26 Facts About Edward Harkness

Edward Stephen Harkness was an American philanthropist.

Edward Harkness was a major benefactor to Columbia University, Yale University, Harvard University, Phillips Exeter Academy, St Paul's School, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the University of St Andrews in Scotland.

Edward Harkness was born in Cleveland, Ohio, one of four sons of Anna M Harkness and Stephen V Harkness, a harness-maker who invested in and was one of the five founding partners in the forerunner of Standard Oil, John D Rockefeller's oil company.

Stephen Harkness died when Edward was fourteen, leaving his wife and oldest son, Charles, to manage the estate.

Edward Harkness attended St Paul's School and Yale College, Class of 1897 and Columbia Law School.

Edward Harkness' mother gave the couple a new Italian Renaissance mansion on New York City's Upper East Side as a wedding present.

Edward Harkness briefly served as a railroad director for the Southern Pacific Railroad, but within several years decided to become a full-time philanthropist.

Edward Harkness began making gifts to the Egyptian collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1912, and that same year was appointed to the museum's board of trustees.

Edward Harkness encouraged and orchestrated the merger of Presbyterian Hospital and Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons, creating Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, the world's first academic medical center.

CPMC was built in the 1920s on the site of Hilltop Park, the one-time home stadium of the New York Yankees, which Edward Harkness purchased and donated.

Edward Harkness was a major benefactor of the New York Public Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Edward Harkness bought the complete Tomb of Perneb for the Met and helped purchase the Carnarvon Collection of Egyptian artifacts.

Edward Harkness donated the Met's unofficial mascot, a blue decorative hippo from the Egyptian Middle Kingdom's Twelfth Dynasty.

In 1917, a year after Charles' death, Anna Edward Harkness donated $3 million to Yale University to build the Memorial Quadrangle student dormitory in Charles' memory.

In 1918, Anna Edward Harkness established the Commonwealth Fund with an initial gift of $10 million, and Ned Edward Harkness was made its president.

Between 1926 and 1930, Edward Harkness made major donations to his alma mater, Yale, and Harvard to establish residential college systems at each school.

Edward Harkness admired the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge in England and proposed to Yale President James Rowland Angell that he would fund a similar system for Yale's undergraduate college to relieve overcrowding and improve social intimacy.

Edward Harkness persuaded Yale to retain his friend James Gamble Rogers as the colleges' architect.

Edward Harkness made gifts that established the Yale School of Drama, the first independent drama faculty in the country, and erected its theater.

Around the same time as his Yale-Harvard philanthropy, Edward Harkness sought to reform the pedagogical techniques of the country's elite boarding schools.

Edward Harkness made gifts to Taft School, The Hill School, and Phillips Academy.

Edward and Mary Harkness had a number of homes in addition to Harkness House in New York.

The Edward Harkness' used their steam yacht Steveana to commute back and forth to New York.

For longer trips across country, Ned and Mary used their Pullman car Pelham named after Pelham, Massachusetts, where the Edward Harkness family started in America.

Edward Harkness was a member of the Racquet and Tennis Club in New York City.

Edward and Mary Harkness are buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, which is today a National Historic Landmark.