THE DUKE OF No. 210 ST JOHNS PL (1907)
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The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations.
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In 1907, a quiet wedding took place on a sleepy Brooklyn block in one of its august brownstones.
It was no ordinary wedding, however. For the ceremony was about to join a young widow of the borough to one of the most successful businessmen of the country – and one of its most ruthless trust violators – the “Tobacco King.”
THE ROBBER BARON CORNERS TOBACCO
James Buchanan Duke, whose name was “lent” to the North Carolina university in exchange for part of a hefty $40M endowment, was known as the “Tobacco King” for his aggressive cornering of the American tobacco market in the late 19th century.
Duke not only brought the American tobacco industry to its knees, but he also knew the importance to the future of the cigarette industry was in its automation; he, thus, obtained the license to the first automated cigarette making machine which brought a speedier production line as well as lower costs to his companies and, in extension, the entire cigarette industry.
By 1890, Duke supplied 40% of the American cigarette market and, in the same year, consolidated control of his four major competitors under one corporate entity, the American Tobacco Company. This formed a monopoly giving him control of more than 90% of the American cigarette market.
In the new century, Duke would move to do the same in the British market. This venture did not go as well as the one in America, and by 1906, his company found itself in the crosshairs of President Teddy Roosevelt, being found guilty of antitrust violations, ordered to be split into four separate companies.
All of this leverage and buying out must have caused a strain on Duke, as his first marriage ended in 1906. In fact, the couple had begun to fight shortly after returning from their honeymoon. By 1907, he was ready, though, to tie the knot again.
THE PARK SLOPE WEDDING
Just like Duke, his soon-to-be wife, Nanaline Holt Inman, was on her second marriage. Holt was a widow, her husband, William P. Inman, a wealthy Atlanta-based cotton merchant, having passed some years before. The couple had been introduced through Duke’s brother, Ben.
It is unknown why Duke and Holt decided to have their wedding at No. 210 St. Johns Place, for neither of them owned the brownstone. It belonged, however, to one of Holt’s school friends, Mrs. William Schuyler Stackpole.
The wedding party “crossed the Brooklyn Bridge in automobiles and went directly to the home of Mrs. Stackpole,” noted the Detroit Free Press.
Only a few relatives and friends were present to witness the ceremony – the family belonging to Holt (her mother and her son), and the friends, to Duke – the list of which was, in essence, a short compilation of “who’s who” of his tobacco world (aside from a former senator, they were primarily leaders of his companies).
The wedding took place at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, after which the new couple left in an automobile for Duke’s country place (his farm) in Somerville, New Jersey, to spend their honeymoon.
No. 210 ST. JOHNS PLACE
No. 210 St John Place had belonged to William Stackpole, Sr., who had been, until his passing in 1895, a maker of nautical instruments for the U.S. government. Some of the first instruments ever ordered by the U. S. government for meteorological purposes were made by Stackpole.
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