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FROM THE BRYANT ROOM ARCHIVES
By Myrna Sloam ©July/August 2009
A View of the Mackay Estate, Part 21: A Full Season at Harbor Hill,
by Stewart Donaldson
NOTE: The following is the final article in a series of reminiscences taken from the memoirs of Stewart W. Donaldson (1907-1994) who grew up on the Clarence H. Mackay estate, in what is now East Hills. Written in the 1950s, these memoirs recall life on this former Gold Coast estate in the 1910s and 1920s. Stewart’s father, William, was a coachman/chauffeur on the estate, and Stewart was born and raised there. The full typewritten manuscript, and more information on the Mackay estate, and the Donaldson family, can be found in the library’s Local History Collection. In addition, portions of this series can also be found on the Library’s website and in the 2007, 2008, and the upcoming 2009 issue of The Nassau County Historical Society Journal.
Let’s see if we can picture a full season [in the 1920s] at Harbor Hill. The Mackay family [would] have spent the winter in New York City [in their townhouse] at 3 East 75th Street. In early May, as the weather gets warmer, some of the servants [would] come out to Roslyn to open the mansion [and] remove the winter coverings. The mansion has been painted and now it remains to be cleaned, aired and set to rights. The front drive has been cleaned, raked and rolled, and the entire estate in general has been “manicured.” The bay trees placed, hedges, grass and shrubs cut and trimmed.
The Mackay family will be out on the weekend, so the flowers are arranged. There are vegetables and milk, cream and butter from the dairy. Clarence, his mother [Marie Louise Hungerford Bryant Mackay], Kay [Clarence’s daughter, Katherine], [daughter] Ellin, and [son] John, finally arrive. Now the peace and quiet that has reigned at Harbor Hill in the greenhouse, dairy, stables, mansion, and other places, has suddenly turned into a nightmare of activity. The estate awakens and now becomes a beehive, with all the workers moving here and there. There are guests-- at the tennis court, then for a swim in the indoor pool, then to the mansion for dinner. The next week end-- tennis, then to the Creek or Piping Rock club, back to the tennis courts, dinner again. This is repeated over and over again. It continues until the 4th of July, when a large dinner party is given for guests and [the day] ends with a display of fireworks.
After the 4th of July, when the weather begins to get hot, the Mackays go to Southampton, L.I., or to Europe, or to the [Adirondack] mountains. This goes [on] through July and August and the place quiets down again until about Labor Day, when the family returns to Harbor Hill. And again [it’s] golf at the clubs, tennis, swimming pool and dinner parties until mid October. Then the Mackay family will move back to the City, but will keep the Roslyn house open, as Mr. Mackay will go to Gardiners Island for the Fall hunting. Mackay has stocked this island with deer and pheasants (ring-necked). Since he has a special [New York] State permit, he can shoot either male or female of anything on the island. So, they proceed to slaughter left and right. He keeps a working force on this Island all year round. Mr. Ted Armstrong heads up the care and maintenance of the Island, as well as the Mackay’s lodge at Jamestown, North Carolina, [which is used] for turkey and partridge shooting.
They usually go to Gardiners Island on Thursday afternoon [in] Mackay’s power yacht, the Machonoch, a 110 foot, twin screw. The power yacht is waiting at the dock at either Greenport or at Sag Harbor, where it takes the party to the Island. They spend Friday, Saturday and Sunday hunting, and come back to Greenport late Sunday evening, where all the chauffeurs and limousines are waiting to carry Mackay and his guests back to Harbor Hill or the city, as the case may be. Billy Donaldson [the author’s father] who had driven a two ton white truck to the boat, now loads the deer, pheasants, duck and geese on the truck and takes them back to Harbor Hill, where the deer are put in the iceboxes and the others are hung in a special house with screen covers, [and] open sides, to keep the ducks, pheasants, etc., cold. During the week these deer, ducks, pheasants, etc., will be taken to Mackay’s friends and to hospitals all over New York City and Long Island.
About Christmas time, the Mackays move the servants permanently to the city and close the mansion for the winter. All winter, Billy Donaldson [would] make three trips a week to [the townhouse at] 3 East 75th Street, New York City, with flowers, milk, cream and butter, and anything else the house would need. He would then do the shopping in New York for the butler and chef, and any other matters that might have to be taken care of. He would get back to Roslyn about 3:30 P.M., and then he was through for the day. He and some of the horsemen might play a few hands of pinochle and then he would drive his car home.
During the winter months the outside men, those working on the estate, that is, would go through the woods and clean out the dead trees and underbrush. Then the boxwood and tender shrubs had to be covered with burlap to keep them from winter kill. This was done about November. They also repaired the farm equipment, and after a heavy snow storm they would shovel out the paths to the dairy, greenhouses, tennis court, and other places. They [also] pruned trees, etc. On an estate the size of this, there was always something to do to keep you busy.
The men at the greenhouse were busy with weeding, watering, spraying, and potting. The outside men were on shifts tending the boiler or furnace day and night. The rest of the men were busy with work at the cottages and other places on the estate. In the winter the Mackay family chauffeurs kept the cars in a garage in the city and had apartments in the city, themselves, returning to Roslyn in the late spring when the Mackay family returned. There was always work to be done [and] as fast as one job was done, another one came along. Then in the spring, the painters came back to work, started to paint the house again, and the cycle started all over again….
[When the estate was in full operation, there were] approximately 126 personnel to be paid, and in many cases, housed, and fed. It certainly accounted for a good size payroll, even though wages were low in those days. Clarence H. Mackay never owned Harbor Hill, as it was given to his [first] wife Katherine, by Clarence’s father, Mr. J.W. Mackay. When she divorced C.H. Mackay [in 1914], she put it [the property] in [her son] young John W. Mackay’s name. When Clarence Mackay died in the 1938, the place went down and was ransacked by vandals. It was sold [by son John W. Mackay] to a Mr. Roth, a Manhattan builder, in 1954, who built small country estates there. The mansion was demolished around 1947. [The housing development of Country Estates at East Hills, The Park at East Hills (formerly the Roslyn Air National Guard Station), as well as the Roslyn High School property, were once all part of the Mackay estate. The exact demolition date of the mansion has not been determined.]
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