'Myhome' was built for Francis S. Smithers, founder and partner of the investment banking firm of F.S. Smithers & Co., on Red Spring Lane in Glen Cove. Ellen Biddle Shipman was responsible for the landscaping, but other than that not much is known on the house. Smithers died in 1919.
Friday, February 27, 2009
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6 comments:
Pics in your last several posts have been extraordinary. Thank you for sharing the history you love so much.
Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
Didn't Francis Smithers also own an estate named Dunrobin on Overlook Rd overlooking Oyster Bay which demolished during The Great Depression? There was a carriage house and servant's house with an attached greenhouse.
I believe a cottage still remains, and is for sale. Im not sure of its original purpose.
Spinzia says that Smithers' brother, Christopher, owned Dunrobin.
I know the cottage still remains along with the greenhouse. I just passed it the other day when my mother’s funeral procession passed the property before burial at Locust Valley Cemetesy.. My mother’s father grew up in that cottage and was the smither’s family gardener who worked in the greenhouse. My great grandfather, Salvatore Aqualina, was the gardener. His wife was Lucia and he had 5 children: Antonio, Julio, Angelina, Angelo (my grandpa), and Madelena.
My great grandparents were the estate care takers, Salvatore and Lucia Aquilino. My Grandmother, Angelina was my Grandmother. Her son Nicholas is my father. My name is Lucia Robin. I have beautiful memories spending most of my time on this estate since the time when there as a chicken house and a bee house. Many hours were spent under the greenhouse table of flowers and vegetables while my Great Grandpa grew every imaginable fruit and vegetable. He won awards for his cross-bred Lillies taller than he was. The grape arbor Salvatore grew varieties of grapes for wine and jams had to be 150 feet long teeming with luscious specimens. And, there was an old bathtub right in the middle for washing the grapes. I have never seen a man as powerful as he climb on a 16 foot ladder to trim the hedges so perfectly to provide the property with privacy.
The carriage house was lived in Mr. Smithers son Kippie who was kind and generous. We felt like our house was home! The best memories of my life.
Upon entering Dunrobin and driving right, on the right bend was a trained champagne bottle garden and trained tree gazebo, if you are very curious, if you scoot back to the right into the woods stands a BBQ of brick which may have deteriorated. When we saw the BBQ we knew we really weren’t lost. In spring every single inch of this property’s ground was covered by hundred of thousands of new fresh daffodils. That is something you will never forget!
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