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The Tale of an Unhappy Kingdom
A DOOR NO MORE –
Through this portal once passed two people who could afford nearly
anything money could buy except happiness. Today both the couple and
their house are gone, tomorrow they’ll be forgotten
Once upon a time, there was a
princess named Edith and a prince named Harold. They were married in 1895
and that was the beginning of an unhappy tale.
Edith
was from the kingdom of Rockefeller, the daughter of oil king JoHn D.
Harold
sprang from the McCormick empire, his father, Cyrus, had devised a thing
called the reaper.
How
much Harold brought into their palace isn’t known, but it didn’t really
matter: John D. made sure his daughter had all the comforts of home by
sending along $40 million for a wedding gift.
After
ruling the Chicago social world for nearly 17 years and supporting the
opera with gifts in the millions, the couple moved to Lake Forest to settle in a cozy $5,000,000 castle nestled on 200
acres overlooking Lake Michigan.
For
the most of that first year their house guests at Villa Turicum ranged
from real royalty to big names in many fields, sometimes both at the same
time. Fifteen bathrooms and 44 rooms were more than enough to take care
of any home entertaining.
To
while away the time there was a lakefront swimming pool, stables and
bridle path, vast gardens in which to stroll, or a high stone pavilion to
sip tea.
But,
alas, this was not a fairy tale and how was love to survive in such
surroundings?ne pavilion to sip
tea.
Perhaps
it could have, but for Edith's "vibrations." she once called
off a luncheon for 200 guests at the last minute without notice. Another
time, she paid an 80 per cent duty on an imported $1,500,000 emerald
necklace, wore it once to a small party, and then tucked it away for
good.
THE TEA HOUSE – “Here
there is sweetness and quiet” reads the carved Latin inscription across
the front of this open pavilion where the McCormicks served tea and otherwise
entertained guests a half century ago. Walls of a kitchen and a second
room beneath the tea house have been defaced by vandals but the building
is perhaps the most structurally sound of those remaining on the estate. (Note: Given that it was one of
the most structurally sound, and that it was quite a distance from the
main house, it still exists today)
Entering a
sanitarium with a nervous disorder later that year (1913) Edith met
Freudian psychoanalyst Carl Jung. She considered his treatments so
beneficial she followed him to Zurich, Switzerland, where for eight years she was his pupil and
assistant. It was also there she developed a theory she was the
reincarnation of the young bride of King Tutankahmen of ancient Egypt.
This
was probably too much for Harold, for when she returned they separated
and eventually were divorced. Harold then married Polish opera singer
Ganna Walska.
This
was believed to have been a blow to Edith, but never giving up the ship
she always kept a room ready for her former husband at her enormous Chicago mansion. Harold, in turn, always sent her a rose on
her birthday.
Edith
returned to Chicago in 1921 and died in 1932. In those 11 years, she
never went back to Villa Turicum, but a large staff kept the place shined
as though Edith would pop in any minute.
She
died as she had lived; among valuable relics in plush surroundings. But
her fortune had dwindled. At her death she had assets of $1,500,000 and
debts of about $3,000,000. She was set aside in a glass-covered coffin in
a crypt in Graceland Cemetery and was buried in a family plot in 1953, and -
according to a caretaker - still well preserved under the glass.
Her
lone mourner at the burial was believed to have been a son, Fowler, who
then disappeared to Europe. Harold, who had died in California, was buried in a plot across the lagoon from
Edith.
But while she
lived, Edith Rockefeller McCormick also had a vision which perhaps could
have become a reality. With two business partners, she bought an 1,800-acre
tract of swampland north of Winthrop Harbor with plans to convert it to an Atlantic City of the Midwest resort area.
But after sinking a
million dollars into the Edithton Beach project she died and five years
later a Chicago bank acting for the bond holders picked up the property
for a mere $187,000. In 1947, the land was subdivided into Carol Beach
Estates.
Villa Turicum, fashioned after an
Italina Catholic cardinal's 100-room summer villa, faded into disuse
among weeds.
Back
taxes accumulated and in the 1940's, a group of investors bought the
place intending to subdivide but lost heavily when plans fell through.
PALATIAL GARAGE –
Larger than the Villa Turicum mansion itself, this quadrangle housed
servants of both the McCormicks and their guests. Put into use in 1912
when cares were still in limited number, the building contained 21
garages each with copper doors facing onto a brick-paved courtyard. Until
a few years ago, the quarters above the garages were rented to a few
persons working in Lake Forest.
In 1956,
present owner Robert Kendler, president of Community Builders Inc.,
Skokie, purchased the property and held on to it a year later in a
delinquent property tax action.
What had cost $5,000,000 to build in
1912 was termed a dangerous building in 1956 and was ordered torn down.
The mansion, razed three years ago, had been ravaged by vandals since it
fell into disuse.
The vandals came from all over to take
a whack at valuable marble floors, teak-paneled walls in the house and
heavy stone statues and fountains about the grounds. They left their
names and initials scrawled everywhere. There is virtually nothing left
to destroy, but still the curiosity seekers converge on the property,
lured by rumors of excitement and intrigue of a haunted house at night.
Those caught have been arrested and fined.
Consequently, carved stone
fountains which cascaded water down terraces leading to the pool below
the bluff have been chipped, pried loose and hammered to a point beyond
repair.
However, the trespassing should
come to an end shortly when Kendler builds his new home on the bluff just
south of where the mansion stood. To provide easier access, half the
remaining quadrangle of servant quarters and garages will be torn down
for an extension of Circle Lane.
The tile - roofed quadrangle,
fashioned after the villa, borders Westleigh Road and is in itself a fine example of Italian
architecture.
The servant’s quarters were
located on the second floor at either end of the structure. The ground
level facing into a brick - paved courtyard contains 21 garages, each
with weathered copper doors. Each garage had pipes to carry water for
washing cars.
Also still standing, east of the
quadrangle, is a walled garden with high arching gates at each end. Where
once was held some of the finest flower shows on the North Shore, weeds now thrive.
A huge stone lily pond on the
south side of the estate is still intact but lies hidden by high shrubs
and filled with green scum. The lakefront swimming pool conceivably could
be cleaned out and used once more.
GREEN GROW THE WEEDS –
This huge lilly pond lies hidden among the underbrush on the estate. The
pool is still in good condition but statues buried in the trees on the
far side have been beheaded by vandals.
A tunnel adjacent to the pool is
littered with rubble. Its arching walls are lined with names and initials
which trail off into the darkness where once an elevator hoisted guests
to the mansion on the bluff above.
The elevator is still in the shaft
which was filled in with dirt a few years ago.
In 1912 the cost of building Villa
Turicum was great; today it would be astronomical.
Edith McCormick's life was a
generous - if not odd - one, but money never brought happiness. Her weird
vibrations also had estranged her two daughters. Another son, John, died
in infancy of an infectious disease.
The heirs to her legacy were the
tax collectors, the vandals and a few who remember "once upon a
time." The McCormick mansion at 1000 Lake Shore Drive in Chicago has long been torn down and Villa Turicum will soon
be just a subdivision where only traces of a once-great dynasty will be
occasionally uncovered by a bulldozer.
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