![\"Talbot](\"http:\/\/www.podles.org\/dialogue\/wp-content\/uploads\/Talbot-J.-Taylor.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nTalbot Jones Taylor (April 25, 1865-1938) came from an established Baltimore family, whose estate became the National Cemetery in the 1930s. His father was apparently an art collector, as this notice appeared in the New York papers after his death:<\/p>\n
At the age of sixteen Talbot entered the firm of C. Irwin Dunn in Baltimore. He went on to Mc Kim and Co., then to the National Bank of Baltimore, where he was a note teller. \u00a0He caught the eye of James Keene. In 1892 Talbot opened his brokerage office.<\/p>\n On May 14, 1892 Jessica married Talbot Jones Taylor in St. John\u2019s Church, Far Rockaway. Delmonico catered the wedding breakfast at the house which was furnished with art and paintings recurred from the elder\u2019s Keene\u2019s house in Newport, which had burnt at the time of one of his financial disasters.<\/p>\n In February 1897 Talbot and his brother James B. Taylor formed a partnership on Wall Street. It became the biggest house on the Street.<\/p>\n 1n 1899 Foxhall Keene became a \u201cspecial partner.\u201d\u00a0 In 1899 Talbot was served with a subpoena by a Grand Jury \u201cpresumably in connection with the false On August 1899 Jessica presented her grandfather with his second grandchild, Jessica Keene Taylor (who seems not to have survived). It seemed to be a day of good omen. James Keene<\/p>\n has cleared up specially a lien of B. R. shorts for Miss Taylor against a future rainy day \u2013 about $500,000 [$15,000,000 in 2015 dollars]. That is the way the ex-Pine-street free-lance does things. And hardly had the congratulations come about Miss Taylor, when Chacornac won the Futurity for Mr. Keene.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n James Keene worked out of his son-in-laws Talbot\u2019s brokerage office. Among the matters he handled was the 1901 manipulation of the initial offering of US Steel as the secret agent of J. P. Morgan.<\/p>\n Perhaps to celebrate this success, James Keene in that year bought a $100,000 ($3,000,000 in 2015 dollars) diamond necklace for his wife, an invalid. As she had no use for it, she gave it to her daughter Jessica.<\/p>\n Mrs. Taylor is thus the possessor of the finest diamond necklace in the United States.\u00a0 It consists of a strand of ninety diamonds of the purest water, so arranged so that they may be worn around the throat of the wearer several times, as pearls are usually worn. Suspended from the center of this glittering strand is a pendant cluster of eight magnificent gems, and from this again is suspended a single diamond, which is said to be the largest and finest stone owned in New York.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n In 1903 the Taylor firm failed because of a speculation in a Southern Pacific RR pool, and James Keene admitted a loss of $1,500,000 ($42,000,000 in 2015 dollars).<\/p>\n Mrs. Keene gave land and money for a house for her daughter and son-in law: Talbot House.<\/p>\n Such a house had to be furnished. Talbot knew just the person, Marie Zane Cowles.<\/p>\n Marie Zane originally met Talbot Taylor in 1897 at a house party in Cedarhurst in honor of Lillie Hastings Jerome Onativia (Mrs. Tomasito Luis de Onativia), whose companion Marie Zane had been for many years (more about the Onativias in later blogs). He apparently fell in love with her. Mrs. Taylor complained to the hostess (Lillie Onativia\u2019s niece) who packed Lillie Onativia and Marie Zane off to New York.<\/p>\n Marie went to Europe with Mrs. Onativia, but returned to New York in 1900 and set up as an interior decorator. Her relationship with Mrs. Onativia was rocky. She had loaned Onatvia $3,500.<\/p>\n When the money was not paid on demand Miss Zane brought suit in a San Francisco court. Her former friend put in a bill for money alleged to have been spent on Miss Zane when they were in Europe together. It included such items as $15 for a pair of blue corsets and $115 for a nickeled bicycle.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n A California newspaper announced her surprise engagement to another Californian who was visiting New York, William Northrup Cowles. It was a surprise because<\/p>\n Cowles was considered the most confirmed of bachelors, and long ago, when he kept the Arlington in Santa Barbara and made it rather a gay resort, his heart was said to be of adamant.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n (The language is, I suspect, more than just a coincidence). Marie married Cowles in December 1901 and divorced him four weeks after the marriage.<\/p>\n A gossip column later explained that Cowles had gone to New York and met Marie.<\/p>\n In New York two old aunts of Marie Zane thought Cowles was too attentive.\u00a0 They laid a trap and a plot. Cowles fell into it.\u00a0 Out of a high sense of chivalry he acceded to the demands of the aunts and marred Miss Zane. He never lived with her and let her get a divorce as soon as she wanted it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Mrs. Taylor, as we shall see, thought there was another explanation.<\/p>\n Marie, the now Mrs. Cowles, moved into an apartment next to Talbot, and when he moved, she moved also into an apartment directly underneath his.<\/p>\n Talbot hired Marie for $40,000 ($1,000,000 in 2015 dollars) to help him decorate Talbot House. As he later explained<\/p>\n he had met Mrs. Cowles as an expert on rugs, ivories, and other costly bric-\u00e0-brac and he had engaged her services in Europe and in this country to pick up for him many objects of art with which to furnish his home.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Talbot traveled to France with her to buy furniture and ecclesiastical art for Talbot House before the new French law controlling the exportation of antiquities went into effect.<\/p>\n And what a home he had to fill: 30 bedrooms:<\/p>\n \u00a0A Bedroom (Note the abundance of chairs; this has provoked\u00a0comments)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Talbot with his 1902 Mercedes<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Talbot published a book on his collection. Jessica took her children to the south for the winter because one child was an invalid. When she returned, she discovered that her husband had given her furs and jewels to his lady friend. She filed for divorce.<\/p>\n Mrs. Taylor claimed the marriage to Cowles, an acquaintance of Talbot\u2019s was engineered purely to provide cover for the relationship. Talbot paid all the expenses of the marriage. She divorced Cowles but was still known as Mrs. William Cowles, a respectable woman, solely to provide cover for the relationship with Talbot.<\/p>\n The court referee found that Talbot had become \u201cunduly intimate\u201d with Marie. Against the denials of Talbot and Mare, was<\/p>\n the testimony of chauffeurs, servants, French hotel employees, elevator boys and maids, and a handwriting expert.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Marie told the papers it was all a misunderstanding, in what the papers called \u201cthe opening of Mrs. Cowles vials of wrath.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere was nothing but the rankest perjury throughout the entire case\u2026<\/p>\n “There was not a tithe of evidence brought against me…<\/p>\n “\u2026the whole affair is incomprehensible, except as showing what a woman\u2019s spite can do.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Marie insisted her relationship with Talbot was purely a business one. Her eyes wandered to a chest with a photograph.<\/p>\n \u201cThere she is\u2026there is the woman who tried to ruin me.\u201d The face was badly scratched with a pencil.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Marie added<\/p>\n “Certain people of very ungentle breeding became millionaires in the gold days of California.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Why was all the mudslinging necessary?<\/p>\n “Gentle folk do not move in that way. It might have gone about l\u2019aimable, as the French say \u2013 in a quiet manner, without all these cruel, unneeded charges and the publicity that has been crueler still.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Talbot had given her free rein in the purchases.<\/p>\n \u201cwhat went into that house was my art, my selections.<\/p>\n Mrs. Cowles did not like the idea of this wealth of furnishings finally passing into the hands of Mrs. Taylor.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/a>
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\n<\/a>rumors circulating about the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n\n
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<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nThe Talbot J. Taylor collection;<\/span>furniture, wood-carving, and other branches of the decorative arts; <\/span><\/em><\/h2>\n
with one hundred and eighty-seven illustrations<\/span>.<\/em><\/h2>\n
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