New York
William Waldorf Astor built the Waldorf Hotel (1890-93) in New York City, with Boldt as proprietor. John Jacob Astor IV built the adjoining Astoria Hotel (1897). Boldt mediated between the feuding millionaire cousins, leasing the Astoria himself, and merging the two buildings under his management as the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. The Empire State Building now occupies its site at 34th Street and 5th Avenue.
He is credited with popularizing Thousand Island dressing at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where he instructed maître d', Oscar Tschirky, to include it on the menu. The hotel introduced other popular food items, such as Waldorf Salad.
He is well known for building Boldt Castle, on an island in the Thousand Islands area of New York State. The enormous castle was intended as a gift for his wife Louise Kehrer Boldt, but when she died suddenly in 1904, construction was halted. The castle, which is still undergoing major restoration after decades of vandalism, is now a major summer tourist attraction at Alexandria Bay.
Towards the end of his life, he commissioned architect Francis T. Underhill to build him a Swiss-chalet-style mansion, "La Manzanita," in Montecito, Santa Barbara, California.
He briefly owned Nikola Tesla's Wardenclyffe Tower property, receiving it as payment for a debt.
He was a trustee of Cornell University, to which his daughter, Mrs. A. Graham Miles, donated a Collegiate-Gothic dormitory, Boldt Hall and Tower (1922-23).
Read more about this topic: George Boldt
Famous quotes containing the word york:
“There is a small steam engine in his brain which not only sets the cerebral mass in motion, but keeps the owner in hot water.”
—Unknown. New York Weekly Mirror (July 5, 1845)
“I haven’t seen so much tippy-toeing around since the last time I went to the ballet. When members of the arts community were asked this week about one of their biggest benefactors, Philip Morris, and its requests that they lobby the New York City Council on the company’s behalf, the pas de deux of self- justification was so painstakingly choreographed that it constituted a performance all by itself.”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)