Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1901-03-07
THURSDAY, MARCH, Z, 1901.
STATE NEWS.
DEATH OF WILLIAM M. EVARTS.
Something about the New York Colony
at Windsor-Mrs. Evarts a Windsor

lawyer and former secretary of state,
died at his home at Fourteenth street
and Second avenue, New York city, at
9:10 O'Clock Thursday morning, after a
| brief illness of pneumonia
William Maxwell Evarts was born in
| Charlestown, Mass, February 6, 1918,
and was the son of jeremiah Evarts, a
Vermonter, who was born in Sunderland
in 1871. Young Evarts graduated at
Yale college in 1887, studied law at the
| Harvard law school and in 1871 was adj
mitted to the New York bar, where he
| took a high position. His first public
office of note was deputy United States
district attorney from 1S49 to 1858. He
was attorney general in the cabinet of
| President johnson and was secretary of
state under President Hayes from 1877
to 1881, and made a brilliant record. In
1885 he was elected United States sena-
| tor, defeating Levi p Morton.
The body reached Windsor Saturday
evening and the funeral was from ST.
Paurs Episcopal church in the village
| with burial in the village cemetery.
| Mr.. Evarts' beautiful summer home
has been priced possession for over
| forty years but the growth of the New
York colony ocalled is development
of the last Is or 20 years. Charles G.
Beaman, son-in-law of Mr.. EvartS and
member of the famous New York firm of
Evarts, Choate & Beaman, was the colon
izing spirit, and it was through his efforts
that a good number of wealthy New
Workers were induced to purchase large
tracts of land and build beautiful sum
mer homes. Mr.. Evarts' home is in
Windsor on the Vermont side of the
river, but all the others are in Plainfield
and Cornish on the New Hampshire side.
There Mr.. Beaman at the time of his
death last December owned 1000 acres or
more and had one of the finest diaries of
Jerseys and Durhams to be found any
where. The entire herd will be sold at
quite a real estate speculator; that is he
bought large tracts of land of the I'M
sophisticated farmer for a song and sold
at a material advance to his city friends.
The impression is that he made
penny. Those owning summer homes
in the vicinity at present are Mrs. G. G.
Beaman, Mrs. F. A. Grayvon, G. A. Platt
artist, Augustus ST. Gaudens sculptor,
L. E. Shipman author, III. P. Fuller
artist, Winston Churchill author, FL. O.
Walker artist, Kenyon Cox artist, I. w.
Dewingsartist, and the Misses Lawrence,
all of New York city; DR.. A. II. Nichols,
F. W. kTodd, w. G.. Houston, Arthur
Whiting, F. B. Forbes and O. NJ. Billiard,
all of Boston; and Stephen and Maxwell
Parrish of Philadelphia, writers and
designers. Each home is built on
separate hill like castles of old and
commands beautiful view up and down
the Connecticut valley. There seems to
be no community of interest other than
that of friendship. The colony forms
community of it's own as exclusive as
New ork s four hundred. Its members
come each summer for two or three
ers know that they are not wanted and
know as little about what goes on in
those splendid homes as they do about
the happenings of London or Paris.
Theseshomes are approached by beauti-
full drives and the broad acres cleared of
pine shrubbery and stunted oaks and de-
voted to lawns and walks are shaded by
trees of native growth. To say that a
million dollars had been spent on these
estates. would probably be to underesti-
mate
The death of both Mr.. Evarts and
Mr.. Beaman leads to grave Speculations
as to the FIXTURE of the colony. Some
fear that the survivors will tire of their
environment and the homes will eventu-
ally degenerate to common farm houses.
Such fate seems probable unless some
colonizing spirit like Beaman steps into
the breach
Mr.. Evarts had not visited Windsor
during the past five years, and during
that time his youngest son, Maxwell Ev-
arts, a New York lawyer, has managed
the Evarts estate. This estate consists
of the old home, Runnymede, in Wind
sor village, six or eight residences in the
neighborhood used as tenant houses for
employees, the farm house and barns out
on the meadow one-half mile from the
village, 700 acres of fertile, level meadow
in Windsor, 500 acres across the Con-