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From the Bryant Room Archives
By Myrna Sloam ©Sept/Oct 2005
View of the Mackay Estate by Stewart Donaldson, Part VII: The Library, Pantry & Kitchen
NOTE: The following is part 7 in an ongoing series of descriptions of the former Clarence H. Mackay Estate, written by Stewart Donaldson (1907-1994) who grew up on this estate in what is now East Hills. Written in the 1950s, these reminiscences were donated to the library and are available in the Local History Collection.
If you started again in the Front Hall and this time walked to the east, towards the back of the house, you would come to the library with its heavy old worm eaten door. This door was brought over from Europe. In this room was a fireplace, tapestries hung on the wall and [it was] lit indirectly by very small pin spots concealed. When they were turned on the picture[s] would seem to come to life and glow. The tapestries in the main ball room were lit the same way. In the library was a guest register, this was signed by all who visited and was signed by Pope Pius XII when he visited the Mackays, as Cardinal Pacelli, by King Edward VIII, when he was the Prince of Wales, by Charles A. Lindberg, and by foreign dignitaries and American statesmen and many others.
After you left the library [if you] then [turned] right again to the back hall, where the elevator was, then to the right again through a doorway into the long hall past the pantry, the first servants dining room, the kitchen, the silver polishing room and other small rooms, and after you passed the stairway and the freight elevator, you would come to the pantry on your left. The first door led to the main pantry. The pantry was divided into two parts. This part was the one food was served from, also the ice boxes were here. [There were] small warming ovens and on the left, midway in the room, was the walk-in safe where the silver was stored. This silver for forks, spoons, knives, plates, etc., came from the famous Comstock Lode mine in Virginia City, Nevada, where old John W. Mackay made his fortune.
The other portion of the pantry, the part which attached to the kitchen, had a sliding door at the kitchen end, so that food could be passed through from the kitchen and then prepared for serving to the main dining room. This room had closets for glasses, towels and other storage, and large sinks for washing. You left this pantry through a door into the hallway and turned left down the hall to another door to your left. Now you were in the west end of the kitchen. At this end of the kitchen was a small dining nook with a table and chairs, where the kitchen help ate and had their coffee break. Also, this is where the small door between the pantry and the kitchen that I spoke of before, was located.
Straight ahead were the sinks on the west wall. On the north wall was a big, long black coal stove. In fact, it was several stoves tied together with a large canopy over it, for the entire length of the stove. In the center of the kitchen was a long table where food was prepared for cooking and at the east end of the table was a large wood chopping block. Opposite the chopping block was the opening to the dumb waiter, which went down to the ground floor to bring up produce and so on, from the big ice boxes. Also on this side hung the pots and pans for cooking—always clean and polished.
The kitchen walls were tile. At the east end of the kitchen was a small room with a desk and ice boxes in it. This was the Chef’s office. Mr. Adam was Chef in the 1920s. I heard it said that in the summer time, it would get as hot as 150 or 160 degrees in the kitchen. There was no air conditioning in those days. The chef wore his white coat and pants and his high white hat. The girls in the kitchen wore white dresses and the kitchen “boys” wore blue pants and aprons. To be continued…..
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