
The 40-room Ormston House in Lattingtown is now a monastery, Sefton Manor in Mill Neck is a school for the deaf and the Chrysler estate in Kings Point is part of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.
But about 500 historic North Shore homes were knocked down in the 1950s and '60s, Randall said. More have fallen in the past 30 years.
"It's becoming more and more of an epidemic," said Alexandra Wolfe, director of preservation services at the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities.
The senior Brodsky has said he bought Lands End with plans to live there, but his family objected. He put it up for sale in 2006 for $30 million.
The subdivision plan wasn't the Gold Coast's first. After serving for decades as a home to steel magnate Henry Phipps' family, the Knole estate in Old Westbury was divided and developed several years ago.
La Selva, a 40-room Italian Renaissance villa in Upper Brookville, also was targeted for subdivision. Sylvia Kumar, wife of imprisoned former Computer Associates chief Sanjay Kumar, bought the 24-acre estate in 2001. It has been for sale for more than three years, now at $9.9 million. Kumar filed subdivision plans last year, but withdrew them, village Building Department clerk Linda Giani said.
Also for sale are a $15 million estate in Mill Neck and a $39.5-million estate in Kings Point called The Point.
"There are many of these in all degrees of condition and all degrees of pricing," said Barbara Candee, vice president of Daniel Gale Sotheby's. "The stories are wonderful and it's very sad if these are taken down."
