Show ur < MRs MARY ELIZABETH JONES OF NEW YORK IS PROBABLY WORLDS WEALTHIEST WOMAN r E 2 r I a 11 e w I o rkhtuw T r q w It taI t-aI gin tai MRS MARY ELIZABETH JONES x t EN YORK The richest woman wom-an in Americaor In the NEW may not be Mrs Hetty Green The greatest landowner landown-er In America may not be one of tho Astors These are the conclusions that probably would be reached If the Green and the Astor I possessions could be valued correctly c and the figures compared with those wild would represent tho vast wealth of Mrs Mary Elizabeth Jones of New as York and of Cold Spring Harbor L h Further than that tho social crown America long held by the Astors by N reason of their wealth would belong to Mrs Jones if she chose to claim it for her fortune Is doubtless greater and her lineage in this country runs a century cen-tury further back She Is related also r Jar and near to nearly every one of iq the great families In New York and et New England whose names are written large on the pages of American history I R from the days of the Colonial wars to BOW pr BOWProbably Probably no one not even Mrs Jones herself could say accurately how great is her fortune It is mostly h land She acknowledges that shed she-d owns and pays taxes on land In every I school district on Long Island In nearly every county In New York stale and in every state in the union except Texas The property immediately immedi-ately surrounding the old manor house at Cold Spring Harbor where she lives In summer is worth millions of dollars Her husband Dr Oliver Livingston Living-ston Jones Is also a great landowner but his possessions fall far short of his a Jr wifes Then there Is the Jones estate I tfhlch Is owned by some 25 heirs which also runs up into scores of millions mil-lions In value Three or more theaters thea-ters In New York city are owned by her and It is said to be her ambition to own property in every city in the down from the eldest of one family to the eldest of the next through five generations until now the bulk of the vast accumulations rests with Mrs Mary Elizabeth Jones Mrs Jones Is the daughter of Charles Hewlett Jones and of Eliza beth Gracie Gardiner She was born July 6 1851 and was married to Dr Oliver Livingston Jones her cousin when she was 19 They have six chill dren two daughters and four sons In summer and In fact at Intervals during the winter the family live In the old Jones manor house at Cold Spring Harbor L I There is nothing ornate or especially striking about this country homo of tho woman who Is perhaps the richest of her sex In America It is simply a large l well built mansion of the later colonial style of architecture of which it Is one of the best examples in this country The rather battered surrey driven by the son of the owner of the hackln1 business at Cold Spring Harbor stopped In front of the main entrance to the mansion and remained there during the hour and more that the reporter re-porter was talking to Mrs Jones The richest woman In America was gowned quite simply In something light blue comfortable and well worn A diamond ring or so with the stones set In the fashion of a generation ago sparkled on her fingers Her almost white hair was combed straight back from her forehead with Just a slight puff to relieve its severity In her girlhood I girl-hood Mrs Jones must have been very beautiful she Is handsome In her middle mid-dle age But her chief charm and attraction at-traction now is her quick clearcut manner of speaking and her large dark eyes which look straight at one while sho talks She Is a woman of extraordinary i ex-traordinary strength of mind and character char-acter and It takes but a moments acquaintance to understand why the I r p v t Tr fb t ft1 iI1 TNT T-NT ANC1l1AIN HALL ill United States She owns property In moat of them now and each year gets nearer to a realization of her ambition The other day she had a controversy IIlth the city of New York about the ownership of tho sunken meadows up In the East river They arc estimated L be Worth 1000000 The grant to the Jones family goes back to Queen Anne so It Is likely Mrs Jones will retain Possession Founder of the Family The foundations of her vast fortune were laid by Maj Thomas Jones who carne ha from Strabane In tho kingdom of Ireland fwand and settled with his young life near what Is now called Oyster him Day I I In 1693 Ho brought with alctnfortablo fortune won on tho seas ton through Privateering privileges Granted he him by James II whoso cause e ought for in the battlo of the DOYne This fortune has been handed with great Jones fortune has grown such rapidity under her management Property In Many States Is It true that you own property everywhere In the United States was asked Yes almost everywhere she answered an-swered i pay taxes In every school district on Long Island In every or almost al-most every county In New York state state In the union No and In every about Texas I forgot that last Isnt so In Texas property I used to own some and but I was down there a while ago dont care concluded to sell It No I to say what the reasons were That Is the only property I have sold except an acre of land that over dear friend a whllo I sold to a very My rule Is to always buy and ago to soil In fact that IB the rule over Imndod down us frpm hat has been was generation to generation and was i 0 In America by the founder otthe fa ndiy Atnerra Jon Maj Thomas Jones our policy has been to lease the lands we I Investing OWn for terms of years and to keel the surplus Income lIow I HJ large aU Catntu have hare about the manor house you acres I dont but 1 ownthe to eMct miles number nearly ° r all around It This would mean that the lands 111 rectly adjoinIng the Innnor house grounds form hat l lu real estate lance would be eaned lIar ° callC a llUrcel ot ground which would contain about six square miles Now 11 square mile has Just GtO acres It III i almost 1m osslblo to buy an acre of ground > a the hartan ndnv western part of Long Mnnd now Mays Practically every Inch of oven the barren est of plains has been snapped up by real estate companies and Is being sold 1E off at from 1SO to s 1000 a lot Sid ° Time six J 1 square miles of land that Mrs Jones owns about her hemo In Cold Spring Harbor If It could be bought would be snapped UII In 24 lo hours at the average Price of 1000 nn acre At this figure the value of that property alone would be nearly 4000 000 Antedate the Astors Your family Is older and has great er possessions than tho AstorsIsnt that so hazarded the reporter Mrs Jones laughed Were certain ly I older by a hundred years or so In this country As to which Is tho greater I couldnt say for I know as little about what the Astors havo as they do about what I own I hardly know the latter myself accurately that Is Hut speaking of tho ancestry of our family there Is much that is in teresting to me In fact I always have been fond of and proud of the men and women who were our ancestors I have several volumes ot histories that havo been written about the family but as Is usually the case when one has a home In the city and ono In the country the things one wants at tho moment always are among those left behind That is why I havent any of them here to show you No I think there is one over there The Jones Family of Long Island You may take it to look over If you wish The edges are a little tattered I guess ono of the puppy dogs must have neon play Ing with It One of tho puppy dogs who had apparently been lurking within earshot In the hall came sidling in just then as if to beg the visitor not to take away his book until he had given It a few more bites Family Fortune Kept Intact I have spoken of Thomas Jones our ancestor went on the richest woman in America He came from Ireland the history I will lend you tells all about him He originated the policy of our family to keep handing down the bulk of the fortune Intact so far as possible from ono generation to tho next It Is to a certain extent very much like the English laws of prima 11 T I oxtont lint when tho conversation would approach anything that related particularly to her personal business affairs or thoso of tho great Jones cs tato of which she is a sharer she invariably In-variably shifted tho conversation to matters genealogical or to generalities Ancestor a Pirate The most Interesting of the many famous ancestors of Dr and Mrs Jones Is tho founder of tho lino In America Somo of tho ruder historians say ho was a pirate and intimate that It was by scuttllngships and maraud ing on tho high seas generally that ho accumulated his many barrels of pieces of eight which ho Is alleged to hUe brought to Oyster May when ho settled there At any rate ho himself him-self was markedly reticent about his earlier history except that ho fought for James II In tho Battle of tho Hoy no Ho oven wrote his own epi taph I Hero Iyp Tntcrd The Body of SInJor Thomns Jones Who Cnmo From Strnbnno In the Kingdom of Irelnnd Settled Hero and Died December 1713 From Distant Lands To this Wild Wnito He Cnmo This Sent ho Choso and Hero Ho Fixed Ills Name latin Stay His Sons This Peaceful Spot Enjoy And No III Fate his Offsprlrts Hero Annoy An-noy nro Ho died In 1713 and was burled a short distance south of the old Brick House on the east bank of tho Massa pequa river The ancient burial place about 30 feet square was threatened I by Inroads of the tides and In 1893 his remains wore removed His headstone bearing tho Inscription quoted above is still well preserved In the early days his was known as the Pirates Grave and for many years after his death It was the common belief says John II Jones In his history of the family that some of Maj Jones wealth was burled with him and BO deeply rooted had this becomo that his grave was opened by vandals In tho quest of relics and the ancient bones left strewn on the ground His remains re-mains now rest In tho burylngground adjoining Grace church at South Oyster Oys-ter Day Record of History About Maj Jones being a pirate little lit-tle Is known There Is extant a letter from Lieut Gov Coldcn to his son written In 1759 In which ho says While Col Fletcher was governor tho Inhabitants of Now York carried on a trade to Madagascar whllo that Island was frequented by pirates and many of tho pirates came and dispersed on Long Island and around Delaware Day It has often been remarked that none of the pirates mado any use of their money to any real advantage excepting one Jones who settled on Long Island and whose son made a remarkable figure fig-ure as speaker of the assembly whllo Mr Clinton was governor It is also known that James II 3 h + lJI Ii r IiW n i jlJ I 1 i genituro and entail These English laws however could not be followed in this country as the statutes are against such a procedure With us however It has become a sort of family fam-ily understanding The Jones estate or property has passed directly through five generations genera-tions In unbroken descent to Its present pres-ent holders On my mothers side I am descended from Lion Gardiner the first proprietor of Gardiners Island John Lyon Gardiner the twelfth proprietor pro-prietor married Elizabeth Corallo Jones My maiden name was Jones so when I married Dr Oliver Livingston Jones I didnt have to change my name The visitor being somewhat of a connoisseur in colonial furniture could not help commenting on some of the splendid pieces of old 1 mahogany In the room where he was sitting This led Mrs Jones to take him from one room to another on the ground floor All this old furniture has been In the family for generations Of course we have some that Is new but tho old Is too beautiful and too well built to be put aside I see no reason why It should not be beautiful and serviceable still a hundred years from now Mrs Jones remarked I am fond of good pictures too she went on A good many of these paintings are Inheritances inheri-tances from my father and those before be-fore him who had some taste in art and some I have bought because I liked them rather than because they I were done by famous artists Mrs Jones was disinclined to talk specifically about the details of the various holdings which make up her own vast possessions In New York and throughout the United States She acknowledged ac-knowledged that her husband and herself her-self vitro Interested In almost every branch of Industry to a greater or Isss granted Maj Jones In 1090 as a com pensatlon for services rendered a commission to cruise against Spanish property At any rate the privateer ing business did not last long but was immensely profitable while it did It was considered a legitimate business in those days Among tho many wellknown and famous families who aro related to the richest woman In America and her husband hus-band are the Wllletts of Flushing the Van Wycks of Flatlands prominent In the colonial wars Dr Valentine Molt tho great surgeon the Underbills famous fa-mous mariners the Remsens who Intermarried In-termarried with tho Do Peysters and the Livingstons tho Tangier Smiths whose ancestor was governor of Tangier Tan-gier Africa under Charles II tho Cornells the Weekses tho Living stons who were among the aristocracy aristoc-racy when New Amsterdam was a village vil-lage the Gardlners who were and are time lords of Gardlners Island the Scudders the Howletts and scores beside be-side They are also related to the Folsom Fol-som family of which Mrs Grover Cleveland Is a member Such Is the woman her family past and present No International Marriages About tho last words that closed the reporters interview with Mrs Jones was his query whether any of her family fam-ily had made or were likely to make any International marriages and thus transfer some of the Jones millions to bolster up decayed nobility We certainly have not and I dont think we are likely to she answered emphatically We are Americans and are proud of It Our wealth lies here and here It will stay so long as God wills to keep It In our hands I had rather be a plain American woman wom-an as I am than the queen of any country under tho BUD |