On June 29, 1889, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that architects Flemer & Koehler had filed plans for eight stone-fronted homes on Park Avenue, wrapping around the northeast corner of 94th Street. The project for developer Edward T. Smith would cost $112,000, or just under $500,000 per house in 2026 terms.
Quickly J. A. Henry Flemer and his partner, V. Hugo Koehler, would be at work filling in the remainder of the block. Completed in 1889, the two projects created a harmonious blockfront of Queen Anne-style mansions.
1211 Park Avenue originally looked much like its architectural siblings to the left.
The Weil family occupied the 20-foot-wide 1211 Park Avenue as early as 1894. By May 1922, when Fredericka Weil sold the house to William A. Hutcheson and his wife, the former Martha Brookes, its stoop had already been removed for the widening of the avenue.
While the address was still fashionable, the home's Victorian design was not. The Hutchesons hired architect William L. Bottomley to transport it from the 19th to the 20th century. The mansion was enlarged to the rear, the brick-and-brownstone facade removed, and a stuccoed neo-Georgian front installed.
The two entrances--the main and service doorways--flanked two windows on the ground level. Directly above, the first floor, or piano nobile, was dominated by dignified French windows below a Georgian-inspired broken pediment and urn. The fully arched windows of the top floor sat within shallow recesses. A handsome stone balustrade crowned the understated molded cornice.
image via NYC Dept of Records & Information Services
William Anderson Hutcheson was vice president and actuary of the Mutual Life Insurance Company. He and Martha were married in 1911 and the following year their only child, Martha Chipman (known as "Little Martha") was born.
Martha Brookes Hutcheson was born in New York City in 1871 and spent her summers at the family's country home in Vermont. It was possibly there that she was first drawn to gardening.
She entered the newly organized New York School of Applied Design for Women in 1893, and in the latter part of the decade toured the gardens of France, Italy and England. Back home, she entered the newly established landscape architecture program at MIT. By the time she met William, she had established herself as a prominent landscape architect, designing the grounds of Newburyport, the estate of Frederick Moseley; Alice Mary Longfellow's gardens in Cambridge, Massachusetts; and the Welwyn and Poplar Hill estates on Long Island.
Careers for females, especially for society women, most often ended with marriage. And, so, in 1911 Martha retired from active practice. She now turned her attention to the couple's 100-acre country estate, Merchiston Farm near Gladstone, New Jersey. A working farm in the 18th century, Martha transformed its grounds into an "outstanding example of natural and classic landscape design," according to the Morris County Heritage Commission later.
Martha Brookes Hutcheson, from the collection of the Morris County Park Commission
The winter social season of 1930-31 was "Little Martha's" debut. On August 20, 1930, the Chicago Tribune reported, "Mr. and Mrs. William Anderson Hutcheson will give a dinner dance Dec. 6 to introduce their daughter, Miss Martha Chipman Hutcheson." The week following that event, the Hutchesons held a dinner-dance at the Colony Club.
Now introduced, Martha's name appeared in the society columns. On February 6, 1932, The Evening Post reported, "Mr. and Mrs. William A. Hutcheson and their daughter, Miss Martha C. Hutcheson, entertained at dinner at their home, 1211 Park Avenue, later taking their guests to the Ritz-Carlton."
In 1935, Martha Brookes Hutcheson was made a fellow in the American Society of Landscape Architects, just the third woman to be so named.
An accomplished pianist, Martha Chipman Hutcheson was married to Charles McKim Norton (who rarely used his first name) in a garden ceremony at Merchiston Farm in the summer of 1939.
The newlyweds in the gardens of Merchiston Farm. from the collection of the Morris County Park Commission
In October 1943, the Hutchesons sold 1211 Park Avenue to Dorothy O. Hegler. Her ownership was short-lived. On July 24, 1945, The New York Times reported that Dr. George Hoppin Humphreys 2d had purchased the property.
Born on November 22, 1903, Humphreys was the son of John Stanford Humphreys, a professor of the department of architecture at Harvard. He married Edith Sturgis in 1928 and they had three children, John Sanford, Cornelia, and Edith.
Humphreys graduated from Harvard University in 1925 and from its medical school in 1929. He began his career as an intern at New York Presbyterian Hospital in 1930, becoming a pioneer in pediatric and chest surgery procedures. The year after moving into 1211 Park Avenue, he was named chairman of the faculty of the hospital's College of Physicians and Surgeons. The New York Times would later recall, "Dr. Humphreys earned an international reputation for the innovations he brought to operations of the esophagus."
By the 1980s, 1211 Park Avenue was home to Edwin and Mary Michael Gifford. (Mary went professionally by her middle name.) The couple, who were married in 1958, were partners in Gifford-Wallace, Inc., a public relations consulting firm. Their country home was in Amagansett, Long Island. They had three children, Mary-Elizabeth, Tierney, and Edward Jr.
The Giffords' work in the theater, government and media resulted in glittering entertainments in the Park Avenue mansion. The East Hampton Star in 1988 remarked, "New York magazine once profiled the couple entertaining friends from the worlds of theater and journalism at late-night suppers."
Michael Gifford suffered a fatal heart attack at the age of 53 in May 1988.
Lindley Welsh Tiers and his wife, the former Sarah Morgan Gardner next occupied 1211 Park Avenue. Born in 1911, Tiers was a nationally ranked tennis player in the late 1930s. Sarah died at the age of 80 on April 20, 1996 and Lindley died two years later, on July 29, 1998, at 86.
The mansion was recently placed on the market for $8.5 million, the realtor calling it a "five story sensation."
photographs by the author
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