The portal of Saint Bartholomew's Church in New York City

Magazine Antiques, Dec, 2001 by Percy Jr. Preston

The entrance to Saint Bartholomew's Church on Park Avenue between Fiftieth and Fifty-first Streets in New York City is through an elegant portal with three sets of bronze doors. Commissioned by the Vanderbilt family, designed by the celebrated architect Stanford White, and executed by several notable sculptors, the portal tells the story of Christianity in bronze, limestone, and marble across its seventy-five-foot span. The oldest part of the church, the portal was added to the previous Saint Bartholomew's Church in 1902 and 1903 and moved from Madison Avenue and Forty-fourth Street to its present location in 1918. In the new location, the portal was turned 180 degrees since the present church faces east, while its predecessor faced west.

For a family known for its palatial houses, the portal may have been a minor project for the Vanderbilts, but there is nothing minor about the painstaking attention to detail and high-quality materials found in it. Although somewhat the worse for wear, the portal has survived long after most of the Vanderbilt houses along New York's avenues have disappeared.

Cornelius Vanderbilt II (1843-1899), a grandson of "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt (1794-1877) who developed the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, was a parishioner of Saint Bartholomew's Church for much of his life. He met his future wife, Alice C. Gwynne (1845-1934) of Cincinnati, while teaching Sunday school at the church. A year after the death of his father, William Henry Vanderbilt (1821-1885), Cornelius was in charge of the Vanderbilt railroad system. A serious man, almost ascetic in his personal tastes, he neither smoked nor drank and had no interest in activities such as yachting or horse racing. However, he and his wife built two of the grandest private residences in the country. Their 137-room house occupied the entire block on Fifth Avenue between Fifty-seventh and Fifty-eighth Streets. (1) Their 70-room Newport "cottage," the Breakers, is today open to the public.

Cornelius was generous both with his money and his time. According to one source, he devoted up to one-quarter of his time to charitable interests. (2) For Saint Bartholomew's, he and his mother, Maria Louisa Vanderbilt (1821-1896), built a parish house at 209 East Forty-second Street, which opened in 1891 and was the site of programs serving immigrants and the poor. Including the land and furnishings, this facility cost $335,000. (3) In 1893, when Saint Bartholomew's undertook a major renovation of the church itself, Vanderbilt gave $35,000 toward the total cost of $103,000. (4)

After Vanderbilt's death in 1899, at the age of fifty-five, his family turned to Saint Bartholomew's when they wished to raise a memorial to him. In June 1900, before sailing for Europe, his widow, Alice, wrote to David H. Greer (1844-1919), who had been the rector of the church since 1888:

Mrs. [Harry Payne] Whitney [Alice and Cornelius Vanderbilt's daughter Gertrude] and I are desirous of putting in St. Bartholomew's Church something as a memorial of my husband. We have thought of bronze doors at the church entrance--or of replacing with marble the present communion rail if that is not already a memorial; or of replacing the four gilded plaster columns reaching to the ceiling in the chancel with marble and we would be glad to know how you regard any one of these projects. I expect to be in town for a few days before sailing and hope it may be convenient for you to let me know before I go -- which is (q.v.) June 13. (5)

Greer opted for the bronze doors, and nothing further was heard of the other suggestions. An architect had to be selected because the then Saint Bartholomew's Church had been designed by James Renwick Jr., who had died in 1895. Although Stanford White had not designed either of the Vanderbilts' great houses, he had done work for other members of the family and his social prominence made him an obvious candidate.

The record of costs relating to the project maintained by McKim, Mead and White lists Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt and four of her children: Alfred G. Vanderbilt, Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney Reginald C. Vanderbilt, and Gladys Moore Vanderbilt, as its clients. All contributed to the cost of the project, which eventually totaled almost $150,000 including McKim, Mead and White's ten percent commission. (6)

In the summer of 1878, Stanford White, then twenty-four years old, had gone on a trip through the south of France with Charles Follen McKim (1847-1909), who later made him a partner in the firm of McKim, Mead and White, and Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907), the sculptor. In a letter written later to his parents from Paris, White gave his impression of one small village near Arles:

At St. Gilles, a little out-of-the-way town--and in it the best piece of architecture in France, the triple marble porch of the church--we were taken in charge by the abbe, who seemed delighted to come across some educated people, his flock (which he evidently rules with a rod of iron) being Of the most ignorant description. He was very pleasant, but a little too priestly--his sole object in life being the restoration of his church--which heaven for fend. It was destroyed by the Huguenots and all the noses knocked off the saints; and I hope they have been well boiled for it. He took occasion to give us his opinion of Huguenots in particular and Protestants in general--which would not have been in the veiy best taste, but for the touch of humor that went with it. (7)