Mary Duke Biddle

Mary Lillian Duke Biddle
Born	Mary Lillian Duke November 16, 1887(1887-11-16)
Died	June 14, 1960(1960-06-14) (aged 72)
Spouse	Anthony Joseph Drexel Biddle, Jr.
Children	Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans Nicholas Benjamin Duke Biddle
Parents	Benjamin Newton Duke Sarah Pearson Angier

Mary Lillian Duke Biddle (November 16, 1887 – June 14, 1960)^[1], was an American philanthropist.

Biography

She was born on November 16, 1887 in Durham, North Carolina as Mary Lillian Duke to Benjamin Newton Duke. She attended Durham's Trinity College, the institutional predecessor of Duke University, which was named in honor of her family. She graduated in 1907 with a degree in English.

She was a great enthusiast for the arts and traveled frequently with her family to New York City for the theater and opera, later becoming an accomplished singer and musician.^[2]

In 1918 she was given her father's brick-and-limestone Beaux-Arts townhouse on Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street, built in 1901;^[3] it is one of only nine surviving mansions on Fifth Avenue.

1009 Fifth Avenue, designed by Alexander McMillan Welch

Her marriage to Anthony Joseph Drexel Biddle, Jr. in 1915 ended in divorce in 1931. She and her husband owned an estate, "Linden Court", in Tarrytown, New York, bought from the William R. Harris family in 1921. It still stands today as The Tarrytown House Estate and Conference Center.^{[4] [5]}

She established the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation in 1956. Since then the Foundation has donated more than $28 million in grants to non-profit organizations.

Notes

1. ^ "A Washington Duke genealogy as it pertains to Duke University" - Duke University Libraries
2. ^ "North Carolina School of the Arts Receives $100,000 Grant from the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation to Endow Opera Scholarship" - Press release, February 4, 2002.
3. ^ The house was one of a group of four built by the speculative builders William and Thomas Hall to designs by Alexander McMillan Welch of Welch, Smith and Provot; 1009 Fifth Avenue was purchased by Mr Biddle. It was granted landmark status in 1974, and was sold in 2005 by her daughter, Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans; the eventual purchaser, after a deal had been concluded with Tamir Sapir, was Carlos Slim Helú, Mexican billionaire ("Sale of Duke Mansion Brings a Lawsuit", New York Times 20 December 2010, accessed 12 January 2911.
4. ^ Tarrytown House property history
5. ^ "History Center at Dolce Tarrytown House", Half Moon Press newspaper, November, 2003 issue

External links

• The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation
• Forbes.com "Manhattan's Most Expensive Townhouse "
• Who's Who 1954

Persondata
Name	Biddle, Mary Duke
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	November 16, 1887
Place of birth
Date of death	June 14, 1960
Place of death