Our trip to the Morgan would not be complete without my sharing the remarkable story behind the great Morgan Collection, a story that few people know! (But everyone should!)
While Mr. JP Morgan was out running and saving the world financially, he, of course, had a personal librarian managing and creating his collection for him. That woman's name was Belle da Costa Greene. And she was a woman of color!
(Stop and think about that again, this is the early, early 20th century we're talking about folks!)
This incredible woman had the most amazing and enviable life. JP would send Belle (in style of course) all around the world to purchase the rare treasures we saw today.
Her past is cloaked in mystery, and there is a theory that she "passed for white" to make it into, and survive in, the high society world she traversed. Very little is written or known about her. She was very strategic is covering her own personal background tracks, and burned all of her letters, papers, etc. before her death. As the old saying goes, those without a past have no future, and this seems to also be her fate. Many of her latter day admireres are desperate to know more about her, but alas there is very little surviving information.
Here is an entry on her from Wikipedia:
(Have a look at the Wikipedia entry to see some amazing images of her...I'd rather like to fancy myself as the "Second Coming of Belle Greene!") :)
Belle da Costa Greene
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Belle da Costa Greene (December 13, 1883 - May 10, 1950)
Librarian to J. P. Morgan and after his death she became the first director of the Pierpont Morgan Library.
She was born Belle Marion Greener in Alexandria, Virginia where she grew up until her parents separation. Her parentage has often been clouded with mystery. Her father was a distinguished attorney Richard Theodore Greener who served as dean of the Howard Law School and was the first black undergraduate at Harvard University graduated in 1870. Her mother changed their name adding "da Costa" while claiming a Portuguese background to explain their darker complexion and moved to Princeton, New Jersey. The cost of a college education out of the question, she began working at the Princeton University Library.
J. P. Morgan had in 1902 engaged Charles F. McKim to build him a library to the south of his Madison Avenue brownstone as his collection already was too large for his study. To manage his collection he hired her as his personal librarian in 1905. She would spend millions of dollars not only buying and selling rare manuscripts, books and art, but she traveled lavishly and frequently at times it is said taking her thoroughbred horse with her for rides in Hyde Park. She has been described as smart and outspoken as well as beautiful and sensual. While she enjoyed a Bohemian freedom, she also able to move with ease within elite society. "Just because I am a librarian," she reportedly announced, "doesn't mean I have to dress like one." She wore couturier gowns and jewels to work.
Not only did her bearing, style and seemingly unlimited means attract notice, but "her role at the Morgan Library placed her at the center of the art trade and her friendship was coveted by every dealer." The power that she wielded for many years was unmatched for 43 years. Her goal she told Morgan, who was willing to pay any price for important works, was to make his library "pre-eminent, especially for incunabula, manuscripts, bindings and the classics."
J.P. Morgan left her $50,000 and $10,000 a year for life, which at that time was a significant sum. Asked if she was Morgan's mistress she is said to have replied "We tried!" Although she never married, her known most lasting relationship was with Bernard Berenson whose biography mentions his wife's "reluctant acceptance (at times)" of their relationship.
She retired in 1948 and died in New York City two years later at 66 years of age.
Images:
Photo of Belle da Costa Greene by Clarence White, 1911
Painting of Belle da Costa Greene by Paul César Helleu ca. 1913.
References
John Steele Gordon, "J. P. Morgan's Accomplice", American Heritage, September, 1999, p.22.
Jean Strouse, Morgan: American Financier (Random House, 1999).
Cheers, and bon weekend,
ASH
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