National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior

Resource History and Description of Existing Conditions
Some of what we deduce about the utilities lines is based on the Hiscox plan, "Map of
Part of Estate of F.W. Vanderbilt" that shows the location of the water, electrical, and telephone
lines. 1112 However, the map raises some questions. For example, the map indicates that there
was to have been a gas generator near the Gardener's Cottage with lines leading to both the
stables and the Tool House. While there are two gas torcheres at the entrance to the Coach
House, there is no evidence that the gas generator was ever installed or gas piping laid.
However, the map also does not show electrical lines going anywhere but to the house and the
Pavilion, which opens the question of lighting for the Howard House, the Wales House, the
Coach House, the two gate houses, the Gardener's Cottage, the Tool House, and the farm
buildings. NPS reports dated 1940 report the existence of electric service to the Gardener's
Cottage, Lower Gate House, Main Gate House, Mansion, and Pavilion. 1113 To add further
confusion, notes taken from a Charles W. Andrae August 26, 1940 memo concerning the
condition of the Pavilion state that "The wiring, while not in use when the inspection was made,
can safely be assumed to be on a par with the wiring in the house. The wiring here was added
upon the discontinuance of manufactured gas." 1114 As with the house, Andrae recommended
installation of an entire new wiring system. None of these documents answers the questions as
to the extent to which the generating plant supplied electricity to the estate or whether or not
there had been a gas generator.
Information about W.T. Hiscox is scarce, however there is an 1892 trade catalog
advertising the New York firm, Cornell, Hiscox & Underhill, whose extensive business supplied
engines, boilers, pumps, hoisting, mining, coal, and ore handling machinery. It also built electric
light and power plants. The firm's three principals included William T. Hiscox, who is most
likely the same W.T. Hiscox who built the Vanderbilt power plant. 1115 The catalog is 308 pages
long and its product offerings range from pipe fittings to mining cars to fire hydrants.
Moreover, the company advocated the use of electric power plants over steam and advertised its
ability to install complete electric power and illuminating plants as well as furnish "dynamos,
motors, and electric supplies of every description." 1116
In the mid-1890s, residential electric lighting was still a luxury reserved for the very
wealthy. Thomas Edison began operating his Pearl Street Station in 1882. Because electric
lighting was so expensive at first, early utilities located their generating plants near their elite
clientele. Historian David Nye notes that "Edison's list of first customers reads like the New
York social register, and included J. P. Morgan and the Vanderbilts." 1117 Electric lighting was a
1112 "Map of Part of Estate of F. W. Vanderbilt, Esq. Showing locations of Pipes, conduits, etc., Hyde Park,
NY, October 1897, W. T. Hiscox and Co., Engineers and Contractors, NY." VAMA 401/101/ ATOP MC
01/RL H, Architectural Drawings Collection, ROVA Archives. Hereafter referred to as Hiscox Map,
1897.
1113 Historian's Research Notes File, 12, 23, 30. Sources: Description of Quarters, February 15, 1941, 38;
Curradi, 39; Chas. W. Andrae, "Mechanical Equipment Report," August 28, 1940, 66; Curradi, 70; and
Charles W. Andrae, "Final Report on the alterations and additions to the Pavilion Bldg," June 20, 1942.
1114 Historian's Research Notes File, 67. Source: Chas. W. Andrae, "Memo for Chief of Planning," August
26, 1940.
1115 Cornell, Hiscox, and Underhill (New York, 1892). In the collection of the Hagley Museum and
Library. TRCAT .C814 1892.
1116 Cornell, et. al., 157.
1117 David E. Nye, Electrifying America, Social Meanings of a New Technology (Cambridge, MA: The MIT
Press, 1992), 242. See also Carolyn Marvin, When Old Technologies Were New, Thinking About Electric
Communication in the Late Nineteenth Century (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 162-3.
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