What Happened to the 10th Biggest Mansion in America? (Harbor Hill)

Рет қаралды 15,383

Күн бұрын

Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code THISHOUSE at the link below and get 60% off an annual plan: incogni.com/thi...
Once towering over Long Island's North Shore, Harbor Hill was a magnificent Gilded Age mansion built by the Mackay family, one of America's wealthiest dynasties. Designed by famed architect Stanford White of McKim, Mead & White, this opulent estate was a testament to wealth, power, and ambition.
Like, Comment, and Share our video, Subscribe if you enjoyed this video!
Help with our research: www.paypal.com...
Location: Long Island, NY
Join our Membership program:
/ @thishouse
Public Domain Photos from: Library of Congress
Assets from: Envato Elements
Music from Epidemic Sound

Пікірлер: 56

@ThisHouse 4 ай бұрын

Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code THISHOUSE at the link below and get 60% off an annual plan: incogni.com/thishouse

@leodannyportal 4 ай бұрын

Love when you show the blueprints/Floor Plan!!! Lots of valuable in formation in those plans.

@angelofsiryu 4 ай бұрын

It's things like this that makes sense why the Huntingtons either gave their property to the state or created a private foundation for future generations to enjoy the beauty of architecture and art. When you leave it up to family, they are usually just desperate to get rid of something they were never interested in keeping or are unable to handle.

@claudiamann7111 4 ай бұрын

What a beautiful home. Would have been at home in France the way it was built like a chateau. Such a shame that we have lost so many of these. Thank you so much for sharing.

@mikenixon2401 4 ай бұрын

Great report, Ken. A beautiful mansion. I always wondered about the grounds keepers and what they endured to keep it up to standards needed to compliment the structure.

@NativeNYer 4 ай бұрын

I love Long Island history, there's so much of it! Ty 4 this vid!

@GlennMandeville154 4 ай бұрын

The lifestyle of that period it was almost like a fantasy world. Thanks Ken, for allowing your viewers to dream if only for a short while...

@David-tm8sl 4 ай бұрын

Such a beautiful grand estate. The stair hall was spectacular. Too many deer trophies in the billiard hall!

@atomicwedgie8176 4 ай бұрын

It needed more deer trophies!

@mamiefish4047 4 ай бұрын

The McKay's daughter, Ellin, was married to musician Irving Berlin which caused quite a scandal at the time

@hewitc 4 ай бұрын

The McKays were devote Catholics

@garygloska7396 4 ай бұрын

Interiors are much more interesting than the exterior

@debbiesueillinois 4 ай бұрын

Please do a tour of West Baden Spring hotel, in Indiana it really cool how it looked and then they saved it,

@ThisHouse 4 ай бұрын

Thanks for the suggestion, cheers!

@andrewbrendan1579 4 ай бұрын

I was maybe nine years old when I was inside the West Baden Springs Hotel. It was used for a business school at that time. I have a faint recollection of being a few steps into the area under the dome and looking up at the rooms above us. We didn't see much else and I don't recall anything else of the under-the-dome area. Maybe my young mind couldn't take in such a huge space indoors!

@learning2live_brokeninchro157 3 ай бұрын

That is the most magnificent cow barn I’ve ever seen! I would love to picture inside it. 🐮🐄🐮

@wdgbirmingham2 4 ай бұрын

Such a beauty, such a shame it was torn down 😔

@darcicali7693 4 ай бұрын

Wow stunning ❤❤

@jonnboy 4 ай бұрын

I really like the interiors of these grand palaces.

@johnoden2857 4 ай бұрын

Gilded age heirs who wanted to create an updated version of some admired European palatial residence had the means and the craftspeople to do it. What's sad is that all that craftsmanship was destroyed. There was a will to recreate historic styles authentically that never could be done today. But the lifestyle and resources that kept these places alive was unsustainable. Now there are just ghostly black and white photos...

@laurielaurie8280 4 ай бұрын

Its kind of hard to even fathom having the finances to build these mansions. Some people really like to flaunt their wealth especially back in the gilded age and while they are absolutely beautiful they are so impractical. I would rather have a home like the "Pink Lady" mansion in Eureka, Ca or the Morey Mansion in Redlands, Ca. any day to these huge mansion estates. These smaller Victorian homes have beauty, charm and beautiful interesting architecture.

@timw8228 4 ай бұрын

One reason they had the money was because they hardly paid any taxes during this era. They kept most of what they earned and inherited.

@chewybunz 4 ай бұрын

Also, there was no minimum wage that servants were guaranteed, and some these barons owned huge utilities firms that nowadays would be under municipal ownership.

@karensmith1158 4 ай бұрын

I grew up on Long Island and have some interesting photos to share also.

@donnamariebrown2478 4 ай бұрын

Thank you Ken!!

@craiggillett5985 4 ай бұрын

Wow this home was amazing. I absolutely love the clean lines, symmetrical placement of doors and windows, and considering the era, remarkably free from excess embellishments. So sad it was demolished and replaced with suburban developments. It’s a shame it wasn’t given time the state for preservation

@Rinahugo 4 ай бұрын

When large entertainment events where held, did the mansion have extra-large bathroom to handle the crowds? Can you show them one time?

@garneauweld1100 4 ай бұрын

Vouzier, in Florissant, Missouri, is very similar in style and size.

@No-oc5dc 2 ай бұрын

It’s amazing that life expectancy was often times shorter back, then that the people that built and lived in these really didn’t enjoy them very long

@EduardoMorales-sn4kp 4 ай бұрын

I love the exterior, and gardens, the symmetry and grandeur is truly reminiscent of great French chateaus, but something about the interior and layout just really irks me… it’s so much wasted space that I feel could have been much better organized into a far more pleasant, luxurious, and intimate series of rooms, more on the comfortable side than the spindly, hard, heavy, sterile, and grand collection of event spaces it ended up being. This general style was simply more suited to a greater degree of compartmentalization and “logical” room progressions through enfilades than what is seen here. That’s just my ¢2 though.

@aaron___6014 4 ай бұрын

Can you cover the Harrington Mansion in Minneapolis? We really need to get Saint Mary's University to open it up.

@DovZeev 4 ай бұрын

They could have at least taken the stone and other hard items and reincorporated them into the new neighborhood somehow

@katgrey6239 4 ай бұрын

Beautiful mansion.

@karensmith1158 4 ай бұрын

Ken, I have hanging on my wall a framed map from 1924 of the Wheatly Hills Real Estate Corp that shows all the estates of the rich and famous at that time. I'd like to share that with you but it would have to be done privately, so let's figure out a way. You will be blown away by this incredible map.

@ThisHouse 4 ай бұрын

Hi, that sounds fascinating! I’d love to see it. Feel free to send an email to Production@ThisHouse.media

@rgrndu 4 ай бұрын

Reminds me of Biltmore estate in Asheville, NC.

@sandybruce9092 3 ай бұрын

Biltmore is still owned by the family! It’s beautiful but the whole area was devastated by Helene - the Biltmore Village from what I’ve seen is gone! The House is closed and will be closed for some time and the tickets for their Christmas have been stopped and I think I heard thst people will be refunded if they already have tickets! It’s beautiful at Christmas - I’ve been there twice at that time (I live maybe about 2 hours east and right now Google can’t even give driving directions to that area!).

@debbiem9218 4 ай бұрын

It was a beautiful home but it is far to big for me. Thanks for sharing

@seanlevchuck8277 3 ай бұрын

Those homes were very difficult to maintain. The damp Long Island climate and cold winters can deteriorate those home quickly. The deciduous trees can over grow in a matter of seasons. Massive estates such as this built with technology from the early 1900's are not sustainable without unlimited funds especially on Long Island.

@robertbrandywine 4 ай бұрын

I love the exteriors of all (or at least most) of these big houses, and most have very fine main rooms, but most of the interior would be wasted space from the point of view of a single family, no matter how large.

@kathleenadams3770 3 ай бұрын

I like the dinning area

@jodirauth8847 4 ай бұрын

Very well designed but as you stated it was unsustainable. Had he invested the same money into a farming ranch in Kentucky with several smaller houses easily maintained, the estate would still be in the family.

@devonna6171 4 ай бұрын

We’ve seen so many of these estates and their grotesque displays of wealth that I honestly cannot grieve this one’s ultimate abandonment and ruin. In my opinion the land was put to better use after it was repurposed as a community of suburban homes. The mansion was pretty, I suppose, but it was also a typically vulgar show of self-important elitism. (and don’t even get me started on that pervert, Stanford White…) No shade on Ken, here, he did a beautiful job, as usual. I just feel I’ve lost patience with the Gilded Age folks. Their stories fail to elicit any sympathy from me.

@markrice4808 4 ай бұрын

Good points here! They paid virtually no taxes and so the future town residents would be expected to have their taxes maintain their visions in perpetuity. These estates were frequently so isolated from the town that they could often serve no useful purpose to the residents for reuse in exchange for their taxes.

@janedee6488 4 ай бұрын

So sad that it was demolished. Wish they could have found another purpose for it.

@califdad4 3 ай бұрын

A lot of these huge homes were built before income tax that happened about 1915, so that and loosing their investments in the crash did these house's in

@LaurenceDay-d2p 3 ай бұрын

What a shame this splendid home was demolished. It could have been saved while the surrounding land was developed. Why not turn it into condos? Tragic loss of a beautiful home.

@jill-ti7oe 3 ай бұрын

👍

@gregoryferraro7379 4 ай бұрын

It only stood for 45 or so years.

@StamperWendy 4 ай бұрын

It's extremely sad that homes like these were flattened to fit mall parking lots & cookie cutter culs de sac

@123pb 3 ай бұрын

Most of these homes were already "socially obsolete" when they were built. They were kind of a waste of resources and a just built for egotistic purposes

@dmd5645 4 ай бұрын

But, it's too big. And, it just doesn't look like its actually lived in... It looks decorated, not accumulated....like u would in a home that you've had for a long time. 36 years, and still institutional... Pretty objet d'arts, though, dont get me wrong. But, personality is missing.