Inside Whitehall Fall 2022

Many Thanks

To our Funders and Sponsors for their support

The MBS Family Foundation

Roe Green Eliasberg Family Foundation, Inc.

The Fortin Foundation of Florida, Inc. The Wise Foundation

Schedule of Events

October

The Mary Alice Fortin Foundation, Inc.

The Max and Victoria Dreyfus Foundation, Inc.

SMITH ARCHITECTURAL GROUP, INC.

11 Fall Exhibition opens — The Story of Whitehall: 120 Years in the Making. Sponsored by Templeton & Company, LLC

November

25 Café des Beaux-Arts opens

December

4 Annual Christmas Tree Lighting Festivities

8 Season Opening Trustees Reception

19 Holiday Evening Tours begin through December 22

31 Fall Exhibition closes — The Story of Whitehall: 120 Years in the Making

January

23 Winter Exhibition opens — The American West During the Gilded Age. Sponsored by Northern Trust

February

3 Whitehall Lecture Series begins, Sunday afternoons through March 19, 2023. Sponsored by Related Southeast, First Republic Bank, and Smith Architectural Group, Inc.

7 Whitehall Music Series begins, Tuesday evenings through March 7, 2023. Sponsored by Roe Green and The MBS Family Foundation

One Whitehall Way, Palm Beach, FL 33480 (561) 655-2833 www.FlaglerMuseum.us

museum hours

Tuesday - Saturday, 10 am to 5 pm Sunday, 12 to 5 pm

Closed Mondays, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day

board of trustees

Kelly M. Hopkins, President

G. F. Robert Hanke, Vice President

William M. Matthews, Treasurer

Thomas S. Kenan, III, Secretary

Barry G. Hoyt, Trustee

Richard M. Krasno, Trustee

George G. Matthews, Trustee

leadership Team

John Blades, Executive Director

Christina Bernstein, Director of Finance

Allison Goff, Member & Visitor Services Director

David Carson, Public Affairs Director

Mark Johnson, Store & Café Manager

Kelly Houghton, Chief Curator

Inside Whitehall is a Henry Morrison Flagler Museum publication © 2022 by the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum. All rights reserved.

Volume 29, Issue 3

Henry Morrison Flagler Museum, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

National Historic Landmark

Accredited since 1973 by follow us:

@flaglermuseum

#flaglermuseum

The Story of Whitehall: 120 Years in the Making

Fall Exhibition Open October 11 - December 31, 2022

In celebration of Whitehall’s 120th anniversary, the Flagler Museum’s Fall exhibition, which will open October 11th, will tell the story of the many lives of Whitehall, as a home, a club, a hotel, and a museum.

The Story of Whitehall over the last 120 years is a story of the people and events critical to its metamorphosis from a grand vision for an amazing private home, in what was then one of the more remote locations in America, to a commercial property that eventually fell out of favor, to a near brush with total destruction, and finally to one of America’s great house museums and National Historic Landmark visited by my millions from all over the world.

Hundreds of objects and photographs drawn from the Museum’s extensive archives and collections will reveal the meaning expressed through Whitehall’s rich symbolism, the advanced technology incorporated into the home that put it at the forefront of domestic living at that time in history, despite its remote location, and the many special decorative features found only at Whitehall.

The 2022 Fall Exhibition is sponsored in part by Templeton & Company, LLC.

Charles B. Simmons

Charles B. Simmons, the longest serving director of the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum, passed away June 30th at his home in Simsbury, Connecticut, at the age of 90.

Simmons was born October 9, 1931, in Bristol, Connecticut, and grew up in Hartford, Connecticut. After earning a bachelor’s degree from Yale University in architecture and following graduate work in the Yale School of Architecture, Simmons served in the U.S. Army Security Agency. In 1965, he received a fellowship from the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum to study in its Early American Culture program, after which he served for three years as a Curator at the Historical Society of York County in York, Pennsylvania, where he oversaw four restored historic homes. He also owned and operated Simmons Gallery Inc., an antique business in Connecticut.

Simmons was appointed the Flagler Museum’s second, and to date, its youngest Executive Director in 1969, following Grant Bedford’s retirement. For the next decade, Charles Simmons worked with the Museum’s founder, Jean Flagler Matthews, to restore Whitehall until her death in 1979. During that period the Museum underwent major changes. Whitehall was added to the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), the Royal Poinciana Chapel was moved from the property where the Museum’s parking lot is now located, many objects original to Whitehall were repatriated, and Whitehall’s Main Gates were restored and opened to the Public for the first time in decades. Simmons was a passionate and devoted supporter of the arts, and he was instrumental in bringing a wide range

of events, exhibits, and performances to wherever he called home. Simmons retired in 1994 after more than a quarter century of service to the Museum.

While he received many awards during his long and distinguished tenure as the Flagler Museum’s director, perhaps the one he was most proud of was the Florida Association of Museums (FAM) Lifetime Achievement Award he received in 1994. A gifted raconteur, Simmons was always the life of any gathering with his unparalleled gift for telling engaging, nonstop tales of his travels and experiences. He could also occasionally be coaxed into sharing his opinions on news, events, and trends of the day.

The family has requested that in lieu of flowers, memorial donations be made to the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum, or to the charity of your choice.

Simmons and Jean Flagler Matthews at Whitehall’s Front Door

Simmons circa 1969.

Simmons positions objects in the morning room to complete its restoration.

Café des Beaux-Arts Opens for the Season

November 25, 2022 - April 9, 2023

Tuesday - Saturday 11:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Sunday 12:00 - 3:00 p.m.

$34 Museum Members

$60 non-members

Price includes Museum Admission and tax Museum Members at the Sponsor level and above receive a 10% discount

The Café des Beaux-Arts will be open for another Season from Friday, November 25th through Easter Sunday. Each afternoon the Flagler Museum serves a prix fixe lunch featuring an array of delicacies and refreshments reminiscent of the elegance of entertaining during the Gilded Age. Visitors may enjoy an assortment of gourmet tea sandwiches, traditional scones, and sweets complemented by the Flagler Museum’s own Whitehall Special Blend™ tea, and served on exquisite Whitehall Collection™ china.

Located in the beautiful Flagler Kenan Pavilion, Café des Beaux-Arts provides guests with spectacular panoramic views of Lake Worth and the West Palm Beach skyline. Henry Flagler’s private Railcar No. 91 completes the sophisticated Gilded Age ambiance.

Museum Honored to Receive Grants

The Flagler Museum has been awarded several grants for marketing and program support. The Florida Division of Arts and Culture has provided full funding of its grant for General Program Support and the Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners has awarded the Museum a grant for marketing and cultural programming through the Cultural Tourism Development Fund.

Additionally, the following foundations have provided the Museum with funding for general operating support. Long-time funders include The Max and Victoria Dreyfus Foundation, Eliasberg Family Foundation, The Mary Alice Fortin Foundation, and The Wise Foundation. The grants will support the Museum’s renewed focus on public and school programming, exhibitions, collections care, and the preservation of the National Historic Landmark, Whitehall.

The Museum is most grateful for the sustained support of these grant funders, whose generosity has made it possible to provide a wealth of resources and extensive cultural programming for hundreds of thousands of residents, guests , and online visitors from around the world.

Whitehall: A Temple to Apollo and So Much More

Having completed the world’s largest wooden structure, the Hotel Royal Poinciana, on the eastern shore of Lake Worth, and laid out and named the streets for what he hoped would become a thriving metropolis on the western shore, Henry Flagler began to think about building a home near the Hotel where he would live out his remaining years.

Unlike the other houses Flagler owned or had built, this house would, as Andrew Carnegie advised in his essay the Gospel of Wealth, be a home “for all that is highest and best in literature and arts, and for all the refinements of civilization.” In other words, a home for Apollo’s Muses of arts and literature, a museum.

For Henry Flagler, the young architects John Carrère and Thomas Hastings, who had designed the Hotels Ponce de Leon and Alcazar in St. Augustine more than a decade earlier and were now enjoying the peak of their careers as the architects of the New York Public Library and the Pan American Exposition Buffalo, were the obvious choice for the design of Whitehall. And, the BeauxArts style of architecture made so popular by the

World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 seemed to provide the perfect means of expressing the view shared by the Titans of Industry, like Henry Flagler, of America’s destiny to become the ultimate realization of all that Western Culture had been evolving toward for millennia.

Carrère and Hastings’ design for Whitehall is filled with symbolism related to Western Culture that any reasonably well-educated person, as Henry Flagler certainly was, of the 1840s would have immediately understood. As one of the 40% of young men in the 1840s who was lucky enough to get an eighth-grade education, Henry Flagler would have been well educated in the traditions and mythology of Western Culture and very much aware of the rich meaning designed into Whitehall by the architects. Unfortunately, because our educational process has taken on a different focus over the last 180 years, much of that meaning is invisible to visitors today. However, with a little help we can see Whitehall through Flagler’s eyes and begin to understand how much more it meant to him than simply the large and beautiful home that most see it as today.

Left and right: Sphinx on the side of the benches in the Grand Hall.

Middle: Lion’s head on the bronze front door of Whitehall

Carrère and Hastings’ design for Whitehall, featured in American Architecture in May of 1900, was an unusual blend of Beaux-Art design and details that seemed more appropriate to its subtropical location. The design of Whitehall’s façade and Grand Hall is clearly a reference to a temple to Apollo, the Sun God and leader of the Muses. Even Whitehall’s grounds are bacchanalian in nature, as would be appropriate for a Temple to Apollo. Surrounded not by an ornate garden but rather a cocoanut grove, Whitehall faces the rising sun. As is typical of a Temple to Apollo, a broad walkway forms the approach to Whitehall and while a winged sphinx stood guard atop an Ionic column at Apollo’s Temple at Delphi, at Whitehall four winged sphinxes support the two marble benches along the walkway. The marble steps leading to Whitehall’s front portico are flanked by Carrara marble urns decorated with bacchanalian scenes and Whitehall’s massive portico is supported by the same Doric column design that appears in all temples to Apollo. At the top of the steps heavy bronze doors decorated with large lion heads, symbols of the sun and Apollo, the Sun God, open into the Grand Hall, in the largest room of any Gilded Age home, where the symbolism further associates Whitehall with a Temple to Apollo.

A large dome at the center of the massive Grand Hall features a painting of Pythia, Apollo’s Oracle of Delphi. The dome is flanked at the cardinal points by allegorical figures representing the Four Rivers that flowed from Eden to nourish the four corners of the earth. Further out from the dome are celling paintings of allegorical figures representing sunrise and sunset. Four Carrara marble benches supported by winged sphinxes grace the east and west walls of the Grand Hall and were made specifically for Whitehall.

Augustus of the Prima Porta bust in the Grand Hall.

Apollo’s Oracle of Delphi dome at the center of Grand Hall.

Atop the table below the south side of the dome is a bust of Augustus of the Prima Porta. Unearthed in Rome in the early 19th Century the original bronze of statue of Augustus, with his breastplate adorned with references to Apollo, resonated with Gilded Age Americans who strongly identified with Augustus’ efforts to address the criticism leveled against the Romans by the Greeks. As the Greeks saw it, while Rome may have had a powerful army and been talented engineers, they simply didn’t have the soul or aesthetics required to be considered a truly great civilization. To prove otherwise, Augustus allied himself with Apollo and transformed Rome from a city of bricks and mortar to the city of massive marble monuments that we think of Rome as to this day. The example of Augustus allying himself with Apollo, who used architecture and monuments to address Rome’s critics, seemed to the Gilded Age leaders to be the perfect way to address the same criticisms being leveled against America by Europe at the time.

Henry Flagler’s portrait by society painter Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta depicts Flagler with a nod towards his work as both a business and civic leader.

It is well, nay, essential for the progress of the race, that the houses of some should be homes for all that is highest and best in literature and the arts, and for all the refinements of civilization...

-Andrew Carnegie, 1889

The large “marriage chest,” or Cassone, on the south side of the Grand Hall features a reproduction of a mid-fifteenth century panel painting that was widely known and understood at the time to represent a marriage joining two wealthy Florentine business families who were also civic leaders.

Other symbolism in the Grand Hall attests to Henry Flagler’s sense of responsibility as a leader in both business and civic matters and the fact that his recent marriage to Mary Lily stongly informed his sense of place. The large “marriage chest,” or Cassone, on the south side of the Grand Hall features a reproduction of a mid-fifteenth century panel painting that was widely known and understood at the time to represent a marriage joining two wealthy Florentine business families who were also civic leaders. The full-size portrait of Henry Flagler in the southwest corner of the Grand Hall, by society painter Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta, shows Flagler standing with the heal of his right hand resting on the corner of table (a bit of symbolism normally reserved for nobility) covered with both ledger books and leatherbound books, communicates to the viewer that Flagler is both a business and civic leader.

In the four corners of the Grand Hall are large Carrara marble sculptures, each representing an important aspect of what the Flaglers hoped their life at Whitehall would be. In the northeast corner is a statue with a base inscribed with the name Déessee (a generic French term for goddess that in this case is misspelled on the base of the statue with an unnecessary umlaut).

The seashell on the figure’s forehead, her right hand resting on an anchor, and the oar in her left hand, decorated with lion’s heads and serpent’s bodies, clearly denote that the statue is of Thalassa, the Greek Goddess of the Sea. In the southeast corner is Hesione (misspelled on its base by one letter as Hesiode), the daughter of the Greek God Oceanus and the wife of Prometheus, who represents Marriage. In the northwest corner is the Greek Muse Thalia, who represents Happiness. In the southwest corner is Eirene, the Greek Goddess of Peace. Together these four allegorical figures represented the Flagler’s hope that Whitehall would be their home by the Sea where their Marriage would be blessed with Happiness and Peace.

Christmas at Whitehall

Each year, the first floor of Whitehall is decorated in traditional Gilded Age splendor for the month of December. The focal point is a 16-foot tall Christmas Tree in the Grand Hall, adorned with colored electrical lights and traditional Gilded Age style ornaments. Experience holiday traditions, such as the Annual Tree Lighting where you can meet Santa Claus, enjoy refreshments, hear music on the historic organ and watch as the Flagler’s light the Grand Hall Christmas Tree. A Special Christmas Lecture will explore the history of Nabisco and animal crackers as Christmas tree ornaments. During Holiday Evening Tours families tour Whitehall after hours by the glow of the original light fixtures, and learn the origins of American Christmas traditions.

Special Christmas Lecture

The History of the National Biscuit Company: A Forgotten Christmas Tradition

By Gary Hoover, Author and Journalist

Sunday, December 4, 2022

2:30 p.m.

$15 per ticket for Members

$40 per ticket for non-members

Includes Museum Admission and Christmas Tree Lighting festivities.

The origins of many of our beloved American Christmas traditions can be traced back to the Gilded Age. This year’s Christmas at Whitehall program will feature a lecture on the history of the National Biscuit Company and how animal crackers became Christmas tree ornaments.

Annual Christmas Tree Lighting

Sunday, December 4, 2022

12:00 - 5:00 p.m. Free with Museum Admission

For more than five decades the Flagler Museum has observed the tradition of Henry Flagler’s youngest descendants lighting the Museum’s Christmas Tree on the first Sunday of December.

Schedule of Events:

12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. — Santa Claus in the West Room

12:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. — Piano and Organ Demonstrations

1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. — Kids Craft Table in the West Room

2:30 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. — Nabisco Special Lecture in the Ballroom

3:40 p.m. — Bak Middle School Performance

4:00 p.m. — Christmas Tree Lighting in the Grand Hall

Holiday Evening Tours

December 19 - 22

Tours begin nightly at 7:25 p.m.

$50 per ticket for adults

$30 per ticket for children (ages 17 and under) Free for Visionary level Members and above, and Whitehall Society Members, plus 2 children.

During this beloved annual event, families tour Whitehall after hours and discover the origins of American Christmas traditions. Guests will have a rare opportunity to see Whitehall by the glow of the original 1902 light fixtures. Every visitor will receive a traditional Flagler Museum Christmas Cracker following the tour. A choral group will sing carols, holiday refreshments will be served, and the Museum Store will be open for holiday shopping.

Museum Store Rebranded

The Flagler Museum Store has been rebranded as and has restocked with a variety of new proprietary products as well as the best selection of books related to the Gilded Age found anywhere. Members and visitors alike will find the Museum Store to be a great place to do their holiday shopping.

Christmas at HM Flagler & Co.

This holiday season, shop our H.M. Flagler & Co. collection features a signature decanter set; authentic hand-woven Panama Hats in the style worn by Flagler himself; and recreations of Gilded Age jewelry and accessories.

Signature Decanter Set H.M. Flagler Luggage Tag Genuine Montecristi Panama Hat

The Mary Lily Ruby Collection

14K Gold-Plated Sterling Silver Made in Israel

New and Renewing Members

June 1 - August 31, 2022

Flagler Legacy Members ($15,000)

Mr. Alex Fanjul

Mr. Domenic J. Dinardo

Ms. Veronica Maoli & Mr. Zach Posen

Mr. & Mrs. William Earle Betts

Mr. Joseph D. Glazer & Ms. Ilyse N. Blazar

Flagler Associate Members ($5,000)

Mrs. John C. LaMonte

Mr. & Mrs. Gilbert C. Maurer

Mr. & Mrs. Charles J. Moore

Benefactor Members ($2,500)

Mr. & Mrs. Henry J. Singer

Patron Members ($1,000)

Mr. & Mrs. Frederick L. Cone

Ms. Melissa H. Sullivan

Mr. J. Bradford White

Mrs. Stephanie Rad-D'Agostino

Mr. Robert W. Slater

Sponsor Members ($500)

Mr. Jeffrey A. Cole & Mrs. Patricia O'Brien Cole

Mr. & Mrs. Robert Mackle

Mr. & Mrs. Tom Bowler

Mr. & Mrs. William M. Feldman

Sustaining Members ($250)

Ms. Lina Busby, Esq. & Mr. Thomas I. Davis, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. Renard S. Iarussi

Mr. Donald Alducin & Dr. Sharada Alducin

Mr. & Mrs. Charles S. Weiss

Mr. & Mrs. A. Carter Pottash

Councilwoman Bobbie D. Lindsay & Mr. Douglas J. Buck

Dr. & Mrs. G. Wesley Price

Mr. & Mrs. John William Broch

Mr. & Mrs. Robert G. Walker, Jr.

Mr. John N. Kandara

Mr. & Mrs. James C. Wirths, III

Ms. Linda Treutel & Mr. Luis Gutierrez

Mr. & Mrs. I. Kemuel Cesani

Ms. Karen C. Brounstein & Mr. Jacob Kadosh

Ms. Susan Dyer

Mr. & Mrs. Terry K. Collier

Mr. & Mrs. James J. Heusinger

Ms. Cheryle Stone & Ms. Leigh Stone

Mr. & Mrs. Theodore Babbitt

Mr. & Mrs. Wayne H. Calabrese

Mr. & Mrs. William Maybury

Mr. & Mrs. John F. Miller, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. Theodore Tribolati

Mr. & Mrs. Thomas Bruce

Mr. & Mrs. James McCluskey

Mr. James Ricotta & Mrs. Bethany Taylor

Mr. & Mrs. Peter Oliver

Mr. & Mrs. Ken Sprechman

Ms. Paula Peterson & Mr. Bill Forness

Mr. Eric Sarner & Mrs. Lisa Marcy

Mrs. Lora Hall-Rudnitsky & Mr. Gary Rudnitsky

Mr. & Mrs. Felix Shapiro

Mr. & Mrs. Jerry Suchman

Ms. Jana Cavalcanti & Mr. Brian Ross

Ms. Susan Lundin

Ms. Ileen Melman & Mr. Steven Hart

Ms. Maureen Nash

Ms. Maria E. Forte-LaTran & Ms. Mia Rose LaTran

Family Members ($125)

Mr. & Mrs. John A. Bollero, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. Raymond Royce

Mr. & Mrs. Bryan J. Belliveau

Ms. Louise H. Stephaich & Ms. Peggy Stephaich-Guinness

Mr. S. Larry Sapp & Mr. Robert Lembeck

Dr. & Mrs. Allen Sklaver

Mr. & Mrs. Lorne Alter

Mr. & Mrs. Tom Sweet

Mr. Billy Burns

Mr. & Mrs. Ed Leonard

Mr. & Mrs. James Gibbons

Ms. Gale Browne & Mr. Dave Lewenz

Ms. Julia Nemiroff & Mr. Maxim Kotelevets

Ms. Dayana B. Rampinelli & Mr. Robert Kaye

Mr. & Mrs. Eduardo Martinez

Ms. Christy Hui

Mr. Richard Gobout & Ms. Maria Gonzalez

Ms. Marcia Lichty & Ms. Dawn Lichty

Mr. & Mrs. Richard Levine

Mr. & Mrs. Chris Tavormina

Individual Members ($75)

Mrs. Carla P. Darlington

Mr. Patrick K. McCarthy

Ms. Jean A. Wagner

Ms. Vivian R. Treves

Mr. Richard Nilsson

Ms. Kari Oeltjen

Mrs. Mara New

Ms. Leticia Harnish

Ms. Fran Knight

Ms. Maria Alejandra Landron

The Honorable Beverly White Yeager

Ms. Patricia Walker

Mr. Kevin Hoch

Mr. Anthony Walker

Educator Members ($50)

Mrs. Esther S. Natter

Dr. Patricia M.Sperano

Dr. Ronald P. Sperano

Mrs. Carol Ann Leslie Sutton

Mrs. Cheryl Klubak

Ms. Mary Alice Baker

Whitehall Society

R. Brandon Sokol

Mrs. Susan C. Gibson

Mr. Lou Hughes

Mrs. Oksana Reyes

Ms. Hannah David Lawrence

Ms. Ann Matthews-Sarkar

Ms. Mei Ling Yee

Ms. Anita Watkins

Mr. Ronald Risner

Contributors, Sponsors & Grantors

June 1 - August 31, 2022

$35,000 and above

Palm Beach County Tourist Development Council

The Wise Foundation

$10,000 and above

Eliasberg Family Foundation, Inc.

Florida Division of Arts and Culture

Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation

Mrs. John C. LaMonte

Mr. & Mrs. Scott Sandell

The Mary Alice Fortin Foundation, Inc.

$5,000 and above

Berton & Sallie Korman Family Fund

Mr. & Mrs. Dennis C. Bottorff

$1,000 and above

Mr. Mark F. Ahlers

Dr. & Mrs. James T. Duncan, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. Haynes G. Griffin

Dudley L. Moore, Jr. Family Foundation, Inc.

Van Buren Family Foundation, Inc.

E.P. and J.J. Henson Foundation

$500 and above

Mr. Thomas Kenan, III

$100 and above

Ms. Janet J. George

Mr. Ronald Risner

Upcoming Schedule of Events

October

11 Fall Exhibition opens — The Story of Whitehall: 120 Years in the Making. Sponsored by Templeton & Company, LLC

November

25 Café des Beaux-Arts opens

December

4 Annual Christmas Tree Lighting Festivities

8 Season Opening Trustees Reception

19 Holiday Evening Tours begin through December 22

31 Fall Exhibition closes — The Story of Whitehall: 120 Years in the Making

January

23 Winter Exhibition opens — The American West During the Gilded Age. Sponsored by Northern Trust

February

3 Whitehall Lecture Series begins, Sunday afternoons through March 19, 2023. Sponsored by Related Southeast, First Republic Bank, and Smith Architectural Group, Inc.

7 Whitehall Music Series begins, Tuesday evenings through March 7, 2023. Sponsored by Roe Green and The MBS Family Foundation