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The Pearsalls

Page history last edited by Mary Ann Koferl 13 years, 2 months ago

 

Robert W. Pearsall was the son of Thomas W. Pearsall and Mary Leggett.  Robert was born on August 30, 1833 and died on May 29, 1871 at the age of 38.  He married Elizabeth Woodbridge Phelps daughter of Thomas W. Phelps and Elizabeth B. on July 2, 1860.  The Pearsalls had two children, a boy, Harold and a girl, Mary Liggett. Pearsall made most of his fortune in the wholesale grocery business.  Elizabeth, Pearsall’s wife was born in 1883 and died in 1924.

 

In 1863, Pearsall purchased land in Brentwood from an Allanson Briggs.  Today the property is referred to as Saint Joseph’s Academy. He purchased another tracts of land near Thompson Station.  Pearsall developed an interest in farming and hired John Ryan as his farm overseer.  He was Secretary of the Long Island Farmers Association and a lifetime member of the Suffolk County Agriculture Society.

 

The Pearsalls settled into Brentwood building a lavish house completed in 1870, which would later become St. Charles Cottage. They built their estate on twelve acres of property and based the plans for the estate on a chateau in France.  Many of accessories were imported from Europe.  Cathedral ceilings, hard wood inlayed floors, Persian rugs and marble statues provided the Pearsalls with the décor for this beautiful estate.  Frederick Law Olmstead was a well known landscape artist who was hired to design the outside grounds for the estate. One year after the estate was finished, Robert W. Pearsall died. Sometime during this period, Elizabeth started the first agricultural school for women on their estate in Brentwood.

 

Elizabeth closed the estate and went to Italy with her two small children.  Elizabeth worked in the tenement districts and started fundraising for various social movements when she was in Rome and Florence.  Her interests included music and she was a friend to Rubinstein and Liszt.  While in Florence her only daughter, Mary Liggett, died at age eleven on November 17, 1873 of Roman Fever.  In Italy she met and married a count, Pio Resse from Rome before 1879.  Elizabeth returned to the Brentwood estate with her new husband. The newly weds only lived in Brentwood for a short time and returned to Europe.  On January 2, 1885 Elizabeth gave her second husband power of Attorney.  On January 26, 1885 Harold W. Pearsall turned 18 and was given a good portion of the estate in Brentwood.  On February 20, 1888 Harold W. Pearsall and his wife sold the Pearsall estate to Arthur B. Hart for thirty thousand dollars.

 

 

-M. Koferl, Local History Newsletter,   January 2007

 

 

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