Edith Rosenwald Stern
Edith Rosenwald Stern was an American philanthropist and champion of educational causes in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. She was instrumental in formation of the Stern Family Fund and was recognized as being willing to support causes for which she had conviction even if the causes were controversial at the time. Examples of her philanthropy included supporting voter registration of African-Americans in the American South, the anti-nuclear movement, public-interest law firms, organizing union and tenant groups, and initiation of challenges by shareholders who wanted corporations to become more socially responsible. Additionally, as political causes, Stern stood for anti-corruption, political fairness at the voting polls, and higher education for African-Americans. She was a patron of the arts including for the New Orleans Philharmonic Orchestra and for promising young artists, especially musicians.
Personal life
Early life and education
Stern was born Edith Rosenwald in Chicago, Illinois, on May 31, 1895, as the third of five children of parents Julius Rosenwald and Augusta Nusbaum Rosenwald. Her family was wealthy, Julius Rosenwald being part-owner and president of the Sears, Roebuck and Company. She grew up with her family in the affluent Kenwood neighborhood of Chicago. As a child, she was known to her family and close friends as Ede.Starting in early childhood, Stern's parents instilled in her a strong sense of charity, commitment to the social and economic well-being of society, and noblesse oblige. Through childhood, her family annually visited Tuskegee, Alabama, because her father had admiration for Tuskegee resident and scholar Booker T. Washington, who was a prominent African-American. The Rosenwald family and Washington frequently visited each other's homes, and Julius Rosenwald was a benefactor of Washington and the Tuskegee Institute.
Stern's early education was at the Chicago University Elementary School. Subsequently, through coercion by her parents, Stern as a teenager attended a finishing school in Dresden, Germany, where she completed her education.
At age 18, Stern married Germon F. Sulzberger, whom she met through a mutual friend. The couple made their home in New York City. They separated a year later and divorced in May 1921. She was known as Edith Sulzberger during the time that they were married and until her second marriage.
Stern met her future husband Edgar B. Stern through a mutual friend. During their courtship, the couple visited Longue Vue, an old inn that overlooked the Hudson River. This inn became the inspiration for two of her future homes in New Orleans, Louisiana. The couple was married on June 29, 1921, aboard an Illinois Central Railroad passenger car while the train was in Hammond, Indiana. These circumstances were so as to avoid the one year grace period after divorce that was required by the state of Illinois at the time.
Personal life in New Orleans
By the time of Stern's 1921 marriage, husband Edgar B. Stern was an established businessman in New Orleans. Stern became a New Orleans resident shortly after the marriage, and she quickly embraced life in New Orleans, immersing herself in various civic activities in addition to managing family life. So complete was her immersion in New Orleans life that her husband Edgar gave her the pet name "Yankee Creole".The couple had three children, and they were active in their communities, like their parents, with respect to charitable, business, and artistic causes. Edgar B. Stern Jr. was chairman of the Royal Street Corporation and completed extensive developments in the states of Colorado and Louisiana. He also served as a public relations director for United Way. Audrey Stern Hess was their middle child. She was chairman of the children's rights section of the Citizens Committee for Children. Their son Philip M. Stern was a writer and a Democratic Party activist.
In 1929, following a period of intense activity sponsoring educational causes, at a time coincident with the start of the Great Depression, Stern became ill and was admitted to the Riggs Sanitarium in Massachusetts, where she was diagnosed with ulcers and exhaustion. Following her recovery, in 1930, Stern and her husband Edgar, together with Stern's sister Adele Levy, acquired as a summer home the compound known as White Pine Camp, which had been the presidential retreat for President Calvin Coolidge. This home was located on Osgood Pond in the hamlet of Paul Smiths, New York and is an example of an Adirondack great camp. The home was often referred to as the "New York White House" during the Coolidge Administration. It served as a respite from the summertime heat and humidity in New Orleans. The Sterns and Levys often used the compound for entertaining friends and relatives, and they owned the home after World War II ended.
In a 1936 to 1937 visit to Europe and the Holy Lands of Palestine with her husband Edgar, Stern witnessed the tense political climate in Europe of the 1930s. The Sterns observed Europe's rising antisemitism, especially during their visits to Germany, and also the actions of Stalin during their time in Russia and the suffering of Polish Jews. They attended a session of the League of Nations Assembly and witnessed the coronation of King George VI. The Sterns considered their travels to be a rich source of ideas and influences to bring to their hometown of New Orleans. It is also made them more politically aware and enhanced their commitment to educational causes. The Sterns hosted many visitors from Europe and elsewhere at their New Orleans home as a result of their travels.
During World War II, Stern worked as a volunteer for the American Red Cross in New Orleans and in Washington, DC. This divided time was due to the fact that her husband Edgar was working for the United States Department of War as a "dollar a year man". Her efforts on behalf of the American Red Cross included membership drives and sales of war bonds. Shortly after World War II, Stern became active in the United Jewish Appeal, following the lead of her sister Adele who was the first chair of the National Women's Division.
Edith and Edgar Stern frequently attended the annual Tanglewood Music Festival in western Massachusetts. For this reason, Edith established a second summer home near Lenox, Massachusetts, purchasing a cottage home. She decorated this home entirely with furnishings selected from the Sears catalog, and she referred to this cottage as "Austerity Castle". The Sterns frequently hosted visiting musicians at the cottage, and offered visits there as a fringe benefit to servants on the Sterns' payroll.
Longue Vue House and Gardens
On moving to New Orleans, Stern and husband Edgar lived at Viara House, before establishing a permanent residence of their own. In 1921, the Sterns purchased eight acres of undeveloped land on the outskirts of New Orleans where they established sequentially two homes, both named Longue Vue. The name of the home came from an inn on the Hudson River that the couple enjoyed visiting early in their marriage. The following year, the Edith and Edgar Stern contracted construction of their first home on this property, which eventually became known as Longue Vue House I. This home was designed by architect Moise Goldstein in the Colonial Revival style.In 1934, Edith Stern hired landscape architect Ellen Biddle Shipman to build an English landscape garden on this property. Although Shipman completed this project shortly thereafter, Shipman continued development of the gardens until her death in 1950. Horticulturalist Caroline Dormon made significant contributions to the design and construction of the gardens, who likewise continued to improve the gardens for years following initial construction.
In the late 1930s, Stern concluded that the home did not provide sufficient views of the gardens and that the property needed a new house that provided a cohesive design of both home and gardens. To this end, Stern commissioned architects William Platt and Geoffrey Platt. The construction extended until December 1942. The resulting home is in the Classical Greek Revival style, with each of the four facades being distinct. One of the facades, the one on the south, is suggestive of the Beauregard-Keyes House in the French Quarter of New Orleans. The house and gardens, sometimes known as Longue Vue II, are considered examples of the Country Place Era.
At the time of the construction of the second Longue Vue Gardens home, the original home was moved intact within the same neighborhood to another lot on Garden Lane.
In 1977, Stern bequeathed Longue Vue House and Gardens to the city of New Orleans, as an extension of the New Orleans Museum of Art. This donation included funds sufficient to convert the home from a private residence into a museum. This act was controversial at the time and was several years in the making, the controversy being based on a zoning dispute with neighbors. Resolution of the dispute required moving the entrance from Garden Lane to Bamboo Road.