Golden Clan

Golden Clan is a non-fiction account of the Murray/ Mc Donnell family of New York, by John Corry, Golden Clan: The Murrays, the McDonnells, & the Irish American Aristocracy, Houghton Mifflin Co.; Boston, 1977.[1] This followed an earlier book by noted chronicler-of-the-wealthy (Our Crowd, The Grandes Dames) Stephen Birmingham Real Lace: America's Irish Rich HarperCollins New York: 1973 in which this family were also the main subjects.

Golden Clan :
the Murrays, the McDonnells,
and the Irish American aristocracy
First edition
AuthorJohn Corry
CountryUS
PublisherHoughton Mifflin
Publication date
2020
Pages203
ISBN9780395251461
OCLC924575580
929.20973
LC ClassCS71.M9785

The Murray/ Mc Donnell clan were the children and grandchildren of inventor Thomas E. Murray, an associate of Thomas Edison's, who was an early summer resident of Southampton, Long Island, New York . Due to their wealth, good looks, and sheer size (one branch, the James Mc Donnells, had 14 children; another, the Thomas E. Murray Jr.s, had 11) they were frequently covered in the social news of the New York press, particularly in the Hearst newspapers by gossip columnist 'Cholly Knickerbocker'. Public interest increased when one Mc Donnell married Henry Ford II, and a Murray cousin Alfred G. Vanderbilt II. Unlike the Kennedy family, with whom several of the Mc Donnells were close, none of the family ran for public office. The eldest son of the patriarch- Thomas E. Murray, Jr., was appointed by President Truman to the United States Atomic Energy Commission and his brother John 'Jack' Murray to the Port Authority of New York by Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt. The McDonnell triplex at 910 Fifth Avenue in New York was reputedly the largest in the city.[2] The clan were considered pillars of the New York Archdiocese, and were very close to Cardinal Spellman and Bishop Fulton J. Sheen; when Clare Boothe Luce converted to Catholicism, Bishop Sheen suggested that Anna Murray Mc Donnell serve as her godmother.

The family has pretty much faded from the public spotlight since the collapse of Mc Donnell & Co., the family stock brokerage firm under T. Murray Mc Donnell in 1970.[3] Several family members such as Catherine Murray di Montezemolo were still prominent in Southampton society at the beginning of the 21st Century, [4][5] and they continued to intermarry with other prominent Catholic families.[6][7][8] Peggy Mc Donnell, a daughter of T. Murray Mc Donnell, is the wife of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr.

Several other wealthy Irish Catholic families were also discussed in Corry and Birmingham's books, and have been referred to in print as "Golden Clans". Foremost perhaps would be the descendants of Thomas Fortune Ryan.[9][10][11][12][13] The Grace family, the grandchildren of William R. Grace such as J. Peter Grace, would be another. Also mentioned were F. Scott Fitzgerald's friends Gerald and Sara Murphy; Gerald's father, the founder of Mark Cross Leather Goods, was a Southampton friend of Thomas Murray. Quite a number of these families sent their sons to Portsmouth Abbey School and Canterbury School (Connecticut) and then on to Georgetown University, and their daughters to Convent of the Sacred Heart schools and Manhattanville College.[14]

Many of the Golden Clans lived in apartment buildings on Park Avenue north of 79th Street, close by St. Ignatius Loyola and St. Thomas More churches, causing some people to refer to the area as the "Irish Gold Coast".[15] Wealthy Irish Catholics are no longer clustered in this neighborhood; many of these families moved out to wealthy suburbs like Rye, New York.

Notes
  1. "GOLDEN CLAN review". The New York Times. 1977-03-13. p. 209. ISSN 1553-8095. OCLC 34107580. Retrieved 2018-04-11.
  2. Real Lace: America's Irish Rich, Stephen Birmingham HarperCollins New York: 1973
  3. Fowler, Glenn. "T. M. McDonnell, Wall St. Broker, 68; Led Family Concern". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  4. "Social Diary 8/4/03 - The Southampton Hospital's 45th annual benefit, The Sapphire Ball". www.newyorksocialdiary.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  5. "Social Diary 10/13/04 - Wedding Bells are Ringing". www.newyorksocialdiary.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  6. "Dina A. Sheridan, Law Journal Editor, Is Bride of Stephen B. Grant, a Lawyer". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  7. "Maria O'Neil Marries James Ruddock". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  8. "ENGAGEMENTS; Kerry Brady, T. P. McDonnell". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  9. Among whom: John Barry Ryan , Clendenin J. Ryan and Virginia Fortune Ryan.
  10. "WEDDING;Saville Ryan, Charles Marsh". 5 May 1996. Retrieved 11 April 2018 – via NYTimes.com.
  11. "Shelley Beck Has Wedding". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  12. "James Freney to Wed Caroline Neville". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  13. "WEDDINGS; Susan O'Rourke, Beau B. Ryan". nytimes.com. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  14. Assimilation in American Life, Milton M. Gordon, Oxford U. Press, 1964, p. 210
  15. The Sky's the Limit: Passion and Property in Manhattan Steven Gaines, p. 39
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.