Hetty_ The Genius and Madness of America's First Female Tycoon - Charles Slack [105]
Because of this connection with Wellesley, Ned in 1923 talked his sister into joining him in a $500,000 donation to the college. They agreed to give $50,000 each per year for five years, toward the construction of an administration building. The building, with a tower rising 185 feet high from Norumbega Hill, was constructed of brick and Indiana limestone; it was and remains the most prominent building on campus. It also bears the distinction of being the only edifice or monument to Hetty Green. It is called Hetty H. R. Green Hall.
For all of their vast differences in personality and temperament, Ned and Sylvia cared for one another. Letters between these two wealthy, childless siblings are playful and affectionate, passing along trivial details of daily life. Ned signed letters to his sister “Your affectionate brother,” or “Your loving brother.” He addresses Sylvia, whose first given name was Hetty, as “Hetty B.”
The day after Christmas 1927, Sylvia wrote: “Many thanks for the electric clock you so kindly sent to Greenwich. I have put it in the library under George Washington’s picture. It is with good company.” In 1935, he sent her another gift, a case of three dagger rum, “which I think is about the finest on the market. I have found this rum to be an excellent sleep producer, and this is how you fix it up: Put some cracked ice in a glass; then squeeze in half a lime; then put in a little over an ounce of rum and gradually increase it until you have two ounces in; then add a little sugar and drink it just before going to bed.”
Sylvia owned a dog named Prince. Ned had two, Stella and Beauty. In the summer of 1928, Sylvia sent a dog bed for Stella. Ned wrote back to “Dear Auntie” from “Your affectionate niece,” as though Stella was Ned and Mabel’s child, writing a thank-you note to her Aunt Sylvia. This conceit amused Ned; he used it on several occasions. Once, he sent a Western Union telegram to Prince, Sylvia’s dog. It read: “Wishing your mother and you many happy returns of the day.—Stella and Beauty.” It is impossible to miss the pathos between the lines, of the aging brother and sister, both childless, exchanging gifts and notes for their dogs instead of their children, writing in the voices of their pets, the closest either of them ever came to producing heirs.
Sylvia, a widow since the death of her husband in 1926, shared her mother’s contempt for Mabel. Ned and Mabel tried their best to thaw Sylvia’s feelings toward her sister-in-law. Ned refers casually to “Aunt Mabel” in some of the letters, and sends love from both of them. But Sylvia wasn’t buying any of it. To Sylvia, she would always be “Mabel Harlot,” the interloper after the family fortune, as she had been to Hetty. In 1930, when Ned fell ill at Round Hill, Mabel sent a seventy-two-word telegram to Sylvia: “Connection over the phone was so bad could not talk to you as I wanted to. While Ned is getting along fairly well, I would like you to come down and see for yourself. Dr. Pascal advises blood transfusion, will probably be Thursday. You could understand things much better if you were here. I could meet you at Providence if you will advise me time of arrival there. Love from us both. Mabel.” Sylvia responded with the chilly, aloof politeness of someone turning down a dinner invitation from a social inferior: “Regret cannot make a trip at present. All best wishes. Sylvia Wilks.”
Mabel’s note to Dr. Henry S. Pascal, Ned’s New York doctor, and the reference to the blood transfusion in a letter to Sylvia, reveals Ned’s state of health. Because he was so tall and heavy, weighing between 250 and 300 pounds for most of his adult life, his good right leg took a tremendous amount of wear and tear. By his fifties, Ned was suffering from