Andy Warhol considered him "the only person in town with glamour." The Philadelphia Art Alliance deemed him "the first gentleman of Philadelphia." Connoisseur Magazine named him one of the top ten art collectors of all time.
When Henry Plumer McIlhenny died in 1986, he left everything - an estimated $100M worth - to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where he had served for 50 years as curator, trustee and chairman of the board. His collections were housed in both his magnificent Rittenhouse Square townhouse and at Glenveagh in Ireland, the largest privately-owned plot of land in the country. His parties were legendary. His friends were society's giants.
At his death, someone commented "I had always thought that no one was irreplaceable, but Henry is irreplaceable."
Fellow volunteer tour guide and historian Thomas Keels tells you of this remarkable man in the mid-August edition of “Biographical Bytes from Bala: Laurel Hill West Stories.” Wherever you get your podcasts.
ABC#054 Hey! I Know That Song! - Composers and Interpreters
ABC#053: Suited to a Tee - Golf Course Pioneers
BBB #022: Shop Until Thou Droppest - Strawbridge & Clothier: The Early Years
ABC#052: Reach for the Sky - Astronomers of Laurel Hill
BBB#021: Blood on the Tracks at Mile 59 - Duffy’s Cut
ABC#051: ”Killed by Indians” - Four Philadelphians Who Died in Battles with Indigenous People
BBB#020: Helping Standardize the World - Charles Benjamin Dudley and ASTM
ABC #050: A Couple of Haunted Houses - Baleroy & Grey Towers Castle
BBB#019: A Forgotten Photography Pioneer - John Carbutt
ABC #049: White Collar Crime - J. Edward Addicks, Samuel Ashbridge, and Joseph Miller Huston
BBB #018: Courage for the Deed, Grace for the Doing - The Shipley Sisters and Educating Girls
ABC #048: Shattering Some Glass Ceilings - Nellie Neilson, PhD; Sara Yorke Stevenson, DSci; Elizabeth Head Fetter, aka Hannah Lees
BBB #017: Swimming While Black - Raphael & Julia Coel
ABC #047: Three More Black Trailblazers - Dr. James Betts, Barbara Blackshear, ”Jocko” Henderson
BBB #016: A Cult of One’s Own - J. Elimar Mira Mitta
ABC #046: Fathers of American Medicine, Part 3 - Some Ethical Dilemmas
BBB #015: Pulling Out All the Stops - The Laurel Hill Organ Episode
ABC #045 Stogies, Coffin Nails, and Spittoons: Laurel Hill Tobacconists
BBB #014: Physician, Author, Philanthropist - Bushrod Washington James
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