Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1883-03-24
JAY COOKIES PALACE.
"OgontS" to be Used for Young Ladies'
SenaSn0ru.


Seminary.
During his first great prosperity Jay
Cooke built at Chelton Hills, eight miles
from the heart of Philadelphia, one of the
finest private residences in the world, ex-
pending upon the house and grounds more
than million of dollars. Here he enter
tanned, in princely style, distinguished Wis
itors from his own and from foreign lands,
and his magnificent home and hospitality
became widely known. The place was
named Ogontz, after an Indian chief who
was a friend of Mr.. Cookies liz
his childhood and youth. The panic of
1873 temporarily broke Mr.. Cookies
fortune, and for a time the Ogontz prop
erty passed from his control; but time has
more than justified his great Northern Pa
cifc enterprise and restored his fortunes,
including the Chelton Hills estate of 40
acres, on which the Ogontz place stands.
In the mean time the uses for which the
house was built have passed away. Mr..
Cookies children are married and settled
in the vicinity, and he has been searching
for some fit use for the place. He finally
decided to offer it to the Chestnut street
seminary for young ladies, which has been
conducted for the past thirty-three years
by Misses Bonney and Dillaye. The offer
was accepted, and on the first day of the
present month contract was signed for
the permanent transfer of the seminary to
Ogontz. The Philadelphia papers give
glowing accounts of the place, the school,
and the liberality of Mr.. Cook, without
which the arrangement would have been
impossible. The rental fixed for a long
term of years is hardly more than nominal.
The Enquirer thus describes the
Ogontz = place and the i'm
proVements recently made to pre-
pare it for the seminary:
Ogontz stands on knoll, commanding
a view of forty acres of landscape garden
ing which are connected with the house..
This spot Mr.. Cooke selected from his farm
of 140 acres IS being the most desirable
for residence. 1t is situated about TWEEN
ty minutes walk from Chelton Hills sta
ton, on the North Pennsylvania railroad.
The building is five-story mica granite of
the Norman gothic order of architecture.
Its air of substantially and refinement
strikes beholder at the first glance and
reminds one of the aristocratic country
seats of England. 1t is a building of the
most ample dimensions, having in the
neighborhood of 100 rooms of comfortable
size. Seventy-fve guests have been en-
tertained there at one time. The conser-
vatories and greenhouses on the grounds
were, at the time they were constructed,
the largest in the country.
There is also a gas-house constructed
of granite, six lighthouses and graperies, a
mushroom-house, potting house, and a
lodge-house at each gate on the main en-
frances. There are a number of other
buildings, such as a farm house, barn, ice
house and frame school house. A beau
tiful stream of water courses through the
entire place. The lawns are lighted by gas
supplied on the grounds. The drives are
all macadamized, both in the grounds and
leading to the station. Mr.. Cooke has had
men at work for many months making the
necessary alterations, frescoing the walls
and ceilings, and otherwise identifying
the already seemingly complete place. To
do this he has expended $4,000. Not Con-
tent with this he intends to furnish the house
entire in an elegant style at a cost of an
other $4,000. The house will thus be
made home into which no young lady,
however refined her tastes might be, but
will say it is unexcelled in the world. Some
idea of the interior attractiveness of the
building may be perhaps obtained from
the statement that the principal hall is
seventeen feet in width and eighty feet
long, extending back into a conservatory
forty feet square. Beyond this is a beau
tiful parterre of flowers.