to have farmed out management of the herd, perhaps to staff. “And the staff ain’t talkin’’,’ a friend told me. “Ain’t talkin’” is a theme with the Goelets. The family’s land (tracts of midtown Manhattan) and banking (Chemical) ventures created the basis of an empire that came to dwarf that of the Gardiners’. While the dimensions of the family businesses and the wealth they create is unclear, by design, the family has had a century-long history of tipping its hand through its involvement with stunning estates and homes. Ochre Court in Newport, built for Ogden Goelet by Richard Morris Hunt in 1892, rivals the Breakers for Newport “cottage” opulence. Goelet’s daughter, May, was announced by the New York Times to be carrying a dowry of nearly $600 million (adjusted) when she left the U.S. to marry the Eighth Duke of Roxburghe. Unlike some of the other Downton Abbey-esque marriages of American money to English and Scottish titles, theirs seems to have been blessed with love (and an heir, ten years in the coming) to go with all the splendor. Floors Castle, the largest inhabited castle in Scotland, set high above the River Tweed, was enlivened by May’s acquisition of a work by the cutting-edge artist Henri Matisse. May’s grandson is the current duke, who is very much a Goelet. The heir to the Gardiners Island branch of the family, Robert G. “Bertie” Goelet, Jr., is markedly less visible than his distant Scottish cousin. In his late 1990s, Bertie, then in his late teens, was spotted on the island by the author Steven Gaines during a Robert Gardiner tour Gaines attended. The old man wanted to play out the family feud with his young great-nephew, but Bertie Goelet stood his ground with impressive diplomacy and poise. Now in his late thirties, he can be glimpsed by locals arriving in East Hampton, usually by train or Jitney, before heading for Three Mile Harbor and the Captain Kidd, the vintage diesel boat that is the prime mode of transport for the island’s guests. “He’s tall and distinguished,” a local who didn’t want to be identified discussing the family, told me. “Very good-looking and very aristocratic. He’s very civilized and polite.” With the passing of Robert Gardiner, the island has rulers for whom it is simply another heirloom retreat, rather than the lynchpin of a public persona. Bertie Goelet and his sister Alexandra are said to be extremely close and to have adopted many of the hobbies and interests of their parents. They are deeply committed to the maintenance and improvement of the island, and continue in the Goelet tradition of the last three decades to employ carpenters and tradesmen to attend to every aspect of the island’s upkeep. The manor house has been altered slightly, but oil deliveries still come by barge from Greenport to the island’s northwest side. Bird watching and butterfly catching and swims at Tobaccolot Beach—“the most pristine beach on the East Coast of the United States!” says Dayton—continue as they have since the Goelet era began. As I poked around, looking for people who had had a peek into the family’s world, I learned that that “golf cart” was really an ATV with a special awning attached. But life in the Hamptons outside Gardiners Island goes on: With the restaurants in East Hampton and Sag Harbor packed, and the shops on Newtown Lane as jammed as visitors’ access to the ocean beaches, the world of the island and its low-key lord seems to be drifting further and further away from the East End and the United States. Dayton, whose exclusive photos of the island accompany this piece and who is preparing a book on the island, is delighted at that happenstance. Though he’s no longer able to return to the island, “You certainly won’t find me criticizing the Goelets,” he declares. “Private wealth will protect Gardiners Island. If Suffolk County had gotten a hold of it, they would have ruined it. Our grandchildren can go out there in 100 years, and it’ll still look the same.” As for those all-terrain vehicles that support the island’s recreation: They have other uses as well. “The security over there is unbelievable,” says Dayton. “They’ve clammed up and they don’t let anyone over.” The word around town is that the watchful eyes and regular patrols of the island’s staff have been augmented of late. Surveillance cameras are said to be mounted on tall poles often confused with those used to encourage the nesting of osprey. Among locals and fishermen the theory runs that Bertie Goelet himself receives video feeds and watches them on a bank of monitors in the office on East 67th Street. The tale adds a fun Ian Fleming touch to all the ongoing speculation about the island and its privileged inhabitants. Who knows? Much stranger things have certainly happened on Gardiners Island. And the important thing is that the legends stand. ✦
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Bertie Goelet is tall and distinguished; very good-looking and very aristocratic.
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Opposite page top: American Pastoral: “T’Other Barn” stands by the road headed east past Tobaccolot Pond, and onward to the island’s grass air strip. (Photo by Chip Dayton) Opposite page below left: The Bench at Lonetree Point: During the American Revolution, the Royal Navy spent four years moored off of Bostwick Pond. Sailors rowed in regularly to collect Gardiners Island’s most precious natural resource—fresh water. (Photo by Chip Dayton) Opposite page below right: On the Beach: Gardiners Island’s 3,300 acres are ringed by 27 miles of undisturbed waterfront. The beaches—two-and-a-half hours and a boat ride from midtown Manhattan—are some of the most pristine in the world. (Photo by Chip Dayton) Above: ISLAND MATRON: Alexandra Goelet and Robert G. Goelet (Photo by ©Patrick McMullan) AUGUST 2013 • AVENUE ON THE BEACH | 95